“That has refreshed you, lad,” said the doctor, glancing at the grave face beside him, “and yet you look as though you had something on your mind.” “Father,” said Gabriel, vehemently, “I hate Archbishop Laud with my whole heart! Yet you said he was a good man!” “Indeed I believe him to be a very good man, but he hath more zeal than discretion, and forgets that ‘the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart.’ Dr. Laud will one day find that he is making a great mistake. He is trying with all his might to make folks better by outward observances, by making clean the cup and the platter; that is to put the cart before the horse. You must first make them pure within, or you will but breed up a generation of ceremonious hypocrites and Pharisees.” “It is because of the discourteous way he spoke to you, sir, that I hate him,” said Gabriel, fiercely. “Nay, hate him not; I fared much better than I should have done had I been a parson. They tell me that twenty clergy have been deprived of their livings, only for this refusal to bow. As for the Archbishop’s discourtesy, which makes him so much disliked by the gentry of the land, that is not altogether his fault, perhaps, for he had neither good birth nor good breeding. He said that ‘Knowledge puffeth up,’ and I was much minded to quote him the rest of the verse--‘but love buildeth up.’ Depend on it, my son, ’tis that love alone which can save our unhappy country in these difficult times.” “Will they still be difficult when I am a man?” asked Gabriel. “I fear they will,” said the doctor, gravely. “Therefore remember that you hate no man, howsoever his sayings and doings may offend you. Have your own faith, but see that you force it not on others, as is too much the custom; for Dr. Laud is wrong--compulsion never yet helped the good cause. What would you think of a physician who thought all men’s ailments were to be treated alike? Men’s souls are as different as their bodies, and their minds are cast in many moulds. The wise servant of Christ knows this, and seeks not to browbeat all men till they conform to one method. Never forget, lad, that your meat may be another man’s poison. There is only one infallible remedy, and as the proverb hath it, ‘_Amor vincit omnia!_” By this time they had reached the house of the first patient, and Gabriel was sent on with the groom to the neighbouring inn to order their noontide meal. When this had been discussed, and he had listened to the cheerful talk between his father and the landlord on the prospects of the crops, he had altogether forgotten Dr. Laud and his harsh words, and thought the world once more a pleasant place.