To them a narrow, grim old Presbyterian--were he but honest and earnest according to his inherited brain and intelligence--might, some time, a year or ten million years from now, be walking arm and arm along the sidewalks of some glorious street of some New Jerusalem with the Jesuit of to-day, honest and earnest according to his brain and his intelligence.

This is not reasoning.

Was it a bad creed?
They were not afraid of old age as it came nearer, hour by hour and day by day, these friends of mine.

They had pondered of it much, of course, for they were thoughtful people, and they had talked of it doubtless many times, for there was little of which they thought that the two did not reveal to each other in plain words; but they were not troubled over the outlook.

They seemed to realize that the flower is no greater than what follows, that fruit is the sequel of all fragrance, and that to those who reason rightly there is no difference in the income of what is good in all the seasons of human being.