John was greatly moved by the whole simple, tragic story, but he spoke only on the last topic, for it seemed to him to dwarf all other sorrow. It roused his indignation, and he said it was a just and holy anger. He wondered how men, and especially mothers, could worship a God who was supposed to damn little children before they were born. He vowed that neither Moloch nor Baal, nor any pagan deity, had been so brutal. He was amazed that ministers believing such a doctrine dared to marry. What special right had they to believe their children would all be elect? And if there was a shadow of doubt on this subject, how awful was their responsibility! Nanna's scruples, he said, were the only possible outcome of a conscientious, unselfish soul believing the devilish doctrine. And he cried out with enthusiasm: "Nanna is to be honored! Oh, for a conscience as tender and void of offense toward God! I will go to Shetland and kiss the hem of her garment! She is a woman in ten thousand!" "Well, then," said David, softly, "I shall take comfort to her." "To think," said John, who was still moved by a holy anger, "to think that God should have created this beautiful world as a nursery for hell! that he should have made such a woman as Nanna to suckle devils! No, no, David!" he said, suddenly calming himself; "thee could never believe such things of thy God." "I was taught them early and late. I can say the Confession of Faith backward, I am sure." "Let no man-made creed impose itself on thee, David--enter into thee, and possess thee, and take the place of thy soul. The voice that spoke from Sinai and from Bethlehem is still speaking. And man's own soul is an oracle, if he will only listen to it--the inward, instant sense of a present God, and of his honorable, true, and only Son Christ Jesus." "I will listen, if God will speak." "Never thee mind catechisms and creeds and confessions. The Word of God was before them, and the Word will be the Word when catechisms and confessions are cast into the dusty museums of ancient things, with all the other shackles of the world in bondage. David, there is in every good man a spiritual center, answering to a higher spiritual center in the universe. All controversies come back to this." "I wish, John Priestly, that you could see Nanna, and speak comfort to her heart." "That must be thy message, David. And be sure that thee knows well the children's portion in the Scriptures. Thee must show Nanna that _theirs is the kingdom_. What we win through great tribulation they inherit through the love of the Father. _Theirs is the kingdom_; and there is no distinction of elect or non-elect, as I read the title."