"Not come yet?" cried the other, "Not come yet! Why, what is the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church but that? There you have one visible kingdom, gathered out of every nation and tongue and people, as the apostle said. I have a little estate in France, Master Norris, where I go sometimes; and there are folk in their wooden shoes, talking a different human tongue to me, but, thank God! the same divine one--of contrition and adoration and prayer. There we have the same mass, the same priesthood, the same blessed sacrament and the same Faith, as in my own little oratory at Stanfield. Go to Spain, Africa, Rome, India; wherever Christ is preached; there is the Church as it is here--the City of Peace. And as for you and your Church! with whom do you hold communion?" This stung Anthony, and he answered impulsively. "In Geneva and Frankfort, at least, there are folk who speak the same divine tongue, as you call it, as we do; they and we are agreed in matters of faith." "Indeed," said Mr. Burton sharply, "then what becomes of your Nationalism, and the varied temperaments that you told me God had made?" Anthony bit his lip; he had overshot his mark. But the other swept on; and as he talked began to step up and down the little room, in a kind of rhapsody. "Is it possible?" he cried, "that men should be so blind as to prefer the little divided companies they name National Churches--all confusion and denial--to that glorious kingdom that Christ bought with his own dear blood, and has built upon Peter, against which the gates of hell shall not prevail. Yes, I know it is a flattering and a pleasant thought that this little nation should have her own Church; and it is humbling and bitter that England should be called to submit to a foreign potentate in the affairs of faith--Nay, cry they like the Jews of old, not Christ but Barabbas--we will not have this Man to reign over us. And yet this is God's will and not that. Mark me, Mr. Norris, what you hope will never come to be--the Liar will not keep his word--you shall not have that National Church that you desire: as you have dealt, so will it be dealt to you: as you have rejected, so will you be rejected. England herself will cast you off: your religious folk will break into a hundred divisions. Even now your Puritans mock at your prelates--so soon! And if they do thus now, what will they do hereafter? You have cast away Authority, and authority shall forsake you. Behold your house is left unto you desolate." "Forgive me, Mr. Norris," he added after a pause, "if I have been discourteous, and have forgotten my manners; but--but I would, as the apostle said, that you were altogether as I am, except these bonds." CHAPTER IV A COUNTER-MARCH