"She be past man's help, sir. Me and you has seen this a-comin' from afar. The pore soul can guide herself so well as any 'ooman I knows, but she do hate to be guided. Allers, she walked wi' the Lard in health, but not in sickness. 'Tis wondersome, but it works t'other way about wi' me. In health I seems to wander from the Lard, do what I will."
"I tried once before—and failed."
"Ah-h-h! You be a faithful shepherd, Mr. Hamlin; we all knows that. If you ask my advice, sir——"
"I do. I do."
"Leave her in the Lard's Hands. None can deny that she be a faithful servant o' His. He'll take pity on the pore dear in His good time."
Hamlin seldom asked for advice from his fellow-men. He nodded his head, shook Uncle's horny hand, and went back to his study.
The great sacrifice demanded of him had strained his faith. Nobody would ever know that. For a few hours he had sat alone, stunned by sorrow. He told himself fiercely that he could have spared any one of his sons except Teddy. The worldly ambitions which this man had renounced for himself bloomed more vigorously for Teddy. He had all the qualities which carry a young man far on any road: robust health, excellent brains, untiring energy, and a kind heart. His jolly laugh, as Hamlin knew, had secured him advancement, quite apart from his ability. Others had ability. The happy combination of laughter and energy had fetched four hundred a year in the open market. And Hamlin knew, none better, what such men are worth to the world, what a stimulus a cheery word and smile may be to the weary and sad. Why had Teddy been taken?
Ultimately, he answered that question.
He must be wanted elsewhere. Hamlin held definite opinions about a future life. He believed that death involved little change. He believed, further, that the conflict between good and evil went on upon the Other Side, that souls expanded or diminished over there just as here. Upon that belief he had built up his philosophy of life. It explained and justified apparent injustices and inequalities very perplexing to him as a young man. He believed, also, that good or evil inspired all human endeavour. The clay was informed by the spirit. Great writers, influencing millions, were merely the mouthpiece, the megaphone, of invisible spirits, guardian angels, to use the homely nursery expression, who whispered their message to the vessel appointed to receive it. Nobody, for many years, had heard him praise enthusiastically an individual. He praised the work that each had been inspired to do. In Nether-Applewhite, there happened to be a village idiot, whose great lolling head and vacuous eyes excited terror in children and often revulsion in adults. And the man was past middle age, helpless and gibbering from birth. Hamlin never passed him without reflecting that death would release an imprisoned soul destined, perhaps, to an undreamed-of development hereafter, the greater because it had been denied expression on earth. And, inversely, when he met, as he did occasionally, men pre-eminent in science, or art, or industry, he seemed to see clearly the man standing sharply apart from his work, often a very ordinary person, undistinguished save for the amazing fact that he had been selected, out of millions, to accomplish something vital to the progress of the world.
He had found Authority for this personal belief in the New Testament.