"It is still great and beautiful," said Lothair, but rather in a tone of
inquiry than decision.

"But the cause of its greatness and its beauty no longer exists. It
became great and beautiful because it believed in God."

"But faith is not extinct?" said Lothair.

"It exists in the Church," replied the cardinal, with decision. "All
without that pale is practical atheism."

"It seems to me that a sense of duty is natural to man," said Lothair,
"and that there can be no satisfaction in life without attempting to
fulfil it."

"Noble words, my dear young friend; noble and true. And the highest
duty of man, especially in this age, is to vindicate the principles of
religion, without which the world must soon become a scene of universal
desolation."

"I wonder if England will ever again be a religious country?" said
Lothair, musingly.

"I pray for that daily," said the cardinal; and he invited his companion
to seat himself on the trunk of an oak that had been lying there since
the autumn fall. A slight hectic flame played over the pale and
attenuated countenance of the cardinal; he seemed for a moment in deep
thought; and then, in a voice distinct yet somewhat hushed, and at
first rather faltering, he said: "I know not a grander, or a nobler
career, for a young man of talents and position in this age, than to be