kerchiefs to them--plucked hairs from his fur coat
to preserve as relics. In the theatre they fell on their knees before
him and kissed his feet. Thus that tendency that calls itself free and
enlightened deified a man--Voltaire, the most trifling scoffer, the
most unprincipled, basest man of Christendom.

"Let us consider an example of our times. Look at Garibaldi in London.
That man permitted himself to be set up and worshipped. The saints
would have turned away from this stupidity with loathing indignation.
But this boundless, veneration flattered the old pirate Garibaldi. He
received 267,000 requests for locks of his hair, to be cased in gold
and preserved as relics. Happily he had not much hair. He should have
graciously given them his moustaches and whiskers."

Frank smiled. Klingenberg's pace increased, and his arms swung more
briskly.

"Such is the man-worship of modern heathenism. This humanitarianism is
ashamed of no absurdity, when it sinks to the worship of licentiousness
and baseness personified."

"The senseless aberrations of modern culture do not excuse
saint-worship. And you certainly do not wish to excuse it in that way.
There is, however, a reasonable veneration of human greatness.
Monuments are erected to great men. We behold them and are reminded of
their genius, their services; and there it stops. It occurs to no
reasonable man to venerate these men on his knees, as is done with the
saints."

"The bending of the knee, according to the teaching of your church,
does not signify adoration, but only veneration," replied Klingenberg.
"Before no Protestant in the world would I bend the knee; before St.
Benedict and St. Vincent de Paul I would willingly, out of mere
admiration and esteem for their greatness of soul and their purity of
morals. If a Catholic kneels before a saint to ask his prayers, what is
there offensive in that? It is an act of religious conviction. But I
will not enter into the religious question. This you can learn better
from your Catholic brethren--say from the Angel of Salingen, for
example, who appears to have such veneration for the saints."

"You will not enter into the religious question; yet you defend
saint-worship, which is something religious."

"I do not defend it on religious grounds, but from history, reason, and
justice. History teaches that this veneration had, and still has, the
greatest moral influence on human society. The spirit of veneration
consists in imi