"'That's just the notion I had, when I first talked of our coming here,' said Shelldrake. 'Here we're alone and unhindered; and if the plan shouldn't happen to work well, (I don't see why it shouldn't, though,) no harm will be done. I've had a deal of hard work in my life, and I've been badgered and bullied so much by your strait-laced professors, that I'm glad to get away from the world for a spell, and talk and do rationally, without being laughed at.' "'Yes,' answered Hollins, 'and if we succeed, as I feel we shall, for I think I know the hearts of all of us here, this may be the commencement of a new _ee_poch for the world. We may become the turning-point between two dispensations: behind us everything false and unnatural,--before us everything true, beautiful, and good.' "'Ah,' sighed Miss Ringtop, 'it reminds me of Gamaliel J. Gawthrop's beautiful lines:-- "Unrobed man is lying hoary In the distance, gray and dead; There no wreaths of godless glory To his mist-like tresses wed, And the foot-fall of the Ages Reigns supreme, with noiseless tread."' "'I am willing to try the experiment,' said I, on being appealed to by Hollins; 'but don't you think we had better observe some kind of order, even in yielding everything to impulse? Shouldn't there be, at least, a platform, as the politicians call it,--an agreement by which we shall all be bound, and which we can afterwards exhibit as the basis of our success?' "He meditated a few moments, and then answered,-- "'I think not. It resembles too much the thing we are trying to overthrow. Can you bind a man's belief by making him sign certain articles of Faith? No: his thought will be free, in spite of it; and I would have Action--Life--as free as Thought. Our platform--to adopt your image--has but one plank: Truth. Let each only be true to himself: _be_ himself, _act_ himself, or herself, with the uttermost candor. We can all agree upon that.' "The agreement was accordingly made. And certainly no happier or more hopeful human beings went to bed in all New England that night.