"Oh! I deserve no credit at all," said she, colouring. "I confess that I copied every line almost out of 'Chambers's Journal.'"
"You have the credit of having chosen well," observed Willy.
"Might I suggest," said Mr. Presgrave, "that in reading our stories we should abstain from either praise or blame? The one might discourage, the other foster vanity, to which we are all but too prone."
"There is one thing in the story which I can hardly think true," exclaimed Amy; "and that is, that those whom the pilot had saved could ever be ungrateful to him!"
"Oh no!" cried Julia, clasping her hands, "after all that he had done, after all that he had suffered, when they sprang one by one on the safe firm shore, and felt the cool wind, and saw the vessel flaming upon the water, and knew themselves saved—saved! Oh! I should have thought that they would have poured out their whole hearts in thankfulness, and never have stopped showing their gratitude to their deliverer!"
"God grant that none of us may be equally ungrateful!" said Mr. Presgrave in a solemn tone of voice.
"O sir! O uncle!" exclaimed all the children at once.
"May not the burning vessel be considered as a type, an image of a world lost by sin, speeding on to death and destruction? The first spark that kindled the flames may have appeared small, but the evil spread, until the whole ship seemed destined to become a prey to the devouring element. What mattered it that the sky was clear above, what mattered it that no rocks opposed her course, how fearful was the fate of that doomed vessel, that carried the destroyer within herself with her!"
"I do not quite understand," said Julia timidly.
"Are there any here who have understood and can explain my meaning?" said the old man, glancing round him.