‘What do you do?’
‘I decline to attend for the present.’
‘And you can give no reason for this?’
There was no reply.
‘Or for your refusal to proceed with the baptism?’
‘I have been christened.’
‘My dear young lady, it is well known that your christening was the work of your aunt, who did it unknown to your parents when she had you in her power, out of pure obstinacy to a church with which she was not in sympathy, taking you surreptitiously, and indefensibly, to the font of the Establishment; so that the rite meant and could mean nothing at all.... But I fear that your new position has brought you into contact with the Paedobaptists, that they have disturbed your old principles, and so induced you to believe in the validity of that trumpery ceremony!’
‘It seems sufficient.’
‘I will demolish the basis of that seeming in three minutes, give me but that time as a listener.’
‘I have no objection.’