THE MINISTER’S WOOING.
Ignorant selfishness.
He was one of that class of people who, of a freezing day, will plant themselves directly between you and the fire, and then stand and argue to prove that selfishness is the root of all moral evil. Simeon said he always had thought so; and his neighbors sometimes supposed that nobody could enjoy better experimental advantages for understanding the subject. He was one of those men who suppose themselves submissive to the divine will, to the uttermost extent demanded by the extreme theology of that day, simply because they have no nerves to feel, no imagination to conceive, what endless happiness or suffering is, and who deal therefore with the great question of the salvation or damnation of myriads as a problem of theological algebra, to be worked out by their inevitable x, y, z.
Sensitiveness to blame.
A generous, upright nature is always more sensitive to blame than another,—sensitive in proportion to the amount of its reverence for good.
Depression after exaltation.
It is a hard condition of our existence that every exaltation must have its depression. God will not let us have heaven here below, but only such glimpses and faint showings as parents sometimes give to children, when they show them beforehand the jewelry and pictures and stores of rare and curious treasures which they hold for the possession of their riper years. So it very often happens that the man who has gone to bed an angel, feeling as if all sin were forever vanquished, and he himself immutably grounded in love, may wake the next morning with a sick-headache, and, if he be not careful, may scold about his breakfast like a miserable sinner.
French nature.
True Frenchwoman as she was, always in one rainbow shimmer of fancy and feeling, like one of those cloud-spotted April days, which give you flowers and rain, sun and shadow, and snatches of bird-singing, all at once.
Simple honesty vs. worldliness.
He is one of those great, honest fellows, without the smallest notion of the world we live in, who think, in dealing with men, that you must go to work and prove the right or the wrong of a matter; just as if anybody cared for that! Supposing he is right,—which appears very probable to me,—what is he going to do about it? No moral argument, since the world began, ever prevailed over twenty-five per cent. profit.
Duty vs. expediency.
“Madam,” said the doctor, “I’d sooner my system should be sunk in the sea than that 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.”
Joy of living.
There are some people so evidently broadly and heartily of this world that their coming into a room always materializes the conversation. We wish to be understood that we mean no disparaging reflection on such persons; they are as necessary to make up a world as cabbages to make up a garden; the great, healthy principles of cheerfulness and animal life seem to exist in them in the gross; they are wedges and ingots of solid, contented vitality.
A boy’s growth.
“Oh, you go ’long, Massa Marvin; ye’ll live to count dat ar’ boy for de staff o’ yer old age yit, now I tell ye; got de makin’ o’ ten or’nary men in him; kittles dat’s full allers will bile over; good yeast will blow at de cork,—lucky ef it don’t bust de bottle. Tell ye, der’s angels hes der hooks in sich, an’ when de Lord wants him, dey’ll haul him in safe an’ sound.”
Will-power.
“Law me! what’s de use? I’se set out to b’liebe de Catechize, an’ I’se gwine to b’liebe it, so!”
The world’s injustice.
“But, Marie, how unjust is the world! how unjust both in praise and blame.”