I said, "Why are you not good all the time?"
"Why ain't I?" said he, after a moment's pause.
"Oh," said I, "I think you have not goodness enough to be good with all the time."
He looked assent, delighted and earnest. I answered his unuttered feeling with the question,—
"Should you like to have goodness enough to be good with all the time?"
"How can I?"
"Oh," said I, "you have a good friend who has a whole sky full of goodness. He gave you all the goodness and love you have in there (I touched his breast), and will give you more and more if you want him to, always and always, enough to be good with all the time."
He looked perfectly blest, did not speak, but laid himself down close by me, took my arm and put it over him, and said, as he nestled up to me,—
"Talk to me some more."
I went on: "Your good friend gives you all your joy to be glad with, and all your love and goodness. They always go together. And now listen to me: the next time you are going to cry (I used his own practical expression instead of saying the next time you are naughty), stop and think. I have a good friend who has a whole sky full of goodness and he will give me goodness enough to be good with all the time, and I guess you will not cry." He responded only with huggings and kissings and exclamations of "I love you a whole sky full," and as I did not want to overdo or say anything to mar the impression I had made, I took advantage of a noise I heard, to change the subject, and said:—