"The walk will do you good. If you do this for me, Uncle John—"
"My dear Tom, I am, as you say, not feeling very well this morning, but—"
He looked at his nephew, and seeing that he was suffering, he said:—
"I know what these scruples of conscience are; they are worse than physical suffering."
But before he decided to go with his nephew to seek the sinners out, he could not help reading him a little lecture.
"I don't feel as sure as you do that a sin has been committed, but admitting that a sin has been committed, I think you ought to admit that you set your face against the pleasure of these poor people too resolutely."
"Pleasure," said Father Tom. "Drinking and dancing, hugging and kissing each other about the lanes."
"You said dancing—now, I can see no harm in it."
"There is no harm in dancing, but it leads to harm. If they only went back with their parents after the dance, but they linger in the lanes."
"It was raining the other night, and I felt sorry, and I said, 'Well, the boys and girls will have to stop at home to-night, there will be no courting to-night.' If you do not let them walk about the lanes and make their own marriages, they marry for money. These walks at eventide represent all the aspiration that may come into their lives. After they get married, the work of the world grinds all the poetry out of them."