he had recognized
instantly his having been sent to this place by that invisible power
which harmonizes all life, for the purpose of bringing help to his
young friend. Such was even more the fact with regard to Manna, though
here he was not conscious of it. Manna was needing and seeking help,
and attached herself, with the loving watchfulness of a daughter, to
this delicate man, who outwardly was so childlike and dependent.

Geology and chemistry have not yet satisfactorily settled the manner in
which these medicinal springs work their cures, and we are equally
ignorant of the workings of that subtle influence by which one man
affects another for good or for evil. Thus mysteriously did Professor
Einsiedel influence Manna. When she told him of her desire to enter the
convent, he expressed his envy.

"If I were a Catholic," he said, "I would enter a convent too; but it
must be a different kind of a convent, one exclusively for men of
science, who have no time or faculty for providing for the necessities
of life, and yet have works of importance to carry out."

Manna smiled, for she could not help thinking of Claus, who also wanted
to enter a convent, so that he might have nothing to do but drink all
the time. But she quickly banished all such comparisons; for here was a
repose, a devotion to a sacred idea, which might boldly compare itself
with the sacredness of the church. She trembled at the thought, but
could not drive it from her mind. With some timidity, and yet
emboldened by the remembrance of her former undoubting confidence, she
ventured to approach the Professor, though only interrogatively, upon
the subject of the necessity of religious faith, as the only means of
salvation. She was amazed at the sudden excitement that blazed up in
the quiet little man.

"We are no enemies of the church," he said, "for we only make war upon
the living. The church has not been able to fashion the world, nor
society, nor a single state; all it has succeeded in doing, is to found
asylums and hospitals. Not to her is given the direction of life, but
to classical education, to continually advancing culture. My child,
there is a fellow-professor of mine in the University, who persistently
maintains that the _Corpus juris_ has done much more for the
civilization of the world, than the fragments which are included under
the name of the Old and New Testament. I do not wholly agree with him,
for the Bible has touched a different chord