"I hope not," I replied.
"O yes!" said he, "I am going — and very fast too; but, thank God,
I am not afraid to go."
I told him I knew he was too brave to fear death, and too honest to be alarmed about its consequences.
"Why, as to that matter, sir," said he, "I won't brag: but I have my hopes, notwithstanding I may be wrong, for I know I am but a poor ignorant body, but somehow or other, I have always built my hopes of what God may do for me hereafter, on what he has done for me here!"
I told him I thought he was very correct in that.
"Do you, indeed?" said he. "Well, I am mighty glad of that — and now major, here's the way I always comfort myself: Fifty years ago, (I say to myself,) I was nothing, and had no thought that there was any such grand and beautiful world as this. But still there was such a world notwithstanding; and here God has brought me into it. Now, can't he, in fifty years more, or indeed in fifty minutes more, bring me into another world, as much above this as this is above that state of nothing, wherein I was fifty years ago?"
I told him that this was, to my mind, a very happy way of reasoning; and such, no doubt, as suited the greatness and goodness of God.
"I think so, major," said he, "and I trust I shall find it so; for though I've been a man of blood, yet, thank God, I've always lived with an eye to that great hope. My mother, major, was a good woman; when I was but a child, and sat on her lap, she used to talk to me of God, and tell how it was he who built this great world, with all its riches and good things: and not for himself, but for ME! and also, that if I would but do his will in that only acceptable way, a good life, he would do still greater and better things for me hereafter.
"Well, major, from the mouth of a dear mother, like her, these things went so deep into my heart, that they could never be taken away from me. I have hardly ever gone to bed, or got up again, without saying my prayers. I have honored my father and mother; and, thank God, been strictly HONEST. And since you have known me, major, I believe you can bear witness, that though a strong man, I never was quarrelsome."
I told him, nothing afforded me more satisfaction, than to remember that, since he was now going to die, he had always led so good a life.