Here was an ideal relation of things, or what should have been an ideal one. What could have been finer than that there should have come into a growing town in a growing region a stalwart, almost fanatical builder-up of faith, who should find a fitting partner in the daughter of the chief man of the locality, and that from the union so buttressed all around should come great results? There was but one obstacle in the way of this perfect combination, and the obstacle was in the woman. It is astonishing how women will nibble at apples and learn things, from Eve down! This particular young woman had graduated from one of the most cleverly conducted of Eastern colleges for girls, and she had views. Not only did she have views, but she had views in the face of her religious teacher, of the man whom she respected for his earnestness and loved for himself. They were intensely happy for a while after their engagement--as becomes strong souls getting close together in such relationship--but with nearer relationship came necessarily more vehement and unguarded interchange of thought, and--sad the day!--they differed seriously, upon a matter of belief. A part of the belief of John Elwell, the preacher, was an implicit confidence in the manifestation at times of what we call a "special providence." One of the ideas of the young woman, deeply religious though she was, was an utter disbelief in this same thing--that is, a disbelief that God sometimes makes an exception, and, instead of working through the laws of the Nature which He has instituted, produces a direct result having the quality of what we are accustomed to call a miracle. The two discussed the matter together very often after they came close together, as lovers may. The first time they debated there came a little wedge between them as thin as tissue paper abraded to an end. Next time the wedge grew larger, and where it ended there was a cleft reaching down to anywhere. The third time there was a split broad and well defined, and the engagement was broken. "My dear, I do believe in special providences; I do believe that earnest prayer will bring results in certain cases, justifiable in themselves." "I do not." "Why?" "Because I believe that the whole thing--and I am only a girl talking, I don't know what you call it--is just a belief and taken on trust. What would you think of going down to the mill there and praying the miller to make one bag of flour coarse in the midst of all his business? The miller is giving us bread for our physical life, and he knows best how to do it, at least as compared with the rest of us. I know that this is all a poor simile, a poor comparison, but I can't help it."