gh and low, Anglican and Nonconformist, were
dotted about the audience, some with folded arms and frowning brows as
though they were expecting the worst of heresies, others smiling in
bland and undisguised contempt, believing that they had come to see one
of their own cloth, who had already made himself an even more
disagreeable subject of reflection to them than even the infidels in
whose house the magic of Vane's sudden fame had brought them together,
do that which would make it impossible for him to again commit such an
offence in the pulpit of an English church.

For a moment or two there was a hush of intense silence of mental
suspense and expectation as Vane faced his audience and looked steadily
about him before he began to speak, and when he did begin, the silence
changed to an almost inaudible murmur and movement which is always the
sign of relaxed tension among a large body of human beings.

His first words were as unconventional as they were unexpected.

"Brother men and sister women; some of you, like myself, believe in God,
in the existence of an all-wise, over-ruling Providence, which shapes
the destinies of mankind, and yet at the same time allows each man and
woman to work out his or her own earthly destinies for good or ill, as
he or she chooses--by reason or desire, by inclination or passion--and
we also believe in the efficacy of the sacrifice which was consummated
on Calvary. There are others listening to me now to whom these beliefs
are merely idle dreams, the inventions of enthusiasts, or the deliberate
frauds of those who brought them into being and imposed them by physical
force upon those who had no means of resistance, for their own personal
and political ends.

"I have not come here to make any attempt to settle these differences
between us. As a priest of the Church, I wish, with all my soul, that I
could. As a man, I know that I can't. But there is one ground at least
upon which we can meet as friends, whatever our opinions may be as
regards religion and theology--two terms which, I think every one here
will agree with me, are very far from meaning the same thing."

"As a priest of the Church, I cannot hear that without protest!" cried a
tall, high-browed, thin-featured, deep-eyed clergyman, springing to his
feet in the middle of the hall. "If theology, the Science of God, does
not mean the same thing as religion, the word religion has no meaning.
More dangerous, I had almost said more d