"Why, Doctor," replied Richling, with sincere amiability, "you're the man of all men I should have picked out to prove the contrary." "No, Richling, no. I wasn't fit, and God took her." In accordance with Dr. Sevier's request Richling essayed to lift the mind of the baker's wife, in the matter of her husband's affliction, to that plane of conviction where facts, and not feelings, should become her motive; and when he had talked until his head reeled, as though he had been blowing a fire, and she would not blaze for all his blowing--would be governed only by a stupid sentimentality; and when at length she suddenly flashed up in silly anger and accused him of interested motives; and when he had demanded instant retraction or release from her employment; and when she humbly and affectionately apologized, and was still as deep as ever in hopeless, clinging sentimentalisms, repeating the dictums of her simple and ignorant German neighbors and intimates, and calling them in to argue with him, the feeling that the Doctor's exhortation had for the moment driven away came back with more force than ever, and he could only turn again to his ovens and account-books with a feeling of annihilation. "Where am I? What am I?" Silence was the only answer. The separation that had once been so sharp a pain had ceased to cut, and was bearing down upon him now with that dull, grinding weight that does the damage in us. Presently came another development: the lack of money, that did no harm while it was merely kept in the mind, settled down upon the heart. "It may be a bad thing to love, but it's a good thing to have," he said, one day, to the little rector, as this friend stood by him at a corner of the high desk where Richling was posting his ledger. "But not to seek," said the rector. Richling posted an item and shook his head doubtingly. "That depends, I should say, on how much one seeks it, and how much of it he seeks." "No," insisted the clergyman. Richling bent a look of inquiry upon him, and he added:-- "The principle is bad, and you know it, Richling. 'Seek ye first'--you know the text, and the assurance that follows with it--'all these things shall be added'"-- "Oh, yes; but still"-- "'But still!'" exclaimed the little preacher; "why must everybody say 'but still'? Don't you see that that 'but still' is the refusal of Christians to practise Christianity?" Richling looked, but said nothing; and his friend hoped the word had taken effect. But Richling was too deeply bitten to be cured by one or two good sayings. After a moment he said:-- "I used to wonder to see nearly everybody struggling to be rich, but I don't now. I don't justify it, but I understand it. It's flight from oblivion. It's the natural longing to be seen and felt." "Why isn't it enough to be felt?" asked the other. "Here, you make bread and sell it. A thousand people eat it from your hand every day. Isn't that something?"