this trouble you, sweet lady? Are you, too, aware of the
peril in which he and others may stand if they intermeddle too much
in forbidden matters?"

"Yes, I think I know somewhat of it; but what troubles me is that
these things should be forbidden. Why may not each man be free in
his own soul to read the Scriptures, and to seek to draw help, and
light, and comfort from them for himself?"

"Ah, dear lady, that is too big a question for my wits to grapple
with. I leave these matters to men who are capable of judging. All
I say is that the church holds enough for me, that I shall never
learn half she has to teach, and that within her fold is safety.
Outside pastures may be pleasant to the eye; but who knows what
ravening wolves may not be lurking there in the disguise of
harmless sheep? The devil himself can appear in the guise of an
angel of light; therefore it behoves us to walk with all wariness,
and to commit ourselves into the keeping of those whom God has set
over us in His Holy Church."

"Up to a certain point, yes," answered Magdalen earnestly; "hut
there be times when--when--Ah, I cannot find words to say all I
would. But methinks that, when such pure and stainless souls as
that of Master Clarke are seeking for light and life, they cannot
go far astray."

Arthur hoped and trusted such was the case, and he was regular in
his attendance whenever Clarke preached in the little chapel, or
gave lectures in some room of the house, to which many flocked.
Dalaber was never absent; all his old zeal and love kindled anew.
Several of the guests in that house, including Radley and
Fitzjames, often sat up far into the night reading the Scriptures
in their own language, and seeming to find new meaning in the fresh
rendering, which their familiarity with the original tongues
enabled them rightly to estimate.

Arthur Cole did not join these readings, though he did not
interfere with them. Once he said to Magdalen, with a certain
intonation of anxiety in his voice:

"I cannot see what they think they benefit thereby. Surely the
tongue in which the Scriptures were written must be the best to
study them in--for those who have learning to do so. Translators do
their best, but errors must creep in. For the ignorant and
unlettered we must translate, but why for such men as our friends
here?"

"But the ignorant and unlettered are forbidden to read or buy the
living Word?" said Magdalen quickly.

"Yes; because they would not