“I’m afraid I’ve not been patient,” said Delia, humbly.
Mr Goodwin was the only person in the world to whom she was always ready to own herself in the wrong.
“Oh, well, patience comes with years,” he said; “you’re too young yet to know much about it. It’s often hard enough, even after a long life, to bear with the failings of others, and to understand our own. People are so different. Some are strong, and some are weak. And the strong ones are always expecting the weak ones to stand upright as they do, and go straight on their way without earing for praise or blame. And, of course they can’t—it’s not in them—they stumble and turn aside at little things that the others wouldn’t notice. And the weak ones, to whom, perhaps, it is natural to be sweet-tempered, and yielding, and forgiving, expect those virtues from the strong—and they don’t find them—and then they wonder how it is that they find it hard to forgive and impossible to forget, and call them harsh and unbearable. And so we go on misunderstanding instead of helping each other.”
Delia’s face softened. Perhaps she had been too hasty with Anna—too quick to blame.
“Listen,” said the Professor, “I was reading this while I waited for service to begin this evening.”
He had taken out of his pocket a stumpy, and very shabby little brown volume of Thomas à Kempis, which was very familiar to her.
“But now, God hath thus ordered it, that we may learn to bear one another’s burdens, for no man is without fault; no man but hath his burden; no man is self-sufficient; no man has wisdom enough for himself alone. But we ought to bear with one another, comfort, help, instruct, and admonish one another.”
He shut the little book, and turned his eyes absently across the broad, green meadows. Delia knew that absent look of the Professor’s well. It meant that he was travelling back into the past, seeing and hearing things of which she knew nothing. Yet, though he did not seem to be speaking to her, every word he said sank into her mind.
“It’s very hard for strong people to bear with weakness. It’s such a disappointing, puzzling thing to them. They are always expecting impossibilities. Yet they are bound to help. It is a sin to turn aside. To leave weakness to trail along in the mire when they might be a prop for it to lean on and climb upwards by. The strong have a duty to the weak, and lessons to learn from them. But they are hard lessons—hard lessons.”
Long after he had finished, Mr Goodwin sat with his eyes fixed musingly on the distance, and Delia would not disturb his thoughts by a single word. Even when they walked home together they had very little to say, and were both in a silent mood. When they parted at the turning to Back Row, Delia spoke almost for the first time.