“But, my child, do you know that you grieve as one without hope and without God in the world?”
Margaret did not answer; she had never in her life received any religious instruction, and scarcely understood the bearing of the minister’s words.
“Shall I tell you, Margaret, of Him who came down from heaven to light up the darkness of the grave?”
Margaret raised her eyes in a mute, appealing glance to his face.
“Shall I speak of Him, Margaret? Of Him, of whom, when his friends had seen him dead and buried out of their sight, the angel of the sepulchre said, ‘He is not here, but risen?’”
Still that uplifted, appealing gaze.
“Of Him, Margaret, who said, ‘I am the resurrection and the life?’”
“Oh, yes! yes! tell me of Him! tell me something to relieve this dreadful sense of loss and death that is pressing all the life out of my heart,” said Margaret, earnestly.
The old man took the seat beside her, held her hand in his own, and for the first time opened to her vision the spiritual views of life, death and immortality—of man, Christ and God.
Sorrow softens and never sears the heart of childhood and youth. Sorrow had made very tender and impressible the heart of the orphan; its soil was in a good state for the reception of the good seed.