"Would you like me to read to you for a little while this evening, Mr.
Higgs? My aunt has given me permission, if you would like me to," Carol
asked modestly as he entered the old man's cottage the following Sunday
evening. Mr. Higgs was seated as usual at the open door, watching the
villagers pass by on their way to church.
"Thank you kindly, young gentleman. I'll be glad to hear some of the
words of the Book. I just keep it close by me. It don't seem Sunday
without. But my eyes fail me, and I just sit and ponder over some of
the Psalms I can well remember. After the service sometimes a
neighbor'll pop in and tell me the text Rector's been preaching about.
A mighty fine preacher is Rector, but often I used to say to my
Missus--she's dead and gone these five years--his thoughts are like
birds, they fly over our heads, and we don't seem able to lay hold of
them. If he'd just tell us something simple to help us day by day. I'd
be glad now if I could remember some of the sermons I've listened to,
year in, year out. But there, it's all gone, and I've got no more
understanding of the Bible than when I was a boy. It's ower late to
think about it now, and me turned seventy."
"I have been taught to understand the Bible. I should like to teach you
what I have been taught. Then, when you understand, you would lose your
rheumatism."
"_Lose my rheumatism!_" The old man repeated the words in the utmost
astonishment.
"Why, yes, of course you would," Carol said with that wonderfully sweet
smile which won all hearts. "I had hip-disease; but I lost it."
"Well, now, young gentleman, I can say with absolute truth that I have
never been told that before--no, _never!_ though I've been a regular
church attendant since I was a little choir boy, and never left off
going till the joints in my old legs grew so stiff I couldn't walk.
It'd want a lot of faith, sir, to believe that just reading the Bible
would make 'em lissom again."
"Faith comes with understanding. There is another book; it is called
_Key to the Scriptures_. I haven't a copy of that book now, but I can
remember so much of it, I shall be able to help you to understand the
Bible perhaps a little better. We will commence with the first chapter
of Genesis."
"Yes, now; I remember that chapter pretty well. I learnt it at Sunday
School sixty years ago, and I've never quite forgotten it. I could
repeat verses straight off now."
"And has it never helped you all through your life?"
"Well, no. I can't say that chapter has. I have found comfort sometimes
from the Psalms. 'The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want,' I have
often turned to when we'd a growing family and work was slack."
"Let me read the chapter now and then we will talk about it."
The boy opened the Bible, and slowly with an impressiveness which the
old man had never before heard, he read the first chapter of Genesis,
and three verses of the second chapter. He read as one reads words that
are very familiar and understandable.
"_Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of
them, and God saw everything that He had made, and behold it was very
good._" He repeated the words from memory, looking with a kindly smile
at the old man, as he asked the question: "If God looked upon everything
which He had created, and declared it very good--where do the things
come from that are not good? Who created them?"
"Well now, young sir, that is a question I'm not prepared to answer. I
can only say like that little black girl in the story, ''spose they
growed'."
"But everything must grow from something, mustn't it? Every tree and
plant has its own seed. God created every living creature after its
kind, and bade it be fruitful and multiply. So you see everything good
was created by the Word of God. Is rheumatism good?"
"'Deed no, young gentleman! It's cruel bad."
"So is hip-disease. It's very, very 'cruel bad,' and because it is the
opposite of good it was not amongst the things which God 'beheld.' Our
dear Heavenly Father did not create poor suffering little children
maimed with hip-disease, and sometimes blind. He created them in His
own image and likeness, and God could not be suffering sometimes with
one disease, sometimes with another, so that His image and likeness
could have it too, could He? See, if I hold my hand up so it casts a
shadow on the wall, that is an exact image or likeness of my hand, is it
not? Now if I just hold something--only a slip of paper between my hand
and the reflection, the reflection is deformed, isn't it? But my hand
is not affected by it. So when we are bound by any cruel disease, there
is something between God and His image and likeness, something that was
never created by Him--was never created at all. It is only a shadowy
mist--a belief: and we have to get rid of it, by knowing its unreality.
We have to know that because we are God's children, His spiritual
creation, we must be perfect, even as He is perfect. Jesus came to
teach people this. He said, 'Be ye therefore perfect, even as your
Father in Heaven is perfect.' But, my cousin says, the world has been
slow to learn the lesson. Sin and disease will disappear from our midst
just as soon as we do learn it. When she came to me, and I was very
ill, she taught me that nothing was real except what God had created,
and pronounced good, and He never created hip-disease. Because she
understood this so clearly, and taught me to understand it, I soon began
to get better. I should like to help you to understand it, so that you
would lose your rheumatism. I think I have stayed as long as I had
permission to-night. Would you like me to come again next Sunday?"
"'Deed, and I would, young gentleman."
"My name is Carol," the boy said simply.
"Thank 'ee, Master Carol, you've given me something to think about, I
shan't forget during the week."
"I should like to teach you the Scientific Statement of Being. It is in
that book I told you of, which explains the Bible. If you would learn
it, and try to realize it, it would help you so much.'
"My mem'ry 's none of the best now, but I'll try," the old man said
regretfully.
"Perhaps it will be better for me to write it for you in large writing,
so that you can read it until you know it. I will bring it with me next
week. These are the words: 'There is no life, truth, intelligence, nor
substance in matter.' He repeated the words gravely and slowly to the
end, the old man gazing at him the while with wondering eyes. The sun
was setting; the crimson light streamed through the lattice window upon
the boy's upturned face, so sweet, so grave, so loving, and so earnest.
"The words seem difficult to understand at first," he said, "but you
will soon grow to love them. It is the truth which Jesus promised
should make us free. It has made me free. It will make you free."