Lady Judith thinks that she can easily obtain leave for me to dwell with Monseigneur, as she will kindly represent it to the Order that he is now an old man, and has no wife nor unmarried daughter to care for him but me.
I think he is my first duty now. And I know he will be so glad, so glad!
It will be hard to part with Guy and Sybil. But I think that is where the Lord is leading me,—home to Lusignan; and I do wish to follow His leading, not my own.
Old Marguerite startled me very much last night.
"Damoiselle," she said, "the cross is shining out at last."
"Where, Margot?" said I, rather puzzled.
"Where I have so longed to see it," she said, "on my darling's brow. Ah, the good God has not brought her through the fire for nothing! Where there used to be pride and mirth in her eyes, there is peace. He will let His old servant depart now, for it was all she had to live for."
But I can never, never do without her! Oh, I do hope the good God will not take dear old Marguerite. Why, I am only just beginning to understand and value her. But I think I am learning, very slowly,—Oh, I am so slow and stupid!—that real happiness lies not in having my way, but in being satisfied with His,—not in trying to make myself happy, but in trying to please Him. I am constantly fancying that I have so learned this lesson that I shall never forget it again. And then, within an hour, I find myself acting as though I had never heard of it.
And I see, too, what I never understood before.—that it is only by taking our Lord's yoke upon us, and becoming meek and lowly in heart, that we can find rest to our souls. Eschine's deep humility is the source of her calm endurance. Pride is not peace; it is its antidote. In Christ we have peace,—first through the purchase of His blood, and secondly, in growing like Him, which is, to grow in love and lowliness, and to lose ourselves in Him.
I think I never before saw the loveliness of humility. And I am sure I never saw the fair beauty of Eschine's character and life. Oh, how far she rises above me! And to think that I once looked down upon her—dismissed her with a careless word of scorn, as having "nothing in her"—when the truth was that I was too low down to see her in reality.