“You must have studied the Bible a great deal, Miss Minturn, to get such lovely thoughts about God,” she said, in an eager tone.

Katherine flushed, for she knew Prof.  Seabrook was listening, and felt that she had already said enough regarding her views.

“Yes, I am very fond of studying the Bible,” she simply returned.

“Papa,” continued Dorothy, turning to him, “how could you say that Miss Minturn’s idea of God is vague and visionary?”

“It certainly seems so to me, dear,” her father briefly returned.

“Well, it doesn’t to me,” was the positive rejoinder; “not half so—­so queer as to think of Him as a man, or three men all mixed up together in one, and able to be everywhere at once,” and there was a look of thoughtfulness in the girl’s large, blue eyes which betrayed a mind on the alert.

“I think we will not talk any more about that now,” said her father.  “You must be tired from sitting here so long, and ought to rest.”

“You know I never get tired in the Sunday class, papa,” cried Dorothy, and still clinging to Katherine, who had tried to release her hand, for she was anxious to escape further argument.  “And,” she added, “I want to ask Miss Minturn another question.”

“I think I will have to run away, dear,” Katherine interposed, “for it is almost tea time, you know.”

“Please—­please! haven’t you time to tell me just one thing more?”

“Yes, I have time for that, but—­” and she lifted a doubtful look to her principal.

“Papa, may I ask her?” pleaded the girl, intuitively realizing that her new friend feared his disapproval.

The man never refused his child anything in reason, and he could not now, although he felt secretly antagonistic, and his look was almost stern as he responded: 

“Very well, dear, if Miss Minturn will kindly have patience with you.”

“Well, then,” and Dorothy eagerly turned again to Katherine, “if God is Mind, Intelligence and Life, as you said, how can man be His image and likeness?”

For a moment Katherine was dismayed, in view of the depths involved in this query, and at a loss how to reply in a way to clearly convey the truth to this inquiring mind, while a slightly ironical smile curved the lips of the learned professor, as he said to himself: 

“This is a poser for the young woman.”

“You do not think the account of the creation of man as God’s image and likeness refers to this imperfect mortal or physical body, do you, Dorothy?” she inquired, after a moment of thought.

“Why, yes; I’ve always supposed it did.  I’ve thought that perhaps God made him perfect in the first place and then, somehow, He let him get all wrong.  I can’t see how or why, though I’ve heard ministers and other people say ‘it was for some wise purpose.’  It’s a great muddle, I think,” Dorothy concluded, with a sigh.

“No, God never let any of His children ‘get wrong.’  He could not, for ‘all His ways are perfect,’ you know.  The man of God’s creating is the spiritual image and likeness of Himself,” Katherine explained.