“Ah!” cried Priscilla, “I daresay that you have been hoping and hoping all the time that you have been ill.”
“I always cherish hope, my dear.”
“Then you are disappointed every day of your life.”
“Oh no!” cried the sick woman, cheerfully; “my hope is firm and sure, and can never be disappointed.”
“That is impossible,” said Priscilla.
“Oh, tell me your secret!” cried Lucy, with animation. “I always am hoping too, but I so often find that I never can have what I hope for.”
“My secret is a very simple one,” replied Bertha. “I ask the Lord, for the sake of His blessed Son, to give me all that is good for me; and I hope—I more than hope—I feel certain—that the Lord hears and will grant my prayer.”
“Yet you are sent poverty and pain,” said Priscilla.
“I firmly believe that both poverty and pain will work together for my good, and that I shall suffer from neither of them one moment longer than the all-wise Father knows to be best for His child.”
“Yet you must be very miserable now,” said Priscilla, glancing round on the almost comfortless abode, and then at its suffering inmate.