CONTENTS
[PREFACE.]
[CHAPTER I. A Philosopher and a Marchioness]
[CHAPTER II. Two Pagans Discuss Fish, Paris and the Higher Criticism]
[CHAPTER III. A Cousin in the Coils of the Great Serpent]
[CHAPTER IV. The Diversions of the Claghorns]
[CHAPTER V. How a Pagan Philosopher Entered the Service of the Church]
[CHAPTER VI. Art, Diplomacy, Love and Other Things]
[CHAPTER VII. A Conference of Spinsters Concerning a Runaway Damsel]
[CHAPTER VIII. A Maiden Fair, a Modern Early Father and a Theologian]
[CHAPTER IX. The Advantages of Treading the Borderland of Vice]
[CHAPTER X. A Youth of Promise, a Female Politician, and a Yellow Man]
[CHAPTER XI. The Devil Walks To and Fro in Hampton]
[CHAPTER XII. Her Eyes Grew Limpid and Her Cheeks Flushed Red]
[CHAPTER XIII. Whereat Cynics and Matrons May Smile Incredulous]
[CHAPTER XIV. In the White House—A Damsel or the Devil, Which?]
[CHAPTER XV. Sur le Pont d'Avignon on y Danse, on y Danse]
[CHAPTER XVI. Warblings in the White House and Snares for a Soul]
[CHAPTER XVII. The Secret of Her Heart Was Never Told by Her to Him]
[CHAPTER XVIII. A Lover Writes a Letter]
[CHAPTER XIX. A Kiss that Might Have Lingered on His Lips While Seeking Entrance at the Gate of Heaven]
[CHAPTER XX. A Dishonest Veiling of a Woman's Heart]
[CHAPTER XXI. A Man About to Meet a Maid]
[CHAPTER XXII. Man Walketh in a Vain Shadow]
[CHAPTER XXIII. A Parson Treads the Primrose Path in Paris]
[CHAPTER XXIV. To Him I will be Henceforth True in All Things]
[CHAPTER XXV. Mrs. Joe on Clerical Bumptiousness and Mrs. Fenton's Shoulders]
[CHAPTER XXVI. Introduces Dr. Stanley, Satan and the Prayer Meeting of Matrons]
[CHAPTER XXVII. The Music of the Chorus of the Anguish of the Damned]
[CHAPTER XXVIII. Cursing and Beating Her Breast, She Falls Upon the Grave]
[CHAPTER XXIX. Dr. Stanley Discourses Concerning the Diversions of the Saints]
[CHAPTER XXX. Startling Effect of Dr. Burley's True Meaning]
[CHAPTER XXXI. He Clasped Her Lithe Body with a Clutch of Fury]
[CHAPTER XXXII. A Pæan of Victory Hymned in Hell]
[CHAPTER XXXIII. A Delectable Discussion in Which a Shakesperian Matron is Routed]
[CHAPTER XXXIV. When Manhood is Lost Woman's Time is Come]
[CHAPTER XXXV. A Bottle of Champagne]
[CHAPTER XXXVI. She Cried Aloud She Was a Guilty Creature]
[CHAPTER XXXVII. A Golden Bridge for Passage Across an Abyss of Shame]
[CHAPTER XXXVIII. The Ruins of Her Air Castles Lay Around Her]
[CHAPTER XXXIX. Voidable Vows of Turks (and Others)]
[CHAPTER XL. Her Face Was the Mirror of Her Pleasant Dreams]
[CHAPTER XLI. Her Guilty Conscience Cried, "Behold Your Handiwork"]
[CHAPTER XLII. I Will Never Leave Him, So Help Me God!]
[CHAPTER XLIII. Money, Heaps of Money]
[CHAPTER XLIV. Wedding Bells]
PREFACE.
Some readers of this novel will charge the author with the crime of laying a sacrilegious hand upon the Ark of God; others will characterize his work as an assault upon a windmill.
I contend (and the fact, if it be a fact, is ample justification for this book) that The Westminster Confession of Faith has driven many honest souls to the gloom of unbelief, to the desperate need of a denial of God; and that to-day a very large number of the adherents of that Confession find it possible to maintain their faith in God only by secret rejection of a creed they openly profess.
Take from that Confession those Articles which give rise to the dilemma which confronts the wife and mother of this story, and nothing is left. The articles in question are the essential articles of the Confession.
He who can in honesty say of The Westminster Confession of Faith: "This is my standard: by this sign I shall conquer," he, and he only, has the right to condemn my purpose.
Hilary Trent.