Part 40 (1/2)

”You look just like a man rising from the dead, Joe,” I said.

”I don't know what you mean, sir,” he returned.

”I will describe yourself to you. Your head and face are full of sunlight, the rest of your body is still buried in the shadow. Look; I will stand where you are now; and you come here. You will soon see what I mean.”

We changed places. Joe stared for a moment. Then his face brightened.

”I see what you mean, sir,” he said. ”I fancy you don't mean the resurrection of the body, but the resurrection of righteousness.”

”I do, Joe. Did it ever strike you that the whole history of the Christian life is a series of such resurrections? Every time a man bethinks himself that he is not walking in the light, that he has been forgetting himself, and must repent, that he has been asleep and must awake, that he has been letting his garments trail, and must gird up the loins of his mind--every time this takes place, there is a resurrection in the world. Yes, Joe; and every time that a man finds that his heart is troubled, that he is not rejoicing in G.o.d, a resurrection must follow--a resurrection out of the night of troubled thoughts into the gladness of the truth. For the truth is, and ever was, and ever must be, gladness, however much the souls on which it s.h.i.+nes may be obscured by the clouds of sorrow, troubled by the thunders of fear, or shot through with the lightnings of pain. Now, Joe, will you let me tell you what you are like--I do not know your thoughts; I am only judging from your words and looks?”

”You may if you like, sir,” answered Joe, a little sulkily. But I was not to be repelled.

I stood up in the sunlight, so that my eyes caught only about half the sun's disc. Then I bent my face towards the earth.

”What part of me is the light s.h.i.+ning on now, Joe?”

”Just the top of your head,” answered he.

”There, then,” I returned, ”that is just what you are like--a man with the light on his head, but not on his face. And why not on your face?

Because you hold your head down.”

”Isn't it possible, sir, that a man might lose the light on his face, as you put it, by doing his duty?”

”That is a difficult question,” I replied. ”I must think before I answer it.”

”I mean,” added Joe--”mightn't his duty be a painful one?”

”Yes. But I think that would rather etherealise than destroy the light.

Behind the sorrow would spring a yet greater light from the very duty itself. I have expressed myself badly, but you will see what I mean.--To be frank with you, Joe, I do not see that light in your face. Therefore I think something must be wrong with you. Remember a good man is not necessarily in the right. St. Peter was a good man, yet our Lord called him Satan--and meant it of course, for he never said what he did not mean.”

”How can I be wrong when all my trouble comes from doing my duty--nothing else, as far as I know?”

”Then,” I replied, a sudden light breaking in on my mind, ”I doubt whether what you suppose to be your duty can be your duty. If it were, I do not think it would make you so miserable. At least--I may be wrong, but I venture to think so.”

”What is a man to go by, then? If he thinks a thing is his duty, is he not to do it?”

”Most a.s.suredly--until he knows better. But it is of the greatest consequence whether the supposed duty be the will of G.o.d or the invention of one's own fancy or mistaken judgment. A real duty is always something right in itself. The duty a man makes his for the time, by supposing it to be a duty, may be something quite wrong in itself. The duty of a Hindoo widow is to burn herself on the body of her husband.

But that duty lasts no longer than till she sees that, not being the will of G.o.d, it is not her duty. A real duty, on the other hand, is a necessity of the human nature, without seeing and doing which a man can never attain to the truth and blessedness of his own being. It was the duty of the early hermits to encourage the growth of vermin upon their bodies, for they supposed that was pleasing to G.o.d; but they could not fare so well as if they had seen the truth that the will of G.o.d was cleanliness. And there may be far more serious things done by Christian people against the will of G.o.d, in the fancy of doing their duty, than such a trifle as swarming with worms. In a word, thinking a thing is your duty makes it your duty only till you know better. And the prime duty of every man is to seek and find, that he may do, the will of G.o.d.”

”But do you think, sir, that a man is likely to be doing what he ought not, if he is doing what he don't like?”

”Not so likely, I allow. But there may be ambition in it. A man must not want to be better than the right. That is the delusion of the anchorite--a delusion in which the man forgets the rights of others for the sake of his own sanct.i.ty.”