Deity' does not quite coincide with the foundation already laid,
whosesoever else may?"

"You are assuming rather hastily."

"Perhaps I may prove also, some day or other. Do you think,
moreover, that the theory which he so boldly started, when his
nerves and his manners were relieved from the unwonted pressure by
Lady Jane and the ladies going upstairs, was part of the same old
foundation?"

"Which, then?"

"That, if a man does but believe a thing, he has a right to speak it
and act on it, right or wrong. Have you forgotten his vindication
of your friend, the radical voter, and his 'spirit of truth'?"

"What, the worthy who, when I canvassed him as the Liberal candidate
for ---, and promised to support complete freedom of religious
opinion, tested me by breaking out into such blasphemous ribaldry as
made me run out of the house, and then went and voted against me as
a bigot?"

"I mean him, of course. The Professor really seemed to admire the
man, as a more brave and conscientious hero than himself. I am not
squeamish, as you know; but I am afraid that I was quite rude to him
when he went as far as that."

"What-when you told him that you thought that, after all, the old
theory of the Divine Right of Kings was as plausible as the new