FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132  
133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>   >|  
ll, and wanted somebody to play with, and he was better than nobody), he made these sops the principal articles of his heart's diet, and cared for no other fare. "What is Mr. Herbert like?" he inquired. "Oh! he is a good man in his way, but a back-boneless, sweet-syrupy kind of a Christian; one of the sort that seems to regard the Almighty as a blindly indulgent and easily-hoodwinked Father, and Satan himself as nothing worse than a rather crusty old bachelor uncle. You know the type." "Perfectly; they always drawl, and use the adjective 'dear' in and out of season. I quite think that among themselves they talk of 'the dear devil.' And yet 'dear' is really quite a nice word, if only people like that hadn't spoiled it." "You shouldn't let people spoil things for you in that way. That is one of your greatest faults, Christopher; whenever you have seen a funny side to anything you never see any other. You have too much humour and too little tenderness; that's what's the matter with you." "Permit me to tender you a sincere vote of thanks for your exhaustive and gratuitous spiritual diagnosis. To cure my faults is my duty--to discover them, your delight." "Well, I'm right; and you'll find it out some day, although you make fun of me now." "I say, how will Mrs. Herbert fit in Tremaine's religious views--or rather absence of religious views--with her code of the next world's etiquette?" asked Christopher, wisely changing the subject. "Oh! she'll simply decline to see them. Although, as I told you, she is driven about entirely by her conscience, it is a well-harnessed conscience and always wears blinkers. It shies a good deal at gnats, I own; but it can run in double-harness with a camel, if worldly considerations render such a course desirable. It is like a horse we once had, which always shied violently at every puddle, but went past a steamroller without turning a hair." "'By my troth, niece, thou wilt never get thee a husband if thou be so shrewd of thy tongue,'" quoted Christopher. "I don't want to be too severe, but Mrs. Herbert does make me so mad. When people put religious things in a horrid light, it makes you feel as if they were telling unkind and untrue tales about your dearest friends." "What does the good woman say that makes 'my lady Tongue' so furious?" "Well, she is always saying one must give up this and give up that, and deny one's self here and deny one's self there, for the sake o
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132  
133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Christopher
 

people

 

religious

 
Herbert
 

conscience

 

faults

 

things

 

considerations

 

harness

 

absence


double

 
worldly
 

Although

 
driven
 
wisely
 

changing

 

simply

 

decline

 

etiquette

 

blinkers


subject

 

harnessed

 

quoted

 

tongue

 

severe

 
shrewd
 

Tongue

 

husband

 

telling

 

unkind


dearest

 

untrue

 
horrid
 

friends

 

violently

 

desirable

 

puddle

 

furious

 

turning

 

steamroller


render
 
Father
 

hoodwinked

 

easily

 

regard

 
Almighty
 

blindly

 
indulgent
 
crusty
 

adjective