In her turn she was silent, still gazing at him, her breath coming deeply, for she was greatly moved.

“Yes,” she said simply, “I can see now why divorce between us would be a sacrilege.  I felt it, John, but I couldn’t reason it out.  It is the consecration of the Spirit that justifies the union of the flesh.  For the Spirit, in that sense, does not deny the flesh.”

“That would be to deny life,” Hodder replied.

“I see.  Why was it all so hidden!” The exclamation was not addressed to him—­she was staring pensively into the fire.  But presently, with a swift movement, she turned to him.

“You will preach this, John,—­all of it!”

It was not a question, but the cry of a new and wider vision of his task.  Her face was transfigured.  And her voice, low and vibrating, expressed no doubts.  “Oh, I am proud of you!  And if they put you out and persecute you I shall always be proud, I shall never know why it was given me to have this, and to live.  Do you remember saying to me once that faith comes to us in some human form we love?  You are my faith.  And faith in you is my faith in humanity, and faith in God.”

Ere he could speak of his own faith in her, in mankind, by grace of which he had been lifted from the abyss, there came a knock at the door.  And even as they answered it a deeper knowledge filtered into their hearts.

Horace Bentley stood before them.  And the light from his face, that shone down upon them, was their benediction.

AFTERWORD

Although these pages have been published serially, it is with a feeling of reluctance that I send them out into the world, for better or worse, between the covers of a book.  They have been written with reverence, and the reading of the proofs has brought back to me vividly the long winters in which I pondered over the matter they contain, and wrote and rewrote the chapters.

I had not thought to add anything to them by way of an afterword.  Nothing could be farther from my mind than to pose as a theologian; and, were it not for one or two of the letters I have received, I should have supposed that no reader could have thought of making the accusation that I presumed to speak for any one except myself.  In a book of this kind, the setting forth of a personal view of religion is not only unavoidable, but necessary; since, if I wrote sincerely, Mr. Hodder’s solution must coincide with my own—­so far as I have been able to work one out.  Such as it is, it represents many years of experience and reflection.  And I can only crave the leniency of any trained theologian who may happen to peruse it.

No one realizes, perhaps, the incompleteness of the religious interpretations here presented more keenly than I. More significant, more vital elements of the truth are the rewards of a mind which searches and craves, especially in these days when the fruit of so many able minds lies on the shelves of library and bookshop.  Since the last chapter was written, many suggestions have come to me which I should like to have the time to develop for this volume.  But the nature of these elements is positive,—­I can think of nothing I should care to subtract.