He had always thought that curate a very silly person.

He thanked his God that he was not such a man, and he thought that he might trust Phyllis to understand the difference between the position which he assumed and the posturing of the silly curate.
His knowledge of her powers of discrimination was not at fault.

Phyllis never for a moment thought of him as posturing.

She did him more than justice.

She regarded him as terribly in earnest; no man unless one who was terribly in earnest could have written that book--a book which she felt was bound to alienate from him all the people who had previously honored him and delighted to listen to his preaching.