“Surely,” I urged, “there is but one reason. I refer to the history of our Lord. I do not know whether all in this place are Christians; but I was one.—Sir! I anticipate your question. I was a most imperfect, useless one—to my sorrow and my shame I say it—but, so far as I went, I was an honest one.”
“Did you love Him?—Him whom you called Lord?” asked the stranger, with an air of reserve. I replied that I thought I could truly say that He was dear to me.
I began to be deeply moved by this conversation. I stole a look at the stranger, whom I had at first scarcely noticed, except as one among many passing souls. He was a man of surpassing majesty of mien, and for loveliness of feature I had seen no mortal to vie with him. “This,” I thought, “must be one of the beings we called angels.” Astonishing brightness rayed from him at every motion, and his noble face was like the sun itself. He moved beside me like any other spirit, and condescended to me so familiarly, yet with so unapproachable a dignity, that my heart went out to him as breath upon the air. It did not occur to me to ask him who he was, or whither he led me. It was enough that he led, and I followed without question or reply. We walked and talked for a long time together.
He renewed the conversation by asking me whether I had really staked my immortal existence upon the promise of that obscure, uneducated Jew, twenty centuries in his grave,—that plain man who lived a fanatic’s life, and died a felon’s death, and whose teachings had given rise to such bigotry and error upon the earth. I answered that I had never been what is commonly called a devout person, not having a spiritual temperament, but that I had not held our Master responsible for the mistakes of either his friends or his foes, and that the greatest regret I had brought with me into Heaven was that I had been so unworthy to bear His blessed name. He next inquired of me, if I truly believed that I owed my entrance upon my present life to the interposition of Him of whom we spoke.
“Sir,” I said, “you touch upon sacred nerves. I should find it hard to tell you how utterly I believe that immortality is the gift of Jesus Christ to the human soul.”
“I believed this on earth,” I added, “I believe it in Heaven. I do not know it yet, however. I am a new-comer; I am still very ignorant. No one has instructed me. I hope to learn ‘syllable by syllable.’ I am impatient to be taught; yet I am patient to be ignorant till I am found worthy to learn. It may be, that you, sir, who evidently are of a higher order of life than ours, are sent to enlighten me?”
My companion smiled, neither dissenting from, nor assenting to my question, and only asked me in reply, if I had yet spoken with the Lord. I said that I had not even seen Him; nay, that I had not even asked to see Him. My friend inquired why this was, and I told him frankly that it was partly because I was so occupied at first—nay, most of the time until I was called below.
“I had not much room to think. I was taken from event to event, like a traveler. This matter that you speak of seemed out of place in every way at that time.”
Then I went on to say that my remissness was owing partly to a little real self-distrust, because I feared I was not the kind of believer to whom He would feel quickly drawn; that I felt afraid to propose such a preposterous thing as being brought into His presence; that I supposed, when He saw fit to reveal Himself to me, I should be summoned in some orderly way, suitable to this celestial community; that, in fact, though I had cherished this most sweet and solemn desire, I had not mentioned it before, not even to my own father who conducted me to this place.
“I have not spoken of it,” I said, “to any body but to you.”