the poor steed gets hung with all sorts of
incongruous burdens."

"Yes," said Mrs. Graves, "but the force is there all the time; the old
hard words, like regeneration and atonement, do not mean DEFINITE
things--that is the mischief; they are the receipts made up by stupid,
hard-headed people who do not understand; but they stand for large and
wonderful experiences and are like the language of children telling
their dreams. The moral genius who sees through it all and gives the
first impulse is trying to deal with life directly and frankly; and the
difficulty arises from people who see the attendant circumstances and
mistake them for the causes. But I do not see it from that side, of
course! I understand what you are aiming at. You are trying to
disentangle all the phenomena, are you not, and referring them to their
real causes, instead of lumping them all together as the phenomena of
religion?"

"Yes," said Howard, "that is what I am doing. I suppose I am naturally
sceptical; but I want to put aside all that stands on insecure
evidence, and all the sham terminology that comes from a muddled
delight in the supernatural. I want to give up and clear away all that
is not certain--material things must be brought to the test of material
laws--and to see what is left."

"Well," said Mrs. Graves, "now I will tell you my own very simple
experience. I began, I think, with a very formal religion, and I tried
in my youth to attach what was really instinctive to religious motives.
It got me into a sad mess, because I did not dare to go direct to life.
I used to fret because your uncle seemed so indifferent to these
things. He was a wise and good man, and lived by a sort of inner beauty
of character that made all mean cruel spiteful petty things impossible
to him. Then when he died, I had a terrible time to go through. I felt
utterly adrift. My old system did not give me the smallest help. I was
trying to find an intellectual solution. It was then that I met Miss
Gordon, the great evangelist. She saw I was unhappy, and she said to me
one day: 'You have no business to be unhappy like this. What you want
is STRENGTH, and it is there all the time waiting for you! You are
arguing your case with God, complaining of the injustice you have
received, trying to excuse yourself, trying to find cause to blame Him.
Your life has been broken to pieces, and you are trying to shelter
yourself among the fragments. You must cast them all away, an