"Reuben," said Faith one time when they were alone together,—"did you ever hear any of the mischievous talk against the Bible, of people who don't love it?"
"Yes, Miss Faith,—I never heard a great deal at a time—only little bits now and then. And I've felt some times from a word or two what other words the people had in their hearts."
"Don't ever let people talk it to you, Reuben, unless God makes it your duty to hear it," she said wearily. Reuben looked at her.
"Do you think he ever makes it our duty, Miss Faith?"
"I don't know!" said Faith, a little as if the question startled her.
"But you might be where you could not help it, Reuben."
He was silent, looking rather thoughtfully into the fire.
"Miss Faith," he said, "you remember when Christian was going through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, the fiends came and whispered to him all sorts of dreadful things which he would not have thought of for the world. 'But,' as Mr. Bunyan says, 'he had not the discretion either to stop his ears, or to know from whence those blasphemies came.'" Reuben blushed a little at his own advice-giving, but made no other apology.
There was much love and respect and delight in Faith's swift look at him. Her words glanced. "Reuben, I am glad you are going to be a minister!"—She added with the sorrowful look stealing over her face, "I wish the world was full of ministers!—if they were good ones."
His face was very bright and grateful, and humble too. "Miss Faith," he said, taking up her words, "don't you love to think of that other definition of minister?—you know—'ye ministers of his, that do his pleasure.'"
"In that way the world is full now," said Faith; "in all things except men. But by and by 'the great trumpet will be blown' and 'they that were ready to perish' shall come, from everywhere. It's good to know that."