s which is
man. Is not the most mendacious mistress often taken with the desire of
confession ... the wish to reveal herself? Upon this bed rock of human
nature the confessional has been built. And Owen admired the humanity of
Rome. Rome was terribly human. No Church, he reflected, was so human.
Her doctrine may seem at times quaint, medieval, even gross, but when
tested by the only test that can be applied, power to reach to human
needs, and administer consolation to the greatest number, the most
obtuse-minded cannot fail to see that Rome easily distances her rivals.
Her dogma and ceremonial are alike conceived in extraordinary sympathy
with man's common nature....

Our lives are enveloped in mystery, the scientist concedes that, and the
woof of which the stuff of life is woven is shot through with many a
thread of unknown origin, untraceable to any earthly shuttle. There is a
mystery, and in the elucidation of that mystery man never tires; the
Sovereign Pontiff and the humblest crystal gazer are engaged in the same
adventure. The mystery is so intense, and lives so intimately in all,
that Rome dared to come forward with a complete explanation. And her
necessarily perfunctory explanation she drapes in a ritual so
magnificent, that even the philosopher ceases to question, and pauses
abashed by the grandeur of the symbolism. High Mass in its own home,
under the arches of a Gothic cathedral, appealed alike to the loftiest
and humblest intelligence. Owen paused to think if there was not
something vulgar in the parade of the Mass. A simple prayer breathed by
a burdened heart in secret awaked a more immediate and intimate response
in him. That was Anglicanism. Perhaps he preferred Anglicanism. The
truth was, he was deficient in the religious instinct.

Awaking from his reverie, he raised himself from the mantelpiece against
which he was leaning. Never had he thought so brilliantly, and he
regretted that no magical stenographer should be there to register his
thoughts as they passed. But they were gone.... Resuming his position
against the mantelpiece, he continued his interrupted train of thoughts.

There would be the priest's interdiction ... unless, indeed, he could
win Evelyn to agnosticism. In his own case he could imagine a sort of
religious agnosticism. But is a woman capable of such a serene
contemplation and comprehension of the mystery, which perforce we must
admit envelops us, and which often seems charged with m