When we so casually meet it is as distressing as it is amusing to me, to
know that the God I intuitively defend presents to you the image of the
curled and scented monster of the Assyrian sculpture.

He was never that to me, and the visualization of an imaginative child
is a remarkable thing. From the first, the word "God," spoken in the
comfortable (almost smug) atmosphere of the old Unitarian congregation,
took my breath and tranced me into a vision of a great flood of
vibrating light, and _only_ light.

I wonder if, in your childhood, some frightening picture in some old
book was not the thing that you are still fighting against? So that,
emancipated as you are, you are still a little afraid, and must
perforce--with a remainder of the brave swagger of youth--set up a
barrier of authorities to fight behind, and, quite unconsciously, you
are thus building yourself into a vault in which no flowers can
bloom--because you have sealed the high window of the imagination so
that the frightening God may not look in upon you--this same window
through which simple men get an illumination that saves their lives, and
in the light of which they communicate kindly, one with the other, their
faith and hopes?

I am impelled to say this to you, first, because of the responsibility
which rests upon you in your relation to young minds; and, second, I
like you and your eagerness and the zest for Truth that you transmit.

You are dedicated to the pursuit of Truth, and you afford us the
dramatic incidents of your pursuit.

Yet up to this moment it seems to me you are accepting Truth at