Part 10 (1/2)
”Well, that's simple enough at any rate. Is that your whole confession of Faith?”
”Yes, those are what I consider the duties of religion, but no one who has really felt its power, could ever think of them merely as duties.”
”You have shown us beyond dispute that you are capable of acting up to the first proposition. Even I, who know little about it, can see that is the easier of the two, how about the second?”
”There is only one way I know of fulfilling that requisition--I can't help it if it seems absurd to you--to me it is the true and only one, and that is by following closely the footsteps of that One who alone trod the world without being corrupted by its evil.”
Charlie considered a minute.
”Well, after all,” he said, ”there must be something in it. No amount of reasoning, however sound, would have moved the turgid intellects of those miners. I suppose that as long as minds of that calibre exist, there must also exist a means of influencing them for good, which must of necessity be the extreme antipodes of their own inclinations.”
”I think I don't understand you very clearly,” returned she, ”but if you mean, as I think you do, that Christianity is only to be tolerated for what it can do in the way of working on the emotions of those who are altogether governed by them, you are wrong. Its purpose is a far higher one, that of awakening the conscience, and enlightening the darkened understanding of such as these.”
”And of what use is it to those who are already freed by other means from that benighted condition?”
Minnie looked perplexed, and the tears began to gather slowly in her eyes. It pained her to find her knowledge on the subject so limited.
”Charlie,” she said tremulously, ”I am but newly awakened myself out of what you call 'that benighted condition,' through the influence of the Gospel of Christ, and I don't know anything of the other means you talk about. You know I am not much given to thinking, and I have never tried to argue out these matters. I only know what it has done for me.”
”And what is that?” asked Charlie.
”It has saved me from a frivolous, unprofitable life on earth, and a death beyond the grave,” replied Minnie, solemnly, ”and what it has done for me, it can do for all who are willing.”
She paused a moment, but as n.o.body spoke, went on: ”I don't imagine that it has the same effect on everybody, it can't, of course, as everybody isn't alike, but it must make a change of some kind, even in people who live the best lives outwardly, before they realize the power of religion, live only half-filled lives, however much work they may do--as Mrs. Browning says--'Nor man, nor nature satisfies whom only _G.o.d_ created.'”
”That's just where Minnie has us, _I_ think,” put in Seymour at this juncture, ”If you all feel as I do, you must acknowledge that there is something within us which isn't of a piece with the corruptible part of our nature--something that craves for an object to wors.h.i.+p and pour itself out to, and yet nothing on earth is perfect enough to satisfy.”
”I suppose you mean the soul,” observed Ned.
”Nay,” replied Seymour, ”that is what I would call the spirit, and if so, it cannot be of the earth--it must be supernatural. It cannot be a substance, and therefore it cannot be killed or subjected to any of the forms of corruption or extinction to which mundane objects are liable.”
Just at this point they were interrupted by the entrance of two of the servants, and they were obliged to exchange their quarters for the drawing-room, where the conversation was not resumed. On the next afternoon, however, as Minnie was alone in the parlour, Archie came in, and leaning on the back of her chair with one arm round her neck, began in his usual impulsive fas.h.i.+on. ”I say Minnie, Ned and I were talking it over--you know, what we were talking about last night--well, we had a long talk after we went to bed and we both came to the conclusion that since we always intended to go in for it some time, and knew that we could not face death without it, it would be a mean and cowardly thing to make a rush for it just at the end, and so we're determined to try for it at once.”
Minnie's heart gave a great throb of joy at these words, and a torrent of thanksgiving went out from it for this answer to her unceasing prayers on her brothers' behalf; nevertheless, she was a good deal perplexed about the queer ideas he seemed to entertain on the subject, especially as he did not seem to have the ghost of a notion as to how he was to ”make a try for it,” as he expressed it.
Just at this point Mabel came in, and Minnie, for the first time in her life, regretted her friend's presence, fully expecting Archie to disappear as he usually did when any of her friends visited her. But this time Archie did not move, and after a minute he said ”Does not Miss Chartres go down to Hollowmell with you? I think Seymour said she was with you the night you went with Charlie?”
”Yes,” answered Minnie, wondering what was coming next.
”Then she won't be annoyed if we go on with what we were talking about.
You see,” he said turning to Mabel, ”I can't bear to leave anything half done, and I don't see how I'm to get through this without Minnie's help.”
Mabel apologised for interrupting them, and begged that they would not mind her presence at all.
”O, but we shall,” said Archie smiling, ”for perhaps you may help us--me, at any rate, to understand what Minnie is trying to teach me.”
”And what may that be?” enquired Mabel, ”I am afraid there is little hope for my success if Minnie fails.”
”The way to Heaven,” replied Archie without a moment's hesitation. To an ordinary observer her face would not have displayed any emotion, but the boy's keen eyes noticed how the shadows deepened in hers, and that her voice trembled a little as she answered that no one was better able to do that than Minnie.
”Well, I'm not so sure of that,” he remarked, ”Minnie has not had any difficulties herself, you see, and she can't understand how any one else can have any either. As she says herself she just took the salvation when it was offered her and G.o.d did the rest. That's easy enough--or looks so at the first glance, but when you come to try it, why, there's nothing more difficult in the whole world. It's just like Columbus and his friends turned the other way. They said it was impossible at first, and when he showed them they cried 'How easy!' we think, 'How easy!' But when we come to try we find it almost impossible.”