These are vain speculations, which I have gone over and over again, till every link in the chain of reasoning is painfully familiar. I had better give it up, and turn to ordinary things. Dear imaginary correspondent, shall I tell you the story of my day?
It began peacefully. I always rest on a Sunday, if I can. I believe, even had heaven not hallowed one day in the seven—Saturday or Sunday matters not; let Jews and Christians battle it out!—there would still be needful a day of rest; and that day would still be a blessed day. Instinct, old habit, and later conviction always incline me to “keep the sabbath:”—not, indeed, after the strict fashion of my forefathers, but as a happy, cheerful, holy time, a resting-place between week and week, in which to enjoy specially all righteous pleasures and earthly repose, and to look forward to that rest which, we are told, “remaineth for the people of God.” The people of God. No other people ever do rest, even in this world.
Treherne passed my hut soon after breakfast, and popped his head in, not over welcomely, I confess, for I was giving myself the rare treat of a bit of unprofessional reading. I had not seen him for two or three days,—not since we appointed to go together to the General's dinner, and he never appeared all the evening.
“I say, Doctor, will you go to church?”
Now, I do usually attend our airy military chapel—all doors and windows—open to every kind of air, except airs from heaven, of which, I am afraid, our chaplain does not bring with him a large quantity. He leaves us to fatten upon Hebrew roots, without throwing us a crumb of Christianity; prefers Moses and the prophets to the New Testament; no wonder, as some few doctrines there, “Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you.”
“He that taketh the sword shall perish by the sword!”... would sound particularly odd in a military chapel, especially with his elucidation of them, for he is the very poorest preacher I ever heard. Yet a worthy man, a most sincere man: did a world of good out in the Crimera: used to spend hours daily in teaching our men to read and write, got personally acquainted with every fellow in the regiment, knew all their private histories, wrote their letters home sought them out in the battle-field and in the hospital, read to them and cheered them, comforted them, and closed their eyes. There was not an officer in the regiment more deservedly beloved than our chaplin. He is an admirable fellow— everywhere but in the pulpit.
Nevertheless I attend his chapel, as I have always been in the habit of attending some Christian worshi somewhere, because it is the simplest way of showing that I am not ashamed of my Master before men.
Therefore, I would not smile at Trehune's astonishing fit of piety, but simply assented: at which he evidently was disappointed.
You see, I'm turning resectable and going to church. I wonder such an exceedingly respectable and religious fellow as you, Urquhart, has not tried to make me go sooner.”
“If you go against your will, and because it's respectable, you had better stop away.”