ld in one mode or another be aware of Him!"

While he spoke, Mr. Drake and Dorothy had come into the room. They stood
silent.

"That is a weighty word," said Wingfold. "But what if you feel His
presence every moment, only do not recognize it as such?"

"Where would be the good of it to me then?"

"The good of it to you might lie in the blinding. What if any further
revelation to one who did not seek it would but obstruct the knowledge
of Him? Truly revealed, the word would be read untruly--even as The Word
has been read by many in all ages. Only the pure in heart, we are told,
shall see Him. The man who, made by Him, does not desire Him--how should
he know Him?"

"Why don't I desire Him then?--I don't."

"That is for you to find out."

"I do what I know to be right; even on your theory I ought to get on,"
said Faber, turning from him with a laugh.

"I think so too," replied Wingfold. "Go on, and prosper. Only, if there
be untruth in you alongside of the truth--? It might be, and you are not
awake to it. It is marvelous what things can co-exist in a human mind."

"In that case, why should not your God help me?"

"Why not? I think he will. But it may _have_ to be in a way you will not
like."

"Well, well! good night. Talk is but talk, whatever be the subject of
it.--I beg your pardon," he added, shaking hands with the minister and
his daughter; "I did not see you come in. Good night."

"I won't allow that talk is only talk, Faber," Wingfold called after him
with a friendly laugh. Then turning to Mr. Drake, "Pardon me," he said,
"for treating you with so much confidence. I saw you come in, but
believed you would rather have us end our talk than break it off."

"Certainly. But I can't help thinking you grant him too much, Mr.
Wingfold," said the minister seriously.

"I never find I lose by giving, even in argument," said the curate.
"Faber rides his hobby well, but the brute is a sorry jade. He will find
one day she has not a sound joint in her whole body."

The man who is anxious to hold every point, will speedily bring a
question to a mere dispute about trifles, leaving the real matter, whose
elements may appeal to the godlike in every man, out in the cold. Such a
man, having gained his paltry point, will crow like the bantam he is,
while the other, who may be the greater, perhaps the better man,
although in the wrong, is embittered by his smallness, and turns away
with increased prejudice. Human nature