"I'm sure I hope so. I have no possible reason to doubt it as to the two or three whom I have seen,--nor indeed as to all the rest whom I have not seen." "They are so much respected everywhere as good and pious men!" "I do not doubt it. Nothing tends so much to respect as a good income. But they may be excellent men without being excellent bishops. I find no fault with them, but much with the system by which they are controlled. Is it probable that a man should be fitted to select guides for other men's souls because he has succeeded by infinite labour in his vocation in becoming the leader of a majority in the House of Commons?" "Indeed, no," said Lady Carbury, who did not in the least understand the nature of the question put to her. "And when you've got your bishop, is it likely that a man should be able to do his duty in that capacity who has no power of his own to decide whether a clergyman under him is or is not fit for his duty?" "Hardly, indeed." "The English people, or some of them,--that some being the richest, and, at present, the most powerful,--like to play at having a Church, though there is not sufficient faith in them to submit to the control of a Church." "Do you think men should be controlled by clergymen, Mr. Barham?" "In matters of faith I do; and so, I suppose, do you; at least you make that profession. You declare it to be your duty to submit yourself to your spiritual pastors and masters." "That, I thought, was for children," said Lady Carbury. "The clergyman, in the catechism, says, 'My good child.'" "It is what you were taught as a child before you had made profession of your faith to a bishop, in order that you might know your duty when you had ceased to be a child. I quite agree, however, that the matter, as viewed by your Church, is childish altogether, and intended only for children. As a rule, adults with you want no religion." "I am afraid that is true of a great many." "It is marvellous to me that, when a man thinks of it, he should not be driven by very fear to the comforts of a safer faith,--unless, indeed, he enjoy the security of absolute infidelity." "That is worse than anything," said Lady Carbury with a sigh and a shudder. "I don't know that it is worse than a belief which is no belief," said the priest with energy;--"than a creed which sits so easily on a man that he does not even know what it contains, and never asks himself as he repeats it, whether it be to him credible or incredible." "That is very bad," said Lady Carbury. "We're getting too deep, I think," said Roger, putting down the book which he had in vain been trying to read.