And who shall say that Mrs. Frankland's missionary impulse was not a true one? Phillida's people were exteriorly more miserable; but who knows whether the woes of a Mulberry street tenement are greater than those of a Fifth Avenue palace? Certainly Mrs. Frankland found wounded hearts enough. The woman with an unfaithful husband, the mother of a reckless son who has been obliged to flee the country, the wife of a runaway cashier, disgraced and dependent upon rich relatives—these and a score besides poured into her ear their sorrows, and were comforted by her sympathy cordially expressed, and by her confidence in a consoling divine love and her visions of a future of everlasting rest. Mrs. Frankland had found her proper field—a true mission field indeed, for in this world-out-of-joint there is little danger of going astray in looking for misery of one sort or another. If the sorrows of the poor are greater, they have, if not consolation, at least a fortunate numbness produced by the never-ending battle for bread; but the canker has time to gnaw the very heart out of the rich woman.
Even on the mind of Phillida, as she now listened to Mrs. Frankland, the accessories made a difference. How many dogmas have lived for centuries, not by their reasonableness but by the impressiveness of trappings! Liturgies chanted under lofty arches, creeds recited by generation following generation, traditions of law, however absurd, uttered by one big-wigged judge following a reverend line of ghostly big-wigs gone before that have said the same foolish things for ages—these all take considerable advantage from the power of accessories to impose upon the human imagination. The divinity that hedges kings is the result of a set of stage-fixings which make the little great, and half the horror inspired by the priest's curse is derived from bell and book and candle. The mystery of print gives weight to small men by the same witchcraft; you would not take the personal advice of so stupid a man as Criticus about the crossing of a t, but when he prints a tirade anonymously in the Philadelphia "Tempus" the condemnation becomes serious.
Just in this way the imagination of Phillida was affected by the new surroundings in the midst of which Mrs. Frankland spoke. The old addresses in a Bible-class room with four plastered walls, or a modest parlor, did not seem to have half so much force as these. The weight of a brilliant success was now thrown into the scale, and Mrs. Frankland could speak with an apostolic authority hitherto unknown. The speaker's own imagination felt the influence of her new-found altitude, and she expressed herself with assurance and deliberation, and with more dignity and pathos than ever before.
With all this background, Mrs. Frankland spoke to-day from the twelfth chapter of Romans on personal consecration. But she did not treat the theme as a person of reformatory temperament might have done, by denouncing the frivolity of rich and fashionable lives. It was not in her nature to antagonize an audience. She drew a charming picture of the beauty of a consecrated life, and she embellished it with wonderful instances of devotion, interspersed with touching anecdotes of heroism and self-sacrifice. The impression upon her audience was as remarkable as it was certain to be transient. Women wept at the ravishing vision of a life wholly given to noble ends, and then went their ways to live as before, after the predispositions of their natures, the habits of their lives, and the conventional standards of their class.
But in the heart of Phillida the words of the speaker fell upon fertile soil, and germinated, where there was never a stone or a thorn. The insularity of her life had left her very susceptible to Mrs. Frankland's discourses. Old stagers who have been impressed now by this, now by that, speech, writing, or personal persuasion, have suffered a certain wholesome induration. Phillida was a virginal enthusiast.
XV.
TWO WAYS.
It seemed to Millard that Phillida would be the better for seeing more of life. He would not have admitted to himself that he could wish her any whit different from what she was. But he was nevertheless disposed to mold her tastes into some likeness to his own—it is the impulse of all advanced lovers and new husbands. It was unlucky that he should have chosen for the time of beginning his experiment the very evening of the day on which she had heard Mrs. Frankland. Phillida's mind was all aglow with the feelings excited by the address when Millard called with the intention of inviting her to attend the theater with him.
He found a far-awayness in her mood which made him keep back his proposal for a while. He did not admire her the less in her periods of exaltation, but he felt less secure of her when she soared into a region whither he could not follow. He hesitated, and discussed the weather of the whole week past, smiting his knee gently with his gloves in the endeavor to obtain cheerfulness by affecting it. She, on her part, was equally eager to draw Millard into the paths of feeling and action she loved so well, and while he was yet trifling with his gloves and the weather topic, she began:
"Charley, I do wish you could have heard Mrs. Frankland's talk to-day." Phillida's hands were turned palms downward on her lap as she spoke; Millard fancied that their lines expressed the refinement of her organization.