THE WOODMAN'S FAMILY IN TROUBLE.
Vol i. p. 105.
I entered her room, and soon perceived that death had cast his fatal shadow on her countenance, which still retained its beautiful form and expression. Addressing myself to the child, I said, "Do you think you shall die?" "Yes, Sir." "And if you die, where do you expect to go?" "To heaven." "What makes you think you shall go to heaven?" "Jesus Christ has said, 'Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me; for of such is the kingdom of heaven.'" "What do you understand by coming to Jesus Christ?" "Believing in him, and loving him." "Did you always believe in him, and love him?" "No, not till he inclined me; for if we love him, it is because he first loved us." "Then you can leave father, and mother, and all your brothers and sisters, to go to heaven?" "Yes, Sir; I have no wish to live on earth when I have the prospect of living a happier life in heaven."
The surgeon, who had been anxiously expected for several hours, now arrived. "Do you think," said the grief-worn mother, "our child is dying?" This question, though familiar to the humane man, was not heard without an evident emotion of sorrow. "While there is life there is hope; but I would not advise you to be too sanguine in your expectations; she is very ill." There was no burst of anguish at this reply. They all knew Jemima was dying, though they were unwilling to believe it; and though their pulse beat a little quicker on hearing this reply, and their faces turned paler, yet they stood pressing round the bed, as if to keep off the king of terrors, whose advanced guards had taken the forlorn hope.
We now went down stairs; and, as the storm was over, the surgeon left, but I could not leave. "Will you," said the father, "go to prayer with us? If it were not for prayer, and the hope which the gospel gives, my heart would break." With this request I complied; and while praying to the God of all grace that the little child might be favoured with the light of his countenance in her passage through the valley of the shadow of death, I heard the mother's shriek, which convinced me that she was gone. The children started up, weeping aloud, wringing their hands, and calling, "Jemima! Jemima! don't leave us." And the mother, with a softened melancholy of countenance, appeared among as, saying, with a faltering tongue, "She exclaimed, as I was raising her up on the pillow, 'I am going to heaven!' and fell back in my arms, and died."
I remained with them about a quarter of an hour, administering to them the consolations of religion, and then left them, in company with the eldest boy, who conducted me to Fairmount, which I reached about ten o'clock. I related to my friends the adventures of my ramble, which compensated for the anxiety which my long absence and the state of the weather had occasioned. When reflecting on this fact, and contrasting the bright prospect which the gospel of Christ unveils to the juvenile as well as to the aged Christian, with the dark and cheerless gloom of infidelity, I feel its immense superiority; and with emotions which no language can describe, I pay my adorations and praises to Him who brought life and immortality to light.