"How do you draw the line between them?" he asked, with an inward smile; and yet Mr. Dillwyn was earnest enough too.
"There is more than a line between them," said Lois. "There is all the distance between freedom and slavery." And the words recurred to her, "I will walk at liberty, for I seek thy precepts;" but she judged they would not be familiar to her companion nor meet appreciation from him, so she did not speak them. "Service," she went on, "I think is one of the noblest words in the world; but it cannot be rendered servilely. It must be free, from the heart."
"You make nice distinctions. Service, I suppose you mean, of one's fellow creatures?"
"No," said Lois, "I do not mean that. Service must be given to God. It will work out upon one's fellow-creatures, of course."
"Nice distinctions again," said Mr. Dillwyn.
"But very real! And very essential."
"Is there not service—true service—that is given wholly to one's needy fellows of humanity? It seems to me I have heard of such."
"There is a good deal of such service," said Lois, "but it is not the true. It is partial, and arbitrary; it ebbs and flows, and chooses; and is found consorting with what is not service, but the contrary. True service, given to God, and rising from the love of him, goes where it is sent and does what it is bidden, and has too high a spring ever to fail. Real service gives all, and is ready for everything."
"How much do you mean, I wonder, by 'giving all'? Do you use the words soberly?"
"Quite soberly," said Lois, laughing.