"We find one trace of the Gospel here, and another there," said
Toussaint; "but a Christian nation, or race, or class of people, who has
seen?"

"Not in the earliest days?" asked Euphrosyne. "Were not the first
confessors and martyrs a Christian class?"

"They were so according to their intention, to their own idea," said
Toussaint. "They were votaries of the one Christian principle most
needed in their time. The noble men, the courageous women, who stood,
calm and resolved, in the midst of the amphitheatre, with the heathen
altar behind them, the hungry tiger before them, and a careless or
scoffing multitude ranged all around--these were strong witnesses to the
great principle of Faith--noble proofs of the power of living and dying
for things unseen. This was their function. It was for others to show
forth the humility and modesty in which, as a class, they failed."

"The anchorites," said Pascal, "each in his cave, solitary, abstemious,
showed forth in its strength the principle of Devotion, leaving Charity
unthought of."

"And then the nun," said Toussaint--

"What possible grace of religion did the nun exhibit?" asked Euphrosyne.

"The original nun, Euphrosyne, was inspired with the reverence of
Purity. In an age of licence, those who were devoted to spiritual
things were the salt of the earth. But in their worship of purity they
outraged human love."

"The friar," said Pascal, "was a perpetual emblem of Unworldliness. He
forced upon the admiration of a self-seeking world the peace of poverty,
the repose of soul which is troubled with no thought for the morrow.
But for other teachers, however, industry would have been despised--the
great law of toil would have remained unrecognised."

"The Crusaders worked hard enough," said Denis. "Thousands and
thousands of them died of their toils, besides the slain."

"They were the apostles of Zeal," said Monsieur Pascal. "For the honour
of the Gospel they suffered and died. They overlooked all that it
teaches of toleration and universal love;--of peace on earth and
good-will to men."

"None of these Christians," said Afra, "appear to have had much concern
for men. They seemed to have lived for God and the faith, without love
or care for those for whose sake God gave the faith."

"Just so," said her husband. "That part of our religion had not yet
come into action. The first step taken towards this action was one
which united with it the former devot