Mrs. Lobeck was a truly interesting person—as genteel in her manners, as she was amiable in her disposition; and as our intimacy increased, she gradually threw off her constitutional reserve, and became more free and communicative. She was naturally more buoyant in spirits than her husband, yet there was an expression of grief in her countenance which excited my sympathy, and I felt desirous of ascertaining the cause of it. She had been, from her youth up, a most rigid devotee of ecclesiastical formalism; no Puseyite could be more scrupulous in observing the times and seasons and ceremonies of his church. I knew, from many incidental allusions, that she had idolized her Prayer Book, which led her to neglect her Bible; and this made me suspect that she was still placing some undue dependence on ecclesiastic ceremonies. I had preached a sermon on the eunuch going on his way rejoicing (Acts viii. 39), to which she made a reference when I was spending an evening with her.
"To be candid, Sir, it is not with me as it was with the eunuch; for I am not quite so easy in my mind now, as I was before I left the church; sometimes I think I must return, though I should regret depriving myself of the benefit I derive from your ministry."
"You do not feel quite so much at ease in your mind now, as you did when attending to your long established religious customs?"
"I do not. Indeed, I feel at times quite unhappy."
"Were you quite happy when you were attending to your religious duties. Did you habitually feel that you were prepared for death; that is, were you assured that your sins were forgiven, and that you would go to heaven when you died?"
"No, Sir, I was never perfectly happy, because I was not quite assured that I should go to heaven, but I always thought that if I continued to the end in the religious course in which I had been trained, the Almighty would take me to himself. I recollect mentioning to our Rector the fears which I occasionally had on this subject, when he quoted a passage from the Bible which gave me much comfort, 'He that endureth to the end shall be saved.' I now feel that I am failing in this duty, which makes me unhappy."
"Did you, when practising your religious duties, think much about Jesus Christ, and much about coming to him by faith, to save you? Did you ever feel that you loved him?"
"I always thought he was our Saviour, but I have thought more about him lately than I used to think. Your preaching puts some new ideas into my mind about Jesus Christ, but they soon pass away. I cannot retain them, because I do not clearly understand them."
"If I do not mistake, you cherished a hope that the Almighty would save you, because you were regular and conscientious in the observance of your religious duties?"