t sufficiently to wait for the Herr Candidat. He could not
understand a word of what was being said in the next room, and only
heard enough to gather that Frau Valentin grew angry, but Lorinser
speedily soothed her; then a box was opened and money counted out on a
table. Directly after both re-appeared in the sitting room, the
professor's widow evidently out of humor and with deeply flushed
cheeks, Lorinser following her in the calmest possible mood. He kissed
his hostess' pretty hand and whispered something, that Edwin did not
hear, but would not permit her to accompany him to the door.

The seamstresses were sitting quietly at work in the large room. The
youngest was a slender brunette, with thick, shining hair, and
beautiful black eyes. As Lorinser passed, Edwin thought he saw the girl
blush and bend lower over her work, but the Herr Candidat seemed to
take no more notice of her than the others.

When they had reached the street, and walked on side by side for some
distance in silence, Lorinser suddenly stood still, removed his hat,
and casting an absent glance at the clouds, said: "You must not
misjudge me. This sort of practical religion, this busy attempt to earn
heaven by making ourselves useful to our fellow mortals, is thoroughly
repugnant to me, and if I allow myself to be used as a tool, it is only
to have some kind of method in the madness. This course or conduct may
be everything you please, warm-hearted, useful, a necessity to certain
natures, but it is as different from true _religion_, as all human
worship is unlike the genuine service of God."

"I have only made Frau Valentin's acquaintance to-day," replied Edwin.
"But she did not give me the impression that she was one of those
persons who hope to engage a place in heaven by their good works. She
cannot imagine any worship--and therefore certainly not the service of
God--without active exertion."

"You express her views exactly," said the other, as he withdrew his
eyes from the clouds and fixed them again on the earth. "To act is a
temporal thing; to be, to behold, to commune with ourselves--only thus
can we here, though imperfectly, attain a conception of the Infinite.
It is possible that in a purer and more sensitive husk than the one we
now have, organs may grow, by means of which we can take an active
share in the inexpressible energy of the Deity, become in a certain
sense co-workers with God. Here below the highest point we can reach,
is: an