fter came
near, towards this, the porch of the great Unknown, all reality
gathered, and there, the altar was the mystic door, through
which all and everything must move on to eternity.

But now, somehow, sadly and disillusioned, he realized that
the doorway was no doorway. It was too narrow, it was false.
Outside the cathedral were many flying spirits that could never
be sifted through the jewelled gloom. He had lost his
absolute.

He listened to the thrushes in the gardens and heard a note
which the cathedrals did not include: something free and
careless and joyous. He crossed a field that was all yellow with
dandelions, on his way to work, and the bath of yellow glowing
was something at once so sumptuous and so fresh, that he was
glad he was away from his shadowy cathedral.

There was life outside the Church. There was much that the
Church did not include. He thought of God, and of the whole blue
rotunda of the day. That was something great and free. He
thought of the ruins of the Grecian worship, and it seemed, a
temple was never perfectly a temple, till it was ruined and
mixed up with the winds and the sky and the herbs.

Still he loved the Church. As a symbol, he loved it. He
tended it for what it tried to represent, rather than for that
which it did represent. Still he loved it. The little church
across his garden-wall drew him, he gave it loving attention.
But he went to take charge of it, to preserve it. It was as an
old, sacred thing to him. He looked after the stone and
woodwork, mending the organ and restoring a piece of broken
carving, repairing the church furniture. Later, he became
choir-master also.

His life was shifting its centre, becoming more superficial.
He had failed to become really articulate, failed to find real
expression. He had to continue in the old form. But in spirit,
he was uncreated.

Anna was absorbed in the child now, she left her husband to
take his own way. She was willing now to postpone all adventure
into unknown realities. She had the child, her palpable and
immediate future was the child. If her soul had found no
utterance, her womb had.

The church that neighboured with his house became very
intimate and dear to him. He cherished it, he had it entirely in
his charge. If he could find no new activity, he would be happy
cherishing the old, dear form of worship. He knew this little,
whitewashed church. In its shadowy atmosphere he sank back into
being. He liked to sin