“It is not open to Me!”
“I say it is open to You. And more—I enjoin, I command, you to dismiss from your mind all merely human obstacles and discouragements. They are beneath the notice of a man who feels himself called to the priesthood. Give me your hand, Romayne! Does your conscience tell you that you are that man?”
Romayne started to his feet, shaken to the soul by the solemnity of the appeal.
“I can’t dismiss the obstacles that surround me!” he cried, passionately. “To a man in my position, your advice is absolutely useless. The ties that bind me are beyond the limit of a priest’s sympathies.”
“Nothing is beyond the limit of a priest’s sympathies.”
“Father Benwell, I am married!”
Father Benwell folded his arms over his breast—looked with immovable resolution straight in Romayne’s face—and struck the blow which he had been meditating for months past.
“Rouse your courage,” he said sternly. “You are no more married than I am.” [ [!-- H2 anchor --] ]