The sunlight filtering through the windows of stained
glass splashed fantastic colors over the long surpliced train which
wound through the aisles down to the chancel, singing processionals of
joyous hope; the air was full of the sense of solemn meaning; the organ
pealed; the noble words of the fine old ritual spoke to the hearts of
the hearers, and carried their message of a faith which took hold upon
the unseen. Above all the circumstance, the form, the conventions, the
creeds, rose the spirit of the worshipers, uplifted by the thrilling
realization of the outpouring of the soul of humanity before the
unknown eternal.
Maurice had accompanied Mrs. Staggchase and Miss Morison to the
ceremony. It had been his impulse not to go, but his cousin urged it,
and it needed little to induce him to go to any place where Berenice
was, even though it were a church. He went with some secret misgiving
lest the service should move him more than he wished; but to his
satisfaction he found that while he felt aesthetic pleasure, he was
inclined to be critical about the doctrine of the ritual. His
satisfaction, he reflected, would have been thought amusing by Mrs.
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