"I thought so too, but perhaps I was wrong; I don't know. All I know is that this new feeling is stronger than any feeling I ever had before; and that I can not give up my religion, whatever it may cost me." "I will not marry a woman who believes in the old faith." "And I will not marry a man who does not." Alan's voice grew hard. "I don't believe you ever loved me," he complained. "I don't know. I thought I did; but perhaps I knew as little about love as you know about religion. Perhaps I shall find a real love some day which will be as different from my friendship for you as this new knowledge is different from the religion that Cousin Maria taught me. I'm very sorry, but I can never marry you now." "You would have given up your religion fast enough if you had really cared for me," sneered Tremaine. Elisabeth pondered for a moment, with the old contraction of her eyebrows. "I don't think so, because, as I told you before, it isn't really my doing at all. It isn't that I won't give up my religion--it is my religion that won't give up me. Supposing that a blind man wanted to marry me on condition that I would believe, as he did, that the world is dark: I couldn't believe it, however much I loved him. You can't not know what you have once known, and you can't not have seen what you have seen, however much you may wish to do so, or however much other people may wish it." "You are a regular woman, in spite of all your cleverness, and I was a fool to imagine that you would prove more intelligent in the long run than the rest of your conventional and superstitious sex." "Please forgive me for hurting you," besought Elisabeth. "It is not only that you have hurt me, but I am so disappointed in you; you seemed so different from other women, and now I find the difference was merely a surface one." "I am so sorry," Elisabeth still pleaded. Tremaine laughed bitterly. "You are disappointed in yourself, I should imagine. You posed as being so broad and modern and enlightened, and yet you have found worn-out dogmas and hackneyed creeds too strong for you." Elisabeth smiled to herself. "No; but I have found the Christ," she answered softly. CHAPTER IX FELICIA FINDS HAPPINESS Give me that peak of cloud which fills The sunset with its gorgeous form, Instead of these familiar hills That shield me from the storm.