“I should like to hear thy objection, daughter.”
“Why, we should have to give up every thing nice!” said Eva, disconsolately. “There are all sorts of delightful things, which are not exactly sins, but—”
“Not quite virtues,” interposed Beatrice, with an amused expression, as Eva paused.
“Well, no. Still they are not wrong—in themselves. But they make one waste one’s time, or forget to say one’s beads, or be cross to one’s sister,—just because they are so delightful, and one does not want to give over. And being cross is sin, I suppose; and so it is when one forgets to say one’s prayers: I don’t know whether wasting time is exactly a sin.”
“I see,” said Bruno, in the same quiet tone. “Had our Lord sent thee to clear His Temple of the profane who desecrated it by traffic, thou wouldst have overthrown the tables of the money-changers, but not the seats of them that sold doves.”
Beatrice and Doucebelle answered by a smile of intelligence; Eva looked rather dissatisfied.
“But it is not a sin to be happy, Father?” asked Margaret in a low voice.
“Not if God give thee the happiness.”
“That is just it!” said Eva, discontentedly. “How is one to know?”
“My child,” answered Bruno, ignoring the tone, “God never means His children to put any thing into the place of Himself. The moment thou dost that, that thing is sin to thee.”