The Inglises; Or, How the Way Opened

by Margaret M. Robertson

“And, my boy, the first step to becoming a ‘soldier’ is the enrolling of the name. And you know who said ‘He that is not for me is against me.’ Think what it would be to be found on the other side on the day when even Death itself ‘shall be swallowed up in victory.’”

David made no answer. It was not Mr Inglis’s way to speak often in this manner to his children. He did not make every solemn circumstance in life the occasion for a personal lesson or warning to them, till they “had got used to it,” as children say, and so heard it without heeding. So David could not just listen to his father’s words, and let them slip out of his mind again as words of course. He could not put them aside, nor could he say, as some boys might have said at such a time, that he wished to be a soldier of Christ and that he meant to try. For in his heart he was not sure that he wished to be a soldier of Christ in the sense his father meant, and though he had sometimes said to himself that he meant to be one, it was sometime in the future—a good while in the future, and he would have been mocking himself and his father, too, if he had told him that he longed to enrol his name. So he sat beside him without a word.

They had come by this time to the highest point of the road leading to Gourlay Centre, at least the highest point where the valley through which the Gourlay river flowed could be seen; and of his own accord old Don stood still to rest. He always did so at this point, and not altogether for his own pleasure, for Mr Inglis and David were hardly ever so pressed for time but that they were willing to linger a minute or two to look down on the valley and the hills beyond. The two villages could be seen, and the bridge, and a great many fine fields lying round the scattered farm-houses, and, beyond these, miles and miles of unbroken forest. David might travel through many lands and see no fairer landscape, but it did not please him to-night. There was no sunshine on it to-night, and he said to himself that it always needed sunshine. The grey clouds had gathered again, and lay in piled-up masses veiling the west, and the November wind came sweeping over the hills cold and keen. Mr Inglis shivered, and wrapped his coat closely about him, and David touched Don impatiently. The drive had been rather a failure, he thought, and they might as well be getting home. But he had time for a good many troubled thoughts before they reached the bridge over the Gourlay.

“To enrol one’s name.” He had not done that, and that was the very first step towards becoming a soldier. “He that is not for me is against me.” He did not like that at all. He would have liked to explain that so as to make it mean something else. He would have liked to make himself believe that there was some middle ground. “He that is not against me is for me.” In one place it said that, and he liked it much better. He tried to persuade himself that he was not against Christ. No, certainly he was not against Him. But was he for Him in the sense his father meant—in the sense that his father was for Him, and his mother, and a good many others that came into his mind? Had he deliberately enrolled his name as one of the great army whom Christ would lead to victory?

But then how could he do this? He could not do it, he said to himself. It was God’s work to convert the soul, and had not his father said within the hour, “It is God that giveth the victory?” Had he not said that salvation was all of grace from beginning to end—that it was a gift—“God’s gift.” What more could be said?

But David knew in his heart that a great deal more could be said. He knew great as this gift was—full and free as it was, he had never asked for it—never really desired it. He desired to be saved from the consequences of sin, as who does not? but he did not long to be saved from sin itself and its power in the heart, as they must be whom God saves. He did not feel that he needed this. If he was not “for Christ” in the sense his father and mother were for Him, still the thought came back—surely he was not against Him; even though it might not be pleasant for him to think of giving up all for Christ—to “take up his cross and follow Him,” still he was not “against Him.”

Oh! if there only were some other way! If people could enlist in a real army, and march away to fight real battles, as men used to do in the times when they fought for the Cross and the possession of the holy Sepulchre! “Or, rather, as they seemed to be fighting for them,” said David, with a sigh, for he knew that pride and envy and the lust for power, too often reigned in the hearts of them who in those days had Christ’s name and honour on their lips; and that the cause of the Cross was made the means to the winning of unworthy ends. Still, if one could only engage sincerely in some great cause with all their hearts, and labour and strive for it for Christ’s sake, it would be an easier way, he thought.

Or if he could have lived in the times of persecution, or in the times when Christian men fought at once for civil and religious freedom! Oh! that would have been grand! He would have sought no middle course then. He would have fought, and suffered, and conquered like a hero in such days as those. Of course such days could never come back again, but if they could!

And then he let his mind wander away in dreams, as to how if such times ever were to come back again, he would be strong and wise, and courageous for the right—how he would stand by his father, and shield his mother, and be a defence and protection to all who were weak or afraid. Bad men should fear him, good men should honour—his name should be a watchword to those who were on the Lord’s side.

It would never do to write down all the foolish thoughts that David had on his way home that afternoon. He knew that they were foolish, and worse than foolish, when he came out of them with a start as old Don made his accustomed little demonstration of energy and speed as they came to the little hill by the bridge, not far from home. He knew that they were foolish, and he could not help glancing up into his father’s face with a little confusion, as if he had known his thoughts all the time.