ndow, and Manna sat on the sofa.

For some time not a word was spoken. Manna was deeply affected by this
elevated strain of cordial sympathy. There was no need of any
hesitating preliminaries; she was at once conducted into the inmost
sanctuary.

She asked at last in a timid way, how she ought to conduct herself
towards all the persons who were received as friends in the house of
her parents, and who plumed themselves upon their culture.

"You question well, you question definitely, and that is the mark of a
mature mind," replied the Priest. "Know then, that you are to smile at
all the boastful things you will be obliged to listen to; they pretend
to be so great, and they are so very little. These learned ones believe
that the world is without understanding, and that it is ruled with no
more wisdom than their understanding and their wisdom attribute to it;
they put God in one scale, and their own brain in the other. Pah!"

The Priest spoke now in a wholly different tone; he was violent and
bitter, so that Manna shrank together with affright. The Priest, who
noticed this, composed himself again, saying:--

"You see that I am still weak, and allow myself to be carried away by
excitement. My child, there are two things which conquer the world:
their names are God and the Devil, or, when transferred into the domain
of our own interior being, Piety and Frivolity. Piety sees everything
as holy; appearances are only a veil, while Frivolity sees nothing as
holy. Piety is the law of God; Frivolity has released herself from the
law of God, and sports with the world of appearances according to her
own pleasure. Between piety and frivolity there is a half-and-half
state, and that is the worst of all. Frivolity reaches its extreme
point and is capable of being converted, to which we have some glorious
witnesses; but the heroes of reason, so-called, or, more properly
speaking, the weaklings of reason, _they_ are not capable of being
converted, for they are wholly destitute of that disposition which
tends to humility."

The Priest thought that Manna would understand him to be pointing out
Eric and Pranken; he did not want to be any more personal at first, but
the ground was to be broken. Now he turned round, smiling, and seating
himself said:--

"But, my child, let us not to-day lose ourselves in such general
considerations. What have you to say?"

Manna complained of finding it so hard to complete another year of
probation,