"What do you think, Miss Meredith—is a man's conscience enough for his guidance?" said the curate.
"I don't know any thing about a man's conscience," answered Juliet.
"A woman's then?" said the curate.
"What else has she got?" returned Juliet.
The doctor was inwardly cursing the curate for talking shop. Only, if a man knows nothing so good, so beautiful, so necessary, as the things in his shop, what else ought he to talk—especially if he is ready to give them without money and without price? The doctor would have done better to talk shop too.
"Of course he has nothing else," answered the curate; "and if he had, he must follow his conscience all the same."
"There you are, Wingfold!—always talking paradoxes!" said Faber.
"Why, man! you may only have a blundering boy to guide you, but if he is your only guide, you must follow him. You don't therefore call him a sufficient guide!"
"What a logomachist you are! If it is a horn lantern you've got, you needn't go mocking at it."
"The lantern is not the light. Perhaps you can not change your horn for glass, but what if you could better the light? Suppose the boy's father knew all about the country, but you never thought it worth while to send the lad to him for instructions?"