I don’t mind the exclamation of any old stager who drinks Madeira worth from two to six Bibles a bottle, and burns, according to his own premises, a dozen souls a year in the cigars with which he muddles his brains.  But as for the good and true and intelligent men whom we see all around us, laborious, self-denying, hopeful, helpful,—­men who know that the active mind of the century is tending more and more to the two poles, Rome and Reason, the sovereign church or the free soul, authority or personality, God in us or God in our masters, and that, though a man may by accident stand half-way between these two points, he must look one way or the other,—­I don’t believe they would take offence at anything I have reported of our late conversation.

But supposing any one do take offence at first sight, let him look over these notes again, and see whether he is quite sure he does not agree with most of these things that were said amongst us.  If he agrees with most of them, let him be patient with an opinion he does not accept, or an expression or illustration a little too vivacious.  I don’t know that I shall report any more conversations on these topics; but I do insist on the right to express a civil opinion on this class of subjects without giving offence, just when and where I please,—–­unless, as in the lecture-room, there is an implied contract to keep clear of doubtful matters.  You did n’t think a man could sit at a breakfast-table doing nothing but making puns every morning for a year or two, and never give a thought to the two thousand of his fellow-creatures who are passing into another state during every hour that he sits talking and laughing.  Of course, the one matter that a real human being cares for is what is going to become of them and of him.  And the plain truth is, that a good many people are saying one thing about it and believing another.

—­How do I know that?  Why, I have known and loved to talk with good people, all the way from Rome to Geneva in doctrine, as long as I can remember.  Besides, the real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men,—­from mothers most of all, who carry the key of our souls in their bosoms.  It is in their hearts that the “sentimental” religion some people are so fond of sneering at has its source.  The sentiment of love, the sentiment of maternity, the sentiment of the paramount obligation of the parent to the child as having called it into existence, enhanced just in proportion to the power and knowledge of the one and the weakness and ignorance of the other,—­these are the “sentiments” that have kept our soulless systems from driving men off to die in holes like those that riddle the sides of the hill opposite the Monastery of St. Saba, where the miserable victims of a falsely-interpreted religion starved and withered in their delusion.