The young man restrained himself with difficulty. "Who has given you the right, father," he cried at last, "who has given you the right of accusing me of ignoble inclinations? Because I must do what must be done in this world to restrain the insolence of the base, am _I_ therefore base? There are different ways of fighting against the spirit of evil. Yours is the way of peace, because you have to deal with men in the aggregate. I stand opposed to a single man, and know what I have to do." "_Thou_ canst not change him," the old man cried angrily: "wilt thou tread God's ordinances under thy feet? He is no son of mine who raises his hand against his brother. I forbid the meeting in the strength of my priestly and paternal power. Beware how you brave it." "So you cast me from your house," said Clement gloomily. The mother, who had burst into tears, arose, and rushed towards her son. "Mother," he said sternly, "I am a man, and may not be false to myself." He approached the door, and glanced over towards Mary, who sought him sorrowfully with her great blind eyes. His mother followed him; her sobs choked her voice. "Do not retain him, wife," cried the old man; "he is no longer a child of ours if he be not a child of God. Let him go whither he will; he is dead to us." Mary heard the door shut, and the mother fall to the ground with a cry from her inmost mother's heart. Then the palsied feeling which had kept her seated went from her. She arose, went to the door, and with a powerful effort bore the fainting woman to her bed. The old man stood by the window and spoke not a word; his clasped hands trembled violently. A quarter of an hour later, some one knocked at the door of Clement's room. He opened it, and Mary stood before him. The room was in confusion. She struck her foot against his travelling trunk, and said sorrowfully, "What are you going to do, Clement?" Then his rigid grief gave way; he seized her hands, and pressed his eyes, in which the hot tears stood, against them. "I _must_ do it," he said; "I have long felt that I have lost his love; perhaps he will feel, when I am far away from him, that I have never ceased to be his son." She raised him up. "Do not weep so, or I shall never have the strength to utter what I _must_ say. Your mother would say it, did your father not forbid her. The sound of his voice told me how hard it was for him to be so stern; but thus he will remain. I know him well. He believes that his sternness is a duty to God, to make him offer up his own heart as a sacrifice." "And do _you_ think that it is required of him?"