"I didn't mean that," said Miss Essie, lowering her crest. "But I mean that everybody can't be good after your strict way."
"I am not standing up for myself, you know," said he pleasantly, "nor denying that you have described me right; but what a follower of Christ ought to be, is no more rigid than sunlight—or than the wings of angels. Yet both sun and angels 'always do his commandment' who made them both."
"Oh people can't be sunlight—nor angels neither, in this world. You're
Utopian! That's what I said."
"They can be 'burning and shining lights,'" said Mr. Linden. "Miss
Essie, will you gainsay the Bible? Why can they not?"
"They can be—but I suppose they aren't obliged to be; or what is to become of us all?" said Miss Essie, half seriously half defiantly.
"That will depend upon whom we follow," he answered gravely.
"Well now, Mr. Linden, how many people in the world are 'followers' in the way you have described them?—and are all the rest going to destruction? Take the people in this room now, for instance,—boys and all here's twenty of us perhaps. How many do you suppose are here of your way of 'following'? You're one—who's another? Stand off there, and see whom you can get to join you!"
"Stand off and say with Moses—'who is on the Lord's side?'—there would be several, Miss Essie."
"Well count up," said Miss Essie. "I suppose they have no objection to shew themselves. You are one—who's another?"
"I am another," said Faith, rising and setting down her ice cream.