[CHAPTER XVI.]
THE BRINK OF THE RIVER.
Amer's path had now for some time led him by the banks of the river that flowed through the Valley of the Shadows. In its shadows he found many waiting for the King's guard to take them across, and going in and out among them, Amer did what he could to remind them of the King's love and of His mercy.
He had not much time to think now of his own dangers and difficulties, indeed he had to leave the keeping of his soul to his faithful Creator and King; and he was surrounded with an invisible army of angels, who warded the enemy off again and again when he was engaged with those he was seeking to comfort.
Every now and then, however, he found himself gripped by the enemies who are peculiarly busy with those soldiers who are spending their lives in working for others.
When Amer saw some of the pilgrims, as they passed through the valley, paying but scant notice (because wrapped up in their own soul's welfare) to those in hopeless misery who were on the borders of the river, he found himself again and again passing a hard judgment on their conduct, and criticising their selfishness, forgetting that there had been a time in his own history, when his thoughts had been so engaged with the health of his own soul, that he had had no eyes to see the needs of others.
Then there were some who did what they could to help, but whose help was so unwise in Amer's eyes, and so far from being profitable, that the enemy, Impatience, took hold of him, and pushed him to the ground more than once. He had in fact, constantly to be reminding himself of the words in the Guide Book,
"'Judge not, that ye be not judged,' 'Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? to his own master he standeth or falleth.'" And when he felt conscious of these enemies he could only cry to his King, as he drew out his sword, and his cry was always heard and answered.
Amer's voice was the last that many a pilgrim heard this side of the dark river.