He assented.  Once more she relapsed into thought, while he sat contemplating her profile.  She turned to him again with a tremulous smile.

“But isn’t a conviction that the good is predominant, that there is a purpose in the universe, a long way from the positive assertions in the Creeds?” she asked.  “I remember, when I went through what you would probably call disintegration, and which seemed to me enlightenment, that the Creeds were my first stumbling-blocks.  It seemed wrong to repeat them.”

“I am glad you spoke of this,” he replied gravely.  “I have arrived at many answers to that difficulty—­which did not give me the trouble I had anticipated.  In the first place, I am convinced that it was much more of a difficulty ten, twenty, thirty years ago than it is to-day.  That which I formerly thought was a radical tendency towards atrophy, the drift of the liberal party in my own Church and others, as well as that which I looked upon with some abhorrence as the free-thinking speculation of many modern writers, I have now come to see is reconstruction.  The results of this teaching of religion in modern terms are already becoming apparent, and some persons are already beginning to see that the Creeds express certain elemental truths in frankly archaic language.  All this should be explained in the churches and the Sunday schools,—­is, in fact, being explained in some, and also in books for popular reading by clergymen of my own Church, both here and in England.  We have got past the critical age.”

She followed him closely, but did not interrupt.

“I do not mean to say that the Creeds are not the sources of much misunderstanding, but in my opinion they do not constitute a sufficient excuse for any clergyman to abandon his Church on account of them.  Indeed there are many who interpret them by modern thought—­which is closer to the teachings of Christ than ancient thought—­whose honesty cannot be questioned.  Personally, I think that the Creeds either ought to be taken out of the service; or changed, or else there should be a note inserted in the service and catechism definitely permitting a liberal interpretation which is exactly what so many clergymen, candidly, do now.

“When I was ordained a deacon, and then a priest, I took vows which would appear to be literally conflicting.  Compelled to choose between these vows, I accept that as supreme which I made when I affirmed that I would teach nothing which I should be persuaded might not be concluded and affirmed by the Scripture.  The Creeds were derived from the Scripture —­not the Scripture from the Creeds.  As an individual among a body of Christians I am powerless to change either the ordinal vows or the Creeds, I am obliged to wait for the consensus of opinion.  But if, on the whole, I can satisfy my conscience in repeating the Creeds and reading the service, as other honest men are doing—­if I am convinced that I have an obvious work to do in that Church, it would be cowardly for me to abandon that work.”