“I am sure you are right,” said the other. “I know I wish to do right, and I feel a pleasure in crossing my own inclination when it will gratify others; but then my inmost look has been to the world and its approbation. ‘What will people say? What will people think?’ or, at any rate, ‘What will good people say and think?’ this has been the prominent thought in my heart, I fear.”
“Well, dear Grace, I suppose this is so, more or less, with us all. What we want, I think, and comparatively seldom find in these showy and surface days, is a high sense of duty, so that we just act as duty calls, let the world, or good people even, judge of us or speak of us as they please.”
“And yet, dear Mary, I think I see a little crevice through which self may creep in even there. I have met some of your ‘duty’ people who have flung themselves so violently against the prejudices of society, or, at any rate, of good people, crying out all the time, ‘Duty, duty! It don’t matter to us what the world thinks,’ that they have given great offence where they might have avoided giving any, and have set up people’s backs against what is good and true.”
“I dare say you have met such, dear Grace, and I think you may be talking to one of the class now,” said Miss Stansfield, laughing; “at least, my character and principles would naturally lead me in that direction, for, of course, we are all disposed to carry out our own views to an extreme, if we do not let common sense, enlightened by grace, preserve a proper balance. But, spite of this, I still feel that a high sense of duty in those who love our Saviour is the surest preservative against being carried away by a subtle selfishness, and is the making of the finest and most truly self-denying characters. If I am manifestly in the path of duty, what matters it what is said of me, or who says it? I may then go forward, not, indeed, arrogantly or defiantly—that would be unlike the great Master—but yet firmly and confidently, and God will set me right with the world and with his people in his own good time.”
“Ah! I believe you are right,” said her friend, with a sigh. “I wish there were more of such true unselfishness amongst us; I wish I were such a character myself.”
“And so you are, dear Grace, in the main. No one can possibly doubt your genuineness and sincerity. You have only just to step up on to the higher platform, and, as your heart’s gaze becomes more fixed on a Saviour known and loved, you will cease to think about how your self-denial looks in the eyes of others, and will feel the cross which you carry after Christ in the path of duty to be easy and his burden light.”
“I shall not forget our conversation on this subject,” said Miss Willerly with tears in her eyes. “I always thought that I hated selfishness, but now I see that I have been blinded to my own. I suppose it is very difficult for us to see it in ourselves as it really is, especially in these days when there are so many attractive forms of self-denial. It occurred to me the other day what an odd thing it would be to see how a number of utterly selfish people would get on if thrown together for some weeks, with not a single unselfish person amongst them, and unable to get rid of one another’s company. I feel sure the result would teach an admirable lesson on the misery of a thoroughly selfish disposition.”
“I think so too, Grace,” said her companion, much amused. “What do you say to putting a story or allegory together on the subject.”
“Capital!” cried Miss Willerly; “it will be something quite in my line I will set about it at once. I shall be able to give myself some very seasonable raps on the knuckles as I go on, and perhaps I may be of use to some of my acquaintance, who might be induced to look through my performance in a friendly way.”
“You must let me be the first to see it,” said her friend.