himself to sanction any of the polite and innocent
lies which society accepts as conventions?"

Stuart nodded and the physician went on:

"In short we encounter, every day, the apparent hypocrite. Yet many such
men are not consciously dishonest. They are merely victims of
disassociation."

"I'm afraid," acknowledged Stuart, "I'm still too much the tyro to
understand the term very fully."

"None of us understand it as fully as we'd like," Dr. Ebbett assured
him. "But we are gradually learning. In every man's consciousness there
is a stream of thought which we call the brain content. Below the
surface of consciousness, there is a second stream of thought as
unrecognized as a dream, but none the less potent."

The speaker paused and Farquaharson waited in silence for him to
continue.

"The broader a man's habit of thought," went on the physician slowly,
"the fewer impulses he is called upon to repress because he is frank.
The narrower his code, the more things there are which are thrust down
into his proscribed list of inhibitions. The peril lies in the fact that
this stream of repressed thought is acting almost as directly on the
man's life and conduct, as the one of which he is constantly aware. He
has more than one self, and since he admits but one, the others are in
constant and secret intrigue, against him."

"And this makes for unconscious hypocrisy?"

"Undoubtedly. Such a man may be actively dishonest and escape all sense
of guilt because he has in his mind logic-proof compartments in which
certain matters are kept immured and safe from conflict with the reason
that he employs for other affairs. It was this exact quirk of lopsided
righteousness which enabled our grandsires to burn witches while they
sang psalms."

"You think our host is of the type most susceptible to such a danger?"

"Yes, because the intolerant man always stands on the border of
insanity."

"But, Doctor," Stuart put his question with a keenly edged interest,
"for such a condition as you describe, is there a cure, or is it only a
matter of analysis?"

"Ah," replied Ebbett gravely, "that's a large question. Usually a cure
is quite possible, but it always depends upon the uncompromising
frankness of the patient's confessions. He must strip his soul naked
before we can help him. If we can trace back into subconsciousness and
identify the disturbing influences, they resolve themselves into a sore
that has been lanced. They are no longe