answered Dorothea, reddening. Unlike Celia, she rarely blushed,
and only from high delight or anger. At this moment she felt angry
with the perverse Sir James. Why did he not pay attention to Celia,
and leave her to listen to Mr. Casaubon?--if that learned man would
only talk, instead of allowing himself to be talked to by Mr. Brooke,
who was just then informing him that the Reformation either meant
something or it did not, that he himself was a Protestant to the core,
but that Catholicism was a fact; and as to refusing an acre
of your ground for a Romanist chapel, all men needed the bridle
of religion, which, properly speaking, was the dread of a Hereafter.

"I made a great study of theology at one time," said Mr. Brooke,
as if to explain the insight just manifested. "I know something
of all schools. I knew Wilberforce in his best days. Do you
know Wilberforce?"

Mr. Casaubon said, "No."

"Well, Wilberforce was perhaps not enough of a thinker; but if I
went into Parliament, as I have been asked to do, I should sit on
the independent bench, as Wilberforce did, and work at philanthropy."

Mr. Casaubon bowed, and observed that it was a wide field.

"Yes," said Mr. Brooke, with an easy smile, "but I have documents.
I began a long while ago to collect documents. They want arranging,
but when a question has struck me, I have written to somebody and got
an answer. I have documents at my back. But now, how do you arrange
your documents?"