of discipline was involved. The Discipline meant
more to a mind of his cast than the Decalogue or the Beatitudes. He
shook his head. He did not know. He must consult Brother Hall. Now,
Brother Hall was the young preacher traveling his second year, very
young and very callow. Ten years of the sharp attritions of a Methodist
itinerant's life would take his unworldliness out of him and develop his
practical sense as no other school in the world could develop it. But as
yet Brother Hall had not rubbed off any of his sanctimoniousness, had
not lost any of his belief that the universe should be governed on high
general principles with no exceptions.

So when Brother Goshorn informed him that one of his members, Sister
Cynthy Ann Dyke, wished to marry, and to marry a man that was a New
Light, and had asked his opinion, and that he did not certainly know
whether New Lights were believers or not, Brother Hall did not stop to
inquire what Jonas might be personally. He looked and felt very solemn,
and said that it was a pity for a Christian to marry a New Light. It was
clearly a sin, for a New Light was an Arian. And an Arian was just as
good as an infidel. An Arian robbed Christ of His supreme deity, and
since he did not worship the Trinity in the orthodox sense he must
worship a false god. He was an idolater therefore, and it was a sin to
be yoked together with such an one.

Many men more learned than the callow but pious and sincere Brother Hall
have left us in print just such deductions.

When this decision was communicated to the scrupulous Cynthy Ann, she
folded her hopes as one lays away the garment of a dead friend; she west
to her little room and prayed; she offered a sacrifice to God not less
costly than Abraham's, and in a like sublime spirit. She watered the
plant In the old cracked blue-and-white tea-pot, she noticed that it was
just about to bloom, and then she dropped one tear upon it, and because
it suggested Jonas in some way, she threw it away, resolved not to have
any idols in her heart. And, doubtless, God received the sacrifice,
mistaken and needless as it was, a token of the faithfulness of her
heart to her duty as she understood it.

[Illustration: CYNTHY ANN'S SACRIFICE.]

Cynthy Ann explained it all to Jonas in a severe and irrevocable way.
Jonas looked at her a moment, stunned.

"Did Brother Goshorn venture to send me any of his wisdom, in the way of
advice, layin' round loose, like counterfeit sma