r and trickled through his fingers. By
the time he had finished the floor was covered with little pools of tea.

'They say that Gord made everything for some useful purpose,' remarked
Harlow, reverting to the original subject, 'but I should like to know
what the hell's the use of sich things as bugs and fleas and the like.'

'To teach people to keep theirselves clean, of course,' said Slyme.

'That's a funny subject, ain't it?' continued Harlow, ignoring Slyme's
answer. 'They say as all diseases is caused by little insects. If
Gord 'adn't made no cancer germs or consumption microbes there wouldn't
be no cancer or consumption.'

'That's one of the proofs that there ISN'T an individual God,' said
Owen. 'If we were to believe that the universe and everything that
lives was deliberately designed and created by God, then we must also
believe that He made his disease germs you are speaking of for the
purpose of torturing His other creatures.'

'You can't tell me a bloody yarn like that,' interposed Crass, roughly.
'There's a Ruler over us, mate, and so you're likely to find out.'

'If Gord didn't create the world, 'ow did it come 'ere?' demanded Slyme.

'I know no more about that than you do,' replied Owen. 'That is--I
know nothing. The only difference between us is that you THINK you
know. You think you know that God made the universe; how long it took
Him to do it; why He made it; how long it's been in existence and how
it will finally pass away. You also imagine you know that we shall
live after we're dead; where we shall go, and the kind of existence we
shall have. In fact, in the excess of your "humility", you think you
know all about it. But really you know no more of these things than
any other human being does; that is, you know NOTHING.'

'That's only YOUR opinion,' said Slyme.

'If we care to take the trouble to learn,' Owen went on, 'we can know a
little of how the universe has grown and changed; but of the beginning
we know nothing.'

'That's just my opinion, matey,' observed Philpot. 'It's just a bloody
mystery, and that's all about it.'

'I don't pretend to 'ave no 'ead knowledge,' said Slyme, 'but 'ead
knowledge won't save a man's soul: it's 'EART knowledge as does that. I
knows in my 'eart as my sins is all hunder the Blood, and it's knowin'
that, wot's given 'appiness and the peace which passes all
understanding to me ever since I've been a Christian.'

'Glory, glory, hallelujah!' shou