"They did it to save my soul. Was not that a good and praiseworthy motive?"
"Yes; but if they thought it their duty to try to make you believe as they do, they should not have promised not to do so."
"But in that case I should never have been placed in the convent, and they would have had no opportunity to labor for my conversion."
Earnestly, constantly had Elsie endeavored to obey the command. "Therefore shall ye lay up these my words in your heart and in your soul, and bind them for a sign upon your hand, that they may be as frontlets between your eyes. And ye shall teach them to your children, speaking of them when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest down, and when thou risest up."
Thus Violet's memory was stored with texts, and these words from Isaiah suggested themselves as a fit comment upon Isadore's last remark. "Woe unto them that call evil good and good evil; that put darkness for light and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter."
CHAPTER EIGHTEENTH.
"But all's not true that supposition saith,
Nor have the mightiest arguments most faith."
—DRAYTON.
"Examples I could cite you more;
But be contented with these four;
For when one's proofs are aptly chosen,
Four are as valid as four dozen."
—PRIOR.
Isa's perversion, Isa's secret, weighed heavily upon the heart and conscience of poor Violet; the child had never been burdened with a secret before.
She thought Aunt Louise ought to know, yet was not at all clear that it was her duty to tell her. She wished it might be discovered in some way without her agency, for "it was a dreadful thing for Isa to be left to go on believing and doing as she did. Oh, if only she could be talked to by some one old enough and wise enough to convince her of her errors!"