"Atheism was most unfashionable when those verses were written," he remarked. "Any other 'ism' was popular enough, but Atheism sounded ugly. Besides, I was only a boy then. Perhaps I had some imagination left. It is a gift which one loses in later life." "But religion is not dependent upon imagination." "Wholly. Religion is an effort of imagination and, therefore, is more or less a matter of disposition. That is one of its chief absurdities. Women and sensitive boys are easiest affected by it. Men of sturdy common-sense, men with brains and the knowledge how to use them, are every day bursting the trammels of an effete orthodoxy." "And what can their common-sense and their brains give them in its place?" I asked. "I cannot conceive any practical religion without orthodoxy." "A little measure of philosophy. It is all they want. Only the faint-hearted, who have not the courage to contemplate physical annihilation, console themselves by building up a hysterical faith in an impossible hereafter. There is no hereafter." "A horrible creed!" I exclaimed. "By no means. Let men devote half the time and the efforts that they devote to this phantasy of religion to schooling themselves in philosophic thought, and they will learn to contemplate it unmoved. To recognise that the end of life is inevitable is to rob it of most of its terrors, save to cowards. The man who wastes a tissue of his body in regretting what he cannot prevent is a fool. Annihilation is a more comfortable doctrine and a more reasonable one, too. Don't you agree with me, boy?" "No; not with a single word!" I cried, growing hot and a little angry, for I could see that he was only half in earnest and I had no fancy to be made a butt of. "Imagination is not the groundwork of religion; common-sense is. Why----" "Oh, spare me the stock arguments!" he broke in, with a slight shudder. "Keep your religion and hug it as close as you like, if you find it any comfort to you. Where have you been to school?" "Nowhere," I answered. "I have read with Mr. Sands, the curate of Rothland." He laughed softly to himself, as though the idea amused him, looking at me all the time as though I were some sort of natural curiosity. "Fond of reading, are you?" he asked abruptly. "Yes. Fonder than I am of anything else." "And your books--where do they come from?" "Wherever I can get any. From the library at Mellborough, or from Mr. Sands, most of them." He laughed again and repeated my words, as though amused. "No wonder you're behind the times," he remarked. "Now, shall I lend you some books?" I shook my head feebly, for I was longing to accept his offer. "I'm afraid your sort of books would not suit me," I said. "I don't want to be converted to your way of thinking. It seems to me that there is such a thing as overtraining of the mind." "So you look upon me as a sort of Mephistopheles, eh? Well, I've no ambition to make a convert of you. To be a pessimist is to be----"