wealthy parishioners is often a touching lesson in charity to the
thoughtful observer who stands outside the fold.

For how could they obtain money to convert the heathen, unless this
sweet cloak of charity were cast over the sins of the liberal rich?
Christ is crucified by the fashionable clergymen to-day more cruelly
than he was by the Jews of old.

Senator Cheney was not a church member, and he seldom attended
service. This was a matter of great solicitude to his wife and
daughter. The Baroness felt it to be a mistake on the part of
Senator Cheney, and even Judge Lawrence, who adored his son-in-law,
regretted the young man's indifference to things spiritual. But with
all Preston Cheney's worldly ambitions and weaknesses, there was a
vein of sincerity in his nature which forbade his feigning a faith he
did not feel; and the daily lives of the three feminine members of
his family were so in disaccord with his views of religion that he
felt no incentive to follow in their footsteps. Judge Lawrence he
knew to be an honest, loyal-hearted, God and humanity loving man. "A
true Christian by nature and education," he said of his father-in-
law, "but I am not born with his tendency to religious observance,
and I see less and less in the churches to lead me into the fold. It
seems to me that these religious institutions are getting to be vast
monopolistic corporations like the railroads and oil trusts, and the
like. I see very little of the spirit of Christ in orthodox people
to-day."

Meanwhile Senator Cheney's purse was always open to any demand the
church made; he believed in churches as benevolent if not soul-saving
institutions, and cheerfully aided their charitable work.