Anson Campbell returns from the seminary to a small village on the New England coast. When the puritanical villagers persecute Bess Morgan, a "fallen" woman, he sticks up for her, telling them that their form of "Christianity" isn't Christian at all. This has no effect on the bigoted villagers and they turn their anger on him. Complications ensue.

George Carter, a revolutionist in South America, is the exact double of Frederick Marston, a famous artist in Paris. Carter is betrayed by a comrade and is sentenced to be shot. He takes a desperate chance and escapes on board a vessel bound for London. In Paris Marston is stabbed by a model because he does not return her love. The wound incapacitates him from painting, and leaves an ugly scar, and he goes to America on a vacation. Highwaymen attack him, inflicting injuries which cause a total loss of memory. The robbers leave nothing in his pockets but the key to his Paris studio, and Marston adopts the name of Robert Anglo-Saxon.