a happy father! But one
thing he will owe to me: that at one period of his life he knew paradise,
and could read God's handwriting on the earth! Now those abominations
whom you call precocious boys--your little pet monsters, doctor!--and who
can wonder that the world is what it is? when it is full of them--as they
will have no divine time to look back upon in their own lives, how can
they believe in innocence and goodness, or be other than sons of
selfishness and the Devil? But my boy," and the baronet dropped his voice
to a key that was touching to hear, "my boy, if he fall, will fall from
an actual region of purity. He dare not be a sceptic as to that. Whatever
his darkness, he will have the guiding light of a memory behind him. So
much is secure."

To talk nonsense, or poetry, or the dash between the two, in a tone of
profound sincerity, and to enunciate solemn discordances with received
opinion so seriously as to convey the impression of a spiritual insight,
is the peculiar gift by which monomaniacs, having first persuaded
themselves, contrive to influence their neighbours, and through them to
make conquest of a good half of the world, for good or for ill. Sir
Austin had this gift. He spoke as if he saw the truth, and, persisting in
it so long, he was accredited by those who did not understand him, and
silenced them that did.

"We shall see," was all the argument left to Dr. Clifford, and other
unbelievers.

So far certainly the experiment had succeeded. A comelier, bracer, better
boy was nowhere to be met. His promise was undeniable. The vessel, too,
though it lay now in harbour and had not yet been proved by the buffets
of the elements on the great ocean, had made a good trial trip, and got
well through stormy weather, as the records of the Bakewell Comedy
witnessed to at Raynham. No augury could be hopefuller. The Fates must
indeed be hard, the Ordeal severe, the Destiny dark, that could destroy
so bright a Spring! But, bright as it was, the baronet relaxed nothing of
his vigilant supervision. He said to his intimates: "Every act, every
fostered inclination, almost every thought, in this Blossoming Season,
bears its seed for the Future. The living Tree now requires incessant
watchfulness." And, acting up to his light, Sir Austin did watch. The
youth submitted to an examination every night before he sought his bed;
professedly to give an account of his studies, but really to recapitulate
his moral experiences o