"Perfectly peaceful, perfectly happy; not a cloud over his soul!" replied Mr. Leyton.
The curate's fair young face brightened as he spoke, but its brightness was not reflected in the countenance of the vicar. It was in a grave, rather anxious tone, that he inquired, "Is he resting on the Rock? Has he found true peace through Christ?"
"Surely, I should have no hesitation in saying so," answered Claudius Leyton. "His manner, however, was not quite so decided as his words; it seemed rather to convey an idea that an unpleasant doubt had been unexpectedly suggested to his mind. Stone is evidently glad to receive spiritual comfort; he listens, he agrees to everything."
"Agrees! yes, he always listens, always assents. How glad I should often have been to have heard a question from him,—I had almost said a contradiction; that would have served to show, at least, that some interest in spiritual things had been aroused."
"You surprise me, my uncle," said the curate. "I thought that Stone was a very good man; everybody speaks well of him; everybody seems to like him."
"I like him," replied the vicar, emphatically; "but it is because I like him so much that I am the more anxious about him. If my only desire for my flock was to have them moral, respectable, regular in church-going, quiet citizens, kind neighbors, honest men, I should be well pleased if all in the village were like the carpenter Stone. And yet, during my twenty years of labor at Colme, there is not one of my parishioners on whom those labors have, I fear, made less impression than on him. Stone has not only heard thousands of sermons in church, but I have repeatedly conversed with him in private on the concerns of his soul, and I have always left him with the discouraging conviction that he is not so much as grounded in the first principles of our religion; that he has always the same assurance of going to heaven, because such an honest, respectable, sober man as he is must by a kind of necessity go there. Satisfied with this false assurance, he has never been induced to make the slightest effort to examine whether it have any safe ground to rest on. I have felt myself, when conversing with Stone, like one firing cannon at a thick earthwork. There is no strong resistance, such as is made by a stone wall, but the balls sink into the soft mud and are lost, and the fortification, seemingly so easy to be assailed, remains as firm and unmoved as if no efforts at all had been made to shake it. I have found, in the course of my long ministry," continued the vicar, "that it is easier to impress a profligate or to convince an infidel, than to lead to true faith and repentance a self-satisfied, self-sufficient soul like that of poor Stone."
Claudius Leyton gave a sigh of disappointment. "I fear that I have been doing harm, then, where I meant to do good," he observed, "saying, peace, peace, where there is no peace. I took it for granted that such a kind-hearted, respectable man as Stone must be a Christian indeed."
"My dear boy," said the silver-haired vicar, kindly, "yours was a most natural mistake, especially for one so young in the ministry. It is extremely difficult to distinguish mere outward good conduct and amiability from that which results from the hidden life of faith in the heart. The sad thing is," continued the pastor, "that the individual who misleads us is usually himself misled; while in danger he believes himself to be perfectly safe, and may approach even the hour of death without the slightest fear or misgiving. With him there is no cry for mercy to the Saviour of sinners, no looking unto him who was lifted up, as the brazen serpent in the wilderness, as the one only means of salvation offered to the perishing sons of men."
The invalid had spoken with animation, and a sensation of exhaustion immediately followed. He leaned wearily back on his pillow, and closed his eyes. Claudius Leyton, aware that the interview had lasted too long for his uncle's strength, quietly arose and quitted the study. The young minister sought his own room, feeling more strongly than ever how difficult it is to be a good physician to souls, and not give an opiate to a conscience already too much inclined to sink into dangerous sleep. Mr. Leyton unclosed his Bible with a sigh, but the promise on which his eye rested came with comfort to his soul: If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering.