It was so obviously superior to Christianity, it commended itself so cogently to the meanest intelligence, that the members of the "Inner Light," try how they might to exercise the tolerance which is universal to-day, could hardly refrain from a mild consciousness of superiority when they looked down upon other creeds. Thus the priests of the Order were not called "Fathers" or "Brethren," which implied a false anthropomorphic relationship to a supreme parent "God"; they were simply "Incandescents":--Incandescent Bernard, Incandescent Margaret, Incandescent Mansel, and so on. Again, in allowing women to officiate at the altar of the Supreme Incandescence, the doctrine of the Inner Light rose superior to Christianity. "Owing to Judaic tradition and influence," as his Incandescence Albernspiel had truly pointed out, "the Christian Church had never enjoyed the eminent advantage of women's ministration. Even the Greeks had been wiser than this. And thus much of an essential character in all true religion had always been absent from Christianity, owing to this proscription of feminine influence." (_The Doctrine of the Inner Light_, Vol. II., p. 1303.) There was only one Temple in England, at which all the faithful met once a year, and that was at Liverpool. It was hoped that other churches would be built sooner or later in other big centres, but meanwhile,--that is to say, pending the collecting of the necessary building fund,--all the faithful outside Liverpool were recommended to meet once a month at each other's houses, where one of the Incandescents would hold a service. The Incandescent for London was a pale and feverish looking little man, Gerald Tribe by name, with false teeth and large, bony red hands, who lived as a sort of non-paying guest at the house of Miss Mallowcoid, Mrs. Delarayne's elder sister, at Hampstead. It was a perfectly orderly arrangement, because, apart from the fact that he had his young wife with him, he was in any case such a learned and pure-minded young man, that, as Miss Mallowcoid declared, even if he had not been married, she would have regarded it as a privilege to live under the same roof with him. She admitted, of course, that his wife was so far beneath him as to present an almost insufferable objection to the arrangement; but Miss Mallowcoid regarded this creature as the trial and chastisement sent by the supreme Incandescence, to bring both her own and Gerald Tribe's inner light to ever greater prodigies of brilliance and power. Miss Mallowcoid, who had been responsible for her sister, Mrs. Delarayne's conversion to the Inner Light, was expected that afternoon, as were also Sir Joseph Bullion, and all the London faithful. Lord Henry had also reluctantly agreed to attend this one meeting after months of persuasion from Mrs. Delarayne.