sly, there was taking
root in their hearts the germ of the only real and lasting
love--the love born of something higher than mere physical
attraction, the nobler, more enduring affection that is born of
mutual sympathy, association and companionship.

"Isn't it beautiful?" exclaimed Shirley ecstatically. "Look at
those great waves out there! See how majestically they soar and
how gracefully they fall!"

"Glorious!" assented Jefferson sharing her enthusiasm. "There's
nothing to compare with it. It's Nature's grandest spectacle. The
ocean is the only place on earth that man has not defiled and
spoiled. Those waves are the same now as they were on the day of
creation."

"Not the day of creation. You mean during the aeons of time
creation was evolving," corrected Shirley.

"I meant that of course," assented Jefferson. "When one says 'day'
that is only a form of speech."

"Why not be accurate?" persisted Shirley. "It was the use of that
little word 'day' which has given the theologians so many
sleepless nights."

There was a roguish twinkle in her eye. She well knew that he
thought as she did on metaphysical questions, but she could not
resist teasing him.

Like Jefferson, she was not a member of any church, although her
nature was deeply religious. Hers was the religion the soul
inculcates, not that which is learned by rote in the temple. She
was a Christian because she thought Christ the greatest figure in
world history, and also because her own conduct of life was
modelled upon Christian principles and virtues. She was religious
for religion's sake and not for public ostentation. The mystery of
life awed her and while her intelligence could not accept all the
doctrines of dogmatic religion she did not go so far as Jefferson,
who was a frank agnostic. She would not admit that we do not know.
The longings and aspirations of her own soul convinced her of the
existence of a Supreme Being, First Cause, Divine Intelligence--call
it what you will--which had brought out of chaos the wonderful
order of the universe. The human mind was, indeed, helpless to
conceive such a First Cause in any form and lay prostrate before
the Unknown, yet she herself was an enthusiastic delver into
scientific hypothesis and the teachings of Darwin, Spencer,
Haeckel had satisfied her intellect if they had failed to content
her soul. The theory of evolution as applied to life on her own
little planet appealed strongly to her because it acc