muel; all the poetry and passion and
sentiment of human nature are taking refuge in religion; and he, whose
deeds and words most nobly represent Divine thoughts, will be the man of
this century."

"But who could be equal to such a task?" murmured Lothair.

"Yourself," exclaimed the cardinal, and he threw his glittering eye upon
his companion. "Any one with the necessary gifts, who had implicit faith
in the Divine purpose."

"But the Church is perplexed; it is ambiguous, contradictory."

"No, no," said the cardinal; "not the Church of Christ; it is never
perplexed, never ambiguous, never contradictory. Why should it be? How
could it be? The Divine persons are ever with it, strengthening and
guiding it with perpetual miracles. Perplexed churches are churches made
by Act of Parliament, not by God."

Lothair seemed to start, and looked at his guardian with a scrutinizing
glance. And then he said, but not without hesitation, "I experience at
times great despondency."

"Naturally," replied the cardinal. "Every man must be despondent who is
not a Christian."

"But I am a Christian," said Lothair.

"A Christian estranged," said the cardinal; "a Christian without the
consolations of Christianity."

"There is something in that," said Lothair. "I require the consolations
of Christianity, and yet I feel I have them not. Why is this?"

"Because what you call your religion is a thing apart from your life,
and it ought to be your life. Religion should be the rule of life, not
a casual incident of it. There is not a duty of existence, not a joy
or sorrow which the services of the Church do not assert, or with which
they do not sympathize. Tell me, now; you have, I was glad to hear,
attended the services of the Church of late, since you have been under
this admirable roof. Have you not then found some consolation?"

"Yes; without doubt I have been often solaced." And Lothair sighed.

"What the soul is to man, the Church is to the world," said the
cardinal. "It is the link between us and the Divine nature. It came
from heaven complete; it has never changed, and it can never alter. Its
ceremonies are types of celestial truths; its services are suited to all
the moods of man; they strengthen him in his wisdom and his purity, and
control and save him in the hour of passion and temptation. Taken as
a whole, with all its ministrations, its orders, its offices, and the
divine splendor of its ritual, it secures us on earth some ad