“Of course our Poet has the power to move people like that,” murmured Marian. “It’s genius, a gift of the gods.”
“He’s been able to do it without ever cheapening himself; there’s never any suggestion of that mawkishness we hear in vaudeville songs that implore us to write home to mother to-night! He takes the simplest theme and makes literature of it.”
Marian was thinking of her talk with the Poet at Mrs. Waring’s garden-party. Strange to say, it seemed more difficult to express her disdain of romance and poetry to this young man than it had been to the Poet. And yet he evidently accepted unquestioningly the Poet’s philosophy of life, which she had dismissed contemptuously, and in which, she assured herself, she did not believe to-day any more than she did a week ago. The incident of a pilgrim from Texas with a poem attached to his railway ticket had its touch of sentiment and pathos, but it did not weigh heavily against the testimony of experience which had proved in her own observation that life is perplexing and difficult, and that poetry and romance are only a lure and mesh to delude and betray the trustful.
“Poets have a good deal to fight against these days,” she said, wishing to state her dissent as kindly as possible. “The Bible is full of poetry, but it has lost its hold on the people; it’s like an outworn sun that no longer lights and warms the world. I wish it weren’t so; but unfortunately we’re all pretty helpless when it comes to the iron hoofs of the Time-Spirit.”
“Oh!” he exclaimed, sitting erect, “we mustn’t make the mistake of thinking the Time-Spirit a new invention. We’re lucky to live in the twentieth century when it goes on rubber heels;—when people are living poetry more and talking about it less. Why, the spirit of the Bible has just gone to work! I was writing an account of a new summer camp for children the day before I came up—one of those Sunday supplement pieces around a lot of pictures; and it occurred to me as I watched youngsters, who had never seen green grass before, having the time of their lives, that such philanthropies didn’t exist in the good old days when people dusted their Bibles oftener than they do now. There’s a difference between the Bible as a fetish and as a working plan for daily use. Preaching isn’t left to the men who stand up in pulpits in black coats on Sundays; there’s preaching in all the magazines and newspapers all the time. For example, my paper raises money every summer to send children into the country; and then starts another fund to buy them Christmas presents. The apostles themselves didn’t do much better than that!”
“Of course there are many agencies and a great deal of generosity,” replied Marian colorlessly. The young men she knew were not in the habit of speaking of the Bible or of religion in this fashion. Religion had never made any strong appeal to her and she had dabbled in philanthropy fitfully without enthusiasm. Fulton’s direct speech made some response necessary and she tried to reply with an equally frank confidence.
“I suppose I’m a sort of heathen; I don’t know what a pantheist is, but I think I must be one.”
“Oh, you can be a pantheist without being a heathen! There’s a natural religion that we all subscribe to, whether we’re conscious of it or not. There’s no use bothering about definitions or quarreling with anybody’s church or creed. We’re getting beyond that; it’s the thing we make of ourselves that counts; and when it comes to the matter of worship, I suppose every one who looks up at a blue sky like that, and knows it to be good, is performing a sort of ritual and saying a prayer.”
There was nothing in the breezy, exultant verses she had thrust into her sleeve to prepare her for such statements as these. While he spoke simply and half-smilingly, as though to minimize the seriousness of his statements, his utterances had an undeniable ring of sincerity. He was provokingly at ease—this dark young gentleman who had been cast by the waters upon this tranquil beach. He was not at all like young men who called upon her and made themselves agreeable by talking of the theater or country club dances or the best places to spend vacations. She could not recall that any one had ever spoken to her before of man’s aspirations in the terms employed by this newspaper reporter.
Marjorie, having prepared for the stabling of all the king’s horses and all the king’s men, announced her intention of contributing a wing to the château. This called for a conference in which they all participated. Then, when the addition had been planned in all soberness and the child had resumed her labors, Marian and Fred stared at the lake until the silence became oppressive. Marian spoke first, tossing the ball of conversation into a new direction.