“Still you ought to go for the sake of example.”
“Do wrong to make other people follow my example? Can that be to do right?”
“Wrong to go to church! What do you mean? Wrong to pray with your fellow-men?”
“Perhaps the hour may come, ma'am, when I shall be able to pray with my fellow-men, even though the words they use seem addressed to a tyrant, not to the Father of Jesus Christ. But at present I can not. I might endure to hear Mr. Smith say evil things concerning God, but the evil things he says to God make me quite unable to pray, and I feel like a hypocrite!”
“Whatever you may think of Mr. Smith's doctrines, it is presumptuous to set yourself up as too good to go to church.”
“I most bear the reproach, ma'am. I can not consent to be a hypocrite in order to avoid being called one!”
Either Miss Fordyce had no answer to this, or did not choose to give any. She was not troubled that Andrew would not go to church, but offended at the unhesitating decision with which he set her counsel aside. Andrew made her a respectful bow, turned away, put on his bonnet, which he had held in his hand all the time, and passed through the garden gate.
“Who is the fellow?” asked George, partaking sympathetically of his companion's annoyance.
“He is Andrew Ingram, the son of a small farmer, one of my father's tenants. He and his brother work with their father on the farm. They are quite respectable people. Andrew is conceited, but has his good points. He imagines himself a poet, and indeed his work has merit. The worst of him is that he sets up for being better than other people.”
“Not an unusual fault with the self-educated!”