He wrote to Mary and told her so. He told her that he was now fully alive to his own weakness, and that she might depend on his watchfulness and moderation, imploring her to give him one, and but one, more trial. He would watch, he would strive, he would pray to be strictly moderate. She should never have cause to reproach him again.
She replied:—
“Dear Frank,—It would be cruelty in me were I to hold out any hope to you that I can ever again be more to you than one who must always take a deep interest in your welfare, and must feel truly grateful to you for having saved her life. That you mean now to be all that you promise, I do not doubt; but that you really will be so, I dare not hope. You have been seen by me twice in such a condition as made me shrink from you with terror and disgust. Were we to be married, and you should be betrayed into excess, the first time, you would be overwhelmed; the second time, you would be ashamed and pained; the third time, you would feel it, but not very acutely. You would get used, by degrees, to my witnessing such degradation; it would be killing me, but it would be making less and less impression upon you. I dare not run the terrible risk. I dare not join myself to you in a bond which could never be severed, however aggravated might be my misery and your sin. Oh, Frank, my heart is well nigh broken! I have loved you, and do love you still. Let us be one in heaven, though we never can be so here. Pray, oh, pray for grace to resist your temptation! Ask to be made a true follower of the Lord Jesus, and you will be guided aright, and we shall meet then in that bright land where all shall rejoice together who have, by grace, fought the fight and won the victory here.—Sincerely yours, Mary Oliphant.”
Frank read this letter over and over again, and groaned in the fulness of his distress. She had not asked him to become an abstainer. Was it because she felt that it was hopeless? He knew it to be so. He knew that if he signed the pledge he should only add a broken vow to his other sins. He felt that, dearly as he loved Mary, he could not forego all intoxicating drinks even for her sake. He dared not pray that he might be able to abstain, for he felt that he should not really wish for the accomplishment of such a prayer. Habitual indulgence had taken all the stiffness out of his will. And yet the thought of losing Mary was utter misery. He leaned his head on his hands, and gazed for a long time on her letter. At last there came a thought into his mind. All might not yet be lost. There was still one way of escape. He rose up comforted, and thrusting the letter into his pocket, sought out his mother. He found her alone. She looked at him with deep anxiety and pitying love, as well she might, when she marked the gloom that had settled down on his once happy face. Alas she knew its cause too well. She knew that he was on the downward path of intemperance, and she knew how rapid was the descent. She was well aware that his sinful excess had been the cause of the breaking off of his engagement with the rector’s daughter. Oh, how her heart ached for him. She would have given all she possessed to see him what he once was. She was prepared for any sacrifice, if only he could be reclaimed before it should be too late.
“Dearest mother,” he said, throwing himself down beside her, clasping her knees, and looking up imploringly into her face, “I’m a miserable creature, on the road to ruin, body and soul, unless something comes to stop me.”
“Oh, my boy, my boy!” cried his mother, bursting into tears; “do not say so. You have gone astray; but so have we all, one way or other. There is hope for you if you return. Surely the evil habit cannot be already so strong upon you that you cannot summon strength and resolution to break through it.”
“Oh, you do not, you cannot know what a helpless creature I am!” was his reply. “When once I begin to taste, every good resolution melts away in a moment.”
“Then give up such things, and abstain altogether, my beloved Frank, if that be the case,” said Lady Oldfield.
“I cannot,” he replied bitterly. “I cannot keep from them, they must be kept from me, and then I should have some chance.”
“But, my dear boy, how can that always be? You cannot expect your father to banish beer and wine from his table, and to refuse to set them before his guests. You cannot expect that he should debar himself the moderate use of these things because you have, unhappily, learned to take them immoderately.”