“No; but then—”
“But what?”
“He is such a sweet little fellow, it is a treat to look at him. Every morning when I woke, I longed to be up, and to get to him.”
“That is, you loved him. Well: your papa and I love you all, in the same way. We get up with pleasure to our business—your father to his shop, and I to my work-basket—because it is the greatest happiness in the world to serve those we love.”
Hugh said nothing; but still, though pleased, he did not look quite satisfied.
“Susan and cook are far more useful to me than any of you children,” continued his mother, “and yet I could not work early and late for them, with the same pleasure as for you.”
Hugh laughed; and then he asked whether Jane was not now as useful as Susan.
“Perhaps she is,” replied his mother; “and the more she learns and does, and the more she becomes my friend,—the more I respect her: but it is impossible to love her more than I did before she could speak or walk. There is some objection in your mind still, my dear. What is it?”
“It makes us of so much consequence,—so much more than I ever thought of,—that the minds of grown people should be busy about us.”
“There is nothing to be vain of in that, my dear, any more than for young kittens, and birds just hatched. But it is very true that all young creatures are of great consequence; for they are the children of God. When, besides this, we consider what human beings are,—that they can never perish, but are to live for ever,—and that they are meant to become more wise and holy than we can imagine, we see that the feeblest infant is indeed a being of infinite consequence. This is surely a reason for God filling the hearts of parents with love, and making them willing to work and suffer for their children, even while the little ones are most unwise and unprofitable. When you and Agnes fancied I should forget you and desert you, you must have forgotten that you had another Parent who rules the hearts of all the fathers and mothers on earth.”