"'Evidence of conversion,' indeed!" rejoined Betty. "I never felt further from it in my life. My head is like a ragbag stuffed to overflowing with all sorts of odds and ends of doctrinal wisdom, and when I want to get at any one sensible idea, out tumble a dozen or more that are of no use whatever."
"My head's all confused, too," acknowledged Susan. "Yesterday Dr. Poague preached on 'Saved by Grace,' and showed that all we have to do is just to sit still and wait for the Lord's call. I felt real comfortable under that discourse. But last night old Brother Steadman's text was, 'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,' and he made me dreadfully uneasy. Now, are there two plans of salvation, or only one?"
"Why, two, of course," said John Calvin, with laughing assurance. "One teaches that if you mean to get to heaven, you must keep your horse everlastingly hittin' the road; the other, that the best way to get there is just to sit still. I like the 'sittin'-still plan' best, myself," he declared, with boyish frivolity.
"This is what puzzles me," said Betsy, ignoring her brother's irreverent summary of the two seemingly conflicting doctrines, "grace" and "works": "if it be true, as so many of our learned brethren teach, that nothing good that one can do merits salvation, then it seems to me that, in accordance with every principle of justice, nothing bad that one can do ought to merit damnation. Therefore, why should not I do the thing that pleaseth me best, whether it be good or bad? If I'm one of the 'elect,' nothing will keep me out of heaven, anyway."
"If you're of the elect, Betsy, you won't ever want to be wicked," Henry said gravely, speaking for the first time.
"Then, I fear I'm not of the elect."
"Oh, yes, I hope you are—only you're not yet converted. When you are, you'll see things differently." Henry was of a devout, reverent temperament, with a vivid imagination in spite of his quiet, self-contained manner. He had been greatly stirred by what he had seen and heard during the last ten days.
"But, Henry," began Betsy, argumentatively, "if I'm among the chosen at all, I'm as much chosen now as I will ever be; for I'm a sheep, not a goat—'Once a sheep, always a sheep,' you know."
"Well, sis," teasingly interrupted John Calvin, "if you're a sheep, you're surely one of the black ones; and it'll take a mighty heap o' scrubbin', I tell you, to get you white."
"And you," rejoined his sister, playfully, "I fear must be a goat—judging by the way you're always butting in, and interrupting serious converse."