"True," said Mr. Carleton,--"but only while they draw partially. No man can fight the battle of truth but in the whole panoply; and no man so armed can fight any other."
"What do you mean, sir?"
"I mean that the Bible is not a riddle, neither inconsistent with itself; but if you take off one leg of a pair of compasses the measuring power is gone."
"But Mr. Carleton, sir," said Mrs. Evelyn,--"do you think that reading the Bible is calculated to give one gloomy ideas of the future?"
"By no means," he said with one of those meaning-fraught smiles,--"but is it safe, Mrs. Evelyn, in such a matter, to venture a single grasp of hope without the direct warrant of God's word?"
"Well, sir?"
"Well, ma'am,--that says, 'the soul that sinneth, it shall die.'"
"That disposes of the whole matter comfortably at once," said Mr. Stackpole.
"But, sir," said Mrs. Evelyn,--"that doesn't stand alone--the Bible everywhere speaks of the fulness and freeness of Christ's salvation?"
"Full and free as it can possibly be," he answered with something of a sad expression of countenance;--"but, Mrs. Evelyn, never offered but with conditions."