"Is he insane?"
"By no means. This failure was the means of securing a title to a more enduring inheritance."
"Is Amy Brace living?"
"Yes. She is also poor. Her husband is a well-meaning, but most inefficient man."
"All my old acquaintances seem to be poor."
"None have been prospered in this world as my brother has. There are some who are comfortably well off, and a few who have an undoubted title to the riches of eternity."
The rich man sighed deeply, but made no reply. After a long interval of silence, he remarked—
"Life has been, to most of us, a very different thing from what we expected."
"You have realized your expectations as to wealth."
"Yes; but if I had my life to live over again, I would not pay the price at which I gained it. I have never been happy, but only preparing to be so. Sickness has come, and death is coming! What has all my life been worth? The few hours that I have spent with your family this summer have been almost the only happy ones I have passed for years, and they gave me almost as much pain as pleasure, by making me feel that I had thrown away my life."