“Surely,” they said.
“And,” I went on, “I want something more of you. I have noticed that you all are very shy about talking of the club to outsiders. But it seems to me that it is worth while telling your thought and your truth, that you must not only seek, but share what you find.”
“You mean,” said Virginia, “that we should try to get converts, like the Catholics?”
“Yes,” I answered, “converts to seeking.”
“It is very hard,” Ruth said, “to talk to outsiders of these things. I can tell my mother. She understands. But we have made a language of our own at the club, and other people don’t understand it. When I begin to tell them, they ask: ‘What sort of language are you using?’”
“That is a pity,” I answered, “and yet we could hardly help it. Perhaps we should have tried to use other words.”
“No,” said Ruth, “I think it is a very beautiful language, and we must use it. But it makes it hard to tell others.”
“People don’t want to understand,” said Henry. “When you begin to tell them what it is about, they make up their minds they won’t understand such things. They set out with that idea.”
Marian said: “I often speak of certain things we discussed, just as the other day I was speaking of women’s professions and social life. But it is impossible to tell the whole idea. One would have to begin at the beginning.”
“Yes,” I answered, “it would be a whole course. So you have to content yourself with telling the unessential parts. But I hope that you will absorb this idea into your life and your actions, and then find new words in which to tell the same truth almost unconsciously, words that will be made clear to all through your own experience.