“Thy strange fancies make me wonder, Ichabod.”
“Wonder; why my strength dies from over wonder. I was ill for hours yesterday. Light to my sweat-blinded, feverish eyes, all calm and healing, comes when I yield to thy will; but still all my joy is haunted by ghosts which rise in day-mare troops, pointing rebukingly to labyrinths into which I seem to be pushed. I sometimes wonder if I’m seeing real spirits or going mad.”
“Dost pray, Jew?”
“I dare not live without praying!”
“Then tell the All Pitiful what thou hast this day told to me. He loves the sincere, down to the deepest hell of doubt, and from it all, at last, will lead tumulted souls safely. An honest doubt is a real prayer, well winged; quickly it reaches heaven, at whose portal it dies to rise again all peace.”
CHAPTER VIII.
FROM JERICHO TO JORDAN.
“Through sins of sense, perversities of will,
Through doubt and pain, through guilt and shame and ill