"The idea of a blood atonement, of the sacrifice of a single innocent being for the sins of all the world, is monstrous, a development of the idea that the crimes of men could be laid upon the back of an animal, which, driven away, took them with him. To these ideas the Seventh-Day Baptists have added others as fantastic as any invented in the history of the queer mind of man. I could just as easily worship the bones of a human being as I could believe it essential to have my feet bathed at a church service. Your denial of opportunities is as ridiculous as that of the hermit who prefers to live in bodily uncleanness. You live in mental sloth and blindness! Your founder was a charlatan of the worst sort who beguiled women away from their husbands and mothers away from their children, to live in fancied holiness in this grim place. Generation by generation his followers have grown fewer in number. In Matthew's generation there will not be half a dozen.
"Now, Matthew, this is my last word. You may return to school for the year—that is one alternative. Or you may come home and live like a normal human being and farm if you wish and without further education if you insist, under the condition that you don't join the Seventh-Day Baptists or attend their meetings until you are twenty-one years old. Or, you may stay here, allied with the past, letting the world go by, alienated from your father and little sister who have a right to your society and your love.
"You must choose now, Matthew. I can't continue to hope for years to come that you'll be an honor to me and then have you fail me. You'll have to make up your mind."
It seemed to Levis that he had been talking a long time. He changed his position, driving his hands deep into his pockets and crossing one knee over the other. Seated easily, his clenched fists invisible, he had the appearance of a man too firmly grounded in his philosophy of life to be seriously affected by any chance which might befall. Matthew sat with bent head; Amos in the shadow held his hand across his lips. Once he remembered a cool, soft cheek. Grandfather seemed to have shrunk within himself; his eyes were half closed, his lips moved. It was evident that against the influence of Levis's eloquence he was opposing all his supplicatory powers. He looked at no one; he seemed to be in a trance. The wind began to blow louder, whistling round the corners. The silence within became nerve-racking.
"Well, Matthew?" said Levis, sitting suddenly upright.
Matthew answered without raising his head.
"I'm under conviction. It would be wrong for me to waste my time studying when nothing was to come of it."
Levis got to his feet quickly.
"You mean you're going to stay here?"