ation at their own
game--that they could teach and work more cheaply and
effectively, and so on--well, the most foolish Political
Economist had to confess that the Religious Orders made for the
country's welfare. And as for the Contemplative Orders----"

Father Jervis' face grew grave and tender.

"Yes?"

"Why, they're the princes of the world! They are models of the
Crucified. So long as there is Sin in the world, so long must
there be Penance. The instant Christianity was accepted, the
Cross stood up dominant once more. . . . And then . . . then
people understood. Why, they're the Holy Ones of the
universe--higher than angels; for they suffer. . . ."

There was a moment's silence.

"Yes?" said Monsignor softly.

"My dear Monsignor, just force upon your mind the fact that the
world is really and intelligently Christian. I think it'll all
be plain then. You seem to me, if I may say so, to be falling
into the old-fashioned way of looking at 'Clericalism,' as it
used to be called, as a kind of department of life, like Art or
Law. No wonder men resented its intrusion when they conceived of
it like that. Well, there is no 'Clericalism' now, and therefore
there is no anti-Clericalism. There's just religion--as a fact.
Do you see? ... Shall we sit down for a few minutes? Aren't the
gardens exquisite?"

(III)

Monsignor Masterman sat that night at his window, looking out at
the stars and the night and the blotted glimmering gardens
beneath; and it seemed to him as if the Dream deepened every day.
Things grew more, not less marvellous, with his appreciation of
the simplicity of it all.

From three to seven he had sat in one of the seats on the right
of the royal dais, reserved for prelates, almost immediately
opposite the double-pulpited platform, itself set in the midst of
the long outer side of the great gallery of Versailles, through
which access was to be had to the little old private rooms of
Marie Antoinette, and had listened spell-bound to two of the
greatest wits of France, respectively attacking and defending,
with extraordinary subtlety and fire, the claim of the Church to
Infallibility. The disputation had been conducted on scholastic
lines, all verbal etiquette being carefully observed; again and
again he had heard, first on one side a string of arguments
adduced against the doctrine, then on the other a torrent of
answers, with the old half-remembered words "Distinguo," "Nego,"
"Concedo"; and th