ries, and was silent.
Many thoughts were working in his childish brain. Presently he said,
meditatively:

"He did shout it out so loud and horrid! I s'pose he had forgotten about
'Our Father.' But, you see, Dolly, it was all a mistake. Come along,
let's race down the drive."

Off they ran. Erica fancied that Donovan watched them rather sadly.

"I thought Ralph was listening in church," she said. "Fancy a child of
his age thinking it all out like that!"

"Children think much more than people imagine," said Donovan. "And a
child invariably carries out a doctrine to its logical conclusion. 'Tis
wonderful the fine sense of justice which you always find in them!"

"Ralph inherits that from you, I should think. How exactly like you he
is, especially when he is puzzling out some question in his own mind."

A strange shadow passed over Donovan's face. He was silent for a moment.

"'Tis hard to be brave for one's own child," he said at last. "I confess
that the thought that Ralph may have to live through what I have lived
through is almost unendurable to me."

"How vexed you must have been that he heard today's sermon," said Erica.

"Not now," he replied. "He has heard and taken in the other side, and
has instinctively recognized the truth. If I had had some one to say as
much to me when I was his age, it might have saved me twenty years of
atheism."

"It is not only children who are repulsed by this," said Erica. "Or
learned men like James Mill. I know well enough that hundreds of my
father's followers were driven away from Christianity merely by having
this view constantly put before them. How were they to know that half
the words about it were mistranslations? How were they to study when
they were hard at work from week's end to week's end? It seems to me
downright wicked of scholars and learned men to keep their light hidden
away under a bushel, and then pretend that they fear the 'people' are
not ready for it."

"As though God's truth needed bolstering up with error!" exclaimed
Donovan. "As though to believe a hideous lie could ever be right
or helpful! There's a vast amount of Jesuitry among well-meaning
Protestants."

"And always will be, I should think," said Erica. "As long as people
will think of possible consequences, instead of the absolutely true.
But I could forgive them all if their idea of the danger of telling the
people were founded on real study of the people. But is it? How many of
the conserve