From Jest to Earnest Part 40

"O, well, your conscience is like Auntie Jane. A speck of dust gives her the fidgets where other people would not see any dust at all.

If your conscience had to deal with my sins there would not be ashes and hair-cloth enough for you."

"What good can ashes, hair-cloth, or any kind of self-punishment, or even self-condemnation, do us?"

"Well, we ought to be sorry, at least."

"Certainly, but there must be more than that. Many a wrong-doer has been sincerely sorry, but has been punished all the same. I cannot tell you, Miss Marsden, how much good you did me on Sunday afternoon.

My mind had been dwelling on the attributes of G.o.d,--upon doctrines as if they were things by themselves and complete in themselves.

I almost fear that I should have become, as I fear some are, the disciple of a religious system, instead of a simple and loyal follower of Christ. But you fixed my eyes on a living personality, who has the right to say, 'I forgive you,' and I am forgiven; who has the right to say, 'I will save you,' and I am saved. If He is the Divine Son of G.o.d, as He claims to be, has He not the right?"

"Yes. He must be able to do just what is pleasing to Him," said Lottie.

"Then look upon Him as you saw Him at the grave of Lazarus,--the very embodiment of sympathy. Suppose that in sincere regret for all the wrong you have ever done, and with the honest wish to be better, you go to such a being and cry, 'Forgive.' Can you doubt His natural, inevitable course towards you? If pardoning love and mercy should encircle you at once, would it not be in perfect keeping with His tears of sympathy?"

"And is that all I have to do to get rid of the old, dark record against me? O, how black it looked last Sat.u.r.day!"

"That is all. What more can you do? Who was it that said, 'Be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee'?"

"Mr. Hemstead," said Lottie, in a low tone, "I have felt very strangely--differently from any time before in all my life--since last Sunday afternoon. I seemed to look upon Christ as if He were before me, and I saw the tears in His eyes, as I saw them in yours the evening you said such plain things to me, and I have felt a peculiar lightness of heart ever since. That hymn we sang on Sunday evening expressed so exactly what I felt that I was overpowered.

It appeared written for me alone. Do you think that I can be a Christian?"

Hemstead's eyes glistened, and his heart bounded at the thought; but he felt that he was in a grave and responsible position, and after a moment's thought answered wisely: "I can base no safe and positive answer on your feeling. I have already learned, from my own experience and that of others, that religious feeling is something that comes and goes, and cannot be depended upon. The test question is, How will you treat this Jesus whom you have seen, and who has proved Himself both worthy to win and keep your trust? A little strong feeling and sentiment in regard to Him can not do you much good. What practical relation do you intend to hold towards Him?

No doubt many that saw Him weep, and then raise Lazarus after he had been four days dead, were profoundly moved, but the majority went on in their old ways all the same. You abound in strong common sense, and must see that more that even sincere, deep feeling is necessary. What do you propose to DO? Are you willing to take up your cross and become His faithful follower?"

"That involves a great deal," said Lottie, with a long breath.

"It does indeed," he replied earnestly. "I would give my life to make you a Christian, and yet I would not seek to win you for Him by false pretences, or hide any part of the rugged path of self-denial.

Count well the cost. But, believe me, Miss Marsden," he added, in a tone that brought a sudden paleness to her cheek, "not following Him involves far more that is sad and terrible."

Tears stood in Lottie's eyes. She was silent a few moments, and was evidently thinking deeply. The young clergyman was desperately in earnest, and fairly trembled in the eagerness of his expectation.

He hoped that Lottie would come to a solemn and half-heroic and formal decision. But he was both puzzled and disappointed by the sudden and brusque manner with which she turned upon him as she said: "Where is the heavy cross that I must take up? Show it to me, and I will think about it. Where is the rugged path? This one that leads to Mrs. Dlimm is very pleasant. I don't see anything very awful in being a Christian nowadays. Of course I shall have to give up all my old nonsense and flirt--Well, I suppose I might as well say it out. But there are no Inquisitions, with thumbscrews and racks, any longer. Come, Mr. Hemstead, you are a Christian.

What heavy cross are you bearing? I hope you are not in the rugged path of self-denial this morning, while taking me to Mrs. Dlimm's.

I don't know any one who appears to enjoy the good things of life more than you. I don't know what answer to give to your solemn and far-reaching questions. I haven't much confidence in what Lottie Marsden will do. All I know is that I feel as I imagine one of those children did whom Jesus took in his arms and blessed."

"But suppose," urged her anxious spiritual guide, who felt that she was giving a reason for her faith that would hardly satisfy the grave elders of the church,--"suppose that at some future time He should impose a heavy cross, or ask of you painful self-denial, would you shrink?"

She turned her dewy eyes upon him with a look of mingled archness and earnestness that he never forgot, and said significantly, "I do not remember the New Testament story very perfectly, but when the last, dark days came, women stood by their Lord as faithfully as the men,--didn't they?"

Hemstead bowed his head in sudden humility, and said: "You are right. It was not woman who betrayed, nor did woman desert or deny Him. Still I treasure the suggestion of your answer beyond all words."

The tears stood thick in Lottie's eyes, and she was provoked that they did. Her strong feelings were quick to find expression, and Hemstead seemed to have the power, as no one else ever had, to evoke them. But she had a morbid dislike of showing emotion or anything verging toward sentiment; therefore she would persist in giving a light and playful turn to his sombre earnestness.

"I did not mean," she said, "to be so hard upon the men, nor to secure so rich a tribute to my s.e.x. I imagine we all stand in need of charity alike. Only do not expect too much of me. I dare not promise anything. You must wait and see."

"Though you promise so little, you inspire me with more confidence than many whom I have heard make great professions"; and the light of a great joy and a great hope shone in his eyes.

"You look very happy, Mr. Hemstead," said Lottie, gratefully. "Would you be very glad to have me become a Christian?"

He looked at her so earnestly that the rich blood mounted to her very brow. After a moment, he replied, in a low, trembling tone: "I scarcely dare trust myself to answer your question, and yet I do not exaggerate when I a.s.sure you that if I could feel that you were a Christian before I go away, it seems as if I could never see a dark day again. O Miss Marsden, how I have hoped and prayed that you might become one!"

Her head bowed low in guilty shame. She compared her purpose towards him with his towards her. Before she thought, the words slipped out, "And for all my wrong to you, you seek to give me heaven in return."

He looked at her inquiringly, not understanding her remark; but after a moment said, "It would be heaven to me on earth, even in my lonely work in the West, if I could remember that, as a result of our brief acquaintance, you had become a Christian."

"Well," she said emphatically, "our acquaintance does promise to end differently from what I expected; and it is because you are different. You are not the kind of a man that I expected you would be."

"But I understood you from the first," remarked Hemstead, complacently.

"My first impression when you gave me your warm hand, and the only true welcome I received, has been borne out. Though at times you have puzzled me, still, the proof you gave--on the evening of my arrival--of a true, generous, and womanly nature, has been confirmed again and again. It has seemed to me that your faults were due largely to circ.u.mstances, but that your good qualities were native."

Again Lottie turned away her burning cheeks in deep embarra.s.sment.

Should she tell him all? She felt she could not. To lose his good opinion and friendship now seemed terrible. But conscience demanded that she should be perfectly frank and sincere with him, and her fears whispered, "He may learn it from the others, and that would be far worse than if I told him myself."

But her moral strength was not yet equal to the test. The old, prevailing influences of her life again swayed her, and she guided the conversation from the topic as a pilot would shun a dangerous rock.

"I will tell him all about it at some future time," she thought; "but not yet when the knowledge might drive him away in anger."

She seized upon one of his words, which, when spoken, had jarred unpleasantly upon her feeling.

"Why do you speak of our acquaintance as brief? Are we to be strangers again after this short visit is over?"

"I most positively a.s.sure you that you can never be a stranger to me again," he said eagerly. "But in a few days you will go to New York, and I thousands of miles in another direction. If I should tell you how you will dwell in my thoughts like an inspiration, I fear you would think me sentimental. But in your absorbing city life I fear that I shall soon become as a stranger to you."

"Well," said Lottie, averting her face, "I don't think I'll promise you anything this time either. You must wait and see. But is that dreadful frontier life of yours a foregone conclusion?"

"Yes," he said, with quiet emphasis.

"There are plenty of heathen in New York, Mr. Hemstead. You found one of them in me, and see how much good you have done; at least, I hope you have."

"There are also plenty of Christians in New York to take care of them. I commend some of the heathen to you."

"I fear that they will remain heathen for all that I can do."

"No, indeed, Miss Marsden. Please never think that. No one has a right to say, 'I can do nothing,' and you least of all. Apart from your other gifts, you abound in personal magnetism, and almost instantly gain control of those around you."

"How mistaken you are! I have no control over you."

"More than you think, perhaps," he said, flushing deeply.

It was his heart that spoke then, and not his will, instructed by deliberate reason.

She too blushed, but said laughingly, "What are words? Let me test my power. Take a church in New York, instead of a thousand miles out of the world."

"You are not in earnest," he said, a little sadly. "You would not seek to dissuade me from what I regard as a sacred duty?"

"But is it 'a sacred duty'? There are plenty of others--less cultivated, less capable of doing good--in the refined and critical East."

"That is not the way a soldier reasons. Some one must go to the front of the battle. And what excuse can such a vigorous young fellow as I am have for hanging back?"

As he turned his glowing face upon her she caught his enthusiasm, and said impulsively, "And in the front of the battle I would be, if I were a man, as I often wish I were."