“There,” said she, “just by the side of the little fir-tree. How Mary Anna would admire it.”
“I'll climb up and get it for her,” said Dwight. “I'll have it in a minute.”
He dropped his mother's hand, and began scrambling up the rocks. They were jagged and irregular fragments, with bushes and trees among them, and Dwight, who was a very expert climber, soon had the blue-bell in his hand, and was coming down delighted with his prize. He brought the leaves of the plant with it, and it was in fact an elegant little flower.
“Now, Dwight,” said Madam Rachel, as they walked along again, Dwight holding his flower very carefully in his hand, “notice this feeling you have towards Mary Anna, which led you to get the flower. It was not fear of her,—it was not hope of getting any reward from her, I suppose.”
“No, indeed, mother,” said Dwight.
“It was simply a desire to give her pleasure. When you go in, you will take a pleasure yourself in going to her, and gratifying her with the present. Now, do you suppose that the boys generally have any such feeling as that towards God?”
“No, mother,” said David, “I don't think they have.”
“Nor do I. They are dead to all such feelings. They take no pleasure in pleasing God. They don't like to think of him, and I don't see that they shew any signs of having any love for him at all.”
They walked along, after this, silently. Dwight saw how destitute of love to God his heart had been, and still was; and yet he could not help thinking that he did sometimes feel a little grateful to God for all his kindness and care; and at least some faint desires to please him.
It was nearly dark when they arrived at the house; and Dwight asked his mother to let him run and give Mary Anna her blue-bell. She was very much pleased with it indeed. She arranged it and the leaves that Dwight had brought with it, so as to give the whole group a graceful form, and put it in water, saying she meant to rise early the next morning to paint it. Dwight determined that he would get up too and see her do it.