That is the soul of nature, sees the good
And bad that man in his most secret heart
Thinks by himself, and brings it to the light. (Text.)
—Her Majesty the Empress Haruko of Japan.
Translated by Arthur Lloyd.
(2246)
There was in my regiment during the Civil War—I was chaplain—a certain corporal, a gay-hearted fellow and a good soldier, of whom I was very fond—with whom on occasion of his recovery from a dangerous sickness I felt it my duty to have a serious pastoral talk; and while he convalesced I watched for an opportunity for it. As I sat one day on the side of his bed in the hospital tent chatting with him, he asked me what the campaign, when by and by spring opened, was going to be. I told him that I didn’t know. “Well,” said he, “I suppose that General McClellan knows all about it.” (This was away back in 1861, not long after we went to the field.) I answered: “General McClellan has his plans, of course, but he doesn’t know. Things may not turn out as he expects.” “But,” said the corporal, “President Lincoln knows, doesn’t he?” “No,” I said, “he doesn’t know, either. He has his ideas, but he can’t see ahead any more than General McClellan can.” “Dear me,” said the corporal, “it would be a great comfort if there was somebody that did know about things”—and I saw my chance. “True, corporal,” I observed, “that’s a very natural feeling; and the blest fact is there is One who does know everything, both past and future, about you and me, and about this army; who knows when we are going to move, and where to, and what’s going to happen; knows the whole thing.” “Oh,” says the corporal, “you mean old Scott!”—Joseph H. Twichell.
(2247)
Omnipresence, A Wrestle with—See [Children’s Religious Ideas].