As a proof of the state of her mind, I may mention the suitable use she made. of an incident, in itself perhaps unimportant. On the last Sabbath evening upon which she had been able to get the length of my cottage, arriving too late, she had found the door closed; and not wishing to disturb us in our little worship, she had turned and gone away in tears. Alluding to this, a circumstance of which I was ignorant until this moment, she said it reminded her of the parable of the wise and foolish virgins. Like the latter, she had been shut out, and debarred the privilege of entering with the people of God; and she prayed that it might remain on her memory, to quicken her in her spiritual race, and urge her to seek with renewed diligence an inheritance in heaven lest having made profession here, and said, 'Lord, Lord!' with feigned lips, she should finally hear the awful asseveration, 'Verily, I' know you not,' and be cast out into outer darkness, where is weeping, and wailing, and gnashing of teeth.' CHAP. V. "When conscience to the heart within To thee, O Lord, my wants I plead- WE were now gradually approaching the cottage where this venerable couple had resided. Our walk had been pleasant! and our way, beguiled as it had been by the interesting narrative of my friend, had been imperceptibly shortening. The wood which embowered this retreat of piety in its grateful shade, a protection from the sun by day and a shelter from the storms of night, was already at hand. The little mansion, however, which had been visible to us at a distance, seen through the opening of the trees that grew around it, was now shut from our view by the intervening foliage. Many and various were the emotions with which we drew near this peaceful abode. Years had fled upon the wings of time, since my companion had bid adieu to these sweet retreats. What had occurred in the interval he knew not. Disease might have reduced his aged acquaintances to poverty and distress, and laid them on the bed of languishing; the sons of violence might have broken in upon their quiet; the sounds of war (for war had since scattered devastations over many a once happy scene) might have spread alarm through their seclusion; their children might have been snatched from their embraces; the youths, whom they had nourished with parental solicitude, to fill the ranks of usurpation; the daughters, whom they had hoped might rock the I cradle of their declining age, left widowed and helpless; or they themselves might have yielded to that stroke which must ere long reach us all, and gone into the world of spirits. With hearts solemnized by such reflections, we continued our route, and my friend resumed. "Assaulted, however, as this good woman was, and 'plied by the tempter's direst arts,' her faith and hope were yet firmly fixed on God. Though troubled on every side, she was not in despair; cast down she was, but not destroyed. With the holy Job, she could say, though he slay me, yet will I trust in him.' I asked her, if her uneasiness was on the subject of God's willingness to receive the returning sinner. She answered with a deep-drawn sigh: "Sixty and five years did he bear |