He began to pace the floor as he was wont to do when he prepared a
sermon.

"Here we have a flagrant example of what is nothing less than spiritual
miscegenation--that's it!--why didn't I think of that phrase
before--spiritual miscegenation. A rattle-brained boy, with the
connivance of a common magistrate, effects a certain kind of alliance
with a person inferior to him in every point of view--birth, breeding,
station, culture, wealth--a person, moreover, who will doubtless be glad
to relinquish her so-called rights for a sum of money. Can that, I ask
you, be called a _marriage?_ Can we suppose an all-wise God to have
joined two natures so ill-adapted, so mutually exclusive, so repellent
to each other after that first glamour is past. Really, such a
supposition is not only puerile but irreverent. It is the conventional
supposition, I grant, and theoretically, the unvarying supposition of
the Church; but God has given us reasoning powers to use fearlessly--not
to be kept superstitiously in the shackles of any tradition whatsoever.
Why, the very Church itself from its founding is an example of the
wisdom of violating tradition when it shall seem meet--it has always had
to do this."

"I see, Allan--every case must be judged by itself; every marriage
requires a special ruling--"

"Well--er--exactly--only don't get to fancying that you could solve
these problems. It's difficult enough for a priest."

"Oh, I'm positive a mere woman couldn't grapple with them--she hasn't
the mind to! All she is capable of is to choose who shall think for