"Come to my room, I am very unhappy.Let me see you ere I go."Your own sister,"HESTER."
"I thought you would not deny me, Eugene," she said, as the latter entered her apartment; "you were ever kind and forgiving. Tell me, first, have you any hopes of mother?"
"Indeed I have, dear sister, the greatest hopes."
"Do you call me 'dear sister'? You are not angry with me, then, Eugene?"
"Not much more angry than I was the day you took my horse away when I wanted to go hunting; do you remember it, Hester?"
"I do, but you would not speak to me then till mother reconciled us. Dear mother! our childish quarrels always worried her. She was never easy till she had set them right. Would we were children again, Eugene, and our quarrels as easily adjusted." Hester was weeping as she spoke.
"We may be, Hester, as soon as we so will it. Why should we lose the simplicity, love, and truth that make childhood sweet?"
"Do you love me still, Eugene?"
"I do; nay, I admire you too, though I think you are mistaken."
"You are very good to say so. Now then, dear Eugene, I may tell you to set our dear mother's mind at rest as soon at she can understand reason.{610}You will tell her that, at least as for as I am concerned, there shall be no injustice committed eventually. My father gives me the control of his property now, which he has a right to do if he so pleases; you have your allowance such as he promised you, that is all right too; but tell my dear mother that, as far as it depends on me, matters shall be made right at my father's death. It would serve nothing, as you know, to moot the matter now, but I will never rob you or any one. Tell my mother this, Eugene, and tell her to restore to me her love."
"I will, my darling Hester. Now make yourself easy. Be sure my mother loves you still, that I love you, that we all love you. Be easy, my sister, my sweet sister." But Hester was weeping bitterly; the thought of not being allowed to see her mother, to help nurse her, was almost more than she could bear, and she very sorrowfully acquiesced in the arrangement.
The estates in Yorkshire were indeed in need of the master's eye. One of the clerks had absconded with a considerable sum of money; and this touched Mr. Godfrey nearly: while Hester was more affected by the discovery that the insidious doctrines of 'free love' were making terrible inroads on the morality of the young people. She was the more affected as she felt a natural repugnance to approach the subject. She found the people legislating for themselves, and systematizing divorce in what they deemed a manner consonant to nature. She was not prepared for this development, and drew back in disgust. "Is there, then, no remedy for this?" she asked of her father. "None but to legalize it, I believe," he replied. "You know nothing of these things, child, and had better not meddle with them. Legalizing divorce must take place sooner or later, from causes you do not understand; nay, I do not think the matter will stop there. As people become enlightened, and live more according to the laws of nature, polygamy must be legalized too; [Footnote 174] it is the only way to prevent disorder. In fact, but for the prejudice created by religion, it would have been done long since in theory as it has ever been done in practice!"
[Footnote 174: This plea is now used by intelligent men, non-Mormonites, to justify the existence of legalized polygamy in an American State. It is gravely asserted that only in Mormondom can the moral laws be enforced; that the practice in other states is the same without the sanction of the law, and that the absence of that sanction creates the disorders and night brawls of our streets. Order reigns in Utah!]
"Are you serious?"
"Perfectly so!"
"Then there must be something wrong, absolutely wrong. I can never be brought to believe polygamy necessary; that must enslave a woman, and I must protest against it."
"Protest as you will you will find nature too strong for your theory. You have been so peculiarly brought up, Hester, by your poor mother, that you know nothing, absolutely nothing, of the world's necessities, and I begin to wish I had never let your eyes become unsealed. You are a privileged one, and belonging to a privileged class; the majority of the world are not so protected. But this is not a subject for you; shut your eyes to these matters, and attended to the spread of intelligence."
But it is not easy to shut one's eyes when once they have been opened. Hester was stupefied. This came as a climax to the sorrow already arising from her mother's illness, from her remorse in having partly occasioned it. The woman's heart within her was beginning to make itself felt. The occupations of the Yorkshire estate grew trite and dull, until she had found a remedy for this grievance, a principal to propose, a power with which to act. Mr. Godfrey was also gloomy from his pecuniary loss through the embezzlement of the clerk, and matters were assuming a very unpleasant appearance.
{611}
M. de Villeneuve called to pay them a parting visit, the illness of his father called him to America.
"Shall you return to Europe?" said Mr. Godfrey.
"Yes; as soon as I can get away, I must return to take care of my ward; and if I can possibly find a location for her order, take her to America with me."
"Your ward? Her order?"
"Did you not know that Euphrasie de Meglior is my ward, that her father increased her to my care the night before he died? That which has kept me in Europe so long as been the hope of assisting her to regain her estates and to establish yourself. Fortunately for my peace of mind, I have been able partially to succeed in both. A part, though but a small part, of the estate has been rescued; and Madame de Meglior is already returned to France. Euphrasie thinks herself still more fortunate. Four of the ladies of the continent where she was educated have found shelter in England. They have met, and by the age of friends have wherewith to establish themselves. They have taken a house at———, about ten miles from this, and have already commenced community life, two Euphrasie's great content."
"And Euphrasie did not return with her mother to France?"
"No. She resigned her right to the estate during madame's life."
"And what will she live on?"
"The poor Clares support themselves by their work."
Hester looked surprised, almost shocked. M. de Villeneuve continued:
"During my absence I have deputed warm friends to look after them, and, as I said, my object is finally to transplant them to America. But I must not forget to inquire after Mrs. Godfrey, of whose health I hear such sad accounts. I do not wonder to perceive you are dejected, every one must sympathize in your anxiety. But tell me, how was it that Mrs. Godfrey, so lofty-minded, so motherly a woman, so full of magnetism, if I may be allowed the expression, could bring herself to patronize this materialistic scheme of education? Her loving heart must have felt intuitively that systems, exterior expressions which lack the vital principle, cannot regenerate the earth."
"I do not know that my mother ever did patronize my plans. She has never been well enough to come to Yorkshire since they were started."
"No! Then you missed the benefit of her fine intuitive reasonings, and of the results of her experience. Believe me, Miss Hester, applauding as I do, perforce, the zeal which animates you, I am constrained to tell you, you must necessarily fail. You appeal but to the selfish passions; you will be startled one day at the demoralization that will be manifested."
"I am beginning to feel this already," said Hester. "I want some power that as yet I do not find."
Mr. Godfrey rose impatiently and went to the window, scarcely out of earshot, but far enough away to decline any share in the conversation. He was always displeased when his "best policy" principle was called in question, though just now his pocket was suffering from that cause.
"You will find out soon the sanction you require," said M. de Villeneuve. "Every real unperverted natural law is the material symbol of a higher supernatural law, to which it is essentially related. It is the disunion of these two laws in your mind that now perplexes you; but you are too sincere in your search for truth not to perceive their relative bearings at last."
"Truth! what is truth?" said Hester.
"Truth is the harmony of all things as they exist in God; as love is their manifestation," said M. de Villeneuve. "The simplicity of ideas, their order, beauty, harmony, find expression in the created world; but the ideas themselves{612}are immaterial or spiritual, and have a relative spiritual expression in the soul. You have taken one and left the other, hence the failure. Missing the idea itself, you necessarily fail in power, for spiritual power is needed to develop truly even the material type. And, moreover, you cannot understand the type until you possess the idea."
"Something is wanted, that is certain," said Hester; "but if all virtue is typified in some material existence, tell me where is the type of purity?"
"Where but in the virgin-mother," responded the comte. "In the mother of him who died to obtain for man that power over sin which had escaped him. The world lies the victim of its own self-will: it needs a high ideal of purity and of sanctifying love, and this it finds in Mary; it needs the power to work out this ideal, and this it finds in Jesus. The progression of man is dearer to Mary than ever it can be to you, for she is our mother, and the mother of our Redeemer; but progression consists in sanctifying the individual, in destroying that overweening empire of sense which overlies the spiritual faculty, and which is fatal to woman in every sense, even in this world. Did you never observe how the progression of ancient times ever riveted woman's chains? From Egypt to Greece, from Greece to Rome, as luxury increased the degradation of the majority of women followed. The temples of the gods were filled with thousands of women enacting scenes of horror under the name of worship. This affords a key to the disorders that always accompanied ancient civilization, for woman is the mother of the race, the peculiar impersonation of the affections, and in her maternity the representative of that self-sacrificing principle which forgets self in care for the welfare of her children. Where woman is not cognizant of her true office, where her spiritual affinities remain undeveloped, the race can get no further than materialism, and that sensuous gratification which contains already within itself the germ of decay, No For it is of earth, earthy. But the divine instinct of religion, when proclaiming the 'grace to rise' one for us by the cross on which the God-man died, raised Mary on the altars of his church, for the special protection of all that is holy and aspirative to in womanhood. And since that blessed time Christian women have been respected as virgins and as mothers; as beings formed to foster virtue and watch over the spiritual education of the of the members of Christ's body. Mary acts wonderfully through her daughters. Christian queens converted their husbands, and with them their subjects throughout Europe; Christian matrons have given that tone to society which now, even in this age of heresy, respect security in theory, though it throws it off in practice. All that is pure, all that is lovely, all that is harmonious and holy invests the shrine of Mary, and from her influence proceeds the charm that represses vice, converts the heart to goodness as its chief happiness, and gives power to the individual to do those works of penance, of violence to self, which win the kingdom of heaven; a kingdom which commences here, in our own hearts, when we once enter into the harmonies of the religious teachings of nature and of revelation."
Hester started to her feet. "Is this the office of Mary?" she exclaimed.
M. de Villeneuve assented by a gesture.
"True or not true," said Hester, "this explanation does not in the least savor of ignorance and superstition it is beautiful poetry!"
"And is not poetry the highest truth?" said the comte.
"No," said Mr. Godfrey, coming forward with a frown on his countenance. "No! I wonder you religious people can never keep within your proper bounds. I, who have traveled in France, in Belgium, and in Italy, and seen the painted dolls and gaudy dressed-up images, protest against your giving a poetic or philosophic dress to this idolatry or mariolatry. When I{613}take Hester abroad, she will see with me that this worship is nothing but the rankest superstition."
"But I thought you said there was always a meaning under every myth. Pop, may not this be the meeting of 'Mary'"?
"Mary is no myth," said the Comte de Villeneuve, "she is a real, holy, pure, and loving woman, to be loved with a personal affection!"
"Beware!" said Mr. Godfrey, "our family has suffered enough already from these fantastic dreams. Eugene's Catholicity has driven his mother crazy. If my Hester were to succumb, it would be even worse with me. Let us make a truce with religion, I see it will produce no other fruits than to set people buy the ears."
"As you will. I am leaving for America, can I bear a greeting from you to my father?"
"Tell him to inspire his son with a little of his common sense. In a twenty years' intercourse he never mentioned the word religion in my family."
"You must forgive me, Mr. Godfrey," said the comte rising. "I thought to console your daughter; she is much changed since I saw her last."
Hester was much changed, but never so much as now. She longed to thank the comte, to unsay her father's rude words, but she dared not. She dared not anger Mr. Godfrey. Nor was it necessary: her eyes had kindled, her countenance had glowed, and the comte felt that his words had not been thrown away, that Hester had received a revelation, and he departed consoled.
It was a new study that Hester now entered upon. Woman as she was in the olden time: in Greece and Rome; in Egypt and Abyssinia; in Persia and India. Woman as she is everywhere where Christianity is not known, where the mothership of Mary is ignored. The facts presented to her were appalling, and none the less so that Mr. Godfrey was so peevish when addressed on this subject. He felt intuitively that the more Hester knew of this, the more she would shrink from materialism; and if she abandoned him, if she adopted Catholicity, he would have lost his last hope. He began to tire of "perfectibility" and "progress," the more that they seemed to detach his only joy from his side.
Yet with an old man's obstinacy he would not yield. Hester continued her system, but now it was to watch more closely its results, to penetrate the secret workings of the heart. She wanted to speak of higher motive than self, but she knew not how. She only knew, and daily she knew it more, that some high controlling power was wanting which could speak to the heart and regulate the inward spirit: "Was that power God?" "And Mary, was she a real manifestation of the power of God residing in a woman's frame?"
Hester now wished this might be true.
After a few weeks spent in the company of Eugene and Annie, Mrs. Godfrey rallied somewhat, and the physicians prescribed change of air. Her insanity had somewhat subsided, but she was now dull and stupid, utterly unlike her former self, and her illness had affected her limbs also so that she was obliged to be wheeled in a chaise-longue from one place to another.
The place chosen for their new abode was a lone house within half a mile of the sea-coast, the road to which lay in a beautiful valley between two hills of considerable elevation. On the highest of these was a light-house, which gave warning of the perilous nature of the coast, while the neat little white dwellings of the coast-guardsmen, at the foot of the hill, betokened that this was a locality famed for smuggling excursions. Mrs. Godfrey was often laid on a couch placed on wheels, and drawn by hand to the beach on the sea-shore. The murmur{614}of the waves seemed to soothe her; and though she spoke very little, she seemed by slow degrees to be recovering her faculties, and now and then listened to the subjects discussed by her children, Eugene and Annie, who were seldom away from her, and who took work or study to the seaside, that they might while away the long hours of attendance. After a little time they observed that when the weather was pleasant an old blind woman was often led from one of the cottages to a pleasant seat beneath the cliff, and that the two or three children who played near her seemed to regard her with equal reverence and affection.
The old woman knitted in the sunshine, now and then interrupting her work to tell her beads or relate short stories to the young ones. In the evening a tidy young woman, of most pleasing appearance, would come to lead the blind woman home. This happened so often that the faces became familiar, and Mrs. Godfrey began to watch for them as for interesting objects, and at length she also began to wish to form their acquaintance. One afternoon she had her chaise-longue wheeled up to the side of the blind woman, and kindly inquired after her health.
"I am well, madam. Thanks for your inquiry," was the reply.
"And is this your daughter?" asked Annie, pointing to the young woman who was just come to lead her home.
"She is my son's wife, thanks be to God, and sure no daughter of my own could be better to me, who am but a burden to them all."
"Don't talk of burden, mother dear," said the young woman. "Sure, what should we do without you? Don't you teach the children their prayers and their catechism, and without you shouldn't we be almost like the heathens in this land of—" She paused and colored.
"Heresy," suggested Eugene, as if concluding the sentence for her.
"No offence, sir, I hope," courtesied the woman.
Eugene took up the old woman's beads which had fallen to the ground, reverently touched the cross with his lips, and restored them to her. "No offence at all," said he. "This is a land of heresy and of infidelity, and it cheers us to find out now and then one who continues faithful to the truth. Where do you live?"
"In the white cottage yonder, sir."
"And your husband belongs to the coast-guard?"
"He does, sir."
"And is he a Catholic also?"
"Glory be to God, he is!" said the old woman.
"But how do you manage? Can you ever go to mass?"
"Not often, sir."
"Is there any priest near here?"
"None that I know of nearer than Arundel Castle. The Duke of Norfolk has a private chaplain, they say." This was all that could be drawn from the parties on that subject. They evidently feared to compromise some one by speaking more plainly.
After this day Mrs. Godfrey seemed attracted to the poor blind old woman. She had always been benevolent, though she seldom took a strong personal interest in the object of her bounty, and beyond relieving physical want had little idea of doing good. Now a new idea had taken possession of her, she appeared to feel reverence for the cheerful sufferer, and treated her with a proportionate respect and sympathy.
"Is your husband long dead," she asked.
"May God rest his soul! He has been dead these ten years."
"And how long have you been blind?"
"Nearly as long, praise be to God! I took the fever immediately after, and the disease fell into my eyes, and when I recovered I was blind."
"Do you praise God, my good woman, for making you blind?"
{615}
"And why not, my lady? Sure 'tis he that knows best what is good for us, and what is most for his own his honor and glory."
"But how can his honor and glory be promoted by your being blind?" asked Mrs. Godfrey, as a dim recollection of Euphrasie crossed her mind.
"Faith, then, and its little we know of such matters, and less that we can tell. But we are sure that God created us himself, and wishes for our love and service; and often when things go well with us we forget him, and love ourselves and our friends so much that we neglect to serve him; then he sends sorrow to recall us to himself, and for this we should bless him."
"But has not God commanded us to love our neighbor?"
"Yes, my lady; but it must be with a holy love that we love our neighbor, because he is the creature of God, the child of the same Father. Many our kind from a dislike to feel pain or to witness pain, but this is not the true worship required by God, who says we must love him with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength. This real love submits in all things to his holy will, because it gives 'self' into his keeping."
"But if you could see you might read of God, and learn to love him better?"
"I never could read, my lady," was the reply.
"Then where did you get your knowledge?" asked Annie.
"The priest taught me my catechism, my lady and every Sunday and holiday he explained it, and for many a long year I never missed the lesson. Then we often had instructions at Mass, and he taught us the rosary and the way of the cross. Ah! it is not the good father's fault if the children of his congregation do not know their religion."
"And you never went to school?"
"To none other than the school of poverty which our Lord founded and blessed," said the old woman. "Oftentimes we had scarcely potatoes enough to eat, though we little ones tried to work as well as the big ones; but labor was worth very little at that time, and afterward my father took sick and lay for a long time helpless. We had hard times of it in my young days."
"And did your mother take it very much to heart?"
"No, not very much. She grieved when my father died, though she hoped and believed he was happy, and would smile through her tears while she told us so. But for the rest, we all knew that it was not fine clothes or dainty food that would make us happy: we knew that we should have as much of both as it was God's will to send us, and we tried not to wish for more. When we were cold and hungry mother would gather us round her, and talk of that solemn midnight at Bethlehem when, under the clear frosty sky, the angels came to the shepherds, singing songs of glory, because the Lord of heaven and earth lay poor and helpless in the stable at Bethlehem. Then she would tell us of the long, dreary flight into Egypt, when Mary and Joseph begged hospitality by the way, because they loved poverty, for it made them more immediately dependent upon God. Then she showed us the poverty of Nazareth, and of the time of his ministry, who had not where to lay his head; and we became not only reconciled to poverty, we tried to love it for his sake, who became poor for our sakes. So you see, my lady, we could not be unhappy even when sorrow was upon us."
"Twas a sublime philosophy," said Annie.
"Rather say a glorious religion, Annie!" said Eugene. "Well might the boast of the gospel be that it was preached unto the poor."
Conversations like these brought a new train of ideas to the minds of both mother and daughter. Patience, meekness, and humility were embodied before them, bringing with them such childlike confidence in the providence of God that they could but feel such religion to be indeed reality.
{616}
"Brother," said Annie, "I begin to perceive that it is of necessity that philosophy divides itself into two branches, the exoteric and esoteric. The human mind evidently needs considerable preparation to be able t comprehend the higher ideas that lie hidden under first teachings. It is not so much the teachings that are separate as that the mind must pass through a given process to arrive at the meaning. Every form of matter seems a metaphor, involving a spiritual idea, and many minds seem powerless to penetrate to this; they necessarily remain content with the material explanation."
"And yet you blame religion for presenting defined dogmas, practical methods, and real precepts to her children, forgetting that this is the necessary preparation to higher truth, and that every mind must begin at the beginning?"
"I blame only trivial and childish practices; I reject only untenable doctrines."
"As for example?"
"The idea that a good God will plunge us into hell!"
"Have you ever reflected on what God is, Annie?"
"No! how should we know aught of such a being?"
"Chiefly by revelation, but also somewhat by observation."
"Give me your idea on the subject, Eugene."
"God is light, power, and love. He created intelligent beings, that he might impart to them a degree of these attributes, and in their degree call upon them to participate in the joys they impart. The unvarying law impressed on material agencies, whether endowed with vitality or not, did not (in all reverence be it spoken) content the love of God; the enforced obedience of the material world to the attractions acting upon it, and the instincts animating the various races of the verified matter, though beautiful, though glorious evidence of power, wisdom, and benevolence, did not call forth a consciousness of creatureship, could not render to the creator a free-will offering of warm, outpouring, grateful love. This the Creator desired. It is his pleasure to desire to be loved; and he created the human soul for the satisfying of this desire; he rendered it free, and endowed it with the faculty of loving, that it may freely offer the purest love to himself."
"Go on; how do you reconcile this with hell?"
"God is pure, holy, incapable of defilement, change, or division. His essential being penetrates all space, comes in contact, literally, with all material and spiritual existence. Now, God created the human soul like unto himself, with affinities to himself, and in proportion as that likeness continues or is restored, light, love, and power exist in that soul. The absence of these constitutes disease, which will result in spiritual death. They are absent in the wicked, and the divine rays entering that soul cause pain, even as the rays of the sun cause pain when they enter the eye of the body after it has become diseased."
"But eternally?"
"The soul preserves its identity and consciousness eternally, though it undergoes spiritual death. If by an act of volition it has lost light, love, and power, it has not lost immortality, and the divine rays, penetrating this wreck of life, necessarily fill it with terror and dismay when all affinity for purity and holiness are destroyed. The spirit of love, culturing the spirit of hate, must produce pain, discord, rage; and as the strife is now unequal and hate is impotent, it creates despair also. We see this on a minor scale on earth. The French revolution{617}brought prominently before us men whose spiritual faculties seemed already dead—men given up to a reprobate sense, who appeared utterly beyond conversion, and who were styled by the vulgar incarnate demons; yet these are immortal beings who will carry their dispositions beyond the grave. Should you like hereafter to come in contact with such?"
Annie shuddered. She thought of Alfred Brookbank, whose mere entrance into the room had often caused her blood to curdle.
Eugene continued: "Remember, sister, that evil means cutting ourselves off voluntarily from God, and thereby subjecting ourselves to become the prey of our own passions, of our own selfishness, which when once loosed may lead to every kind of excess. Good, on the contrary, is living in God, adoring his will, admiring his perfections, loving his law. While on earth the choice of good and evil is before us; and what repugnances to perfect action or to perfect dispositions we find difficult to overcome in this our fallen state will be overcome for us if we pray in a sincere, in a co-operative spirit, or rather we shall receive power to overcome all evil and to accomplish all good if only in simplicity of heart we turn to him who is faithful to fulfil all promises; for he has said, 'Ask and you shell receive' all graces necessary to form in you the true spiritual life. If we choose to neglect this means appointed by God, we have no right to complain of the result."
"I will pray," whispered Annie.
"I, too," said Mrs. Godfrey, who was for the most part a silent listener in these discussions. "Strange it is, Eugene, that you should be teaching the principles which I ought to have instilled into you from youth upward."
"Why, you were not a Catholic, mother!" said Eugene.
"No! but I had many opportunities of becoming instructed, had I been willing; but I was worldly; I cared for none of these things; I did not think the time would come when I should consider sorrow and sickness a blessing: without that fearful malady and these paralyzed limbs I might have died in ignorance of all that it most concerns me to know. I have lived without God; dare I hope, Eugene, he will accept my tardy return to him now?"
"The grace that is working in your heart to make you wish that return is an evidence of his love for yon, dear mother; only continue to respond to it, and all will be well."
. . . . .
"Brother," said Annie, on another occasion, "the accounts that we have of the ancients soon after the deluge seem to denote that they were a race of wondrous power. The mere history we have of the building of the city of Babylon, its wondrous walls, its bricks so well cemented by bitumen that they seemed imperishable; its six hundred and seventy-six squares, so planned that they preserved the ventilation of the city in perfect order; its provision for water; its hanging gardens and palaces—to read of such cities as this and Nineveh and many others, one imagines a fairy tale in hand instead of realities. Then, I presume, the raising of those immense blocks of stone which go to form the Pyramids would puzzle our modern engineers, as would many things in that land of wonders, Egypt. Conceive a modern traveller losing his way among the ruins of ancient temples that strew the site where Thebes once stood, passing the night in the rude hut of a Bedouin or Copt erected amid these ruins, and in the morning seated upon a fallen pillar, making his meditation on 'Progression.' All ancient, very ancient history, is instinct with power. What does this mean?"
"That probably the knowledge that Adam imparted to his descendants was greater than that which we now possess, or the intellectual faculties may have been stronger before passion and egotism again corrupted the race."
{618}
"You think the earlier men really possessed higher intellectual facilities than we have now?"
"I think their works would warrant the assumption. Beside, it is reasonable to suppose that Adam was created perfect according to his nature, that it was endowed with the highest spiritual and intellectual faculties, capable not only of understanding the material creation in its laws of attraction, in the relationships of matter to matter, but also of comprehending the type enfolded in each material manifestation; the spiritual co-relationship existing between such manifestation and the idea it represents. This spiritual faculty was overborne by sin, impurity deluged the world, and a material deluge destroyed the race. But to Noah, doubtless, the mental organization as well as the spiritual power descended; hence immediately after the deluge we see mighty works which betoken that high creative intellect which inspire modern imitators with mute wonder."
"Then you think sin was absolutely a destroying power?"
"I do, even from the first. The intellectual faculties, when used as the mere servant of the selfish passions, shrink and cannot receive their full expansion, cannot perceive spiritual relationships, cannot perceive man's moral relationships, each one to his fellow. Indulgence of the passions, inordinately pursued, of itself cripples the intellect and takes away the desire of intellectual culture; selfishness, on the other hand, shuts up the fountains of knowledge, in order to retain the material power that knowledge gives for selfish purposes. Both these causes were in operation to cause that inequality of fortune which finally wrought the 'castes' among mankind. The knowing ones kept the knowledge transmitted from Noah downward in their own exclusive possession, which the majority submitted to at first in order more freely to indulge their passions, and afterward because they could not help themselves, having (under the influence of passion) fallen out of the intellectual sphere. Laws compelling by force certain restraints became necessary, and soon labor was performed by force also, and most of the laborers became slaves. These laws, in their action, usually touched only the governed, that is, those who had let the intellectual power slip from them. The governors had, almost universally, power to trample on the common law when applied to themselves; it was only when they came in contact with each other, and intruded on each other's privileges, that they were called to account. I speak not of the theory, but of the practice; there was one law for the rich, another for the poor, throughout all ages. What was called civilization, before the coming of Christ, did not touch the poor, the enslaved; the down-trodden slaves had little chance of justice or of mercy. What was meant by liberty applied only to the freemen; the want of remembering this leads many two mistakes in comparing the civilization of ancient and modern times. The gospel preached to the poor taught them to repress the empire of the passions, thus slowly but surely causing that rise of intellect in the masses which has swept slavery from Europe, and from all countries where the laborer has followed even imperfectly this first requisite, the doing which has enabled him to cultivate his intellect sufficiently to compete with those in possession of power. A people enslaved my passion easily succumb to external force, as a virtuous people, however poor, have an innate power of preserving external freedom. The external depends on the internal. One is a manifestation of the other; almost a consequence."
"Then," said Annie, "if I have understood you aright, man was originally in direct communication with his Creator. Sin not only destroyed this communication, which was the source of all knowledge and happiness, it impaired the faculties through which that communication is held."
"Yes," said Eugene.
{619}
"And as temporal happiness is but the reflex of spiritual happiness, the necessary result of order in the spiritual relationship, it follows that the spiritual order must be restored before the natural order can yield the happiness it is calculated to produce. This, then, is the redemption, penance, violence to flesh, and to self will, before the restoration can take place; these being the necessary medicine to heal the soul's diseases. Those who refuse the medicine perish."
"You surprise me, sister," said Eugene; "you are apt at understanding."
"You forget that long since the enigma was propounded to us. I am but just getting my ideas into form. You will tell me if I have drawn correct inferences. Man, by the fall, lost not only actual knowledge and actual means of knowledge, but he lost empire over the animal world, and, worse than all, over himself; he became a slave to his own appetites and passions, and to his own self-will. From this state no effort of his own could rescue him. The Redeemer came to offer him means of rescue, to enable him to re-establish spiritual communication, to bring man again into such actual relationship with God that he shall look up to him, practically as well as theoretically, as the highest metaphysical teacher; as the source of real power and light to the understanding; the restorer of all things to their pristine harmony. Is this so?"
"It is."
"And naturally this restoration must begin by the healing of the disorders of the soul. The first impulses of grace create desire for goodness, purity, and truth; but the old man is still within, and can only be subdued by violence done to ourselves. 'The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force.' This is why the saints welcome mortification and suffering, looking on them as tools with which to subdue themselves, with which they may be enabled to offer themselves a living sacrifice to God. This is why what men call 'progress' is repugnant to sanctity—progress meaning increased facilities for indulging the passions; facilities which, as we advance in sanctity, we learn to dispense with more and more. This is what Euphrasie meant when she puzzled us at her first coming."
"Indeed, sister, I believe it is."
"And her non-appreciation of human learning must have arisen from the intense pleasure she felt in personal, absolute dependence upon God. She did not want to know the material intermediate sequences; of all things, she preferred feeling they came to her directly from her Father's hand."
"I presume this was the case."
"Then, too, if I understood her aright, the soul, purified by prayer, mortification, and good works, becomes by the grace of God detached from the things of this world; it seeks its rest only in God, and then it begins to regain some of the sublime spiritual privileges it had lost. Even on earth it may hold communication with the glorified spirits in heaven, while these glorified spirits themselves, blessed with the beatific vision, drink in sensations of beauty, harmony, and delight, such as exist only in God, and of which we cannot form the slightest conception."
Eugene could only press his sister's hand in silence. She continued:
"It is this union of spiritual natures with our struggling existence, this interest taken by the saints in glory in the members of the church militant on earth, that you term the 'communion of saints,' is it not, Eugene?"
"Yes, Annie."
"And men have dared to call the recognition of this divine union, of this sacred bond of love, idolatry! It is the true conquest over death! the earnest of our own loving immortality! How absurd to call so beautiful a demonstration of the effect of divine charity 'idolatry'!"
"As absurd," said Eugene, "as to believe that God, in providing means to redeem men from the death of sin, should not watch over those means, and preserve them intact from man's defilement."
{620}
"Yes," interposed Mrs. Godfrey, "it is wonderful that men who believe in revelation should not see,primâ facie, that the same miraculous interposition which produced the revelation would, as if of necessity, watch over and protect that revelation." Then suddenly becoming very earnest, she said: "Eugene, I am drawing near my end, I feel it every day more. You must bring me a priest, if, indeed, one so worthless as I can become a member of the church of Christ. O my God! it scarcely seems possible that a life of worldliness should be followed by an eternity of bliss! But I will hope against my feelings of justice! The blood of Jesus is powerful to save. O my God! accept it; it was shed for me in pity and in mercy."
"And for me, too," said Annie. "I must be a Catholic also."
"But have you considered the cost, Annie? Your husband! your children!"
"I have weighed everything, and am resolved."
"I think feet, O my God!" said the sick woman. "O eternal justice! I offer thee my children's faith, my children's courage, in union with the precious blood of thy Son, to atone for my own shortcomings. Oh! bless these my children—give them grace to persevere!"
There was a solemn pause. Than she added: "Annie, there is suffering in store for you, but you will accept it. Eugene will be to a friend, a protector, a guide. I made my will before this malady came on. I dare not change it now, lest it should be disputed. I left to Eugene all that I have to leave, but he will provide for you, if provision is needed; and you, Annie, will confide in him when you need a friend."
"I will, dear mother," faltered Annie. "Surely, we have always loved each other."
Eugene threw his arm around his sister's waist, and kneeling by his mother's side, solemnly pledged himself self to watch over his sister and care for her.
TO BE CONTINUED.
"Many sins are forgiven her, because she hath loved much."
Love may, then, hope to quite refundWhat sin hath ta'en away?Poor heart! thou hast a debt beyondThy straitened means to pay.My sins in number far excelThe sands beside the sea.Lord! if thou wilt, I pay thee well.Then lend thy heart to me.
{621}
Visitors to the sea-shore love to wander along the beach in search of the beauteous shells of scallop or cowry, left by the retiring tide, and delight to trace their exquisite design and structure; or, scrambling over the shiny rocks, covered with treacherous algae, will appear into the little pools, fringed with crimson and purple weed, inhabited by various anemones, gray shrimps, and darting fish, in hopes of discovering some new treasure to capture, and carry off in triumph for the aquarium at home; but how few care to examine the modest beauty of the many sea-side flowers blooming on regarded at their very feet; nay, their very existence often unknown, or looked upon as common weeds, devoid of all beauty or interest. Many a lover of wildflowers and country beauty will pause in the fields and lanes, and even dusty roads that skirt the shore—especially if they be on the southern coasts of England—where the brier and hawthorn hedges are tangled with luscious honeysuckle, and the primroses cluster in masses; where the wild hyacinth peeps from amidst the nettles, and the speedwell opens its "angel's eyes" of loveliest azure; but as they approached the sea-beach, the proverb of its sterility,
"Barren as the sand on the sea-sure,"
is felt, and not is expected or looked four but the rich harvest of the ocean's wondrous things cast on the shingle, or left in the pools beyond. The immediate banks and links of the sea-side are usually treeless, and, to non-observant eyes, dreary wastes; but not a spot on this wide world is without its interest and beauty, and delightful it is, when rambling along the sandy beach, listening to the music of the waves on the pebbly shore, to find how many lovely blossoms are scattered even here, ornamenting the rugged sides of the chalky cliff or rock, weaving a flowery tapestry over the sloping links, and binding together with interlaced roots the loose substance of many a sand-bank.
Unlike the country meadows, where the loveliest blossoms appear with the earliest sunshine of the year, the fairest sea-side flowers are to be gathered during the summer and autumn months; though even in spring, the turf which enamels the links, down often to the water's edge, will be found decked with an occasional early blossom,