Pine Needles Part 31

"Why, sir, I mean, like these Meredith was reading about. I know such people. They are selfish, and envious, and get angry, care for n.o.body in the world but themselves, and are not at all particular about telling the truth."

"Therefore _not_ good people."

"But they are members of the Church, sir, and they go to the Communion."

"Don't you know, the Lord forewarned His disciples that a large portion of His so-called Church would be none of His? You need not be surprised at it. It is just what He told us would be."

"Then how are we to know?"

"You can know with certainty about yourself," said Mr. Murray with a smile. "It is not difficult to find out in your own heart whether Christ or self comes first. For other people, you can afford to wait till the judge comes, cannot you?"

"You are thinking, Flo, are you not, that this man and his family were just about the right pattern?" said her brother.

"I think such people are pleasant," Flora confessed. "They make no pretences. That man seems to have been just and kind and nice."

"Ah, you make a mistake," said Mr. Murray again. "We all make pretences, of one sort or another, true or false. Such people as you are speaking of pretend _not_ to be Christians; and no doubt with perfect truth."

"But is not G.o.d pleased with justice and kindness and benevolence?"

"_With_ disobedience?"

"Surely He commands us to love one another?"

"He commands first that we love _Him_."

"Isn't that loving Him?"

"Love always shows itself towards the beloved one; _afterwards_ towards the objects the beloved one cares for."

"May I go on?" said Meredith as Flora paused. "I think my story will ill.u.s.trate this."

"Go on, by all means. Perhaps an ill.u.s.tration will make it clear to everybody."

"'This man was a scholar in the law; and was already pretty well on in years, when one of his sons, a special favourite with him on account of his fine parts and who was just studying law at the time, at the University, learned to know his Saviour, and turned to Him with all his heart. The instrument of his conversion was a faithful minister, whose preaching he had attended diligently, and with whom he afterwards came into very intimate terms of intercourse. Now when this son's heart was filled with intense love to his Saviour, such as I have seen equalled in few men, nothing was more natural than that he should send longing wishes towards the parents and brothers and sisters whom he loved so tenderly; wishes that they too might learn to know the Saviour; and so, in his letters, he poured his whole heart out, told them without reserve what had gone on in his own heart, and how he was now rejoicing in the certainty that his sins were forgiven and in the sure hope of everlasting life. "Oh that all men were as happy as I!" he cried out in his letters. For a long time he was left without an answer. At last came a letter from his father, it ran thus: "My son, your letters were wont always formerly to be a refreshment and a delight to me; now, on the contrary, they are a vexation and a bitter grief. I see that you are exactly in the way to become like those hypocrites of whom you used to hear me tell. I beg that you will either write as you have been accustomed to do, or not write at all."

"'The son answered, "Father, you have always enjoined it upon me to tell the truth; you always impressed it upon me that there is no more contemptible and cowardly being than a liar, for he has not even the spirit to be honest; and now do you want to compel me to be untrue?

Either I must write you what is according to my heart; for lie I cannot and will not, neither will I make believe; or I must indeed do as you say and not write at all." This startled the father, for he had in former times said to his friends,--"The lad will not tell a falsehood; he would sooner let his head be taken off;"--and he was honest enough to write to his son, "Well, write what you like; if you are not a hypocrite, you are a fanatic; but you shall tell no lies; there you are right and I was wrong."

"'Soon after this the time of the holidays came about, and the son took his journey to his parents, to spend the holidays with them as it was his wont to do; for it has been already remarked that love and peace reigned in that house. As he came in, his mother met him with tears, and looked at him in a very critical way, as if she feared he were not right in his head; but he caught her heartily round the neck and kissed her and hugged her, whispering at the same time, "Mother, don't look at me with such a doubtful face; I have got all my five senses yet." Then he went to his father in the sitting-room, and would have fallen on his neck too but the father at first kept him off with all his strength; till his son asked him, "Thou art my dear good father always, and always wilt be so; am I thy son no longer? and why not? what have I done that is wrong? is reading the Bible and praying anything wrong?" Then the father kissed his son and spoke--"I must honour the truth, thou hast done nothing wrong, my son!" For an hour or so they talked together about the professors at the University, and about the lectures the son had been attending there; and in the meantime the mother had got supper ready, and they went to table. The son stood up, folded his hands and prayed. With that the father thrust his chair back till it cracked, and ran out of the room, and the mother full of anxiety ran after him. The son, however, did not follow them, but after he had heartily prayed for his father and his mother, he sat down, and with tears ate his supper.

When he found his parents did not come back, he sought his own room, and once more poured out his heart before his faithful G.o.d and Saviour; then he slept quietly until morning. Next morning naturally the first thing was to go at his prayers again; then he read a chapter in his beloved Bible; and went afterwards to the dwelling-room, as he was accustomed.

His father was there, sitting in his arm-chair, and turned pale one minute and red the next. The son gave him his hand cordially and bade him good-morning, and to his mother as well. "My son," his father then asked him, "are you master in the house? or am I? The son answered, "Who but you, father?" "Why do you take upon you then to introduce prayer at meals, seeing you know that it is not our habit here?" "Father," the son answered, "did I then say that you and my mother were to pray? I asked expressly only, 'Come, Lord Jesus, be _my_ guest'--whereas elsewhere usually the prayer is, 'be _our_ guest.' I knew it was not your custom to pray; therefore it would have been an untruth to say, 'our guest,'

and that would have been a.s.suming, too, for it would have been trying to draw you in." "But why did you not let the whole thing entirely alone?

you knew very well we have no such regulation here." "Not for you, father; for me, however, there is such a regulation; and if I had taken my supper without praying, I should have been false to my G.o.d; and it is certainly not your pleasure that I should be false towards G.o.d, since you cannot endure any falsehood towards men." "No," said his father, "you are not to be false; well, pray away, for all I care; but only when we are alone, not when strangers are by, else we should become a laughing-stock." "Father, I could not be untrue to G.o.d for my own dear father's sake; should I for the sake of strangers? I am not ashamed of my G.o.d and Saviour before any man, neither before strangers nor before the king himself; and I will be faithful and true to my G.o.d. If it is not your pleasure to have this thing done when strangers are present, then do not call me to table." The father said, "Boy, where did you get your pluck?" "I love the Lord," the son answered, "who has redeemed me; I would go into death a thousand times for Him." "You are no hypocrite, my boy," said the father; "well, for all I care, you may be pious, if you only will not be a hypocrite."

"'From that time the ice was broken; and I have myself seen it with my own eyes, how father and mother and son used to read together in the Bible, pray and sing together, and how the brothers and sisters one after the other turned to the Lord. Rarely have I known a house in which the Lord Jesus was so fearlessly acknowledged as in that house. And do you know what of this history I would like to inscribe in your hearts, yea, would like to burn into your hearts with letters of fire? It is this. Let your Christianity be no lip work; let your religion not consist in words; lip-work Christianity is hypocritical Christianity.

True religion is a fact. The genuine believer is upright and makes no pretence, neither to G.o.d nor man. The heartfelt conviction--"Boy, you are no hypocrite"--ought to be forced upon the beholder by the walk and behaviour of every real believer; if that had been the case, the world would present a different aspect from what it offers now. But most people's Christianity is a fashion of speech; and so it is lying and hypocrisy; therefore it can at one and the same time, like Pilate, chastise and set free, pray and neglect prayer, confess and not confess, just as happens to be convenient in the circ.u.mstances. It is not required that you should preach to everybody you fall in with, as if it were your vocation to set up lights for everybody's guidance; much more would often be spoiled than mended in that way. But to be a Christian, to walk as a Christian, and thus to confess one's Christianity honestly in action, just because it is so and you are not going to be false either towards G.o.d or towards men; that is the way in which the hearts of the parents are turned to the children, and the hearts of the children turned to the parents.'"

CHAPTER XVII.

The sun had got low, in fact, he was dipping behind the dark line of Eagle Hill; and everybody looked and watched. The bright ball of fiery gold disappeared, leaving a trail of glory; lights glowed against shadows on the hazy hill sh.o.r.e; little flecks of cloud in the west grew gorgeous, and a low-lying rack of vapour in the south-east took on the loveliest changes of warm browns and purples and greys. And as the sun got further below the horizon, the cloud scenery became but the more resplendent.

"Mr. Murray," Flora began, "you will think I am always taking objections."

"Well, Miss Flora--what now?"

"Please to criticise this story Ditto has been reading. I would rather you did it than I."

"By 'criticise' you mean, find fault?"

"If you see reason."

"Suppose I do not see reason?"

"But do you not, really?"

"Wherein?"

"Mr. Murray, I like things kept to their proper places."

"We are agreed there."

"And I think it is a pity to make religious observances, or what are meant for them, repelling and disgusting to other people."

"Certainly. As how, for instance, Miss Flora?"

"Well, I never like to see people--I _have_ seen it--make a show of praying at table, where no general blessing has been asked by the person at the head of the table or a minister. It just makes them conspicuous, and as good as says that they are the only right people there."

"That is not a pleasant impression to receive."

"No, and I did not receive it. I thought it was a mistake. And quite ill-bred."

"But perhaps those people felt that they wanted a particular blessing, where there was no general blessing asked as you say."

"They might ask for it quietly, secretly."

"Yes. Would they get it?"

"Why, Mr. Murray! Doesn't the Lord always hear prayer?"

"No. It is written--'He that turneth away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer shall be abomination.'"

"But what law is there about saying grace at meals, in public?"

"There is this, Miss Flora. 'Whosoever shall confess Me before men, him will I also confess'"----