"Now, I don't think it strange, Lucy, dear," the vicar said; "it's far more natural to me than the other. The wonderful power of the Church lies in this, _that her mysteries appeal to quite simple people whose minds are a blank on religious questions. They appeal to the simple instantly and triumphantly._ They feel the power of the Blessed Sacrament. And _only_ Catholicism can do this in full and satisfying measure. We find that over and over again. The jam-and-glory teas, the kiss-in-the-ring revivals, have a momentary and hysterical influence with the irreligious. But it doesn't last, there is no system or discipline, and above all, _there is no dignity_. Only priests realise thoroughly how the poorer and less-educated classes crave for the proper dignity and beauty of worship. It has always been so. It is the secret of the power that the Roman Church has over the minds of men." "Then why are there so many Salvationists and Dissenters?" Lucy asked. "For a multitude of reasons. A dislike to discipline chiefly. People don't go to church because the novelties of thirty or forty years ago have filtered down into the omnibuses and people who are naturally irreligious prefer to make a comfortable little code for themselves. The Church says you _must not_ do this or that; its rules are thoroughly well defined. Folk are afraid to come as near to God as the Church brings them. Their cry is always that the Church comes between them and God. Often that is a malevolent cry, and more often still it's pure ignorance. The silly people haven't an idea what they're talking about. It would be just as reasonable for me to say, 'I hate and abominate Nicaragua, which is a pernicious and soul-destroying place,' when I've never been nearer to Nicaragua than Penzance." "There is one thing that we do see," King continued in his slow, powerful way. "Whenever we have open-minded men or women come to church to pray and find help, they find it. Dozens and dozens of people have come to me after they have become members of the Church and said that they could not understand the anti-Church nonsense they themselves had joined in before. '_We never knew_,' that is the cry always." "The thunder's beginning!" Father Blantyre said suddenly, realising apparently that the talk was straying into channels somewhat alien to a young society lady presiding at afternoon tea. "Lucy, me dear, it's tired you'll be of sitting with three blathering old priests talking shop in a thunderstorm--there's a flash for ye!" A sheet of brilliant steel-blue had flashed into the room as he spoke, showing every detail of it clear and distinct as in some lurid day of the underworld. The books, the writing table, the faces of the three clergymen, and the tall silver crucifix between the candles, which had momentarily faded to a dull and muddy yellow, all made a sudden tableau which burned itself upon the retina. Then came darkness once more and the giant stammer of the thunder far overhead.