"Abjure her company then for ever. I warned you of your peril when you had a wife, when I feared your spirit hovered on the brink of hell—for remember, Stobart, there is no such height of holiness as it is impossible to fall from. I adjured you to renounce that woman's company as you would avoid companionship with Satan. I warn you even more solemnly to-day; for at that time it was a sin to love her, and your conscience might have been your safeguard. You are a free man now; and you may account it no sin to love an infidel."
"Is it a sin, sir, even when that love goes hand in hand with the desire to bring her into Christ's fold?"
"It is a sin, George. It is the way to everlasting perdition, it is the choice of evil instead of good, Lucifer instead of Christ. Do you know what would happen if you were to marry this woman?"
"You would cease to be my friend, perhaps?"
"No, my son. I could not cease to love you and to pity you; but you could be no more my fellow worker. This pleasant communion in work and hope would be at an end for ever. At our last Conference we resolved to expel any member of our society who should marry an unbeliever. We have all seen the evil of such unions, the confusion worse confounded when the cloven foot crosses the threshold of a Christian's home, the uselessness of a Teacher whose heart is divided between fidelity to Christ and affection for a wicked wife. We resolved that no member of our society must marry without first taking counsel with some of our most serious members, and being governed by their advice."
"Oh, sir, this is tyranny!"
"It is the upshot of long experience. He who is not with me is against me. We can have no half-hearted helpers. You must choose whom you will serve, George: Christ or Satan."
"Ah, sir, my fortitude will not be put to the test. The lady for whom I would lay down my life looks upon me with a chilling disdain. 'Tis half a year since I forced myself upon her presence to acknowledge her goodness to my wife; and in all that time she has given me no sign that she remembers my existence."
"Shun her, my friend; walk not in the way of sinners; and thank God on your knees that your Delilah scorns you."
George Stobart spent many a bitter hour after that conversation with his leader. To be forbidden to think of the woman he worshipped now, when no moral law came between him and her love, when from the worldling's standpoint it was the most natural thing that he should try to win her; he, who for her sake had been disinherited, and who had by his life of self-denial proved himself above all mercenary views. Why should he not pursue her, with a love so sincere and so ardent that it might prevail even over indifference, might conquer disdain? There was not a man in his late regiment, not a man in the London clubs, who would not laugh him to scorn for letting spiritual things stand between him and that earthly bliss. And yet for him who had taken up the Cross of Christ, who had given his best years and all the power of heart and brain to preaching Christ's Law of self-surrender and submission, how horrible a falling away would it be if he were to abandon his beloved leader, turn deserter while the Society was still on its trial before the sight of men, and while every fervent voice was an element of strength. He thought of Wesley's other helpers, and recalled those ardent enthusiasts who had broken all family ties, parted from father and mother, sisters and brothers and plighted wife, renounced the comforts of home, and suffered the opprobrium of the world, in order to spend and be spent in the task of converting the English heathen, the toilers in the copper mine or the coal pit, the weavers of Somerset and Yorkshire, the black faces, the crooked backs, the forgotten sheep of Episcopal Shepherds.