obtain a
just judgment for the enemy of his faith; for holding out a brotherly
hand to a man who might very probably not care to take it; for
consorting with those who would at best regard him as an amiable
fanatic. Was this worth all it would cost? Could the exceedingly
problematical gain make up for the absolutely certain loss?

He took up the day's newspaper. His eye was at once attracted to a
paragraph headed: "Mr. Raeburn at Longstaff." The report, sent from
the same source as the report in the "Longstaff Mercury," which had so
greatly displeased Raeburn that morning, struck Charles Osmond in a most
unfavorable light. This bitter opponent of Christianity, this unsparing
denouncer of all that he held most sacred, THIS was the man for whom
he was sacrificing friendship, reputation, advancement. A feeling of
absolute disgust rose within him. For a moment the thought came: "I
can't have any more to do with the man."

But he was too honest not to detect almost at once his own Pharisaical,
un-Christlike spirit.

"Look not every man on his own things, but every man also on the things
of others. Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus."

He had been selfishly consulting his own happiness, his own ease. Worse
still, he, of all men in the world, had dared to set himself up as too
virtuous forsooth to have anything to do with an atheist. Was that
the mind which was in Christ? Was He a strait-laced, self-righteous
Pharisee, too good, too religious to have anything to say to those
who disagreed with Him? Did He not live and die for those who are yet
enemies to God? Was not the work of reconciliation the work he came for?
Did He calculate the loss to Himself, the risk of failure? Ah, no, those
who would imitate God must first give as a free gift, without thought
of self, perfect love to all, perfect justice through that love, or else
they are not like the Father who "maketh His sun to shine on the evil
and the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust."

Charles Osmond paced to and fro, the look of trouble gradually passing
from his face. Presently he paused beside the open window; it looked
upon the little back garden, a tiny strip of ground, indeed, but just
now bright with sunshine and fresh with the beauty of early summer. The
sunshine seemed to steal into his heart as he prayed.

"All-Father, drive out my selfish cowardice, my self-righteous conceit.
Give me Thy spirit of perfect love to all