a model of hard, sharp, uncompromising common sense, looking her
sister down during this weak apology for the higher wisdom. For now,
as in the days of old, the wisdom of the cross is foolishness to the
wise and prudent of the world; and the heavenly arithmetic, which
counts the one lost sheep more than the ninety and nine that went not
astray, is still the arithmetic, not of earth, but of heaven. There
are many who believe in the Trinity, and the Incarnation, and all the
articles of the Athanasian and Nicene Creeds, to whom this wisdom of
the Master is counted as folly: "For the natural man understandeth
not the things of the kingdom of God; they are foolishness unto him:
neither can he know them."
Now Aunt Maria was in an eminent degree a specimen of the feminine
sort of "natural man."
That a young and happy wife, with a peaceful, prosperous home,
should put a particle of her own happiness to risk, or herself to
inconvenience, for the sake of a poor servant woman and a sinful
child, was, in her view, folly amounting almost to fatuity; and she
inly congratulated herself with the thought that her sister and
Eva would yet see themselves in trouble by their fine fancies and
sentimental benevolence.
"Well, sister," she said, rising and drawing her cashmere shawl in
graceful folds round her handsome shoulders, "I thought I should come
to you first, as you really are the most proper person to talk to Eva;
but if you should neglect your duty, there is no reason why I should
neglect mine.
"I hear of a very nice, capable girl that has lived five years
with the Willises, who has had permission to advertise from the
house, and I am going to have an interview with her, and engage her
provisionally, so that, if Eva has a mind to listen to reason, there
may be a way for her to supply Mary's place at once. I've made up
my mind that, on the whole, it's best Mary should go," she added
reflectively, as if she were the mistress of Eva's house and person.
"I'm sorry to have you take so much trouble, Maria; I'm sure it won't
do any good."
"Did you ever know me to shrink from any trouble or care or
responsibility by which I could serve you and your children, Nellie? I
may not be appreciated--I don't expect it--but I shall not swerve from
my duty to you; at any rate, it's my duty to leave no stone unturned,
and so I shall start out at once for the Willises. They are going
to Europe for a year or two, and want to find good places for their
servants."
And so Mrs. Van Arsdel, being a little frightened at the suggestions
of Aunt Maria, began to think with herself that perhaps she had been
too yielding, and made herself very uncomfortable in reflecting on
positive evils that might come on Eva.
She watched her sister's stately, positive, determined figure as she
went down the stairs with the decision of a general, gave a weak sigh,
wished that she had not come, and, on the whole, concluded to resume
her story where she had left off at Aunt Maria's entrance.
_CHAPTER XXVI._
SHE STOOD OUTSIDE THE GATE.
The trial of human life would be a much simpler and easier thing to
meet, if the lines of right and wrong were always perfectly definite.
We are happy so far to believe in our kind as to think that there are
vast multitudes who, if they only knew exactly what was right and
proper to be done, would do it at all hazards.
But _what is right_ for me, in these particular circumstances?--in
that question, as it constantly rises, lies the great stress of the
trial of life.
We have, for our guidance, a Book of most high and unworldly maxims
and directions, and the life of a Leader so exalted above all the
ordinary conceptions and maxims of this world that a genuine effort to
be a Christian, after the pattern and directions of Christ, at once
brings us face to face with daily practical inquiries of the most
perplexing nature.
Our friend, Mrs. Maria Wouvermans, was the very type and impersonation
of this world's wisdom of the ordinary level. The great object of
life being to insure ease, comfort, and freedom from annoyance to
one's self and one's family, her views of duty were all conveniently
arranged along this line. In her view, it was the first duty of every
good housekeeper to look ahead and avoid every occasion whence might
arise a possible inconvenience or embarrassment. It was nobody's duty,
in her opinion, to have any trouble, if it could be avoided, or to
risk having any. There were, of course, duties to the poor, which she
settled for by a regular annual subscription to some well-recommended
board of charity in her most respectable church. That done, she
regarded herself as clear for action, and bound to shake off in detail
any troublesome or embarrassing person that threatened to be a burden
to her, or to those of her family that she felt responsible for.
On the other hand, Eva was possessed by an earnest desire to make her
religious profession mean something adequate to those startling and
constantly recurring phrases in the Bible and the church service which
spoke of the Christian as a being of a higher order, led by another
Spirit, and living a higher life than that of the world in general.
Nothing is more trying to an ingenuous mind than the conviction of
anything like a sham and a pretense in its daily life.
Mr. St. John had lately been preaching a series of sermons on the
history and customs of the primitive church, in hearing which the
conviction often forced itself on her mind that it was the unworldly
life of the first Christians which gave victorious power to the faith.
She was intimately associated with people who seemed to her to live
practically on the same plan. Here was Sibyl Selwyn, whose whole
life was an exalted mission of religious devotion; there was her
neighbor Ruth Baxter, associated as a lay sister with the work of her
more gifted friend. Here were the Sisters of St. Barnabas, lovely,
cultivated women who had renounced all selfish ends and occupations in
life, to give themselves to the work of comforting the sorrowful and
saving the lost. Such people, she thought, fully answered to the terms
in which Christians were spoken of in the Bible. But could she, if she
lived only to brighten one little spot of her own, if she shut out of
its charmed circle all sight or feeling of the suffering and sorrow of
the world around her, and made her own home a little paradise of ease
and forgetfulness, could she be living a Christian life?
When, therefore, she heard from the poor mother under her roof the
tale of her secretly-kept shames, sorrows, and struggles for the
daughter whose fate had filled her with misery, she accepted with a
large-hearted inconsiderateness a mission of love towards the wanderer.
She carried it to her husband; and, like two kind-hearted,
generous-minded young people, they resolved at once to make their home
sacred by bringing into it this work of charity.
Now, this work would be far easier in most cases, if the sinner
sought to be saved would step forthwith right across the line, and
behave henceforth like a saint. But unhappily that is not to be
expected. Certain it was, that Maggie, with her great, black eyes and
her wavy black hair, was no saint. A petted, indulged child, with a
strong, ungovernable nature, she had been whirled hither and thither
in the tides of passion, and now felt less repentance for sin than
indignation at her own wrongs. It might have been held a hopeful
symptom that Maggie had, at least, so much real truthfulness in her as
not to profess what she did not feel.
It was a fact that the constant hymns and prayers and services of
the pious Sisters wearied her. They were too high for her. The calm,
refined spirituality of these exalted natures was too far above her,
and she joined their services at best with a patient acquiescence,
feeling the while how sinful she must be to be so bored by them.
But for Eva she had a sort of wondering, passionate admiration.
When she fluttered into her sick room, with all her usual little
graceful array of ribbons and fanciful ornament, Maggie's dull eye
would brighten, and she looked after her with delighted wonder. When
she spoke to her tenderly, smoothed her pillow, put cologne on her
laced handkerchief and laid it on her brow, poor Maggie felt awed
and flattered by the attention, far more, it is to be feared, than
if somebody more resembling the traditional angel had done it. This
lively, sprightly little lady, so graceful, so pretty in all her
motions and in all her belongings, seemed to poor worldly Maggie much
more nearly what she would like an angel to be, in any world where she
would have to live with them.
The Sisters, with their black robes, their white caps, and their
solemn prayers, seemed to her so awfully good that their presence
chilled her. She felt more subdued, but more sinful and more hopeless
with them than ever.
In short, poor Maggie was yet a creature of this world, and of
sense, and the spiritual world to her was only one dark, confused
blur, rather more appalling than attractive. A life like that of the
Sisters, given to prayer and meditation and good works, was too high
a rest for a soul growing so near the ground and with so few tendrils
to climb by. Maggie could conceive of nothing more dreary. To her, it
seemed like being always thinking of her sins; and that topic was no
more agreeable a subject of meditation to Maggie than it is to any of
us. Many people seem to feel that the only way of return for those who
have wandered from the paths of virtue is the most immediate and utter
self-abasement. There must be no effort at self-justification, no
excusing one's self, no plea for abatement of condemnation. But let us
Christians who have never fallen, in the grosser sense, ask ourselves
if, with regard to our own particular sins and failings, we hold the
same strict line of reckoning. Do we come down upon ourselves for our
ill temper, for our selfishness, for our pride, and other respectable
sins, as we ask the poor girl to do who has been led astray from
virtue?
Let us look back and remember how the Master once coupled an
immaculate Pharisee and a fallen woman in one sentence as two debtors,
both owing a sum to a creditor, and both having nothing to pay,--both
freely forgiven by infinite clemency. It is a summing up of the case
that is too often forgotten.
Eva's natural tact and delicacy stood her in stead in her dealings
with Maggie, and made _her_ touch upon the wounds of the latter more
endurable than any other. Without reproof for the past, she expressed
hope for the future.
"You shall come and stay with your mother at my house, Maggie," she
said, cheerfully, "and we will make you useful. The fact is, your
mother needs you; she is not so strong as she was, and you could save
her a great many steps."
Now, Maggie still had skillful hands and a good many available worldly
capacities. The very love of finery and of fine living which had once
helped to entrap her, now came in play for her salvation. Something
definite to do, is, in some crises, a far better medicine for a
sick soul than any amount of meditation and prayer. One step fairly
taken in a right direction, goes farther than any amount of agonized
back-looking.
In a few days, Maggie made for herself in Eva's family a place in
which she could feel herself to be of service. She took charge of
Eva's wardrobe, and was zealous and efficient in ripping, altering and
adapting articles for the adornment of her pretty mistress; and Eva
never failed to praise and encourage her for every right thing she
did, and never by word or look reminded her of the past.
Eva did not preach to Maggie; but sometimes, sitting at her piano
while she sat sewing in an adjoining room, she played and sung some of
those little melodies which Sunday-schools have scattered as a sort
of popular ballad literature. Words of piety, allied to a catching
tune, are like seeds with wings--they float out in the air and drop in
odd corners of the heart, to spring up in good purposes.
One of these little ballads reminded Eva of the night she first saw
Maggie lingering in the street by her house:
"I stood outside the gate,
A poor wayfaring child;
Within my heart there beat
A tempest fierce and wild.
A fear oppressed my soul
That I might be too late;
And, oh, I trembled sore
And prayed--outside the gate,
"'Mercy,' I loudly cried,
'Oh, give me rest from sin!'
'I will,' a voice replied,
And Mercy let me in.
She bound my bleeding wounds
And carried all my sin;
She eased my burdened soul,
Then Jesus took me in.
"In Mercy's guise I knew
The Saviour long abused,
Who oft had sought my heart,
And oft had been refused.
Oh, what a blest return
For ignorance and sin!
I stood outside the gate
And Jesus let me in."
After a few days, Eva heard Maggie humming this tune over her work.
"There," she said to herself, "the good angels are near her! _I_ don't
know what to say to her, but they do."
In fact, Eva had that delicacy and self-distrust in regard to any
direct and personal appeal to Maggie which is the natural attendant of
personal refinement. She was little versed in any ordinary religious
phraseology, such as very well-meaning persons often so freely deal
in. Her own religious experiences, fervent and sincere though they
were, never came out in any accredited set of phrases; nor had she any
store of cut-and-dried pious talk laid by, to be used for inferiors
whom she was called to admonish. But she had stores of kind artifices
to keep Maggie usefully employed, to give her a sense that she was
trusted in the family, to encourage hope that there was a better
future before her.
Maggie's mother, fond and loving as she was, seconded these tactics of
her mistress but indifferently. Mary had the stern pride of chastity
which distinguishes the women of the old country, and which keeps most
of the Irish girls who are thrown unprotected on our shores superior
to temptation.
Mary keenly felt that Maggie had disgraced her, and as health returned
and she no longer trembled for her life, she seemed called upon to
keep her daughter's sin ever before her. Her past bad conduct and the
lenity of her young mistress, her treating her so much better than
she had any reason to expect, were topics on which Mary took every
occasion to enlarge in private, leading to passionate altercations
between herself and her daughter, in which the child broke over all
bounds of goodness and showed the very worst aspects of her nature.
Nothing can be more miserable, more pitiable, than these stormy
passages between wayward children and honest, good-hearted mothers,
who love them to the death, and yet do not know how to handle them,
sensitive and sore with moral wounds. Many a time poor Mary went to
sleep with a wet pillow, while Maggie, sullen and hard-hearted, lay
with her great black eyes wide open, obdurate and silent, yet in her
secret heart longing to make it right with her mother. Often, after
such a passage she would revolve the line of the hymn--
"I stood outside the gate."
It seemed to her that that gate was her mother's heart, and that she
stood outside of it; and yet all the while the poor mother would have
died for her. Eva could not at first account for the sullen and gloomy
moods which came upon Maggie, when she would go about the house with
lowering brows, and all her bright, cheerful ways and devices could
bring no smile upon her face.
"What is the matter with Maggie?" she would say to Mary.
"Oh, nothing, ma'am, only she's bad; she's got to be brought under,
and brought down,--that's what she has."
"Mary, I think you had better not talk to Maggie about her past
faults. She knows she has been wrong, and the best way is to let her
get quietly into the right way. We mustn't keep throwing up the past
to her. When we do wrong, we don't like to have people keep putting
_us_ in mind of it."
"You're jest an angel, Miss Eva, and it isn't many ladies that would
do as you do. You're too good to her entirely. She ought to be made
sensible of it."
"Well, Mary, the best way to make her sensible and bring her to
repentance is to treat her kindly and never bring up the past. Don't
you see it does no good, Mary? It only makes her sullen, and gloomy,
and unhappy, so that I can't get anything out of her. Now please,
Mary, just keep quiet, and let _me_ manage Maggie."
And then Mary would promise, and Eva would smooth matters over,
and affairs would go on for a day or two harmoniously. But there
was another authority in Mary's family, as in almost every Irish
household,--a man who felt called to have a say and give a sentence.
Mary had an elder brother, Mike McArtney, who had established himself
in a grocery business a little out of the city, and who felt himself
to stand in position of head of the family to Mary and her children.
The absolute and entire reverence and deference with which Irish women
look up to the men of their kindred is something in direct contrast
to the demeanor of American women. The male sex, if repulsed in
other directions, certainly are fully justified and glorified by the
submissive daughters of Erin. Mike was the elder brother, under whose
care Mary came to this country. He was the adviser and director of all
her affairs. He found her places; he guided her in every emergency.
Mike, of course, had felt and bitterly resented the dishonor brought
on their family by Maggie's fall. In his view, there was danger that
the path of repentance was being made altogether too easy for her, and
he had resolved on the first leisure Sunday evening to come to the
house and execute a thorough work of judgment on Maggie, setting her
sin in order before her, and, in general, bearing down on her in such
a way as to bring her to the dust and make her feel it the greatest
possible mercy and favor that any of her relations should speak to her.
So, after Eva had hushed the mother and tranquilized the girl, and
there had been two or three days of serenity, came Sunday evening and
Uncle Mike.
The result was, as might have been expected, a loud and noisy
altercation. Maggie was perfectly infuriated, and talked like one
possessed of a demon; using, alas! language with which her sinful life
had made her only too familiar, and which went far to justify the
rebukes which were heaped upon her.
In his anger at such contumacious conduct, Uncle Mike took full
advantage of the situation, and told Maggie that she was a disgrace to
her mother and her relations--a disgrace to any honest house--and that
he wondered that decent gentle-folks would have her under their roof.
In short, in one hour, two of Maggie's best friends--the mother that
loved her as her life and the uncle that had been as a father to
her--contrived utterly to sweep away and destroy all those delicate
cords and filaments which the hands of good angels had been fastening
to her heart, to draw her heavenward.
When a young tree is put in new ground, its roots put forth fibres
delicate as hairs, but in which is all the vitality of a new phase of
existence. To tear up those roots and wrench off those fibres is too
often the destructive work of well-intending friends; it is done too
often by those who would, if need be, give their very heart's blood
for the welfare they imperil. Such is life as we find it.
_CHAPTER XXVII._
ROUGH HANDLING OF SORE NERVES.
The same Sunday evening that Mary and her brother Mike had devoted to
the disciplinary processes with Maggie, had been spent by Eva and her
husband at her father's house.
Mrs. Van Arsdel, to say the truth, had been somewhat shaken and
disturbed by Aunt Maria's suggestions; and she took early occasion
to draw Eva aside, and make many doubtful inquiries and utter many
admonitory cautions with regard to the part she had taken for Maggie.
"Of course, dear, it's very kind in you," said Mrs. Van Arsdel; "but
your aunt thinks it isn't quite prudent; and, come to think it over,
Eva, I'm afraid it may get you into trouble. Everything is going on so
well in your house, I don't want you to have anything disagreeable,
you know."
"Well, after all, mother, how can I be a Christian, or anything like a
Christian, if I am never willing to take any trouble? If you heard the
preaching we do every Sunday, you would feel so."
"I don't doubt that Mr. St. John is a good preacher," said Mrs. Van
Arsdel; "but then I never could go so far, you know; and your aunt is
almost crazy now because the girls go up there and don't sit in our
pew in church. She was here yesterday, and talked very strongly about
your taking Maggie. She really made me quite uncomfortable."
"Well, I should like to know what concern it is of Aunt Maria's!"
said Eva. "It's a matter in which Harry and I must follow our own
judgment and conscience; Harry thinks we are doing right, and I
suspect Harry knows what is best to do as well as Aunt Maria."
"Well, certainly, Eva, I must say it's an unusual sort of thing to do.
I know your motives are all right and lovely, and I stood up for you
with your aunt. I didn't give in to her a bit; and yet, all the while,
I couldn't help thinking that maybe she was right and that maybe your
good-heartedness would get you into difficulty."
"Well, suppose it does; what then? Am I never to have any trouble for
the sake of helping anybody? I am not one of the very good women with
missions, like Sibyl Selwyn, and can't do good that way; and I'm not
enterprising and courageous, like sister Ida, to make new professions
for women: but here is a case of a poor woman right under my own roof
who is perplexed and suffering, and if I can help her carry her load,
ought I not to do it, even if it makes me a good deal of trouble?"
"Well, yes, I don't know but you ought," said Mrs. Van Arsdel, who was
always convinced by the last speaker.
"You see," continued Eva, "the priest and the Levite who passed by on
the other side when a man lay wounded were just of Aunt Maria's mind.
They didn't want trouble, and if they undertook to do anything for him
they would have a good deal; so they left him. And if I turn my back
on Mary and Maggie I shall be doing pretty much the same thing."
"Well, if you only are sure of succeeding. But girls that have fallen
into bad ways are such dangerous creatures; perhaps you can't do her
any good, and will only get yourself into trouble."
"Well, if I fail, why then I shall fail. But I think it's better to
try and fail in doing our part for others than never to try at all."
"Well, I suppose you are right, Eva; and after all I'm sorry for poor
Mary. She had a hard time with her marriage all round; and I suppose
it's no wonder Maggie went astray. Mary couldn't control her; and
handsome girls in that walk of life are so tempted. How does she get
on?"
"Oh, nicely, for the most part. She seems to have a sort of adoration
for me. I can say or do anything with her, and she really is very
handy and skillful with her needle; she has ripped up and made over
an old dress for me so you'd be quite astonished to see it, and seems
really pleased and interested to have something to do. If only her
mother will let her alone, and not keep nagging her, and bringing up
old offenses. Mary is so eager to make her do right that she isn't
judicious, she doesn't realize how sensitive and sore people are that
know they have been wrong. Maggie is a proud girl."
"Oh, well, she's no business to be proud," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "I'm
sure she ought to be humbled in the very dust; that's the least one
should expect."
"And so ought we all," said Eva, "but we are not, and she isn't. She
makes excuses for herself, and feels as if she had been abused and
hardly treated, just as most of us do when we go wrong, and I tell
Mary not to talk to her about the past, but just quietly let her do
better in future; but it's very hard to get her to feel that Maggie
ought not to be willing to be lectured and preached to from morning
till night."
"Your Aunt Maria, no doubt, will come up and free her mind to you
about this affair," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "She has a scheme in her
head of getting another girl for you in Mary's place. The Willises are
going abroad for three years and have given their servants leave to
advertise from the house; and your aunt left me Saturday, saying she
was going up there to ascertain all about them and get you the refusal
of one of them, provided you wished to get rid of Mary."
"Get rid of Mary! I think I see myself turning upon my good Mary
that loves me as she does her life, and scheming to get her out of
my house because she's in trouble. No, indeed; Mary has been true
and faithful to me, and I will be a true and faithful friend to her.
What could I do with one of the Willises' servants, with their airs
and their graces? Would they come to a little house like mine, and
take all departments in turn, and do for me as if they were doing for
themselves, as Mary does?"