urs. When the differences are great, and the parties
comparative strangers, men quarrel with courtesy. What combatants
are ever so eager as two brothers?"

"But do not such contentions bring scandal on the church?"

"More scandal would fall on the church if there were no such
contentions. We have but one way to avoid them--by that of
acknowledging a common head of our church, whose word on all
points of doctrine shall be authoritative. Such a termination
of our difficulties is alluring enough. It has charms which are
irresistible to many, and all but irresistible, I own, to me."

"You speak now of the Church of Rome?" said Eleanor.

"No," said he, "not necessarily of the Church of Rome; but of a
church with a head. Had it pleased God to vouchsafe to us such a
church our path would have been easy. But easy paths have not been
thought good for us." He paused and stood silent for awhile, thinking
of the time when he had so nearly sacrificed all he had, his powers
of mind, his free agency, the fresh running waters of his mind's
fountain, his very inner self, for an easy path in which no fighting
would be needed; and then he continued: "What you say is partly true:
our contentions do bring on us some scandal. The outer world, though
it constantly reviles us for our human infirmities and throws in our
teeth the fact that being clergymen we are still no more than men,
demands of us that we should do our work with godlike perfection.
There is nothing god-like about us: we differ from each other with
the acerbity common to man; we triumph over each other with human
frailty; we allow differences on subjects of divine origin to produce
among us antipathies and enmities which are anything but divine. This
is all true. But what would you have in place of it? There is no
infallible head for a church on earth. This dream of believing man
has been tried, and we see in Italy and in Spain what has come of it.
Grant that there are and have been no bickerings within the pale of
the Pope's Church. Such an assumption would be utterly untrue, but
let us grant it, and then let us say which church has incurred the
heavier scandals."

There was a quiet earnestness about Mr. Arabin, as he
half-acknowledged and half-defended himself from the charge brought
against him, which surprised Eleanor. She had been used all her life
to listen to clerical discussion, but the points at issue between the
disputants had so seldom been of more than tempor