“But, if I find it impossible to believe all you believe, Mary, surely you would not punish me for having the sincerity to tell you the truth, and the whole truth.”

“No, indeed, Roswell,” answered the honest girl, gently, not to say tenderly.  “Nothing has given me a better opinion of your principles, Roswell—­a higher notion of what your upright and frank character really is, than the manly way in which you have admitted the justice of my suspicions of your want of faith—­of faith, as I consider faith can alone exist.  This fair dealing has made me honour you, and esteem you, in addition to the more girlish attachment that I do not wish to conceal from you, at least, I have so long felt.”

“Blessed Mary!” exclaimed Roswell Gardiner, almost ready to fall down on his knees and worship the pretty enthusiast, who sat at his side, with a countenance in which intense interest in his welfare was beaming from two of the softest and sweetest blue eyes that maiden ever bent on a youth in modest tenderness, whatever disposition he might be in to accept her God as his God.  “How can one so kind in all other respects, prove so cruel in this one particular!”

“Because that one particular, as you term it, Roswell, is all in all to her,” answered the girl, with a face that was now flushed with feeling.  “I must answer you as Joshua told the Israelites of old—­’Choose you, this day, whom you will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served, that were on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell:  but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.’”

“Do you class me with the idolaters and pagans of Palestine?” demanded Gardiner, reproachfully.

“You have said it, Roswell.  It is not I, but yourself, who have thus classed you.  You worship your reason, instead of the one true and living God.  This is idolatry of the worst character, since the idol is never seen by the devotee, and he does not know of its existence.”

“You consider it then idolatry for one to use those gifts which he has received from his Maker, and to treat the most important of all subjects, as a rational being, instead of receiving a creed blindly, and without thought?”

“If what you call thought could better the matter; if it were sufficient to comprehend and master this subject, there might be force in what you say.  But what is this boasted reason, after all?  It is not sufficient to explain a single mystery of the creation, though there are thousands.  I know there are, nay there must be, a variety of opinions among those who look to their reasons, instead of accepting the doctrine of revelation, for the character of Christ; but I believe all, who are not open infidels, admit that the atonement of his death was sufficient for the salvation of men:  now, can you explain this part of the theory of our religion any more than you can explain the divine nature of the Redeemer?