Yours trewly,

JACK O'MEARA.

P.S.--The young lady have quit the family prayers, but me and the old man
have to say ours just the same, only more so.

XLVII

FROM PHILIP'S DIARY

A wise man of the sect of Simon Magus has replied to an assault of mine on
humanitarianism by trying to show that in this one faith of modern days
are summed up all the varying ideals of past ages,--renunciation,
self-development, religion, chivalry, humanism, pantheistic return to
nature, liberty. Ah, my dear sir, I envy you your easy, kindly vision.
Indeed, all these do persist in a dim groping way, empty echoes of great
words that have been, bare shadows without substance. What made them
something more than graceful acts of materialism was that each and all
ended not in themselves or in worldly accommodation, but in some purpose
outside of human nature as our humanitarians comprehend that nature.
Renunciation was practised, not that my neighbour might have a morsel more
of bread, but that one hungry soul might turn from the desires of the
flesh to its own purer longings. Self-development looked to the purging
and making perfect of the bodily faculties, that within the chamber of a
man's own breast might dwell in sweet serenity the eternal spirit of
beauty and joy. Even humanism, which by its name would seem to be brother
to its present-day parody, perceived an ideal far above the vicious circle
in which humanitarianism gyrates. My dear foe might read Castiglione's
book of _The Courtier_ and learn how high the Platonic ideal of the better
humanists floated above the charitable mockery of its name to-day. As for
religion--go to almost any church in the land and hear what exhortations
flow from the pulpit. The intellectual contention of dogmas is
forgotten--and better so, possibly. But more than that: for one word on
the spirit or on the way and necessity of the soul's individual growth,
you will hear a thousand on the means of bettering the condition of the
poor; for one word on the personal relation of man to his God, you will
hear a thousand on the duties of man to man. Woe unto you, preachers of a
base creed, hypocrites! These things ought ye to have done, and not to
leave the other undone! You have betrayed the faith and forgotten your
high charge; you have made of religion a mingling for this world's use of
materialism and altruism, while the spirit hungers and is n