"Your mistake is a very common one, little lassie. You are trying to
believe what, and you have got to believe whom. If you had to cross a
raging torrent, and I offered to carry you over, it would signify
nothing whether you knew where I was born, or if I were able to speak
Latin. But it would signify a great deal to you whether you knew me;
whether you believed that I would carry you safe over, or that I would
take the opportunity to drop you into the water and run away. Would it
not?"
"Of course it would," I said; "the whole thing would depend on whether I
trusted you."
My Uncle Drummond rose and laid his hand on my head--not as Mr Digby
used to do, as though he were condescending to a little child; but as if
he were blessing me in God's name. Then he said, in that low, soft,
solemn tone which sounds to me so very high and holy, as if an angel
spoke to me:--"Cary, dear child, the whole thing depends--your soul and
your eternity depend--on whether you trust the Lord Jesus." Then he
went out of the room, and left me alone, as if he wanted me to think
well about that before he said anything more.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
I think something is coming to help me. My Uncle Drummond was late for
supper last night--a thing which I could see was very unusual. And when
he did come, he was particularly silent and meditative. At length, when
supper was over, as we turned our chairs round from the table, and were
sitting down again to our work, my Uncle Drummond, who generally goes to
his study after supper, sat down among us.
"Young people," said he, with a look on his face which it seemed to me
was partly grave and partly diverted, "considering that you are more
travelled persons than I, I come to you for information. Have you--any
of you--while in England, either seen or heard anything of one Mr
George Whitefield, a clergyman of the Church of England, who is commonly
reckoned a Methodist?"