"Yes, my child," said Mistress Margaret, "I know it is new and strange to you; but it was not to your grandfather or his forbears: to them, as to me, it is the plain meaning of the words. We Catholics are a simple folk. We hold that what our Saviour said simply He meant simply: as we do in the sacred mystery of His Body and Blood. To us, you know," she went on, smiling, with a hand on the girl's arm, "it seems as if you Protestants twisted the Word of God against all justice." Isabel smiled back at her; but she was puzzled. The point of view was new to her. And yet again in the garden, a few months later, as they sat out together on the lawn, the girl opened the same subject. "Mistress Margaret," she said, "I have been thinking a great deal; and it seems very plain when you talk. But you know our great divines could answer you, though I cannot. My father was no Papist; and Dr. Grindal and the Bishops are all wise men. How do you answer that?" The nun looked silently down at the grass a moment or two. "It is the old tale," she said at last, looking up; "we cannot believe that the babes and sucklings are as likely to be right in such matters as the wise and prudent--even more likely, if our Saviour's words are to be believed. Dear child, do you not see that our Lord came to save all men, and call all men into His Church; and that therefore He must have marked His Church in such a manner that the most ignorant may perceive it as easily as the most learned? Learning is very well, and it is the gift of God; but salvation and grace cannot depend upon it. It needs an architect to understand why Paul's Church is strong and beautiful, and what makes it so; but any child or foolish fellow can see that it is so." "I do not understand," said Isabel, wrinkling her forehead. "Why this--that you are as likely to know the Catholic Church when you see it, as Dr. Grindal or Dr. Freake, or your dear father himself. Only a divine can explain about it and understand it, but you and I are as fit to see it and walk into it, as any of them." "But then why are they not all Catholics?" asked Isabel, still bewildered. "Ah!" said the nun, softly, "God alone knows, who reads hearts and calls whom He will. But learning, at least, has nought to do with it."