“And what is the upshot of all this reply?” interrupted the patriarch shrugging his shoulders.

“That my father found himself compelled to conclude a peace, and that—­ but read on.—­That as a wise man he was forced to ally himself with the foe.”

“The foe to whom he yielded more readily and paid much greater honor than became him as a Christian!—­Does not this discourse convey the idea that the joys of Paradise solely and exclusively await our damned and blood-thirsty oppressors?—­And the Moslem Paradise!  What is it but a gulf of iniquity, in which they are to wallow in sensual delight?  The false prophet invented it to tempt his followers to force his lying creed, by might of arms and in mad contempt of death, on nation after nation.  Our Lord, the Word made flesh, came down on earth to win hearts and souls by the persuasive power of the living truth, one and eternal, which emanates from Him as light proceeds from the sun; this Mohammed, on the contrary, is a sword made flesh!  For me, then, there is no choice but to submit to superior strength; but I can still hate and loathe their accursed and soul-destroying superstition.—­And so I do, and so I shall, to the last throb of this old heart, which only longs for rest, the sooner the better....

“But you?  And your father?  Verily, verily, the man who, even for an instant, ceases to hate unbelief or false doctrine has sinned for his whole life on this side of the grave and beyond it; sinned against the only true and saving faith and its divine Founder.  Blasphemous and flattering praise of the piety and moderation of our foes, the very antichrist incarnate, who kill both body and soul.—­With these your father fouled his heart and tongue. . .”

“Fouled?” cried Orion and the blood tingled in his cheeks.  “He kept his heart and tongue alike pure and honorable; never did a false word pass his lips.  Justice, justice to all, even to his enemies, was the ruling principle, the guiding clue of his blameless life; and the noblest of the heathen Greeks admired the man who could so far triumph over himself as to recognize what was fine and good in a foe.”

“And they were right,” replied the patriarch, “for they were not yet acquainted with truth.  In a worldly sense, even now, each of us may aim at such magnanimity; but the man who forgives those who tamper with the sacred truth, which is the bread, meat, and wine of the Christian’s soul, sins against that truth; and, if he is a leader of men, he draws on those who look up to him, and who are only too ready to follow his example, into everlasting fire.  Where your father ought to have been a recalcitrant though conquered enemy, he became an ally; nay, so far as the leader of the infidels was concerned, a friend—­how many tears it cost me!  And our hapless people were forced to see this attitude of their chief, and imitated it.—­Forgive their seducer, Merciful God!—­ forming their conduct on his.  Thousands fell away from our