the most touching, the most consoling. . . . It seems to open
the gates of paradise to me. . . . If I could die now. . . .”
Faint and far the words rose out of the stillness:
Nearer, my God, to Thee,
Nearer to Thee,
E’en though it be a cross
That raiseth me.
With the closing of the hymn another soul passed to its rest,
and they that had been one in life were not sundered in death.
The sisters, mourning and rejoicing, said:
“How blessed it was that she never knew!”
CHAPTER IX
At midnight they sat together, grieving, and the angel of the Lord
appeared in the midst transfigured with a radiance not of earth;
and speaking, said:
“For liars a place is appointed. There they burn in the fires
of hell from everlasting unto everlasting. Repent!”
The bereaved fell upon their knees before him and clasped their
hands and bowed their gray heads, adoring. But their tongues
clove to the roof of their mouths, and they were dumb.
“Speak! that I may bear the message to the chancery of heaven
and bring again the decree from which there is no appeal.”
Then they bowed their heads yet lower, and one said:
“Our sin is great, and we suffer shame; but only perfect and final
repentance can make us whole; and we are poor creatures who have learned
our human weakness, and we know that if we were in those hard straits
again our hearts would fail again, and we should sin as before.
The strong could prevail, and so be saved, but we are lost.”
They lifted their heads in supplication. The angel was gone.
While they marveled and wept he came again; and bending low,
he whispered the decree.
CHAPTER X
Was it Heaven? Or Hell?
***
A CURE FOR THE BLUES
By courtesy of Mr. Cable I came into possession of a singular book
eight or ten years ago. It is likely that mine is now the only copy
in existence. Its title-page, unabbreviated, reads as follows:
“The Enemy Conquered; or, Love Triumphant. By G. Ragsdale McClintock,
[1] author of ‘An Address,’ etc., delivered at Sunflower Hill,
South Carolina, and member of the Yale Law School. New Haven:
published by T. H. Pease, 83 Chapel Street, 1845.”
No one can take up this book and lay it down again unread.
Whoever reads one line of it is caught, is chained; he has become
the contented slave of its fascinations; and he will read and read,
devour and devour, and will not let it go out of his hand till it
is finished to the last line, though the house be on fire over
his head. And after a first reading he will not throw it aside,
but will keep it by him, with his Shakespeare and his Homer,
and will take it up many and many a time, when the world is dark
and his spirits are low, and be straightway cheered and refreshed.
Yet this work has been allowed to lie wholly neglected, unmentioned,
and apparently unregretted, for nearly half a century.
The reader must not imagine that he is to find in it wisdom,
brilliancy, fertility of invention, ingenuity of construction,
excellence of form, purity of style, perfection of imagery,
truth to nature, clearness of statement, humanly possible situations,
humanly possible people, fluent narrative, connected sequence of events–
or philosophy, or logic, or sense. No; the rich, deep, beguiling charm
of the book lies in the total and miraculous ABSENCE from it of all
these qualities–a charm which is completed and perfected by the
evident fact that the author, whose naive innocence easily and surely
wins our regard, and almost our worship, does not know that they
are absent, does not even suspect that they are absent. When read
by the light of these helps to an understanding of the situation,
the book is delicious–profoundly and satisfyingly delicious.
I call it a book because the author calls it a book, I call it a work
because he calls it a work; but, in truth, it is merely a duodecimo
pamphlet of thirty-one pages. It was written for fame and money,