* 2 Cor. vi. 17, 18. 1 John i. 7.
"Will He take me from this hateful place?" said Sophy, bitterly; "will He give me back my sight and my father?"
"The Lord will do far more," replied Persis, "for those who love and trust Him. He will take them 'from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God'; * He will open their eyes to see His love, and will fulfil to them His gracious promise—'I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.'" †
"That promise is not for me," said Sophy Puller, with a sigh of despair.
"And why not for you?" cried Persis, in her earnestness pressing the hand of the miserable girl between both her own. "You have tried the broad path, you have found it to be a path of disappointment and anguish; the Lord is pleading with you now, 'turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?'‡ You have served Satan, and found him to be a hard master; the Lord is able, willing to redeem you, and set you free! 'The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God'—Oh! Mark the word, the GIFT, not purchased, not earned, not deserved—'the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord.'" §
* Rom. viii. 2, 21. † 2 Cor. vi. 17, 18.
‡ Ezekiel xxxiii. 11. § Rom. vi. 23.
"Do you mean to say," asked Sophy, abruptly, "that the good and the bad all go to Heaven alike?"
"Who are 'the good?'" asked Persis; "'there is none good but One, that is God.' * If our 'hope of salvation' rested on any merit of our own, it would be a hope indeed built on a trembling quicksand."
"Then what is our hope?" cried Sophy.