"Then is everybody wicked who gives such assemblies or goes to them? Sure if they all spent their superfluous wealth upon charity, instead of fine clothes and musicians and wax candles, there need be nobody starving or homeless in England."
"'Tis a problem the world has not solved yet, Lucy; but for my own part I think the man who squanders his fortune upon pomp and luxury can have no more appreciation of gospel truth than the heathen has who never heard of a Redeemer."
"Then you think Lady Kilrush is no better than a heathen?"
"Alas! poor wretch, did she not confess herself so in your hearing—an infidel, blind to the light of revelation, deaf to the message of pardon? We can but pity her, Lucy, and pray that God's hour may come for her as it came for you and me. She has a fine nature, and I cannot think she will be left in outer darkness."
"Unless she is one of those that were predestined to eternal perdition before they were born," said Lucy.
"You know I have never countenanced that gospel of despair, and I deplore that so fine a preacher as Mr. Whitefield should have taken up such gloomy views."
"She might have sent us a card for her ball," murmured Lucy. "'Twould have been civil, even though she guessed you would not take me."
The discontented sigh which followed the complaining speech showed George Stobart that his wife was still among the unregenerate. His religion was of a stern temper, and he could not suffer this unchristian peevishness to pass unreproved.
"Do you think, madam, that a journeyman printer's daughter would be in her place among dukes and duchesses at a fashionable assembly? 'Twas not for such a life I chose you."
Lucy, who always trembled at her husband's frown, though she never refrained from provoking his anger, replied with her accustomed argument of tears. George saw the slim shoulders shaken by suppressed sobs, flung his book aside in a rage, and began to pace the cottage parlour, whose narrow bounds he was not yet accustomed to. In mild weather the half-glass door stood ever open, and he could pass to the grass plot outside when his impatient mood was on; but with a November rain beating against the casement there was no escape, and he felt like a caged bear.