I fear, be wasted on me, and our good
mother would willingly see me under your subsoiling and fertilizing
hand."

"Do you ever seriously think?"

"I? oh yes! such thoughts as I can think. I think of the wondrously
beautiful in nature, and am glad. I think of the wretched race of men,
and am sad. I think of my shallow self, and am mad."

Henry, with unchanged gravity: "Do you believe in anything?"

"Yes, I believe fully in our mother; a good deal in you, though my
faith is shaken a little just now; and am inclined to great faith in
your friend Mr. Ranney."

All smile but Henry. "Yes, all that of course, but abstract
propositions. Have you faith, in anything?"

"Well, I believe in genius, I believe in poetry--though not much in
poets--music--though that is not for men. I believe in love--for those
who may have it. I believe in woman and in God. When I draw myself
close to Him, I am overcome with a great awe, and dare not pray. It
is only when I seem to push Him off, and coop Him up in a little
crystal-domed palace beyond the stars, and out of hearing, that I
dare tell Him how huge He is, and pipe little serenades of psalmody to
Him."

"Oh, Barton, you are profane!"

"No, mother, men are profane in their gorgeous egotism. We are the
braggarts, and ascribe egotism to God Himself; while we are the sole
objects of interest in the universe. God was and is on our account
only; and when men fancy that they have found a way of running things
without Him, they shove Him out entirely. I put it plainly, and it
sounds bad."

"This is a compendious confession of faith," said Henry; and, pausing,
"why do you put genius first?"

"As the most doubtful, and, at the same time, an interesting article.
I am at the age when a young man queries anxiously about it. Has he
any of it--the least bit?"

"Well, what is your conclusion?"

"Sometimes I fancy I feel faintly its stir and spur and inspiration."

"When it may be only dyspepsia," said Henry.

"It may be. I haven't ranked myself among geniuses."

"Yet you believe in it. What is it?"

"I can't tell. Can you tell what is electricity or life?"

"That is not logical. You answer one question by asking another."

"I am not sure but that is allowable," interrupted Ranney. "You pose
your opponent with an unanswerable question, and he in turn proposes
several, thereby suggesting that there are things unknown, and that if
you will push him to that realm you are equally involve