CHAPTER X

'It sounds like stories from the Land of Spirits,If any one attain the thing he merits,Or any merit that which he obtains.'

I am glad to have heard such a romance."

"Marion, or Mrs. Caird, could have told it to you, chapter by chapter, as it was making."

"And with what advices and entreaties!"

"Words only. I never mind words. Ian, you are looking ill. What is the matter with you? Is it the loss of that woman?"

"The Duchess of Rotherham? No. I never allow myself to think of her. It is a loss so transcendantly greater that there is not speech to define the distance.I have lost God!" and he looked up with a face of such desperate sorrow and patience as infected the heart of the older man with uncontrollable pity.

"O Ian! Ian!" he answered in a low, intense voice, "you cannot lose God, and, if you could, He cannot lose you."

"My father's brother![1]I have lost God, and the Devil——"

"Stop now. I disclaim for you and for myself all interest in the devil. I deny him! I deny him!Ach!I will not talk of him. If there be a devil, he can talk for himself."

"My God has left me. I know not where to find Him. I watch the day and the night through for a whisper or a sign from Him. 'As the hart panteth after the water brook, so panteth my soul for the living God.' To all my pleading He is deaf and dumb. My heart would break, but He has made it so hard that sometimes I can only pray for tears, lest I die of my soul's thirst."

"But this is dreadful, Ian, dreadful! Dear me! Dear me! What can I do?"

"What do you do when, through faults all your own, you have lost the sense of God's loving presence?"

"I will tell you truly, Ian. I write down all my sins and shortcomings, and then, kneeling humbly at His feet, I acknowledge them, and ask for pardon. I wait a moment or two, and then I mark them out with the sign of the [symbol: cross]. It cancels all, and generally I can feel this. If I do not feel it, I know something is wrong, and the confession is to make over again. It seems a childish thing for a man of sixty years old to rely on, Ian, but it has kept me at His Pierced Feet all my life long. If I had been a Roman Catholic—as the Macraes once all of them were—I should have gone to my confessor and had the priest's absolution; and I suppose it is some ancient feeling after the need and the comfort of confession. For I have 'confessed' in this way ever since I was a little lad, and I shall do so as long as I live. I have never told anyone but you of my simple, solemn rite; but it is a very solemn thing to me, however simple. Yes, it is. I speak the truth."

"Thank you. It is sacred and secret with me. Tell me now what would you do if you had to carry the burden Bunyan makes poor Christian carry through the Slough of Despond every Sabbath. It is my unspeakable burden to be compelled to preach. While I am preaching to others I am asking my soul, 'Art thou not thyself become a castaway?' Life is too hard to bear."

"Yet it was small help or comfort you gave your congregation last Sabbath."

"I did not see you in Church."

"I was there. It is indeed a very rare circumstance, but I was there, and I heard you tell your hearers that, bad as this life was, the next life would be much worse unless they lived a kind of righteousness impossible to them. Why do people listen to such words? Why do you say them? How do you dare to represent God as ordaining all things, yet angry with the actions of the creatures whom He has created to disobey His orders? And, since a man must sin by the very necessity of his nature, why is he guilty of his sins? How can people bear such sermons?"

"They do not feel them. No one takes them as for themselves. The majority give all menaces to their neighbors. A great many do not believe such doctrine any more than you do."

"Then why do they go and hear it?"

"Because in Glasgow, Uncle, the respectable element compel the scornful to sit in the seat of the righteous. It is fashionable to go to church, and the strictest sect is the most fashionable. Anything like Armenianism or Methodism is democratic, and suitable only for the lower classes—it is too emotional, and brings religion down to Ohs! and Ahs! and to feelings that compel expression. There are various other reasons not worth mentioning."

"And you are permitting this false preaching of a false doctrine to kill you?"

"My trouble is far greater. Is there a God at all?"

"Now, Ian, such a question as that never darkened any man's life who did not go out of his way to seek it. Why did you meddle with those cloudy German philosophies? Like Satan, they are one everlastingNo! How could you be influenced by them? I defy any metaphysician to argue me out of the testimony of my soul and my senses. It is not the 'No!' but the victorious 'Yes!' that life demands."

Then Ian made some explanations, but without success. The Major laughed scornfully at the names of his misleaders, and said, "I know all about them that I want to know. I could not sleep if their books were under my roof.Imphm!" he added with ejaculatory disdain. "You call their ravings scientific religion and religious philosophy.Rubbish,rubbishis the exact term for them."

"They have been widely read, sir."

"Nonsense! The Scotch mind is far too logical to grasp an existence that is non-existent; it sees no reality in what never happened, and you cannot make it believe that 'Being and not Being' are identical facts. It leaves all such ideas to those who live in that land

'Where Hegel found out, to his profit and fame,That Something and Nothing were one and the same.'

These two lines of a great critic were all I needed. I laughed heartily, and sent all the philosophies I had to the Clyde. Sandy, who threw them into it, said they went straight to the bottom. Ian, you are wandering in the Valley of the Shadow of Death. Are you quite alone? Have you lost the Great Companion?"

"Yes."

"Then trust to the Man within you. No one can lose his soul who risks it with his Higher Self. He will lead you to the One mighty to save. And go and do your daily duty as you see it, and I am led to believe you will require to begin in the house on Bath Street.Dod, Man!I'm sorry for the two poor women who have to live with you. You must be a very uncomfortable, unsocial fellow to eat and to bide with."

"I don't think so, Uncle. When I cannot eat it is kind to keep away from the table; when I am unable to converse about the trivial things of this life it is best for me to be silent. A man as full of sorrow as I am——"

"Fills the whole house with his worry and lamenting. Go home, and eat with the two women you are treating so badly, and talk with them about the people and the things that they love and care for. That youcando, and that youmustdo."

"They love and care for me."

"I'm bound to say you don't deserve it, and that's a fact. Talk to them of Donald and Lord Cramer, and talk hopefully and pleasantly. They will be so grateful to you and so kind in return."

"They are always kind to me."

"Well, well! They just show that the grace of God and two women can live with a man that no one else could live with. I met Marion last week in the Arcade, and the little girl was miserable. She said you had scarcely spoken a word for three days. It is not right. Go home and talk to them."

"How can I talk what seems foolishness to me?"

"Try it. Foolishness has often turned out to be wisdom. There is what Paul calls 'the foolishness of preaching.' What are you going to do about that subject?"

"What would you do, Uncle?"

"I would preach the Truth, as I saw it and felt it, or—I would not preach it at all."

"Jessy Caird thinks that, until Marion is married, everything should remain as it is. Then! Then I will seek God until I find Him, or die seeking."

"Just so! I have noticed that few things give a man more satisfaction than a resolve to do better at some future time. As for Marion's marriage, I can't see what influence your preaching or not preaching can have on that circumstance. She will not be married in the Church of the Disciples, and of course you cannot marry her."

"Marion will be married in my church and I shall marry her. It will be a great trial, but I shall not shirk it."

"Lord Cramer will insist on being married in St. Mary's Church, and by the Episcopal ritual. You would not be permitted to perform any service in St. Mary's unless you had taken Episcopal orders."

"Then we can have a private marriage."

"We can do nothing of the kind. Do you think that I will consent to my niece being married in a mouse hole? The Bishop is going to marry her, and it is to be a very grand affair. I have influence to bring to the ceremony most of our neighboring nobility, and the military friends of Lord Cramer will be there in force, and their splendid uniforms will make a fine effect. It is the first wedding I have ever had anything to do with. You were married in a little Border village, and none of your kin there;—father and mother and your wife, all gone!" and the Major looked into the far horizon, as if he must see beyond it, while Ian stood still and white at his side. Not a word was spoken. For a few minutes both men surrendered themselves to Memory's divinest anguish. Then the elder returned to their conversation and said—though in a much more subdued manner:

"Tell Marion to choose her six bride'smaids and give them beautiful wedding garments; tell her all I have said, and try to take some interest in the matter. Do, my dear lad, for no man will ever win Heaven by making his earthly home a hell. Be sure and tell Marion that Lord Cramer will be here in three months, and give her a big check to prepare for his coming."

"I promise to tell Marion. I will be as good as my word."

"Just so. But this is a forgetful world, so I'll remind you of your promise once more—and there is the girl's little fortune."

"It is ready for her as soon as she is married. I have not touched a penny of it. It is intact, principal and interest, and, by a little careful investment, much increased."

"You are a good man—a generous man."

"No, no, Uncle. It was just pride, nothing better. She ismychild. I preferred to take care of her myself—with my own money."

Then they talked over the amounts to be spent on the marriage, on dress, visitors, the ceremony and traveling expense, and when some decision had been reached the Major was weary. He sighed heavily, and advised Ian to go home and try to be of a kinder and more familiar spirit. "And tell Marion," he said, "Lord Cramer will be in Glasgow in three or four months, and she must have all her 'braws' ready, for he will not hear tell of waiting—no, not for a day."

For while all things were in quiet silence and the night was in the midst of her swift course.... Then suddenly visions of horrible dreams troubled them sore, and terrors came upon them unlooked for.—Wisdom of Solomon, 18: 14: 17.

Dreams are rudiments of the great state to come.

For nearly two weeks after the Minister's talk with his uncle something of the old cheerfulness and peace returned to the house on Bath Street. To Marion her father was exceedingly kind and generous, and the girl was radiantly happy in his love and in the many beautiful gifts by which he proved it. But "the good and the not so good," which is, to some extent, the inheritance of us all, gave him no rest, though for some days he was able partially to control the strife. He had been too intense a believer to stand still and say nothing about his doubts; and when a Scotchman has cast off Calvin, and been unable to accept Kant, he is not an agreeable man in domestic life. He was morbid, but he was not insincere, and he was really desperate concerning the salvation of his own soul. So the busy gladness of Mrs. Caird about the wedding preparations and the joyous voice and radiant face of Marion, as the stream of love was bearing her gently to the Happy Isles, rasped and irritated him. He was beginning to feel that he had done enough—to wonder if he could not go away until the marriage was an accomplished fact. Everything about it, as far as he was concerned, had undergone the earth and been touched by disappointment; and nothing had brought him back the calm peace, the sweet content, the abiding strength that his old trust in the God of His Fathers had always given. The cynicism of lost faith infected his nature. He was even less courteous to all persons than he had ever been before. The man was deteriorating on every side.

"Oh, the regrets! the struggles and the failings!Oh, the days desolate! the wasted years!"

To such mournful refrains he walked, hour after hour, the crowded streets and the narrow spaces of his own rooms; for he felt, even as St. Paul did, that, if all this great scheme of Christianity were not true, then its preachers were of all men most miserable. Generally speaking, poor Burns' prayer that we might see ourselves as others see us is surely an injudicious one, but if the Minister could have been favored with one day's observation of Ian Macrae, as he really appeared to his family, it might at least have given him food for reflection.

After a day of great depression, partly due to the marriage preparations and gloomy atmospheric conditions, but mainly, no doubt, to his wretched spiritual state, he went one evening to a session at the Church of the Disciples. He wondered at himself for going and his elders and deacons wondered at his presence. He was lost in thought, took no interest in the financial report of the treasurer, and left the meeting before it closed.

"The Minister was not heeding whether the Church was in good financial standing or not," said Deacon Crawford, "and I never saw such a look on any man's face. It comes back, and back, into my mind."

"Ay," answered another deacon, "and did you notice his brows? They were sorely vexed and troubled. And the eyes that had to live under them! They gave you a heartache if he but cast them on you."

"We'll be having a great sermon come the Sabbath Day, no doubt," said the leading Elder; "and, the finances being in such good shape, what think you if we give the Minister's daughter a handsome bridal gift?"

"It isn't an ordinary thing to do, Elder."

"The Minister is getting a very good salary."

"He is an uncommonly proud man, too."

"And his daughter is marrying a lord."

"Well," answered the proposer of the gift, "there's plenty of time to think the matter over," and all readily agreed to this wise delay.

Though the Minister had left the session early, it was late when he reached home, weary and hungry, and glad of Mrs. Caird's kind words and plate of cold beef and bread.

"Where on earth have you been, Ian?" she asked. "Do you know it is past eleven?"

"I have been going up and down and to and fro in the city, watching the unceasing march of the armies of labor. The crowd never rested. When the day workers stopped the night workers began—weary, joyless men. It was awful, Jessy."

"I know," said Mrs. Caird, "it is

'All Life moving to one measure,Daily bread! Daily bread!Bread of Life, and bread of Labor,Bread of bitterness and sorrow,Hand to mouth, and no to-morrow.'

Good night, Ian. Go to sleep as soon as you can."

How soon he kept this promise he never could remember; he only knew that when he awakened he was drenched with the sweat of terror and trembling from head to feet. "Who am I? Where am I?" he asked, as he fumbled with the Venetian blind until it somehow went up and let in the early dawning. Then he noticed the dripping condition of his night clothing, and he hurried to his bed and cried out in a low, shocked voice, "The sheets are wet! The pillow is wet!What can it mean? What has happened?Oh, I remember!" And he covered his face with his hands and his very soul shuddered within him.

Then his wet clothing shocked and frightened him, and he began to remove it with palpitating haste, muttering fearfully as he redressed himself: "How I must have suffered! Great God, the physical melts away at the touch of the Spiritual! Oh, I wish Jessy would come! Why is she so late? When I do not want her she is here half an hour before this time." The next moment she tapped at his door and called,

"Ian."

"Oh, come in, Jessy. Come in! I want you! I want you!"

"Breakfast is waiting."

"Let it wait. Come in. I want you to tell me the truth, the plain, sure truth about what I am going to ask you."

"What is it, Ian?"

"Jessy, did you ever know me to dream?"

"Never. You have always declared that you could not understand what Marion and I meant by dreaming."

"Well, I had a dream this morning, and, though it seemed very short, I felt when I awoke from it as if I had been in hell all the night long."

"What did you dream?"

"I was in the vestry of the Church of the Disciples, putting on my vestments. I knew that the church was crowded, and I looked at myself and was proud of my appearance. Then I was walking up the aisle very slowly. Step by step I mounted the pulpit stairs, and stood facing the largest congregation I had ever seen. And the light was just like the light when there is an eclipse of the sun—an unearthly, solemn obscurity, frightful and mysterious. I stood in my place and surveyed the congregation. It filled the church, but the furthest points of distance appeared to be nearly in the dark. I could see forms and movements there, but nothing distinct. I looked at this gathering for a moment, and then laid my hand upon the Bible, and, with my eyes still upon the people, I opened it—Jessy!"

"O man! Speak!"

"There was nothing there."

"Nothing there! What do you mean?"

"Every page was blank—only white paper—not a word of any kind——"

"Ian Macrae!"

"I looked for my text. It was gone. I turned the pages with trembling hands, but neither in the Old nor the New Testament was there a word. And I cried out in my anguish, and looked at the wordless Bible till I felt as if body and soul were parting. God, how I suffered! Earth has no suffering to compare with it."

"Then, Ian?"

"Then I looked up at the congregation, and was going to tell them the Bible had faded away, but I saw the people were a moving dark mass, in a rapidly vanishing light; and I tried to find the pulpit stairs, but could not, for I was in black darkness. And I was not alone; to the right and the left there were movements and whispers and a sense ofPresenceabout me. Powers unutterable and unseen that must have come out of inevitable hell. The whole earth appeared to be awake and aware, andthe Name,the NameI wanted to call upon I could not remember. The effort to do so was a tasting of death."

He covered his face and was silent, and Mrs. Caird took his cold hand and said softly, "O Lord, Thou Lover of souls! Thou sparest all, for they are Thine."

"At lastthe Namecame into my heart, Jessy, and though I but whispered the Word, its power filled the whole place, and the Evil Ones were overcome—not with strength nor force of celestial arms, but with thatOne Wordthey were driven away; and I awakened and it was just daylight, and I was so wet with the sweat of terror that I might have been in the Clyde all night. Was this a dream, Jessy?"

"Yes."

"What does it mean?"

"You know best. A God-sent dream brings its meaning with it. It is not a dream unless it does so. You know, Ian. Why ask me?"

"Yes, I know."

About this experience Mrs. Caird would not converse, for she was not willing to talk away the influence of Ian's spiritual visitation. She was quite sure that he understood the message sent him, and equally sure that he would implicitly obey it. So she left him alone, though she heard him destroying papers all day long. The next day being Saturday, he was very quiet, and she told herself he was preparing his sermon, and then with a trembling heart she began to speculate as to its burden. She feared that in some way his dream would come into relation or comment, and she could not bear the idea of such a public confidence.

She was still more uneasy when on Sunday morning he said in his most positive manner, "Jessy, I wish you and Marion to remain at home to-day. A little later you will understand my desire."

"As you wish, Ian. We shall both be glad of a quiet rest day. I hope you know what you are going to do, Ian. Our life is a spectacle—a tragedy to both men and angels—bad angels as well as good ones. Don't forget that, Ian."

"I shall not forget, and I know what I am going to do."

She looked at him anxiously, but had never seen him more decided and purposeful. He was also dressed with extreme care, and, though in ecclesiastical costume, was so singularly like his uncle that Mrs. Caird involuntarily thought, "How soldierly he carries himself! What a fighter he would have been! But he is some way quite different—not like the old Ian at all."

Yes, he was different, for on the soul's shoreless ocean the tides only heave and swell when they are penetrated by the Powers of the World to Come. And Dr. Macrae was still under the emotions of his first experience of that kind. He was prescient and restless. For, though the outward man appeared the same, the archway inside was uplifted and widened, and Dr. Macrae had risen to its requirements. He was ready to fight for his soul. Yes, with his life in his hand, to fight for its salvation. What would it profit him if he gained the whole world and lost his soul?

Frequently he assured himself that he did not now regard the Bible as divinely inspired, yet he was constantly deciding this or that question by its decrees. So quite naturally he followed this tremendous inquiry of Christ's by those two passionate invocations of David, "Cast me not away from Thy Presence. Take not Thy Holy Spirit from me." To be cast out of God's Presence. To be sent into the Outer Darkness, full of the Evil Ones! "O Jessy!" he cried, "such a doom would turn a living man into clay!"

It was of this awful possibility he was thinking as he walked to the Church of the Disciples. Two or three of the deacons were standing in the vestibule, and they looked at him and then at each other with a pleased expression.

"We rejoice to see you, sir, looking so well," said one. "The church is full, sir, and, if our clock is correct, there is but five minutes to service time."

He had five minutes yet, in the which he could draw back or postpone his intention—or—or—then his dream came to his remembrance, and he put all hesitation out of the question. With a thoughtful gravity he walked down the aisle, ascended the pulpit stairs, and stood in his place before the people. And they watched him with a sigh of content and pleasure. They had often seen in his eyes that far-away gaze of one who looks past the visible and sees time and eternity as the old prophets saw them.

They expected from this sign a sermon which would take them for an hour "to the Land which is very far off."

He stood silently facing his congregation, for even at this last minute there came to his soul a doubtful whisper, "The position is yet yours. You can delay any explanation a week—or even two. You had better do so." He trembled under the strain of this instant decision. But the whole congregation were rustling their hymn books and the precentor was taking his desk. Then in a dear, vibrant voice he said:

"We shall sing no hymn this morning. We shall make no prayer. I am here to bid you farewell. You will see my face no more."

There was an indescribable movement throughout the building, but nothing articulate, and he quietly continued: "I have ceased to believe in the divinity and the inspiration of the Bible. It is not any longer to me the Word of God. It has nothing to say to me, either of Time or Eternity. Its pages are blank. I might have gone away from you without any explanation. I was tempted to do so, but we have been twenty years together, and I desired to give you my last words." There was no response from the cold, voiceless crowd, but he felt their antagonism to be more palpable than that of either scornful looks or reproachful words. With eloquent anger he described the cynical complaisance with which the very existence of God and the inspiration of the Bible were now challenged and discussed. "There is boundless danger in all such discussions," he cried. "As long as we are loving and simple-minded we judge the Bible by the heart and not by the intellect. And of such are the Kingdom of Heaven." Then, as he spoke, theWordbecameFleshand prevailed like a message from another world. Many were the hard words he gave them, and, if he had never before spoken the whole truth, he did so at this last hour—not of any settled purpose—but because it was the last hour, and he wanted them to see through his sight "the dead, small and great, standing before God for the judgment to come."

At this point the church was no longer either cold or voiceless, it felt rather as if it were on fire. The people trembled and prayed and wept as he spoke, and Ian Macrae was a man they had never before seen. His tall, grave figure radiated a kind of awe, his voice rang out like a command. The keen spiritual life within lit up his pale, striking face, and in his eyes there was a strange glory—they shone like windows in a setting sun.

The intensity of feeling had been so great that there was in about fifteen minutes an inevitable pause. Then he looked round, and continued:

"Listen to me a few moments, while I illustrate what I have said by my own experience. A few months ago the Bible lay in every fold of my consciousness. Now it has nothing to say to me, and it is impossible to describe the loneliness and grief that fills my empty heart. For the God of my Bible has left me. All my life I had trusted to whatever God said in His Word. God had said it, and I knew that God would keep His Word. Then I was tempted by the devil—no, by the gift of one thousand pounds, to examine my Father's Word—to prove, and to test, and to try it, by the suppositions and ideas of some small German, French, English—and Scotch, so-called philosophers. And I was too small for the intellectual dragon I went out to slay. All of them wounded me in some way, and my God left me. I deserved it. I have lost my place among the sons of God. With my own hand I crossed out my name from the list of those who serve His altar. In the honored halls of St. Andrews they will think it kind to forget Ian Macrae.

"I am now bidding farewell—bidding farewell forever—to you, and not only to you, but to all the innocent pleasures and happy labors of the past. For me there is no birthday of Christ—no farewell supper in the upper chamber—no flowery Easter morning. I dare not even think of that sacred ghost story in the garden, for, if the stone was not rolled away from the grave of Christ, it lies on every grave that has been dug since the creation. And if there is no resurrection of the body—there is no Life Eternal—there is no God!"

His voice had sunk at the last few words, but it was poignantly audible. A long, shuddering wail filled the church, and the women's cries and the men's mutterings and movements were sharply distinct. Then the Senior Elder looked expressively at the precentor, and he instantly raised the hymn known to every church-going Scot:

"O God of Bethel, by whose handThy people still are fed,Who through this weary wildernessHast all our fathers led."

The first line was lifted heartily by the congregation; they evidently felt it to be a proclamation of their Faith, but the melody quickly began to scatter and cease, and before the first four lines were sung it had practically ceased. Everyone, with movements of shock or sorrow, was watching the Minister, who was slowly removing from his shoulders the vestment of his office. In a few moments he had laid it slowly and carefully over the front of the pulpit. Then he turned to the stairs, and he remembered his dream and was afraid of them. What if there should be onlyonestep to the floor below? The descent seemed steep and dark. He kept his hand on the railing of the balusters, and the cries of hysterical women and movements and mutterings of angry men filled his ears. It was growing dark. He felt that he was losing consciousness. Then a large, strong hand was stretched up to him, and, grasping it gratefully, he reached the ground in safety. And when he looked into his helper's face he said with wonder, "Uncle! You?"

"Just me, laddie. Keep your heart and head up. Come what will, you've done what's right. Put your arm through mine. We will take this walk together."

So arm in arm down the long aisle they went, and the Major said afterward, "It was a worse walk than any down a red lane on a battlefield." The women mostly covered their faces and wept. Many of the men were standing up, angry and offensive in word and manner, but sure that their attitude was well pleasing to God and to the Kirk He loved. The Major's carriage was standing at the curbstone, and, without delay, yet also without hurry, they took it and went together to Dr. Macrae's home. Being Sunday morning, the streets were nearly empty, and the drive, as became the day, was slow and silent. But Ian's hand was clasped in his uncle's hand, and words were not necessary.

Mrs. Caird was at the open door to meet them. "I heard the clatter of the Major's horses; they clatter louder than any other in Glasgow—but what are you here for? Who's preaching this morning? Ian, are you ill? Major, what is it?"

"Wait a while, my dear lady. Ian wishes to be alone, and I am going to take lunch with you. Then I will tell you all that Ian has done. I am going to give to-morrow to Ian and his affairs, so he will not require to worry himself either about the Kirk or the market place."

"I wish I had been present," answered Mrs. Caird. "I wish I had! I think I also would have had a few words to say—or at least a few questions to ask."

"I cannot understand Ian taking such a noticeable farewell. It would have been more like him to have said nothing to anyone, just resigned without reason or right about it. But doubtless he had a reason."

"He had. Two nights ago he had a dream."

"Never! Ian never dreams."

"He dreamt last Friday morning just at or before the streak of dawn. Listen!"

Then in an awed and whispering voice she related Ian's dream. The Major, who was naturally a psychic man and a great dreamer, listened with intense interest, but did not at once make any comment. After a short reflection, however, he answered with an air of complacent gratitude:

"God's dealings with the Macraes have ever been close and personal. Plenty of preachers are no doubt preaching this day what they do not believe, but they have not been shown and warned like Ian. I think his dream was a great honor and favor."

"You Macraes have a wonderful way of appropriating God. I dare say a great many ministers have been warned and advised as well as Ian."

"No, Jessy, they have not. If they had been warned as Ian was warned, they would have done exactly as Ian has done. Dreams are strange things. You cannot help noticing them—you cannot help being led by them. I wonder why."

"Because dreams belong to the Spiritual World, and humanity has an instinctive belief in this Spiritual World. You do not have to teach men and women to dream. A true dreamer has the gift in childhood as perfectly as in old age. There is no age, no race, no class, no circumstances free from dreams. God is everywhere and knows everything, and He speaks to His children in dreams and by the oracles that lurk in darkness."

"In my own life, Mrs. Caird, they have often read the future. How do they do it?"

"How can we tell what subtle lines are between Spirit and Spirit? A century ago nobody knew how messages could be sent through the air—sent all over the world. We had not then discovered the medium nor the method. In another century—or less—we may discover the medium and method of communication between this world and the other."

"Do you think some houses are more easily visited by dreams than others?"

"Yes, and for many reasons, but they cannot be prevented from entering any place to which they are sent. I was not a week at Cramer before I was aware

'of Dreams upon the wall,And visions passing up the shadowy stair and through the vacant hall.'"

"I am glad you told me of Ian's dream. I understand him better now."

"And like him better?"

"Yes, but I have always loved Ian above all others."

"Then be patient with him now. It is hard for mortals to live when their moments are filled with eternity."

"Then, as the veil is rent in twain,From unremembered places where they layDead thoughts, dead words arise and live again,The clouded eyes can see, the lips can pray.A purer light dawns on the night of pain,And, on the morrow, 'tis the Sabbath day."

The love of God, which passeth all understanding.

For a few days Dr. Macrae was seen frequently about the streets of Glasgow. Some bowed to him, some passed by on the other side. He was also generally accompanied by Major Macrae or by a certain well-known lawyer, neither of them men partial to greetings in the market place or conversations at the street corners. So in a manner he was protected by his companions and his preoccupation. In his home all knew that he was going away, but no one named the circumstance to him. It was not an easy thing to talk to Macrae on subjects he did not wish named.

Indeed, it was four days after his public resignation from the ministry before the Church of the Disciples ventured to make any movement signifying their acceptance of his withdrawal. Then a little company of church officials called on him to exchange some necessary papers and pay the salary which was due. Thomas Reid's name was among those of the visitors, and for a moment Ian resolved not to meet them. But it was Jessy Caird who brought him their request, and she looked so persuasively at Ian that he answered:

"Very well, Jessy, if you think so, send them in here."

When the little band entered his study his heart melted at the sight of these old associates of his dead life. They had honored and loved him for many years, and his miserable state was not their fault. Only Elder Reid had ever offended, and he had always regretted the trouble and been glad when it was removed. So Ian looked at them with his heart in his eyes, and they looked at him and could not utter a word.

For this man was not their long-beloved Minister. He was even outwardly so changed they could not for a few moments accept him. That very day Ian had taken off his "blacks" forever. The long black broadcloth coat and vest and the snow-white band around his throat had been replaced by a very handsome suit of dark tweed, such as they were themselves wearing. And this change in his dress—so totally unexpected—moved them beyond all reason. They looked at him in silence, and their hearts and eyes were full of unshed tears.

They had seated themselves on the long sofa, and Macrae rose and went to them: "You have come to bid me farewell," he said, "and I am glad to see you—you have been brothers to me—it breaks my heart to part with you—and all you represent—but I must go. I know not where—nor yet what may befall me, but if I die I shall die seeking the God I have loved—and—lost."

As he spoke he advanced to the man nearest him and held out his hand, and it was taken with great apparent love and emotion. An older man bent his head over it—was it not the kindly, gracious hand that had so often broken to him the Bread of Life? Thomas Reid was the last of the company. He looked into Macrae's face with brimming eyes, and when he took Ian's offered hand a great tear dropped upon the clasping fingers. Both men saw it, and Macrae said with a sad smile:

"That washes all unkindness out, Elder," and with sobbing words Reid answered: "It does, sir. It does. O Minister, is it not possible for you to unsay the words you said last Sabbath Day?"

"No."

"The Lord is merciful to His elect."

"I have denied the Lord, and He has forsaken me."

"He cannot forsake those whom He has chosen. You have lived a good life."

"I have not. I have run after strange gods. I have looked His Word in the face and disobeyed it. I have put scientific and philosophical religion in the place of Christ's religion, and my Bible, once full of comfort, has nothing to say to me."

"Well, then, sir, you know who is the mediator between God and man."

"Elder, if there is a God, I want to find Him."

"Then seek Him, sir."

"I am seeking Him as those who seek for life and life eternal. Through the world I will seek Him. To the last breath of this life I will call upon—perhaps—if there is a God—He may hear me."

Blind with feeling, the men went away so quietly that Mrs. Caird threw down her work and said impatiently: "There! He has sent them off without a word. How could he do it? Oh, but Scots are hard-baked men. Even those proud English would have had a 'God speed' to bless the parting, and I——"

Then Ian entered, and he said cheerfully: "We had a pleasant parting, Jessy. I am glad of it. I would have been sorry to have missed it."

"What did you say to them?"

"What I said last Sabbath—that I was going to seek Him whom my soul loveth, even if I died in the search."

"There is no 'if' in such a search. God is not a 'highly probable' God. He is a fact. He is nearer to you than breathing, closer than hands and feet. Even a pagan knew that much, Ian; all that is wanted is to become conscious of thenearness of God, and to seek God with all your heart and all your soul, and you will find Him. Not perhaps! Youwillfind Him." And Ian was silent and troubled, and went away.

Then Jessy took her knitting again, and, as she lifted the dropped stitches, said slowly and sorrowfully: "Ah me! How many half-saved souls must come back again to learn the lesson they should have learned in this life. God may well be merciful to sinners, for they know not what they do."

On Saturday morning he went very quietly away. He had done all that could be done for the happiness of his family, and the situation had been tranquilly accepted by them. There was no haste, no irritating questions or advices, and, as soon as he was out of sight, everyone went back to the work occupying them. Yet the man they had watched away was near and dear to them, and full of a sorrow so great they hardly understood it.

He was bound for the Shetlands, because he believed he would find in their simple Kirks the height, and depth, and purity of Calvinism. But he found nothing peculiar to these strong, silent fishers. They had generally an inflexible faith in their own election, and in the ordering of their lives by a God who knew "neither variableness nor shadow of turning." They went fearlessly out on any sea a boat could live in, because, if it was not their appointed hour of death, "water could not drown them"; and in all other matters they approved of John Calvin's plan of sin and retribution, and stuck to it like grim death.

Yet he spent the whole summer in Shetland, and winter was threatening to shut in the lonely islands when he saw one morning an unusual craft fighting her way into harbor. She was a strong, handsome boat, a perfect model of what a fine fishing-smack should be, and she was flying a blue ribbon from her masthead. Evidently she was one of the mission ships serving the Deep-Sea Fishermen. Ian was instantly much interested, and soon fell into conversation with one of her surgeons, who took him on board and who talked to him all day of this great floating city of the fishing fleets—a city whose streets were made of tossing ships—a city without a woman in it—a city whose strange, winding lanes of habitations ceaselessly wander over the lonely, stormy miles of the black North Sea—a city even then of more than forty thousand inhabitants.

"And what of the men in this floating city?" asked Ian.

"They are men indeed! Speaking physically, they are the flower of our race. They have muscles like steel, their eyes are steady, their feet sure. The sight of the work they do strikes terror in the heart of one not used to it. When the call comes for the great net to be hauled they hurry, half-asleep, on deck, very often to face a roaring icy wind, lashing sleet or blinding snow. They tramp round the capstan and tug and strain with dogged persistence until the huge beam of the trawl comes up. Then, often in the dark, they grope about till they mechanically coil the nets and begin the gruesome work of sorting and packing fish, with but fitful gleams of light."

"What a dreadful life!" exclaimed Ian.

"And when the haul is over there is no bath, no change of clothes, no warmth for the men. They plunge into their reeking dog-hole of a cabin, and in their sodden clothes sleep until the next call sends them on deck with their clothes steaming.

"But you see, sir," he continued, "we are beginning to send mission ships and hospital ships among the fleets, and the men do not have—when they break or fracture a limb, or in other ways injure themselves—to be tossed from ship to ship until, perhaps after three or four days, they come to a place where they can be attended to."

"And are you improving these conditions in every way?" asked Ian.

"Yes, indeed, very rapidly."

"I should like to go with you."

"No. You would soon be wretched. You could not bear to see the smacksmen at their work. It makes me shiver to think of it. Two days ago I attended to a man who had shattered three fingers and divided a tendon, and who was working out his time in pain that would have been unbearable to me or to you. Our hospital ships, when we have builded plenty of them, will alter such things. But, sir, if you do not want to die of heartache, keep out of the Deep-Sea Fishing Fleet. No weakling could stand it—he could not live a month in it."

Ian, however, could not be discouraged. He remained anxious to see the fleet fisheries at close quarters, and when a boat, urged by four strong rowers, came that afternoon for the surgeon, Ian pleaded to accompany him. "I can help you, Doctor," he said. "I know a little about surgery." So Ian prevailed, and in a few minutes was with the surgeon on his way to the injured man. They found him lying in a lump on the deck, under his head a coil of ropes. The skipper stood at his side, making no pretense to hide his grief. "It's Adam Bork, Doctor," he said, "the best sailor in the fleet,my old mate. Doctor, do something for him."

The Doctor looked at the man, then at the skipper. "There is not a hope," he answered. "He is dying now."

The man heard and understood, he looked at the skipper and the skipper bent to his face. Something was asked, something was promised, and the two men, with one long farewell look, parted forever.

The Doctor soon found other patients, and he told Ian to watch by the dying sailor and to give him spoonsful of cold water as long as he could take them.

"Is that all that can be done?" inquired Ian.

"I will ask him," and he said, "Adam, you are in mortal pain—the pains of death—shall I give you something to ease them?"

"What can you give me?"

"Laudanum."

"No. I won't go to God drunk."

"You are right, Bork. Good-bye."

About dawning the dying man looked at Ian with such a piteous entreaty in his pale blue eyes that Ian felt he must, if possible, grant whatever he desired. Very slowly and distinctly he asked, "What—do—you—want—me—to—do?" and the answer came, as if from another world, muffled and far off, but thrilled with such an agonizing intensity that it struck Ian as if it was a physical blow,

"Pray for me!"

Ian knelt down. He tried to pray, but he could not. With almost superhuman efforts he tried to pray, not for himself, but for this poor sailor sinking and dying in that dark place, struggling, forsaken, alone, but he could not. Again the dying man whispered, "Pray!" and his eyes were full of reproach, and the look in them almost broke Ian's heart. The next moment he was gone.

It was against all Ian's spiritual feelings to pray for the dead, but in after years he prayed often and sincerely, "for the repose of the soul of Adam Bork." And why not? God was still in His Universe, Adam was therefore somewhere in God's presence. It may even be that prayer prevails there more easily than here. Creeds may say what they like, the heart of humanity prays for its beloved dead as naturally as it prays for its beloved absent.

As soon as possible Ian was put on shore, and a week afterward he found himself in his uncle's home. He had gone first to Bath Street, but the house there was closed and empty. There were placards in the windows offering it for sale or rent, and the windows themselves, always so spotless, were now black with smoke and dust. It was a cold day and had a sharp promise of winter in its flurries of north wind and little showers of icy rain with them. All was desolation. Ian's first thoughts were of an angry, injured nature. The empty house told its own story. Marion was married, Donald in California, and Jessy had doubtless returned to her own home in the Border country. "No one cared about him, etc.," and when people get into this selfish mood they never ask themselves whether they are reasoning on just or unjust premises.

So Ian went to Blytheswood Square, and found his uncle cheerfully eating a good dinner. He was delighted at his nephew's return. "Laddie! Laddie!" he cried joyfully, "you are a sight to cure sore eyes. I was just thinking of you; when did you touch Glasgow?"

"An hour ago. I went to Bath Street, and found the house empty."

"Just so. All gone to bonnier and better homes. At least they think so, and we must even bear the same hope. Where have you been?"

"In the Shetlands. I found nothing to help me there. The last week I spent with the North Sea Fishing Fleet."

"Did you? I am delighted. That is where all my spare cash goes. That is the reason I do not give Elder Reid a big sum for his Foreign Mission Fund. I do not like Hindoos and Chinamen, and they have a religion of their own quite good enough for them. But oh! Ian, those big, brave fellows, working like giants and suffering beyond ease or help, they are our kin—leal, brave Scots, who would die for Scotland's right, or Scotland's faith, any hour it was necessary. It was only yesterday Reid stopped me on the street and asked me for a subscription for the Chinese Missions."

"What did you say?"

"I did not heed him. I buttoned up my coat and set my eyes far off to the river side."

"You did right."

"It stands to reason that Scotchmen ought to look after their own first."

"I suppose I am quite forgotten. I have had no letters. I do not know whether anything has happened or not."

"You left no address. You wrote to no one. Yes, to me you sent one letter, full to its edges with uncertainties. You must remember Marion is married and greatly taken up with her husband. You never answered Donald's letter, and the lad, of course, takes it for granted that his silence was what you wished. Ian, you have tried wandering, and there is no peace or profit in it. Now, then, if you cannot pray, you can work; if you can't love God, you can love your fellow creatures. Dr. James Lindsey was here last week, and I spoke to him about you. When you were a stripling you were all for surgery, and Dr. James thinks you will yet make a fine surgeon. You are to live with him, and he was delighted at the very thought of your company. It is the great opportunity left you, and I hope you see all its possibilities and will accept them."

Ian was satisfied at the prospect. It was quite true that even in boyhood he had had a craving for the surgical profession, and the arrangements made for him by the two elder gentlemen were so homely and generous, and so full of kind consideration, that he was greatly moved by their unselfishness. In a few days he went to London, and was met at the train by Dr. Lindsey. Ian was not ignorant of him. He had seen him at his uncle's house several times, and he knew that the Major and Dr. James had been friends since ever they were barefooted laddies, fishing in the mountain streams together.

Neither was Lindsey ignorant of Ian. He had heard him preach, and he knew something of the soul struggle through which he was passing. Indeed, he had his own plans for relieving this spiritual misery, and, as soon, therefore, as Ian reached London, he found all his days filled with study and labor. But his surroundings were homelike and pleasant, and the men were intellectually well matched.

Now, the road downward is easy and rapidly taken, and Ian had managed to slip from the pinnacle of ministerial fame into silence and forgetfulness in about one year, but it took him a ten years' climb to win his way to about the same pitch of public favor in his new vocation. But of this ten years I shall have little to say. The road upward is a climb to the very top, and all men find it so, but Ian enjoyed the study and the practical work of his profession and became extraordinarily skillful in it.

Their lives were by no means dull or monotonous. Truly the day was given up to business, but they usually dined together at seven, and afterward went to the opera or theater, or perhaps to a reception at some house where they were familiar and honored guests. Or, if they wished to stay at their own fireside, they were the best of good company for each other. Nothing that touched man's soul or body came amiss for their discussion, and if Ian was the more widely and generally educated, Dr. Lindsey had the keener spiritual instinct, and his soul often ventured where Ian's followed only with flagging and uncertain wings. In the summer they made short trips to the Continent or they went to Glasgow, and, being joined there by the Major, sailed north to the Macrae country, and then home by Cromarty and Fife.

When Ian had been in London ten years Dr. Lindsey began to talk of a rather longer holiday than usual. "But first," he added, "here is a letter from Squire Airey, and he wants either you or me to run up to Airey Hall to examine his fractured arm. It is all right, I know, but he is frightened and impatient, and you might go as far as Furness and make him comfortable."

"I should like to go. I have long wanted to see Windermere, and I could return that way."

With his patient at Airey Hall Ian stayed two days, and on the third morning the Squire said: "Doctor, I will give you a good mount, and you can ride as far as Ambleside. You will go through a lovely land. Leave the horse at the Salutation Inn in Ambleside when you take the train. I will send a groom for it."

So Ian took the Squire's offer, for it was a lovely day in August, and everything seemed to shimmer and glow through a soft golden haze. The tender, peaceful scenes on all sides induced in him a little mood of pathos or regret. He could not help it. He had no particular reason for it; he appeared, indeed, to be in a very enviable condition. He was yet exceedingly handsome, for it takes a Scotchman fifty years to clothe his big frame, to round off the corners and soften the large features, and to make out of a gigantic block of bone and sinew a handsome, finely modeled man. He had, as far as business went, made himself twice over. He was the welcome friend and guest of the greatest scientists and physicians, and his short visits to the most exclusive drawing-rooms were regarded as great favors. Was he not happy, then? No. Regret, like a slant shadow, darkened all his sunshine, and the want of personal love left his life poor and thin on its most vital side.

Nor could he ever forget that solemnly joyful night following the day of his admission to the ministry. Like the knights of old, he had spent the midnight hours in the dark, still Kirk of Macrae, and the promises he then made and the secret, sacred joys of his espousal to the Holy Office, had been graven on his memory by a pen which no eraser can touch. Whenever he was long alone this memory shone out in every detail, and he said once, in a passion of anger at himself: "If I had been a soldier of the Queen, they would have drummed me out of the ranks. I would have deserved it—yes, I would!"

This morning the unwelcome memory returned and returned, and, in order to be rid of it, he began to pity himself for the loneliness of his life and the misfortune which had attended all his affections.

"There was old Lord Cramer, his apparent kindness was all a plot to get a little posthumous fame out of my intellect. His one thousand pounds was a miserable price for the work he proposed for me, and he tried to pass it off as a kindness. I hate the man, and I hate myself for being fooled by him. Lady Cramer—nay, I will let her go—another has judged her now. Donald, whom I idolized, nearly broke my heart, gave a son's love to a stranger, married a Spaniard and a Roman Catholic, and has not noticed me for years. I dare say Donald and that Scotchman have had many a laugh over my leaving the ministry. Jessy went to them, and she could tell them every circumstance of the event. And, though Marion writes whiles, and has called her son after me, I never see her unless she happens to be at Uncle Hector's when I go to see him. And, of course, I cannot call at Lord Cramer's house, not even to see my daughter. Was any man ever so undeservedly deserted as I am?"

He was slowly passing through a little village as he troubled his heart with these thoughts. And, as he looked at the small dark cottages wanting the usual gardens of flowers, he said to himself, "It is a mining village; there must be many of them in this locality;" and so was returning to his unprofitable musing when a tremendous explosion occurred, and the women from every cottage ran crying to the pit mouth. Ian also hastened there, and, when he said he was a physician, was taken down in the first cage. It stopped at an upper gallery and the men ran backward into the mine. Ian thought he had suddenly awakened from life and found himself in hell. He heard only cries and groans and shouts, and the running of men and their frantic calling of names. And he was spellbound at the first moment by the sight of a boy about nine years old, lying in a narrow cut of the coal, with a great block of coal across his body. His father stood beside him, his face full of unspeakable love and pity, for the mute anguish of the child was terrible. But, ere he could speak to them, there was a frenzied rush of men crying, "Fire! Fire! After-damp!" For just one minute they stood at the cut where the child lay, and called, "For God's sake, Davie, come, come, come!" and Davie shook his head slightly, and answered,

"Nay, I'll stay with the lad."

And when Ian heard these words, they smote him like a sword, and he cried out: "I have seen God's love!This hourI have seen God's love—like as a father pitieth his children—even unto death—so God pities and loves. My God, love me! Teach me how to love! I am thy faithless son, Ian; forgive me and love me!"

He was in an ecstasy, and, even as he prayed, a still, small voice ran, like a swift arrow of flame, through all the black galleries of the mine—a voice like the noise of many waters, but sweet as the music of heaven, and it spoke but one word:

"Ian!"

Through all that earthly hell, filled with death and horror of suffering, above the crying of the men, above the screams of the wounded, the voices of fear and agony, this wonderful voice passed along, swift as the lightning, yet full of the divinest melody.

These events so marvelous to Ian had not occupied more than a moment or two of time. Then there was another rush of men with the assurance that it would be the last. They swept Ian with them, but Davie, still standing by his child, just shook his head and repeated his decision, "Nay, I'll stay with the lad"; and the crowd, with fire behind them, struggled to the cage and were drawn up to the sunshine.

At the pit mouth Ian met the rescue company of the pit and the physicians, and he untied his horse and rode away into the woods and hills. He was weeping unconsciously, washing every word he uttered with tears of repentance and love.

"Oh, it is wonderful!" he cried. "Wonderful! Wonderful!Out of all the millions of men in this world,God knew my name. He knewwhere I was. Hecalled me by my name. Oh, miracle of love!"

All the way to Ambleside he rode slowly. He was in a transport of love and joy—had he not been veritably taken by God's love "out of hell"? He was thrilled with wonder, and he would make no haste. He bent his soul to the heavenly influences which had made the last few hours forever memorable. So his prayers grew sweeter and calmer. They had in them the voices of the night wind, the awe of the stars, and the rustle of unseen wings. And, just as he was entering Ambleside, his Bible took part in his happiness and whispered to his heart a verse he had read hundreds of times, but which at this hour seemed to have been written specially for him.

"Fear thou not. I have redeemed thee. I have called thee by thy name. Thou art mine."—Isaiah 43:1.

He knew then what he was to do.

Back to Index Next