So this precious pair started, each of them bent, though for different reasons, upon as evil a mission as the mind of man can conceive. For what is there more wicked than to wish to bring about the separation and subsequent misery of two young people who, as they guessed well enough, loved each other body and soul, and thereby to spoil their lives? Yet, so strange is human nature, that neither of them thought that they were committing any sin. Mr. Knight, now and afterwards, justified himself with the reflection that he was parting his son from a "pernicious" young woman of strong character, who would probably lead him away from religion as it was understood by him. One also whom he looked upon as the worst of outcasts, who deserved and doubtless was destined to inhabit hell, because hastily she had rejected his form of faith, as the young are apt to do, for reasons, however hollow, that seemed to her sufficient.
He took no account of his bitter, secret jealousy of this girl, who, as he thought, had estranged his son from him, and prevented him from carrying out his cherished plans of making of him a clergyman like himself, or of his innate physical hatred of women which caused him to desire that Godfrey should remain celibate. These motives, although he was well aware of them, he set down as naught, being quite sure, in view of the goodness of his aims, that they would be overlooked or even commended by the Power above Whom he pictured in his mind's eye as a furious old man, animated chiefly by jealousy and a desire to wreak vengeance on and torture the helpless. For it is the lessons of the Old Testament that sink most deeply into the souls of Mr. Knight and his kind.
Sir John's ends were quite different. He was the very vulgarest of self-made men, coarse and brutal by nature, a sensualist of the type that is untouched by imagination; a man who would crush anyone who stood in his path without compunction, just because that person did stand in his path. But he was extremely shrewd--witness the way he saw through Mr. Knight--and in his own fashion very able--witness his success in life.
Moreover, since a man of his type has generally some object beyond the mere acquiring of money, particularly after it has been acquired, he had his, to rise high, for he was very ambitious. His natural discernment set all his own failings before him in the clearest light; also their consequences. He knew that he was vulgar and brutal, and that as a result all persons of real gentility looked down upon him, however much they might seem to cringe before his money and power, yes, though they chanced to be but labouring men.