‘Truly my waiting soul reliesIn silence God upon:Because from him there doth ariseAll my salvation.’
‘Truly my waiting soul reliesIn silence God upon:Because from him there doth ariseAll my salvation.’
‘Truly my waiting soul reliesIn silence God upon:Because from him there doth ariseAll my salvation.’
‘Truly my waiting soul relies
In silence God upon:
Because from him there doth arise
All my salvation.’
And then came the busy patter of the little footsteps without, the moving of chairs, the clink of plates, as busy hands were arranging the table; and then again there was a pause, and he thought she seemed to come near to the open window of the adjoining room, for the voice floated in clearer and sadder:—
‘O God, to me be merciful,Be merciful to me!Because my soul for shelter safe,Betakes itself to thee.‘Yea, in the shadow of thy wingsMy refuge have I placed,Until these sore calamitiesShall quite be overpast.’
‘O God, to me be merciful,Be merciful to me!Because my soul for shelter safe,Betakes itself to thee.‘Yea, in the shadow of thy wingsMy refuge have I placed,Until these sore calamitiesShall quite be overpast.’
‘O God, to me be merciful,Be merciful to me!Because my soul for shelter safe,Betakes itself to thee.
‘O God, to me be merciful,
Be merciful to me!
Because my soul for shelter safe,
Betakes itself to thee.
‘Yea, in the shadow of thy wingsMy refuge have I placed,Until these sore calamitiesShall quite be overpast.’
‘Yea, in the shadow of thy wings
My refuge have I placed,
Until these sore calamities
Shall quite be overpast.’
The tone of life in New England, so habitually earnest and solemn, breathed itself in the grave and plaintive melodies of the tunes then sung in the churches; and so these words, though in the saddest minor key, did not suggest to the listening ear of the auditor anything more than that pensive religious calm in which he delighted to repose. A contrast indeed they were, in their melancholy earnestness, to the exuberant carollings of a robin, who, apparently attracted by them, perched himself hard by in the lilacs, and struck up such a merryrouladeas quite diverted the attention of the fair singer; in fact, the intoxication breathed in the strain of this little messenger, whom God had feathered and winged and filled to the throat with ignorant joy, came in singular contrast with the sadder notes breathed by that creature of so much higher mould and fairer clay,—that creature born for an immortal life.
But the good Doctor was inly pleased when she sung; and when she stopped, looked up from his Bible wistfully, as missing something, he knew not what; for he scarce thoughthow pleasant the little voice was, or knew he had been listening to it,—and yet he was in a manner enchanted by it, so thankful and happy that he exclaimed with fervour, ‘The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage.’
So went the world with him, full of joy and praise, because the voice and the presence wherein lay his unsuspected life, were securely near,—so certainly and constantly a part of his daily walk, that he had not even the trouble to wish for them. But in that other heart how was it?—how with the sweet saint that was talking to herself in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs?
The good child had remembered her mother’s parting words the night before,—‘Put your mind upon your duties,’—and had begun her first conscious exercise of thought with a prayer that grace might be given her to do it. But even as she spoke, mingling and interweaving with that golden thread of prayer was another consciousness, a life in another soul, as she prayed that the grace of God might overshadow him, shield him from temptation, and lead him up to heaven; and this prayer so got the start of the other, that, ere she was aware, she had quite forgotten self, and was feeling, living, thinking in that other life.
The first discovery she made, when she looked out into the fragrant orchard, whose perfumes steamed in at her window, and listened to the first chirping of birds among the old apple-trees, was one that has astonished many a person before her;—it was this: she found that all that had made life interesting to her was suddenly gone. She herself had not known that, for the month past, since James came from sea, she had been living in an enchanted land; that Newport harbour, and every rock and stone, and every mat of yellow seaweed on the shore, that the two-mile road between the cottage and the white house of Zebedee Marvyn, every mullein-stalk, every juniper-tree, had all had a light and a charm which were suddenly gone. There had not been an hour in the day for the last four weeks that had not had its unsuspected interest,—because he was at the White House; because, possibly, hemight be going by, or coming in: nay, even in church, when she stood up to sing, and thought she was thinking only of God, had she not been conscious of that tenor voice that poured itself out by her side? and though afraid to turn her head that way, had she not felt that he was there every moment?—heard every word of the sermon and prayer for him? The very vigilant care which her mother had taken to prevent private interviews had only served to increase the interest by throwing over it the veil of constraint and mystery. Silent looks, involuntary starts, things indicated, not expressed—these are the most dangerous, the most seductive aliment of thought to a delicate and sensitive nature. If things were said out, they might not be said wisely,—they might repel by their freedom, or disturb by their unfitness; but what is only looked is sent into the soul through the imagination, which makes of it all that the ideal faculties desire.
In a refined and exalted nature it is very seldom that the feeling of love, when once thoroughly aroused, bears any sort of relation to the reality of the object. It is commonly an enkindling of the whole power of the soul’s love for whatever she considers highest and fairest; it is, in fact, the love of something divine and unearthly, which, by a sort of illusion, connects itself with a personality. Properly speaking, there is but One true, eternal Object of all that the mind conceives in this trance of its exaltation. Disenchantment must come, of course; and in a love which terminates in happy marriage there is a tender and gracious process, by which, without shock or violence, the ideal is gradually sunk in the real, which, though found faulty and earthly, is still ever tenderly remembered as it seemed under the morning light of that enchantment.
What Mary loved so passionately, that which came between her and God in every prayer, was not the gay, young, dashing sailor,—sudden in anger, imprudent of speech, and, though generous in heart, yet worldly in plans and schemings,—but her own ideal of a grand and noble man, such a man as she thought he might become. He stood glorified before her—an image of the strength that overcomes things physical; of thepower of command which controls men and circumstances; of the courage which disdains fear; of the honour which cannot lie; of constancy which knows no shadow of turning; of tenderness which protects the weak; and, lastly, of religious loyalty, which should lay the golden crown of its perfected manhood at the feet of a Sovereign Lord and Redeemer. This was the man she loved; and with this regal mantle of glories she invested the person called James Marvyn: and all that she saw and felt to be wanting, she prayed for with the faith of a believing woman.
Nor was she wrong; for, as to every leaf and every flower there is an ideal to which the growth of the plant is constantly urging, so is there an ideal to every human being,—a perfect form in which it might appear, were every defect removed and every characteristic excellence stimulated to the highest point. Once, in an age, God sends to some of us a friend who loves in us,nota false imagining, an unreal character, but, looking through all the rubbish of our imperfections, loves in us the divine ideal of our nature,—loves, not the man that we are, but the angel that we may be. Such friends seem inspired by a divine gift of prophecy,—like the mother of St. Augustine, who, in the midst of the wayward, reckless youth of her son, beheld him in a vision, standing, clothed in white, a ministering priest at the right hand of God—as he has stood for long ages since. Could a mysterious foresight unveil to us this resurrection form of the friends with whom we daily walk, compassed about with mortal infirmity, we should follow them with faith and reverence through all the disguises of human faults and weaknesses, ‘waiting for the manifestation of the sons of God.’
But these wonderful soul-friends, to whom God grants such perception, are the exceptions in life; yet, sometimes are we blessed with one who sees through us, as Michel Angelo saw through a block of marble when he attacked it in a divine fervour, declaring that an angel was imprisoned within it: and it is often the resolute and delicate hand of such a friend that sets the angel free.
There be soul-artists, who go through this world, lookingamong their fellows with reverence, as one looks amid the dust and rubbish of old shops for hidden works of Titian and Leonardo; and, finding them, however cracked or torn, or painted over with tawdry daubs of pretenders, immediately recognise the divine original, and set themselves to cleanse and restore. Such be God’s real priests, whose ordination and anointing are from the Holy Spirit; and he who hath not this enthusiasm is not ordained of God, though whole synods of bishops laid hands on him.
Many such priests there be among women; for to this silent ministry their nature calls them, endowed, as it is, with fineness of fibre and a subtile keenness of perception outrunning slow-footed reason,—and she of whom we write was one of these.
At this very moment, while the crimson wings of morning were casting delicate reflections on tree, and bush, and rock, they were also reddening innumerable waves round a ship that sailed alone, with a wide horizon stretching like an eternity around it; and in the advancing morning stood a young man, thoughtfully looking off into the ocean, with a book in his hand—James Marvyn,—as truly and heartily a creature of this material world as Mary was of the invisible and heavenly.
There are some who seem made tolive,—life is such a joy to them; their senses are so fullyen rapportwith all outward things; the world is so keenly appreciable, so much a part of themselves; they are so conscious of power and victory in the government and control of material things, that the moral and invisible life often seems to hang tremulous and unreal in their minds, like the pale, faded moon in the light of a gorgeous sunrise. When brought face to face with the great truths of the invisible world, they stand related to the higher wisdom much like the gorgeous, gay Alcibiades to the divine Socrates, or like the young man in Holy Writ to Him for whose appearing Socrates longed;—they gaze, imperfectly comprehending, and at the call of ambition or riches turn away sorrowing.
So it was with James: in full tide of worldly energy and ambition there had been forming over his mind that hardcrust—that scepticism of the spiritual and exalted which men of the world delight to call practical sense. He had been suddenly arrested and humbled by the revelation of a nature so much nobler than his own that he seemed worthless in his own eyes: he had asked for love; but whensuchlove unveiled itself, he felt like the disciple of old in the view of a diviner tenderness,—‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man.’
But it is not often that all the current of a life is reversed in one hour: and now, as James stood on the ship’s deck, with life passing around him, and everything drawing upon the strings of old habits, Mary and her religion recurred to his mind, as some fair, sweet, inexplicable vision. Where she stood he saw; but howhewas ever to get there seemed as incomprehensible as how a mortal man should pillow his form on sunset clouds.
He held the little Bible in his hand as if it were some amulet charmed by the touch of a superior being; but when he strove to read it, his thoughts wandered, and he shut it, troubled and unsatisfied. Yet there were within him yearnings and cravings, wants never felt before, the beginning of that trouble which must ever precede the soul’s rise to a higher plan of being.
There we leave him. We have shown you now our three different characters, each one in its separate sphere, feeling the force of that strongest and holiest power with which it has pleased our great Author to glorify this mortal life.
As, for example, the breakfast. It is six o’clock,—the hired men and oxen are gone,—the breakfast-table stands before the open kitchen-door, snowy with its fresh cloth, the old silver coffee-pot steaming up a refreshing perfume,—and the Doctor sits on one side, sipping his coffee and looking across the table at Mary, who is innocently pleased at the kindly beamingin his placid blue eyes,—and Aunt Katy Scudder discourses of housekeeping, and fancies something must have disturbed the rising of the cream, as it is not so thick and yellow as wont.
Now the Doctor, it is to be confessed, was apt to fall into a way of looking at people such as pertains to philosophers and scholars generally, that is, as if he were looking through them into the infinite,—in which case, his gaze became so earnest and intent that it would quite embarrass an uninitiated person; but Mary, being used to this style of contemplation, was only quietly amused, and waited till some great thought should loom up before his mental vision,—in which case, she hoped to hear from him.
The good man swallowed his first cup of coffee and spoke:—
‘In the Millennium, I suppose, there will be such a fulness and plenty of all the necessaries and conveniences of life, that it will not be necessary for men and women to spend the greater part of their lives in labour in order to procure a living. It will not be necessary for each one to labour more than two or three hours a day,—not more than will conduce to health of body and vigour of mind; and the rest of their time they will spend in reading and conversation, and such exercises as are necessary and proper to improve their minds and make progress in knowledge.’
New England presents probably the only example of a successful commonwealth founded on a theory, as a distinct experiment in the problem of society. It was for this reason that the minds of its great thinkers dwelt so much on the final solution of that problem in this world. The fact of a future Millennium was a favourite doctrine of the great leading theologians of New England, and Dr. H. dwelt upon it with a peculiar partiality. Indeed, it was the solace and refuge of his soul, when oppressed with the discouragements which always attend things actual, to dwell upon and draw out in detail the splendours of this perfect future which was destined to glorify the world.
Nobody, therefore, at the cottage was in the least surprised when there dropped into the flow of their daily life thesesparkling bits of ore, which their friend had dug in his explorations of a future Canaan,—in fact, they served to raise the hackneyed present out of the level of mere commonplace.
‘But how will it be possible,’ inquired Mrs. Scudder, ‘that so much less work will suffice in those days to do all that is to be done?’
‘Because of the great advance of arts and sciences which will take place before those days,’ said the Doctor, ‘whereby everything shall be performed with so much greater ease,—also the great increase of disinterested love, whereby the skill and talents of those who have much shall make up for the weakness of those who have less.
‘Yes,’—he continued, after a pause,—‘all the careful Marthas in those days will have no excuse for not sitting at the feet of Jesus; there will be no cumbering with much serving; the church will have only Maries in those days.’
This remark, made without the slightest personal intention, called a curious smile into Mrs. Scudder’s face, which was reflected in a slight blush from Mary’s, when the crack of a whip and the rattling of waggon-wheels disturbed the conversation and drew all eyes to the door.
There appeared the vision of Mr. Zebedee Marvyn’s farm-waggon, stored with barrels, boxes, and baskets, over which Candace sat throned triumphant, her black face and yellow-striped turban glowing in the fresh morning with a hearty, joyous light, as she pulled up the reins, and shouted to the horse to stop with a voice that might have done credit to any man living.
‘Dear me, if there isn’t Candace!’ said Mary.
‘Queen of Ethiopia,’ said the Doctor, who sometimes adventured a very placid joke.
The Doctor was universally known in all the neighbourhood as a sort of friend and patron-saint of the negro race; he had devoted himself to their interests with a zeal unusual in those days. His church numbered more of them than any in Newport; and his hours of leisure from study were often spent in lowliest visitations among them, hearing their stories, consoling their sorrows, advising and directing their plans,teaching them reading and writing, and he often drew hard on his slender salary to assist them in their emergencies and distresses.
This unusual condescension on his part was repaid on theirs with all the warmth of their race; and Candace, in particular, devoted herself to the Doctor with all the force of her being.
There was a legend current in the neighbourhood, that the first efforts to catechize Candace were not eminently successful, her modes of contemplating theological tenets being so peculiarly from her own individual point of view that it was hard to get her subscription to a received opinion. On the venerable clause in the Catechism, in particular, which declares that all men sinned in Adam and fell with him, Candace made a dead halt:—
‘I didn’t do dat ar’, for one, I knows. I’s got good mem’ry,—allers knows what I does,—nebber did eat dat ar’ apple,—nebber eat a bit ob him. Don’t tell me!’
It was of no use, of course, to tell Candace of all the explanations of this redoubtable passage,—of potential presence, and representative presence, and representative identity, and federal headship. She met all with the dogged,—
‘Nebber did it, I knows; should ’ave ’membered, if I had. Don’t tell me!’
And even in the catechizing class of the Doctor himself, if this answer came to her, she sat black and frowning in stony silence even in his reverend presence.
Candace was often reminded that the Doctor believed the Catechism, and that she was differing from a great and good man; but the argument made no manner of impression on her, till, one day, a far-off cousin of hers, whose condition under a hard master had often moved her compassion, came in overjoyed to recount to her how, owing to Dr. H.’s exertions, he had gained his freedom. The Doctor himself had in person gone from house to house, raising the sum for his redemption; and when more yet was wanting, supplied it by paying half his last quarter’s limited salary.
‘He do dat ar’?’ said Candace, dropping the fork wherewithshe was spearing doughnuts. ‘Den I’m gwine to b’liebe ebery wordhedoes!’
And accordingly, at the next catechizing, the Doctor’s astonishment was great when Candace pressed up to him, exclaiming,—
‘De Lord bress you, Doctor, for opening de prison for dem dat is bound! I b’liebes in you now, Doctor. I’s gwine to b’liebe ebery word you say. I’ll say de Catechize now,—fix it any way you like. Idideat dat ar’ apple,—I eat de whole tree, an’ swallowed ebery bit ob it, if you say so.’
And this very thorough profession of faith was followed, on the part of Candace, by years of the most strenuous orthodoxy. Her general mode of expressing her mind on the subject was short and definitive.
‘Law me! what’s de use? I’s set out to b’liebe de Catechize, an’ I’m gwine to b’liebe it,—so!’
While we have been telling you all this about her, she has fastened her horse, and is swinging leisurely up to the house with a basket on either arm.
‘Good morning, Candace,’ said Mrs. Scudder. ‘What brings you so early?’
‘Come down ’fore light to sell my chickens an’ eggs,—got a lot o’ money for ’em, too. Missy Marvyn she sent Miss Scudder some turkey-eggs, an’ I brought down some o’ my doughnuts for de Doctor. Good folks must lib, you know, as well as wicked ones,’—and Candace gave a hearty, unctuous laugh. ‘No reason why Doctors shouldn’t hab good tings as well as sinners, is dere?’—and she shook in great billows, and showed her white teeth in theabandonof her laugh. ‘Lor’ bress ye, honey, chile!’ she said, turning to Mary, ‘why, ye looks like a new rose, ebery bit! Don’t wondersomebodywas allers pryin’ an’ spyin’ about here!’
‘How is your mistress, Candace?’ said Mrs. Scudder, by way of changing the subject.
‘Well, porly,—rader porly. When Massa Jim goes, ’pears like takin’ de light right out her eyes. Dat ar’ boy trains roun’ arter his mudder like a cosset, he does. Lor’, de house seems so still widout him!—can’t a fly scratch his ear but itstarts a body. Missy Marvyn she sent down, an’ says, would you and de Doctor an’ Miss Mary please come to tea dis arternoon?’
‘Thank your mistress, Candace,’ said Mrs. Scudder; ‘Mary and I will come,—and the Doctor, perhaps,’ looking at the good man, who had relapsed into meditation, and was eating his breakfast without taking note of anything going on. ‘It will be time enough to tell him of it,’ she said to Mary, ‘when we have to wake him up to dress; so we won’t disturb him now.’
To Mary the prospect of the visit was a pleasant one, for reasons which she scarce gave a definite form to. Of course, like a good girl, she had come to a fixed and settled resolution to think of James as little as possible; but when the path of duty lay directly along scenes and among people fitted to recall him, it was more agreeable than if it had lain in another direction. Added to this, a very tender and silent friendship subsisted between Mrs. Marvyn and Mary; in which, besides similarity of mind and intellectual pursuits, there was a deep, unspoken element of sympathy.
Candace watched the light in Mary’s eyes with the instinctive shrewdness by which her race seem to divine the thoughts and feelings of their superiors, and chuckled to herself internally. Without ever having been made aconfidanteby any party, or having a word said to or before her, still the whole position of affairs was as clear to her as if she had seen it on a map. She had appreciated at once Mrs. Scudder’s coolness, James’s devotion, and Mary’s perplexity,—and inly resolved, that, if the little maiden did not think of James in his absence, it should not be her fault.
‘Laws, Miss Scudder,’ she said, ‘I’s right glad you’s comin’, ’cause you hasn’t seen how we’s kind o’ splendified since Massa Jim come home. You wouldn’t know it. Why, he’s got mats from Mogadore on all de entries, and a great big ’un on de parlour; and ye ought to see de shawl he brought Missus, an’ all de cur’us kind o’ tings to de Squire. ’Tell ye, dat ar’ boy honours his fader and mudder, ef he don’t do nuffin else,—an’ dat’s de fus’ commandment wid promise, ma’am; and to see him a-settin’ up ebery day in prayer-time, so handsome,holdin’ Missus’s han’, an’ lookin’ right into her eyes all de time! Why, dat ar’ boy is one o’ de ’lect,—it’s jest as clare to me; and de ’lect has got to come in,—dat’s what I say. My faith’s strong,—real clare, ’tell ye,’ she added, with the triumphant laugh which usually chorused her conversation, and turning to the Doctor, who, aroused by her loud and vigorous strain, was attending with interest to her.
‘Well, Candace,’ he said, ‘we all hope you are right.’
‘Hope, Doctor!—I don’t hope,—Iknows. ’Tell ye, when I pray for him, don’t I feel enlarged? ’Tell ye, it goes wid a rush. I can feel it gwine up like a rushin’, mighty wind. I feels strong, I do.’
‘That’s right, Candace,’ said the Doctor, ‘keep on; your prayers stand as much chance with God as if you were a crowned queen. The Lord is no respecter of persons.’
‘Dat’s what he a’n’t, Doctor,—an’ dere’s where I ’gree wid him,’ said Candace, as she gathered her baskets vigorously together, and, after a sweeping curtsy, went sailing down to her waggon, full laden with content, shouting a hearty ‘Good mornin’, Missus,’ with the full power of her cheerful lungs, as she rode off.
As the Doctor looked after her, the simple, pleased expression with which he had watched her, gradually faded, and there passed over his broad, good face, a shadow, as of a cloud on a mountain-side.
‘What a shame it is,’ he said; ‘what a scandal and disgrace to the Protestant religion, that Christians of America should openly practise and countenance this enslaving of the Africans! I have for a long time holden my peace—may the Lord forgive me!—but I believe the time is coming when I must utter my voice. I cannot go down to the wharves, or among the shipping, without these poor dumb creatures look at me so that I am ashamed; as if they asked me what I, a Christian minister, was doing, that I did not come to their help. I must testify.’
Mrs. Scudder looked grave at this earnest announcement; she had heard many like it before, and they always filled her with alarm, because——Shall we tell you why?
Well, then, it was not because she was not a thoroughlyindoctrinated anti-slavery woman. Her husband, who did all her thinking for her, had been a man of ideas beyond his day, and never for a moment countenanced the right of slavery so far as to buy or own a servant or attendant of any kind: and Mrs. Scudder had always followed decidedly along the path of his opinions and practice, and never hesitated to declare the reasons for the faith that was in her. But if any of us could imagine an angel dropped down out of heaven, with wings, ideas, notions, manners, and customs all fresh from that very different country, we might easily suppose that the most pious and orthodox family might find the task of presenting him in general society, and piloting him along the courses of this world, a very delicate and embarrassing one. However much they might reverence him on their own private account, their hearts would probably sink within them at the idea of allowing him to expand himself according to his previous nature and habits in the great world without. In like manner, men of high, unworldly natures are often reverenced by those who are somewhat puzzled what to do with them practically.
Mrs. Scudder considered the Doctor as a superior being, possessed by a holy helplessness in all things material and temporal, which imposed on her the necessity of thinking and caring for him, and prevising the earthly and material aspects of his affairs.
There was not in Newport a more thriving and reputable business at that time than the slave-trade. Large fortunes were constantly being turned out in it, and what better Providential witness of its justice could most people require?
Beside this, in their own little church, she reflected with alarm, that Simeon Brown, the richest and most liberal supporter of the society, had been, and was then, drawing all his wealth from this source; and rapidly there flashed before her mind a picture of one and another, influential persons, who were holders of slaves. Therefore, when the Doctor announced, ‘I must testify,’ she rattled her tea-spoon uneasily, and answered,—
‘In what way, Doctor, do you think of bearing testimony? The subject, I think, is a very difficult one.’
‘Difficult? I think no subject can be clearer. If we were right in our war for liberty, we are wrong in making slaves or keeping them.’
‘Oh, I did not mean,’ said Mrs. Scudder, ‘that it was difficult to understand the subject; therightof the matter is clear, but what todois the thing.’
‘I shall preach about it,’ said the Doctor; ‘my mind has run upon it some time. I shall show to the house of Judah their sin in this matter.’
‘I fear there will be great offence given,’ said Mrs. Scudder. ‘There’s Simeon Brown, one of our largest supporters,—he is in the trade.’
‘Ah, yes,—but he will come out of it,—of course he will,—he is all right, all clear. I was delighted with the clearness of his views the other night, and thought then of bringing them to bear on this point,—only, as others were present, I deferred it. But I can show him that it follows logically from his principles; I am confident of that.’
‘I think you’ll be disappointed in him, Doctor;—I think he’ll be angry, and get up a commotion, and leave the church.’
‘Madam,’ said the Doctor, ‘do you suppose that a man who would be willing even to give up his eternal salvation for the greatest good of the universe could hesitate about a few paltry thousands that perish in the using?’
‘He may feel willing to give up his soul,’ said Mrs. Scudder, naïvely, ‘but I don’t think he’ll give up his ships,—that’s quite another matter,—he won’t see it to be his duty.’
‘Then, ma’am, he’ll be a hypocrite, a gross hypocrite, if he won’t,’ said the Doctor. ‘It is not Christian charity to think it of him. I shall call upon him this morning and tell him my intentions.’
‘But, Doctor,’ exclaimed Mrs. Scudder, with a start, ‘pray, think a little more of it. You know a great many things depend on him. Why! he has subscribed for twenty copies of your “System of Theology.” I hope you’ll remember that.’
‘And why should I remember that?’ said the Doctor,—hastily turning round, suddenly enkindled, his blue eyesflashing out of their usual misty calm,—‘what has my “System of Theology” to do with the matter?’
Page 90. Sampson Low, Son & Co. March, 25th, 1859The Minister is moved.
The Minister is moved.
‘Why,’ said Mrs. Scudder, ‘it’s of more importance to get right views of the gospel before the world than anything else, is it not?—and if, by any imprudence in treating influential people, this should be prevented, more harm than good would be done.’
‘Madam,’ said the Doctor, ‘I’d sooner my system should be sunk in the sea than it should be a millstone round my neck to keep me from my duty. Let God take care of my theology; I must do my duty.’
And as the Doctor spoke, he straightened himself to the full dignity of his height, his face kindling with an unconscious majesty, and, as he turned, his eye fell on Mary, who was standing with her slender figure dilated, her large blue eye wide and bright, in a sort of trance of solemn feeling, half-smiles, half-tears,—and the strong, heroic man started, to see this answer to his higher soul in the sweet, tremulous mirror of womanhood. One of those lightning glances passed between his eyes and hers which are the freemasonry of noble spirits,—and, by a sudden impulse, they approached each other. He took both her outstretched hands, looked down into her face with a look full of admiration, and a sort of naïve wonder,—then, as if her inspired silence had been a voice to him, he laid his hand on her head, and said,—
‘God bless you, child! “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast thou ordained strength because of thine enemies, that thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.”’
In a moment he was gone.
‘Mary,’ said Mrs. Scudder, laying her hand on her daughter’s arm, ‘the Doctor loves you!’
‘I know he does, mother,’ said Mary, innocently; ‘and I love him,—dearly!—he is a noble, grand man!’
Mrs. Scudder looked keenly at her daughter. Mary’s eye was as calm as a June sky, and she began, composedly, gathering up the teacups.
‘She did not understand me,’ thought the mother.
TheDoctor went immediately to his study and put on his best coat and his wig, and, surmounting them by his cocked hat, walked manfully out of the house, with his gold-headed cane in his hand.
‘There he goes!’ said Mrs. Scudder, looking regretfully after him. ‘He issucha good man!—but he has not the least idea how to get along in the world. He never thinks of anything but what is true; he hasn’t a particle of management about him.’
‘Seems to me,’ said Mary, ‘that is like an Apostle. You know, mother, St. Paul says, “In simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world.”’
‘To be sure,—that is just the Doctor,’ said Mrs. Scudder; ‘that’s as like him as if it had been written for him. But that kind of way, somehow, don’t seem to do in our times; it won’t answer with Simeon Brown,—I know the man. I know just as well, now, how it will all seem to him, and what will be the upshot of this talk, if the Doctor goes there! It won’t do any good; if it would I would be willing. I feel as much desire to have this horrid trade in slaves stopped as anybody; your father, I’m sure, said enough about it in his time; but then I know it’s no use trying. Just as if Simeon Brown, when he is making his hundreds of thousands in it, is going to be persuaded to give it up! He won’t—he’ll only turn against the Doctor, and won’t pay his part of the salary, and will use his influence to get up a party against him, and our church will be broken up and the Doctor driven away,—that’s all that will come of it; and all the good that he is now doingto these poor negroes will be overthrown,—and they never did have so good a friend. If he would stay here and work gradually, and get his System of Theology printed,—and Simeon Brown would help at that,—and only drop words in season here and there, till people are brought along with him, why, by-and-by something might be done; but now, it’s just the most imprudent thing a man could undertake.’
‘But, mother, if it really is a sin to trade in slaves and hold them, I don’t see how he can help himself. I quite agree with him. I don’t see how he came to let it go so long as he has.’
‘Well,’ said Mrs. Scudder, ‘if worst comes to worst, and he will do it, I, for one, shall stand by him to the last.’
‘And I, for another,’ said Mary.
‘I would like him to talk with Cousin Zebedee about it,’ said Mrs. Scudder. ‘When we are up there this afternoon, we will introduce the conversation. He is a good sound man, and the Doctor thinks much of him, and perhaps he may shed some light upon this matter.’
Meanwhile the Doctor was making the best of his way in the strength of his purpose to test the orthodoxy of Simeon Brown.
Honest old granite boulder that he was, no sooner did he perceive a truth than he rolled after it with all the massive gravitation of his being, inconsiderate as to what might lie in his way:—from which it is to be inferred, that, with all his intellect and goodness, he would have been a very clumsy and troublesome inmate of the modern American Church. How many societies, boards, colleges, and other good institutions, have reason to congratulate themselves that he has long been among the saints!
With him logic was everything; and to perceive a truth and not act in logical sequence from it a thing so incredible, that he had not yet enlarged his capacity to take it in as a possibility. That a man should refuse to hear truth, he could understand. In fact, he had good reason to think the majority of his townsmen had no leisure to give to that purpose. That men hearing truth should dispute it and argue stoutly againstit, he could also understand; but that a man could admit a truth and not admit the plain practice resulting from it was to him a thing incomprehensible. Therefore, spite of Mrs. Katy Scudder’s discouraging observations, our good Doctor walked stoutly, and with a trusting heart.
At the moment when the Doctor, with a silent uplifting of his soul to his invisible Sovereign, passed out of his study, on this errand, where was the disciple whom he went to seek?
In a small, dirty room, down by the wharf, the windows veiled by cobwebs and dingy with the accumulated dust of ages, he sat in a greasy, leathern chair by a rickety office-table, on which were a great pewter inkstand, an account-book, and divers papers tied with red tape.
Opposite to him was seated a square-built individual,—a man of about forty, whose round head, shaggy eyebrows, small, keen eyes, broad chest, and heavy muscles, showed a preponderance of the animal and brutal over the intellectual and spiritual. This was Mr. Scroggs, the agent of a rice plantation, who had come on, bringing an order for a new relay of negroes to supply the deficit occasioned by fever, dysentery, and other causes, in their last year’s stock.
‘The fact is,’ said Simeon, ‘this last ship-load wasn’t as good a one as usual; we lost more than a third of it, so we can’t afford to put them a penny lower.’
‘Ay,’ said the other—‘but then there are so many women!’
‘Well,’ said Simeon, ‘women a’n’t so strong perhaps to start with; but then they stan’ it out, perhaps, in the long run, better. They’re more patient;—some of these men, the Mandingoes particularly, are pretty troublesome to manage. We lost a splendid fellow, coming over, on this very voyage. Let ’em on deck for air, and this fellow managed to get himself loose and fought like a dragon. He settled one of our men with his fist, and another with a marlinespike that he caught,—and, in fact, they had to shoot him down. You’ll have his wife; there’s his son, too,—fine fellow, fifteen year old by his teeth.’
‘What! that lame one?’
‘Oh, he a’n’t lame!—it’s nothing but the cramps from stowing. You know, of course, they are more or less stiff. He’s as sound as a nut.’
‘Don’t much like to buy relations, on account of their hatching up mischief together,’ said Mr. Scroggs.
‘Oh, that’s all humbug! You must keep ’em from coming together, anyway. It’s about as broad as ’tis long. There’ll be wives and husbands and children among ’em before long, start ’em as you will. And then this woman will work better for having the boy; she’s kinder set on him; she jabbers lots of lingo to him, day and night.’
‘Too much, I doubt,’ said the overseer, with a shrug.
‘Well, well,—I’ll tell you,’ said Simeon, rising. ‘I’ve got a few errands up town, and you just step over with Matlock and look over the stock;—just set aside any that you want, and when I see ’em all together, I’ll tell you just what you shall have ’em for. I’ll be back in an hour or two.’
And so saying, Simeon Brown called an underling from an adjoining room, and, committing his customer to his care, took his way up-town, in a serene frame of mind, like a man who comes from the calm performance of duty.
Just as he came upon the street where was situated his own large and somewhat pretentious mansion, the tall figure of the Doctor loomed in sight, sailing majestically down upon him, making a signal to attract his attention.
‘Good morning, Doctor,’ said Simeon.
‘Good morning, Mr. Brown,’ said the Doctor. ‘I was looking for you. I did not quite finish the subject we were talking about at Mrs. Scudder’s table last night. I thought I should like to go on with it a little.’
‘With all my heart, Doctor,’ said Simeon, not a little flattered. ‘Turn right in. Mrs. Brown will be about her house business, and we will have the keeping-room all to ourselves. Come right in.’
The ‘keeping-room’ of Mr. Simeon Brown’s house was an intermediate apartment between the ineffable glories of the front parlour and that court of the Gentiles, the kitchen; for the presence of a large train of negro servants made the latterapartment an altogether different institution from the throne-room of Mrs. Katy Scudder.
This keeping-room was a low-studded apartment, finished with the heavy oaken beams of the wall left full in sight, boarded over and painted. Two windows looked out on the street, and another into a sort of court-yard, where three black wenches, each with a broom, pretended to be sweeping, but were, in fact, chattering and laughing, like so many crows.
On one side of the room stood a heavy mahogany sideboard, covered with decanters, labelled Gin, Brandy, Rum, &c.; for Simeon was held to be a provider of none but the best, in his housekeeping. Heavy mahogany chairs, with crewel coverings, stood sentry about the room; and the fireplace was flanked by two broad arm-chairs, covered with stamped leather.
On ushering the Doctor into this apartment, Simeon courteously led him to the sideboard.
‘We mus’n’t make our discussions toodry, Doctor,’ he said; ‘what will you take?’
‘Thank you, sir,’ said the Doctor, with a wave of his hand,—‘nothing this morning.’
And, depositing his cocked hat in a chair, he settled himself into one of the leathern easy chairs, and, dropping his hands upon his knees, looked fixedly before him, like a man who is studying how to enter upon an inwardly absorbing subject.
‘Well, Doctor,’ said Simeon, seating himself opposite, sipping comfortably at a glass of rum-and-water, ‘our views appear to be making a noise in the world. Everything is preparing for your volumes; and when they appear, the battle of New Divinity, I think, may fairly be considered as won.’
Let us consider, that, though a woman may forget her firstborn, yet a man cannot forget his own system of theology,—because, therein, if he be a true man, is the very elixir and essence of all that is valuable and hopeful to the universe; and considering this, let us appreciate the settled purpose ofour friend, whom even this tempting bait did not swerve from the end which he had in view.
‘Mr. Brown,’ he said, ‘all our theology is as a drop in the ocean of God’s majesty, to whose glory we must be ready to make any and every sacrifice.’
‘Certainly,’ said Mr. Brown, not exactly comprehending the turn the Doctor’s thoughts were taking.
‘And the glory of God consisteth in the happiness of all his rational universe, each in his proportion, according to his separate amount of being; so that, when we devote ourselves to God’s glory, it is the same as saying that we devote ourselves to the highest happiness of his created universe.’
‘That’s clear, sir,’ said Simeon, rubbing his hands, and taking out his watch to see the time.
The Doctor hitherto had spoken in a laborious manner, like a man who is slowly lifting a heavy bucket of thought out of an internal well.
‘I am glad to find your mind so clear on this all-important point, Mr. Brown, the more so as I feel that we must immediately proceed to apply our principles, at whatever sacrifice of worldly goods; and I trust, sir, that you are one who, at the call of your Master, would not hesitate even to lay down all your worldly possessions for the greater good of the universe.’
‘I trust so, sir,’ said Simeon, rather uneasily, and without the most distant idea what could be coming next in the mind of his reverend friend.
‘Did it never occur to you, my friend,’ said the Doctor, ‘that the enslaving of the African race is a clear violation of the great law which commands us to love our neighbour as ourselves,—and a dishonour upon the Christian religion, more particularly in us Americans, whom the Lord hath so marvellously protected, in our recent struggle for our own liberty?’
Simeon started at the first words of this address, much as if some one had dashed a bucket of water on his head, and after that rose uneasily, walking the room and playing with the seals of his watch.
‘I—I never regarded it in this light,’ he said.
‘Possibly not, my friend’ said the Doctor,—‘so much doth established custom blind the minds of the best of men. But since I have given more particular attention to the case of the poor negroes here in Newport, the thought has more and more laboured in my mind,—more especially as our own struggles for liberty have turned my attention to the rights which every human creature hath before God,—so that I find much in my former blindness and the comparative dumbness I have heretofore maintained on this subject wherewith to reproach myself; for, though I have borne somewhat of a testimony, I have not given it that force which so important a subject required. I am humbled before God for my neglect, and resolved now, by his grace, to leave no stone unturned till this iniquity be purged away from our Zion.’
‘Well, Doctor,’ said Simeon, ‘you are certainly touching on a very dark and difficult subject, and one in which it is hard to find out the path of duty. Perhaps it will be well to bear it in mind, and by looking at it prayerfully some light may arise. There are such great obstacles in the way, that I do not see at present what can be done; do you, Doctor?’
‘I intend to preach on the subject next Sunday, and hereafter devote my best energies in the most public way to this great work,’ said the Doctor.
‘You, Doctor?—and now, immediately? Why, it appears to me you cannot do it. You are the most unfit man possible. Whosoever’s duty it may be, it does not seem to me to be yours. You already have more on your shoulders than you can carry; you are hardly able to keep your ground now, with all the odium of this new theology upon you. Such an effort would break up your church,—destroy the chance you have to do good here,—prevent the publication of your system.’
‘If it’s nobody’s system but mine, the world won’t lose much, if it never be published; but if it be God’s system, nothing can hinder its appearing. Besides, Mr. Brown, I ought not to be one man alone. I count on your help. I hold it as a special providence, Mr. Brown, that in our own church an opportunity will be given to testify to the realityof disinterested benevolence. How glorious the opportunity for a man to come out and testify by sacrificing his worldly living and business! If you, Mr. Brown, will at once, at whatever sacrifice, quit all connection with this detestable and diabolical slave-trade, you will exhibit a spectacle over which angels will rejoice, and which will strengthen and encourage me to preach and write and testify.’
Mr. Simeon Brown’s usual demeanour was that of the most leathery imperturbability. In calm theological reasoning, he could demonstrate, in the dryest tone, that, if the eternal torment of six bodies and souls were absolutely the necessary means for preserving the eternal blessedness of thirty-six, benevolence would require us to rejoice in it, not in itself considered, but in view of greater good. And when he spoke, not a nerve quivered; the great mysterious sorrow with which the creation groaneth and travaileth, the sorrow from which angels veil their faces, never had touched one vibrating chord either of body or soul; and he laid down the obligations of man to unconditional submission in a style which would have affected a person of delicate sensibility much like being mentally sawn in sunder. Benevolence, when Simeon Brown spoke of it, seemed the grimmest and unloveliest of Gorgons; for his mind seemed to resemble those fountains which petrify everything that falls into them. But the hardest-shelled animals have a vital and sensitive part, though only so large as the point of a needle; and the Doctor’s innocent proposition to Simeon, to abandon his whole worldly estate for his principles, touched this spot.
When benevolence required but the acquiescence in certain possible things which might be supposed to happen to his soul, which, after all, he was comfortably certain never would happen, or the acquiescence in certain suppositious sacrifices for the good of that most intangible of all abstractions, Being in general, it was a dry, calm subject. But when it concerned the immediate giving up of his slave-ships and a transfer of business, attended with all that confusion and loss which he foresaw at a glance, then hefelt, and felt too much to see clearly. His swarthy face flushed, hislittle blue eye kindled, he walked up to the Doctor, and began speaking in the short, energetic sentences of a man thoroughly awake to what he is talking about.
‘Doctor, you’re too fast. You are not a practical man, Doctor. You are good in your pulpit;—nobody better. Your theology is clear;—nobody can argue better. But come to practical matters, why, business has its laws, Doctor. Ministers are the most unfit men in the world to talk on such subjects; it’s departing from their sphere; they talk about what they don’t understand. Besides, you take too much for granted. I’m not sure that this trade is an evil. I want to be convinced of it. I’m sure it’s a favour to these poor creatures to bring them to a Christian land. They are a thousand times better off. Here they can hear the gospel and have some chance of salvation.’
‘If we want to get the gospel to the Africans,’ said the Doctor, ‘why not send whole ship-loads of missionaries to them, and carry civilization and the arts and Christianity to Africa, instead of stirring up wars, tempting them to ravage each other’s territories, that we may get the booty? Think of the numbers killed in the wars,—of all that die on the passage! Is there any need of killing ninety-nine men to give the hundredth one the gospel, when we could give the gospel to them all? Ah, Mr. Brown, what if all the money spent in fitting out ships to bring the poor negroes here, so prejudiced against Christianity that they regard it with fear and aversion, had been spent in sending it to them, Africa would have been covered with towns and villages, rejoicing in civilization and Christianity!’
‘Doctor, you are a dreamer,’ replied Simeon, ‘an unpractical man. Your situation prevents your knowing anything of real life.’
‘Amen! the Lord be praised there for!’ said the Doctor, with a slowly-increasing flush mounting to his cheek, showing the burning brand of a smouldering fire of indignation.
‘Now let me just talk common-sense, Doctor,—which has its time and place, just as much as theology; and if you have the most theology, I flatter myself I have the most common-sense:a business-man must have it. Now just look at your situation,—how you stand. You’ve got a most important work to do. In order to do it, you must keep your pulpit, you must keep our church together. We are few and weak. We are a minority. Now there’s not an influential man in your society that don’t either hold slaves or engage in the trade; and, if you open upon this subject as you are going to do, you’ll just divide and destroy the church. All men are not like you; men are men, and will be, till they are thoroughly sanctified, which never happens in this life,—and there will be an instant and most unfavourable agitation. Minds will be turned off from the discussion of the great saving doctrines of the gospel to a side issue. You will be turned out; and you know, Doctor, you are not appreciated as you ought to be, and it won’t be easy for you to get a new settlement; and then subscriptions will all drop off from your book, and you won’t be able to get that out; and all this good will be lost to the world, just for want of common-sense.’
‘There is a kind of wisdom in what you say, Mr. Brown,’ replied the Doctor, naïvely; ‘but I fear much that it is the wisdom spoken in James iii. 15, which “descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish.” You avoid the very point of the argument, which is, Is this a sin against God? That it is, I am solemnly convinced; and shall I “use lightness? or the things that I purpose do I purpose according to the flesh, that with me there should be yea, yea, and nay, nay?” No, Mr. Brown, immediate repentance, unconditional submission, these are what I must preach as long as God gives me a pulpit to stand in, whether men will hear or whether they will forbear.’
‘Well, Doctor,’ said Simeon, shortly, ‘you can do as you like; but I give you fair warning, that I, for one, shall stop my subscription, and go to Dr. Stiles’s church.’
‘Mr. Brown,’ said the Doctor, solemnly, rising, and drawing his tall figure to its full height, while a vivid light gleamed from his blue eye, ‘as to that, you can do as you like; but I think it my duty, as your pastor, to warn you that I have perceived, in my conversation with you this morning, such a wantof true spiritual illumination and discernment as leads me to believe that you are yet in the flesh, blinded by that “carnal mind” which “is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.” I much fear you have no part nor lot in this matter, and that you have need, seriously, to set yourself to search into the foundations of your hope; for you may be like him of whom it is written, (Isaiah xliv. 20,) “He feedeth on ashes: a deceived heart hath turned him aside, that he cannot deliver his soul, nor say, is there not a lie in my right hand?”’
The Doctor delivered this address to his man of influence with the calmness of an ambassador charged with a message from a sovereign, for which he is no otherwise responsible than to speak it in the most intelligible manner; and then, taking up his hat and cane, he bade him good morning, leaving Simeon Brown in a tumult of excitement which no previous theological discussion had ever raised in him.
Thehens cackled drowsily in the barn-yard of the white Marvyn-house; in the blue June-afternoon sky sported great sailing islands of cloud, whose white, glistening heads looked in and out through the green apertures of maple and blossoming apple-boughs; the shadows of the trees had already turned eastward, when the one-horse waggon of Mrs. Katy Scudder appeared at the door, where Mrs. Marvyn stood, with a pleased, quiet welcome in her soft brown eyes. Mrs. Scudder herself drove, sitting on a seat in front,—while the Doctor, apparelled in the most faultless style, with white wrist-ruffles, plaited shirt-bosom, immaculate wig, and well-brushed coat, sat by Mary’s side, serenely unconscious how many feminine cares had gone to his getting-up. He did not know of the privy consultations, the sewings, stitchings, and starchings, the ironings, the brushings, the foldings and unfoldings and timely arrangements, that gave such dignity and respectability to his outer man, any more than the serene moon rising tranquilly behind a purple mountain-top troubles her calm head with treatises on astronomy; it is enough for her to shine,—she thinks not how or why.
There is a vast amount of latent gratitude to women lying undeveloped in the hearts of men, which would come out plentifully, if they only knew what they did for them. The Doctor was so used to being well dressed, that he never asked why. That his wig always sat straight, and even around his ample forehead, not facetiously poked to one side, nor assuming rakish airs, unsuited to clerical dignity, was entirely owingto Mrs. Katy Scudder. That his best broadcloth coat was not illustrated with shreds and patches, fluff and dust, and hanging in ungainly folds, was owing to the same. That his long silk stockings never had a treacherous stitch allowed to break out into a long running ladder was due to her watchfulness; and that he wore spotless ruffles on his wrists or at his bosom was her doing also. The Doctor little thought, while he, in common with good ministers generally, gently traduced the Scriptural Martha and insisted on the duty of heavenly abstractedness, how much of his own leisure for spiritual contemplation was due to the Martha-like talents of his hostess. But then, the good soul had it in him to be grateful, and would have been unboundedly so, if he had known his indebtedness,—as, we trust, most of our magnanimous masters would be.
Mr. Zebedee Marvyn was quietly sitting in the front summer parlour, listening to the story of two of his brother church-members, between whom some difficulty had arisen in the settling of accounts: Jim Bigelow, a small, dry, dapper little individual, known as general jobber and factotum, and Abram Griswold, a stolid, wealthy, well-to-do farmer. And the fragments of conversation we catch are not uninteresting, as showing Mr. Zebedee’s habits of thought and mode of treating those who came to him for advice.
‘I could ’ave got along better, if he’d ’a’ paid me regular every night,’ said the squeaky voice of little Jim;—‘but he was allers puttin’ me off till it come even change, he said.’
‘Well, ’t’aint always handy,’ replied the other; ‘one doesn’t like to break into a five-pound note for nothing; and I like to let it run till it comes even change.’
‘But, brother,’ said Mr. Zebedee, turning over the great Bible that lay on the mahogany stand in the corner, ‘we must go to the law and to the testimony,’—and, turning over the leaves, he read from Deuteronomy xxiv.:—
‘Thou shalt not oppress an hired servant that is poor and needy, whether he be of thy brethren or of thy strangers that are in thy land within thy gates. At his day thou shalt givehim his hire, neither shall the sun go down upon it; for he is poor, and setteth his heart upon it: lest he cry against thee unto the Lord, and it be sin unto thee.’
‘You see what the Bible has to say on the matter,’ he said.
‘Well, now, Deacon, I rather think you’ve got me in a tight place,’ said Mr. Griswold, rising; and turning confusedly round, he saw the placid figure of the Doctor, who had entered the room unobserved in the midst of the conversation, and was staring with that look of calm, dreamy abstraction which often led people to suppose that he heard and saw nothing of what was going forward.
All rose reverently; and while Mr. Zebedee was shaking hands with the Doctor, and welcoming him to his house, the other two silently withdrew, making respectful obeisance.
Mrs. Marvyn had drawn Mary’s hand gently under her arm and taken her to her own sleeping-room, as it was her general habit to do, that she might show her the last book she had been reading, and pour into her ear the thoughts that had been kindled up by it.
Mrs. Scudder, after carefully brushing every speck of dust from the Doctor’s coat and seeing him seated in an arm-chair by the open window, took out a long stocking of blue-mixed yarn which she was knitting for his winter-wear, and, pinning her knitting-sheath on her side, was soon trotting her needles contentedly in front of him.
The ill-success of the Doctor’s morning attempt at enforcing his theology in practice rather depressed his spirits. There was a noble innocence of nature in him which looked at hypocrisy with a puzzled and incredulous astonishment. How a mancoulddo so and be so was to him a problem at which his thoughts vainly laboured. Not that he was in the least discouraged or hesitating in regard to his own course. When he had made up his mind to perform a duty, the question of success no more entered his thoughts than those of the granite boulder to which we have before compared him. When the time came for him to roll, he did roll with the whole force of his being;—where he was to land was not his concern.
Mildly and placidly he sat with his hands resting on his knees, while Mr. Zebedee and Mrs. Scudder compared notes respecting the relative prospects of corn, flax, and buckwheat, and thence passed to the doings of Congress and the last proclamation of General Washington, pausing once in a while, if, peradventure, the Doctor might take up the conversation. Still he sat dreamily eyeing the flies as they fizzed down the panes of the half-open window.
‘I think,’ said Mr. Zebedee, ‘the prospects of the Federal party were never brighter.’
The Doctor was a stanch Federalist, and generally warmed to this allurement; but it did not serve this time.
Suddenly drawing himself up, a light came into his blue eyes, and he said to Mr. Marvyn,—
‘I’m thinking, Deacon, if it is wrong to keep back the wages of a servant till after the going down of the sun, what those are to do who keep them back all their lives.’
There was a way the Doctor had of hearing and seeing when he looked as if his soul were afar off, and bringing suddenly into present conversation some fragment of the past on which he had been leisurely hammering in the quiet chambers of his brain, which was sometimes quite startling.
This allusion to a passage of Scripture which Mr. Marvyn was reading when he came in, and which nobody supposed he had attended to, startled Mrs. Scudder, who thought, mentally, ‘Now for it!’ and laid down her knitting-work, and eyed her cousin anxiously. Mrs. Marvyn and Mary, who had glided in and joined the circle, looking interested; and a slight flush rose and overspread the thin cheeks of Mr. Marvyn, and his blue eyes deepened in a moment with a thoughtful shadow, as he looked inquiringly at the Doctor, who proceeded:—
‘My mind labours with this subject of the enslaving of the Africans, Mr. Marvyn. We have just been declaring to the world that all men are born with an inalienable right to liberty. We have fought for it, and the Lord of Hosts has been with us; and can we stand before Him, with our foot upon our brother’s neck?’
A generous, upright nature is always more sensitive to blame than another,—sensitive in proportion to the amount of its reverence for good,—and Mr. Marvyn’s face flushed, his eye kindled, and his compressed respiration showed how deeply the subject moved him. Mrs. Marvyn’s eyes turned on him an anxious look of inquiry. He answered, however, calmly:—
‘Doctor, I have thought of the subject myself. Mrs. Marvyn has lately been reading a pamphlet of Mr. Thomas Clarkson’s on the slave-trade, and she was saying to me only last night, that she did not see but the argument extended equally to holding slaves. One thing, I confess, stumbles me:—Was there not an express permission given to Israel to buy and hold slaves of old?’
‘Doubtless,’ said the Doctor; ‘but many permissions were given to them which were local and temporary; for if we hold them to apply to the human race, the Turks might quote the Bible for making slaves of us, if they could,—and the Algerines have the Scripture all on their side,—and our own blacks, at some future time, if they can get the power, might justify themselves in making slaves of us.’
‘I assure you, sir,’ said Mr. Marvyn, ‘if I speak, it is not to excuse myself. But I am quite sure my servants do not desire liberty, and would not take it, if it were offered.’
‘Call them in and try it,’ said the Doctor. ‘If they refuse, it is their own matter.’
There was a gentle movement in the group at the directness of this personal application; but Mr. Marvyn replied, calmly,—
‘Cato is up at the eight-acre lot, but you may call in Candace. My dear, call Candace, and let the Doctor put the question to her.’
Candace was at this moment sitting before the ample fireplace in the kitchen, with two iron kettles before her, nestled each in its bed of hickory coals, which gleamed out from their white ashes like sleepy, red eyes, opening and shutting. In one was coffee, which she was burning, stirring vigorously with a pudding-stick,—and in the other, puffy dough-nuts, inshapes of rings, hearts, and marvellous twists, which Candace had such a special proclivity for making, that Mrs. Marvyn’s table and closets never knew an intermission of their presence.
‘Candace, the Doctor wishes to see you,’ said Mrs. Marvyn.
‘Bress his heart!’ said Candace, looking up, perplexed. ‘Wants to see me, does he? Can’t nobody hab me till dis yer coffee’s done; a minnit’s a minnit in coffee;—but I’ll be in dereckly,’ she added, in a patronising tone. ‘Missis, you jes’ go ‘long in, an’ I’ll be dar dereckly.’
A few moments after Candace joined the group in the sitting-room, having hastily tied a clean white apron over her blue linsey working-dress, and donned the brilliant Madras which James had lately given her, and which she had a barbaric fashion of arranging so as to give to her head the air of a gigantic butterfly. She sunk a dutiful curtsy, and stood twirling her thumbs, while the Doctor surveyed her gravely.
‘Candace,’ said he, ‘do you think it right that the black race should be slaves to the white?’
The face and air of Candace presented a curious picture at this moment; a sort of rude sense of delicacy embarrassed her, and she turned a deprecating look, first on Mrs. Marvyn and then on her master.
‘Don’t mind us, Candace,’ said Mrs. Marvyn; ‘tell the Doctor the exact truth.’
Candace stood still a moment, and the spectators saw a deeper shadow roll over her sable face, like a cloud over a dark pool of water, and her immense person heaved with her laboured breathing.