Part 20 (2/2)
”If I should say everywhere?” suggested Donal.
”Ah, yes!” said the boy.
”But I agree with you that it begins nowhere.”
”It can't do both!”
”Oh, yes, it can! it begins nowhere for itself, but everywhere for us.
Only all its beginnings are endings, and all its endings are beginnings. Look here: suppose we begin at this red streak, it is just there we should end again. That is because it is a perfect thing.--Well, there was one who said, 'I am Alpha and Omega,'--the first Greek letter and the last, you know--'the beginning and the end, the first and the last.' All the New Testament is about him. He is perfect, and I may begin about him where I best can. Listen then as if you had never heard anything about him before.--Many years ago--about fifty or sixty grandfathers off--there appeared in the world a few men who said that a certain man had been their companion for some time and had just left them; that he was killed by cruel men, and buried by his friends; but that, as he had told them he would, he lay in the grave only three days, and left it on the third alive and well; and that, after forty days, during which they saw him several times, he went up into the sky, and disappeared.--It wasn't a very likely story, was it?”
”No,” replied Davie.
The ladies exchanged looks of horror. Neither spoke, but each leaned eagerly forward, in fascinated expectation of worse to follow.
”But, Davie,” Donal went on, ”however unlikely it must have seemed to those who heard it, I believe every word of it.”
A ripple of contempt pa.s.sed over Miss Carmichael's face.
”For,” continued Donal, ”the man said he was the son of G.o.d, come down from his father to see his brothers, his father's children, and take home with him to his father those who would go.”
”Excuse me,” interrupted Miss Carmichael, with a pungent smile: ”what he said was, that if any man believed in him, he should be saved.”
”Run along, Davie,” said Donal. ”I will tell you more of what he said next lesson. Don't forget what I've told you now.”
”No, sir,” answered Davie, and ran off.
Donal lifted his hat, and would have gone towards the river. But Miss Carmichael, stepping forward, said,
”Mr. Grant, I cannot let you go till you answer me one question: do you believe in the atonement?”
”I do,” answered Donal.
”Favour me then with your views upon it,” she said.
”Are you troubled in your mind on the subject?” asked Donal.
”Not in the least,” she replied, with a slight curl of her lip.
”Then I see no occasion for giving you my views.”
”But I insist.”
Donald smiled.
”Of what consequence can my opinions be to you, ma'am? Why should you compel a confession of my faith?”
”As the friend of this family, and the daughter of the clergyman of this parish, I have a right to ask what your opinions are: you have a most important charge committed to you--a child for whose soul you have to account!”
”For that I am accountable, but, pardon me, not to you.”
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