Elkhorn did not like that. But then Robert didn’t wish him to like it, as he objected to having Judge Elkhorn come into the family at all. For he considered that Elkhorn had roots of character which rendered liberty for him, an unattainable glory. Because his progenitors had been through so much fighting and persecuting in trying to obtain liberty for their _own_ consciences and for Calvinism, that, though the tendency to persecute and fight remained with Elkhorn, liberty was neither yet obtained by him for himself, nor was it by him permitted to others. But this was exactly what Judge Elkhorn did not realize about himself. He figured as a liberty league man; but of late was beginning to realize it is a mighty acquisition to really be in league with liberty.... Meanwhile, Daniel liked Judge Elkhorn for many reasons. For though Judge Elkhorn got as excited over his negations as his progenitors had gotten over their affirmations of immortality, and though he became irascible at the suggestion that there was a realm of life beyond the ken of those senses called common; and though he got very angry with people who insisted on a knowledge of “the unseen world,” “invisible powers,” and the theory of a moral accountability beyond the grave, yet Daniel liked him, as a make-weight against the top-lofty theories of people who lived more in the unseen world than in the seen. And Daniel knew himself to be one of these last-mentioned people. And, too, Daniel knew the peculiar fact about Robert was, he at this time knew a terrifying amount about the unseen world, and was receiving as much from the psychical realm as he could support without becoming a maniac. And Daniel knew Robert did not relish having Elkhorn come into the family; for Elkhorn’s prowess consisted in trying to annihilate the popular and private reverence which the people of this nation have for their several partial-statements of religious truth. Meanwhile Robert knew it had never been Daniel’s way to say, “We—‘us and you’—will chum together against the rest of the world. We have uttered the last word.” But Robert also knew that the fact that Elkhorn was on the warpath against almost everything, had but caused Daniel to think his presence in the family might act as an antidote against any tendency to any form of unity which, when based on indolent, ignorant acquiescence, results in not unity, but _nullity_. Daniel comprehended the crisis which Robert was facing. Poor Robert, who had been singled out from the Daksha family by the not flattering title, “Robert le Diable.” Not that he was so really wicked, but because the singular goodness of his style of wickedness made the excessive wickedness of some good people’s goodness look very wicked, indeed.