ecstatic realization that we possess God. Everything that
perplexes us, procures our powers room to develop, tempts us, so to
speak, from resting in God to rely on ourselves, no matter how useful
it may be in a _worldly_ point of view, is a sin against the Holy
Ghost, a crime against our own souls. I do not know how far your
philosophy will enable you to follow me."

[Illustration: Lorinser suddenly stood still, removed his hat, and
cast an absent glance at the clouds.]

"To the most extreme consequences of your view of the world, which
extend to the familiar mystical quietism," replied Edwin with a calm
smile. "This is not the first time I have encountered such a mixed
temperament--you are undoubtedly phlegmatic---choleric--and therefore
my philosophy is not perplexed about the formula. The only thing new
and not quite intelligible, is how any one with such views can become a
clergyman, accept an office as the servant of religion, which calls
itself the religion of love."

"You are perfectly right. And I also am too honest a man to consent to
the pitiful compromises and casuistries, which most clergymen drag with
them through life as galley-slaves do the chains which grow into their
flesh. I wish to have nothing to do with the so-called established
church, and abhor or pity the delusion that religion can be managed in
bulk, like a joint stock company, on whose terms a deed of partnership
is drawn up. There has never been a revelation, which has come from
heaven to earth as of universal validity. _At every moment_ the fulness
of God's mercy is revealed anew, the Son of Man dies again, sinful
mortals are saved once more by the Saviour's blood. But no one knows or
perceives anything of this, except those, who have not exchanged the
gold of their love for God, for the base coin of the so-called love for
one's neighbor, only to be beggars when God demands a sacrifice. We
have only one neighbor, God himself. Our lives are nothing but an act
of mercy on the part of the Creator, who by means of a temporary
separation from him, arouses the wish, the desire, the passionate
longing for a re-union, and thereby affords us the first conscious
delight of sinking back into eternity. The souls who never attain to
this, are, as it were, only the dark elements in the nature of God, and
in the great crucible of time will be separated from the purer ore and
cast aside like dross."

"Go on," said Edwin after a pause, as his companion re