We do not know, however, whether old Jerry ever adopted Khalid's idea. He himself is an Oriental in this sense; and the business is good enough to keep up, so long as Khalid comes. He is supremely content. Indeed, Shakib asseverates in round Arabic, that the old man of the cellar got a good portion of Khalid's balance, while balancing Khalid's mind. Nay, firing it with free-thought literature. Are we then to consider this cellar as Khalid's source of spiritual illumination? And is this genial old heretic an American avatar of the monk Bohaira? For Khalid is gradually becoming a man of ideas and crotchets. He is beginning to see a purpose in all his literary and spiritual rambles. His mental nebulosity is resolving itself into something concrete, which shall weigh upon him for a while and propel him in the direction of Atheism and Demagogy. For old Jerry once visits Khalid in his cellar, and after partaking of a dish of _mojadderah_, takes him to a political meeting to hear the popular orators of the day. And in this is ineffable joy for Khalid. Like every young mind he is spellbound by one of those masters of spread-eagle oratory, and for some time he does not miss a single political meeting in his district. We even see him among the crowd before the corner groggery, cheering one of the political spouters of the day. And once he accompanies Jerry to the Temple of Atheism to behold its high Priest and hear him chant halleluiah to the Nebular Hypothesis. This is wonderful. How easy it is to dereligionise the human race and banish God from the Universe! But after the High Priest had done this, after he had proven to the satisfaction of every atheist that God is a myth, old Jerry turns around and gives Khalid this warning: "Don't believe all he says, for I know that atheist well. He is as eloquent as he is insincere." And so are all atheists. For at bottom, atheism is either a fad or a trade or a fatuity. And whether the one or the other, it is a sham more pernicious than the worst. To the young mind, it is a shibboleth of cheap culture; to the shrewd and calculating mind, to such orators as Khalid heard, it is a trade most remunerative; and to the scientists, or rather monists, it is the aliment with which they nourish the perversity of their preconceptions. Second-hand Jerry did not say these things to our young philosopher; for had he done so, Khalid, now become edacious, would not have experienced those dyspeptic pangs which almost crushed the soul-fetus in him. For we are told that he is as sedulous in attending these atheistic lectures as he is in flocking with his fellow citizens to hear and cheer the idols of the stump. Once he took Shakib to the Temple of Atheism, but the Poet seems to prefer his _Al-Mutanabby_. In relating of Khalid's waywardness he says: