"Which is, speakin' free an' easy," said he, "that they lie!"
"'Twill be hard," I argued, "'t save un all."
"'Twould be a mean poor God," he replied, "that couldn't manage a
little thing like that."
My uncle's soul, as I had been taught (and but a moment gone
informed), was damned.
"Uncle Nick," I inquired, "will the Shepherd find you?"
"Me?" cries he.
"Ay," I persisted; "will he not seek till he finds you, too?"
"Hist!" he whispered. "I'm damned, Dannie, for good an' all."
"You?"
"Good Lord, yes!" said he, under his breath. "Hist! Certain sure, I
is--damned t' hell for what I'm doin'."
At this distant day I know that what he did was all for me, but not on
that moonlit night of my childhood.
"What's that?" said I.
"I'm damned for it, anyhow," he answered. "Say no more, Dannie."
I marvelled, but could make nothing of it at all. 'Tis strange (I have
since thought) that we damn ourselves without hesitation: not one
worthy man in all the world counting himself deserving of escape from
those dreadful tortures preached for us by such apostles of injustice
as find themselves, by the laws they have framed, interpreting without
reverence or fear of blunder, free from the common judgment. Ay, we
damn ourselves; but no man among us damns his friend, who is as evil
as himself. And who damns his own child? 'Tis no doubt foolish to be
vexed by any philosophy comprehending what is vulgarly called hell;
but still (as I have thought) this is a reasonable view: there is no
hell in the philosophy of a mother for her own child; and as by
beneficent decree every man is the son of his mother, consequently
there is no hell; else 'twould make such unhappiness in heaven. Ah,
well! I looked out of the window where were the great works of the
Lord: His rock and sea and sky. The moon was there to surprise
me--half risen: the sea shot with a glistening pathway to the glory of
the night. And in that vast uncertain and inimical place, far out from
shore, there rode a schooner of twenty tons, dawdling unafraid, her
small sails spread for a breeze, in hope. Whither bound? Northward: an
evil coast for sailing-craft--cruel waters: rock and fog and ice and
tempestuous winds. Thither bound, undaunted, with wings wide, abroad
in the teeth of many perils, come wreck or not. At least (I thought)
she had ventured from snug harbor.
"Dannie," said my uncle, "you're all alone in the world."