"But if one believes in the Word of God, is it not better to be the honest man contemned than the throned hypocrite?"
"If we find every fact of life at cross-purpose with Scripture, what then?"
"Perhaps you don't believe in the Bible?" Henry put it thus bluntly to him.
"I prefer to say that it does not convince me. It tells, for example, of a man who was guilty of a paltry fraud in attempting to cheat a small number of his fellows; and upon whom, in the very act, sudden destruction fell. He was struck down dead, we are told. Where to-day is that Power which meted out such swift and deadly punishment? Here, in this town, men lie and cheat with impunity, and on a scale which involves hundreds of innocent victims. The Divine vengeance slumbers. God—if there is a God—sleeps; or else looks on with supreme indifference to the sufferings of His creatures."
"It is all a great mystery, I confess," returned Henry, with something very like a sigh.
The anchor of faith, which had of late been dragging, seemed almost to have slipped, and he felt himself drifting out into dark and troubled waters. This was the young man who, less than an hour ago, was vowing to trounce the author of "Ashes" for his gloomy view of life. The thought had come to him that perhaps his very faith was a mere convention of early teaching. He sat ill at ease before his visitor, whose passionate outburst had left both without further speech. It was a strange conclusion of an irresponsible gossip on the art of literature. After looking for a minute or two at Henry's book-shelves, Mr. Puddephatt said abruptly:
"I am indebted to you for a most enjoyable hour, Mr. Charles, and hope we shall see more of each other in the future."
"I hope so too," answered Henry, at a loss for words, his brain in a whirl of distracting thought.
When the mysterious Mr. P. quitted the room, Henry felt that his lightly-chosen epithet was more suitable than ever. But it was less of the man he thought, as he now unconsciously imitated him in pacing his room, than of the ideas he had enunciated; these had instantly become detached from their originator and boiled up in Henry's mind with all the lees of youthful doubts and questionings that had been lying there. The mental ferment had a harassing effect on him. Almost for the first time in his life he felt a strange desire to turn inside out his spiritual nature and find what it consisted of. And the next instant the thought was madness to him.
"I said to him that we are told to love one another," he reflected, setting his teeth defiantly. "If we did, then evil would cease out of the world. So the religion which teaches this must be right. But we don't do so—he was right there—and if our natures are not capable of this love, what profits the advice? He's no fool; but the way seems very dark. I half wish he hadn't touched the subject."