A Handful of Stars Part 16

VI

Down at the library yesterday afternoon I spent an hour in glancing through the various volumes of Southey's _Commonplace Book_. And, among a vast a.s.sortment of musty notes that are now of interest to n.o.body, I came upon this: 'I have been reading of a man on the Malabar coast who had inquired of many devotees and priests as to how he might make atonement for his sins. At last he was directed to drive iron spikes, sufficiently blunted, through his sandals, and on these spikes he was to place his naked feet and then walk a distance of five hundred miles. He undertook the journey, but loss of blood and exhaustion of body compelled him to rest one day under the shade of a spreading tree. As he lay there, a missionary approached and began to preach the gospel. He announced as his theme the words: "_The blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin_." Whilst the evangelist still preached, the man sprang up, tore off his sandals, and cried aloud: "That is what I want! That is what I want!" And he became a living witness to the fact that the redeeming blood of Christ _does_ cleanse from human guilt.'

'_That is what I want!_' cried Southey's pilgrim on the coast of Malabar.

'_That is what I want!_' cried Luther in the Wartburg.

'_That is what I want!_' cried Bunyan at Bedford.

'_That is what I want!_' cried Donald Menzies at Drumtochty.

'_That is what I want!_' exclaimed young Hedley Vicars, as his startled eyes fell upon the tremendous words that seemed to leap from the Bible on the table. '_The blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin._' 'That is what I want! That is what I want!'

Hedley Vicars appropriated the priceless gift held out to him, and his whole life was transfigured in consequence. His life--and his death!

For, on that fatal night before Sebastopol, it was with Hedley Vicars as it was with the soldier with whom the poet has familiarized us.

Everybody knows the story. Two men of G.o.d moved in the darkness across the field on which, that day, a battle had been fought.

And now they stand Beside a manly form, outstretched alone.

His helmet from his head had fallen. His hand Still firmly grasped his keen but broken sword.

His face was white and cold, and, thinking he was gone, They were just pa.s.sing on, for time was precious, When a faint sigh caught their attentive ears.

Life was still there, so bending down, They whispered in his ears most earnestly, Yet with that hush and gentleness with which We ever speak to a departing soul-- '_Brother! the blood of Jesus Christ, G.o.d's Son, Cleanseth from every sin._'

The pale lips moved, And gently whispered 'hush!' and then they closed, And life again seemed gone.

But yet once more They whispered those thrice blessed words, in hope To point the parting soul to Christ and heaven-- '_Brother! the precious blood of Jesus Christ Can cleanse from every sin._'

Again the pale lips moved, All else was still and motionless, for Death Already had his fatal work half done; But gathering up his quickly failing strength, The dying soldier--dying victor--said: 'Hush! for the angels call the muster roll!

I wait to hear my name!'

They spoke no more.

What need to speak again? for now full well They knew on whom his dying hopes were fixed, And what his prospects were. So, hushed and still, They, kneeling, watched.

And presently a smile, As of most thrilling and intense delight, Played for a moment on the soldier's face, And with his one last breath he whispered 'Here!'

'_I have sinned! What shall I do?_' cries this despairing soul at the beginning of my Bible.

'_The blood of Jesus Christ, His Son, cleanseth us from all sin!_'

answers the man who leaned upon the Saviour's breast and gazed full into the thorn-crowned face of the Crucified.

'_That is what I want!_' exclaims the man at Malabar, speaking, not for himself alone, but for each and all of us.

'_Those words are more golden than gold!_' says Miss Havergal, as she orders them to be inscribed upon her tomb.

'_They are like a gleam from the Mercy-seat!_' cries Donald Menzies.

'_They are the sheet-anchor of my soul!_' Hedley Vicars tells his sweetheart. And he is a very wise man who, in the straits of his experience, stakes his faith upon that which such witnesses have tested and have found sublimely true.

XV

SILAS WRIGHT'S TEXT

I

Silas Wright was deprived by sheer modesty of the honor of being President of the United States. His is one of the truly Homeric figures in American history. By downright purity of motive, transparency of purpose, and the devotion of commanding powers to the public good, he won for himself the honor, the love and the unbounded confidence of all his fellows. It used to be said of him that he was as honest as any man under heaven _or in it_. He might have aspired to any office to which it was in America's power to call him. Only his extreme humility, and his dread of impeding the promotion of his friends, kept him from rising to a position in which his name would have taken its place with those of Washington and Lincoln. But he refused almost every honor. 'He refused cabinet appointments,' says Benton, in his _Thirty Years' View_. 'He refused a seat on the bench of the Supreme Court of the United States; he rejected instantly the nomination of 1844 for Vice-President; he refused to be nominated for the Presidency. He spent as much time in declining office as others did in winning it. The offices he did accept were thrust upon him. He was born great and above office and unwillingly descended to it.' Whittier is very conservative in his choice of heroes.

Those whom he commemorates in verse are not only great men, but good ones. And Silas Wright is among them. 'Man of the millions,' he says, in the lines that he penned on hearing of Mr. Wright's death:

Man of the millions, thou art lost too soon!

Portents at which the bravest stand aghast-- The birththroes of a Future, strange and vast, Alarm the land; yet thou, so wise, and strong, Suddenly summoned to the burial bed, Lapped in its slumbers deep and ever long, Hear'st not the tumult surging overhead.

Who now shall rally Freedom's scattered host?

Who wear the mantle of the leader lost?

The splendid personality of Silas Wright has been best revealed to us in Irving Bach.e.l.ler's _The Light in the Clearing_. The book is partly history and partly commentary and partly fiction. Silas Wright, says Irving Bach.e.l.ler, carried the candle of the Lord; and all the world rejoiced in its radiance.

II

Barton Baynes, the hero of the book--for whose actuality and historicity the author vouches--is an orphan brought up on a farm by his Uncle Peabody and Aunt Deel. Getting into all sorts of sc.r.a.pes, he makes up his mind that he is too heavy a burden on the affectionate and good-natured couple; and one night he runs away. Out in the darkness, however, he meets with strange adventures, loses his way, and at length finds himself in the hands of Silas Wright, the Comptroller. The Senator first falls in love with the bright-faced, open-hearted, intelligent boy, and then takes him back to his uncle's farm. From that moment the friendship between the two--the great man and the obscure country boy--grows apace. After a while the Senator visits the district to deliver an address, and he spends the night at the farmhouse. It is a great occasion for Bart; and after supper an incident occurs that colors all his life and strikes the keynote of the book. As Barton approaches Mr. Wright to say Good-night, the Senator says:

'I shall be gone when you are up in the morning. It may be a long time before I see you; I shall leave something for you in a sealed envelope with your name on it. You are not to open the envelope until you go away to school. I know how you will feel that first day. When night falls, you will think of your aunt and uncle and be very lonely. When you go to your room for the night I want you to sit down all by yourself and read what I shall write. They will be, I think, the most impressive words ever written. You will think them over, but you will not understand them for a long time. Ask every wise man you meet to explain them to you, for all your happiness will depend upon your understanding of those few words in the envelope.'

The words in the sealed envelope!

What are the mysterious words in the envelope?

And what if the sealed envelope contains a _text_?

III

In the morning, when Barton rose, the Senator was gone, and Aunt Deel handed the boy the sealed envelope. It was addressed: 'Master Barton Baynes; to be opened when he leaves home to go to school.' That day soon came. At the Canton Academy, under the care of the excellent Michael Hacket, Bart felt terribly lonely, and, in accordance with the Senator's instructions, he opened the note. And this is what he read:

'Dear Bart, I want you to ask the wisest man you know to explain these words to you. I suggest that you commit them to memory and think often of their meaning. They are from Job: "_His bones are full of the sin of his youth, which shall lie down with him in the dust._" I believe that they are the most impressive in all the literature I have read.--Silas Wright.'

Bart soon learned to love and admire the schoolmaster; _he_ was the wisest man he knew; to _him_, therefore, he went for an explanation of the words.

'All true!' exclaimed Mr. Hacket, after reading the note. 'I have seen it sinking into the bones of the young, and I have seen it lying down with the aged in the dust of their graves. Your body is like a sponge; it takes things in and holds them and feeds upon them. A part of every apple that you eat sinks down into your blood and bones. You can't get it out. It's the same with the books that you read and the thoughts that you enjoy. They go down into your bones and you can't get them out. _A man's bones are full of the sin of his youth, which lies down with him in the dust!_'

IV

But the best exposition of the text is not Michael Hacket's, but Irving Bach.e.l.ler's. The whole book is a vivid and arresting and terrible forth-setting of the impressive words that Barton found in his sealed envelope.

All through the book two dreadful characters move side by side--Benjamin Grimshaw and Silent Kate. Benjamin Grimshaw is rich and proud and pitiless. Everybody is afraid of him. But Roving Kate is not afraid.

Indeed, he seems to be more afraid of her. Wherever he is, she is there.

She is wild and bony and ragged. She is, or pretends to be, half demented. She tells fortunes with strange antics and gesticulations, scrawling her prognostications upon stray slips of paper. But Benjamin Grimshaw is the main object of her attention. She hates him, and hates him all the more terribly because she once loved him. For Roving Kate, the Silent Woman, was once Kate Fullerton, Squire Fullerton's pretty daughter. And Benjamin Grimshaw had loved her, and betrayed her, and spurned her, and married another. In the village cemetery you might have seen a tombstone bearing her name. Her father erected it to show that she was dead _to him_ for ever. Poor Kate had never known her mother.