Discipline

From the supineness of sickness and despair, I was at last forced to momentary exertion. My landlady renewed her entreaties that I would send for my friends; enforcing her request by informing me that my little fund was nearly exhausted. Disturbed with her importunity, and careless of providing against difficulties from which I expected soon to escape, I commanded her to desist. But my commands were no longer indisputable. The woman probably fearing, from the continuance of my disorder, that my death might soon involve her in trouble and expense, persisted in her importunity. Finding me obstinately determined to persevere in concealment, she proceeded to hint not obscurely, that it would be necessary to consider of some means of supply, or to provide myself with another abode. Only a few days were past since an insinuation like this would have driven me indignant from a palace; but now the depression of sickness was added to that of sorrow, and I only answered, that when I could no longer repay her trouble, I would release her from it.

Dissatisfied, however, with an assurance which she foresaw that I might be unable to fulfil, the widow proceeded to enquire whether I retained any properly which could be converted into money; and mentioned a ring which she observed me to wear. Dead as I was to all earthly affection, I firmly refused to part with this ring, for it had been my mother's. I had drawn it a hundred times from her slender hand, and she thought it best employed as a toy for her little Ellen, while yet its quickly shifting rays made its only value to me. 'No!' said I, as the woman urged me to dispose of it, 'this shall go with me to the grave, in memory that one heart had human feeling towards me.' The landlady, however, venturing a tedious remonstrance against this resolution, the dying fire again gave a momentary flash. 'Be silent,' I cried. 'Speak to me no more till I am penniless; then tell me so at once, and I will that instant leave your house, though I die at the threshold!' Highly offended by this haughty command, the woman immediately retired, leaving me for the rest of that day in total solitude.

An evil was now ready to fall upon me, for which I was wholly unprepared either by experience or reflection. Unaccustomed as I was to approach the abodes of poverty, the very form of want was new to me; and since I had myself been numbered with the poor, my thoughts had chiefly dwelt upon my past misfortunes, or taken refuge from the anticipation of future distress in the prospect of dissolution. But, in spite of my wishes and my prophecies, abstinence, and the strength of my constitution, prevailed over my disorder. My heavy eyes were this night visited by a deep and refreshing sleep, from which I awoke not till a mid-day sun glanced through the smoke a dull ray upon the chimney crags that bounded my horizon.

I looked up with a murmur of regret that I was restored to consciousness. 'Why,' thought I, 'must the flaring light revisit those to whom it brings no comfort?' and I closed my eyes in thankless impatience of my prolonged existence. Oh, where is the human physician, whose patience would endure to have his every prescription questioned, and vilified, and rejected! whose pitying hand would offer again and again the medicine which in scorn we dash from our lips! – No! Such forbearance dwells with one Being alone; and such perverseness we reserve for the infallible Physician.

I presently became sensible that my fever had abated. With a deep feeling of disappointment I perceived that death had eluded my desires; and that I must return to the thorny and perplexing path where the serpent lurked to sting, and tigers prowled for prey. While my thoughts were thus engaged, a footstep crossed my chamber; but, lost in my gloomy reverie, I suffered it, ere I raised my eyes, to approach close to my bed. I was roused by a cry of strong and mingled feeling. 'Miss Mortimer!' I exclaimed; but she could not speak. She threw herself upon my bed, and wept aloud. The voice of true affection for a moment touched my heart; but I remembered that the words of kindness had soothed only to deceive; and stern recollection of my wrongs steeled me against better thoughts.

'Why are you come hither, Miss Mortimer?' said I, coldly withdrawing myself from her arms.

'Unkind Ellen!' returned my weeping friend; 'could I know that you were in sorrow and not seek you? May I not comfort, – or, if that cannot be, may I not mourn with you?'

'I do not mourn – I want no comfort – leave me.'

'Oh say not so, dearest child. You are not forbidden to feel. Let us weep together under the chastisement, and trust together that there is mercy in it.'

'Mercy! no. I have been dashed without pity to the earth, and there will I lie till it open to receive me.'

Miss Mortimer gazed on me in sorrowful amazement; then, wringing her hands as in sudden anguish, 'Oh, Heaven!' she cried, 'is this my Ellen? – Is this the joyous spirit that brought cheerfulness wherever it came? – Is this the face that was bright with life and pleasure? Loveliest, dearest, how hast thou lost the comfort which belongs even to the lowest of mankind, – the hope which is offered even to the worst of sinners?'

'Leave me, Miss Mortimer!' I cried, impatient of the self-reproach which her sorrow awakened in my breast. 'I wish only to die in peace. Must even this be denied me?'

'Ellen, my beloved Ellen, is that what you call peace? – Oh Thou who alone canst, deign to visit this troubled soul with the peace of thy children!' Miss Mortimer turned from me, and ceased to speak; but I saw her wasted hand lifted as in prayer, and her sobs attested the fervency of the petition. After a short silence, making a visible effort to compose herself, she again addressed me. 'Do not ask me to leave you, Ellen,' said she. 'I came hither, resolved not to return without you. If you are too weak to-day for our little journey, I will nurse you here. Nay, you must not forbid me. I will sit by you as still as death. Or, make an effort, my love, to reach home with me, and I will not intrude on you for a minute. You shall not even be urged to join my solitary meals. It will be comfort enough for me to feel that you are near.'

I could not be wholly insensible to an invitation so affectionate; but I struggled against my better self, and pronounced a hasty and peremptory refusal. Miss Mortimer looked deeply grieved and disappointed; but hers was that truly Christian spirit whose kindness no ingratitude could discourage, whose meekness no perverseness could provoke. She might have checked the untoward plant in its summer pride; but the lightning had scathed it, and it was become sacred in her eyes.

Sparing the irritability of the wounded spirit, she forbore to fret it by further urging her request. She rather endeavoured to soothe me by every expression of tenderness and respect. She at last submitted so far to my wayward humour, as to quit my apartment; aware, perhaps, that the spirit which roused itself against opposition might yield to solitary reflection. The voice of kindness, which I had expected never more to hear, stirred in my breast a milder nature; and as my eye followed the feeble step of Miss Mortimer, and read her wasted countenance, my heart smote me for my resistance to her love. 'She has risen from a sick-bed to seek me,' thought I; 'me, renounced as I have been by all mankind, – bereft as I am of all that allured the perfidious. Surely this is not treachery.'

My reverie was suddenly interrupted by poor Fido, who made good his entrance as Miss Mortimer left the room; and instantly began to express, as he could, his recognition of his altered mistress. The sight of him awakened at once a thousand recollections. It recalled to my mind my former petulant treatment of my mother's friend, her invariable patience and affection, and the remorse excited by our separation. My mother herself rose to my view, such as she was when Fido and I had gamboled together by her side, – such as she was when sinking in untimely decay. I felt again the caress which memory shall ever hold dear and holy. I saw again the ominous flush brighten her sunken cheek; knelt once more at her feet to pray that we might meet again; and heard once more the melancholy cry which spoke the pang of a last farewell. The stubborn spirit failed. I threw my arms round my mother's poor old favourite, and melted into tears. These tears were the first which I had shed since the unkindness of my altered friend had turned my gentler affections into gall; – and let those who would know the real luxury of grief turn from the stern anguish of a proud heart to the mild regrets which follow those who are gone beyond the reach of our gratitude and our love.

Miss Mortimer did not leave me long alone. She returned to bring me refreshment better suited to my past habits and present weakness than to her own very limited finances. As she entered, I hastily concealed my tears; but when her accents of heartfelt affection mingled in my soul with the recollections which were already there, the claim of my mother's friend grew irresistible. A half confession of my late ingratitude rose to my lips; but that to which Ellen, the favoured child of fortune, might have condescended as an instance of graceful candour, seemed an act of meanness in Ellen fallen and dependent. I pressed Miss Mortimer's hand between mine. 'My best, my only friend!' said I; and Miss Mortimer asked no more. It was sufficient for the generous heart that its kindness was at last felt and accepted.

CHAPTER XVI

– Fruit – some harsh, 'tis true,Pick'd from the thorns and briars of reproof;But wholesome, well-digested; grateful someTo palates that can taste immortal truth;Insipid else, and sure to be despised.Cowper.

The news of my father's misfortune no sooner reached Miss Mortimer's retirement, than she made an exertion beyond her strength, that she might visit and comfort me. At my father's house, she learnt that I was gone no one knew whither; but the conveyance which I had chosen enabled her at last to trace my retreat, and she lost not a moment in following me thither. There, with all the tenderness of love, and all the perseverance of duty, she watched over my returning health; nor ever quitted me by night or by day, till I was able to accompany her home.

It was on a golden summer morning that we together left my dreary lurking-place. The sun shone forth as brightly as on the last day that I had visited Miss Mortimer's abode; the trees were in yet fuller foliage; and the hues of spring were ripening to the richer tints of autumn. The river flashed as gaily in the beam, and the vessels veered as proudly to the breeze. My friend sought to cheer my mind by calling my attention to the bright and busy scene. But the smile which I called up to answer her cares, came not from the heart. Cold and undelighted I turned from the view. 'To what end,' thought I, 'should this prison-house be so adorned? this den of the wretched and the base!' So dismal a change had a few weeks wrought upon this goodly frame of things to me. But thus it ever fares with those who refuse to contemplate the world with the eye of reason and of religion. In the day of prosperity, this foreign land is their chosen rest, for which they willingly forget their Father's house, but when the hours of darkness come, they refuse to find in it even accommodations fitted for the pilgrim 'that tarries but a night.'

When we had reached the cottage, and Miss Mortimer, with every testimony of affection had welcomed me home, she led me to the apartment which was thenceforth to be called my own. It was the gayest in my friend's simple mansion. Its green walls, snowy curtains, and light furniture, were models of neatness and order; and though the jessamine had been lately pruned from the casement to enlarge my view, enough still remained to adorn the projecting thatch with a little starry wreath.

On one side of my window were placed some shelves containing a few volumes of history, and the best works of our British essayists and poets; on the other was a chest of drawers, in which I found all the more useful part of my own wardrobe, secured to me by the considerate attention of Miss Mortimer. My friend rigidly performed her promise of leaving my time wholly at my own command. As soon as she had established me in my apartment, she resigned it solely to me: nor ever reminded me, by officious attentions, that I was a guest rather than an inmate. She told me the hours at which her meals were punctually served, giving me to understand that when I did not choose to join them, no warning or apology was necessary; since, if I did not appear in the family-room, I should be waited upon in my own. These arrangements being made, she advised me to repose myself after the fatigue of my journey, and left me alone. Wearied out by an exertion to which my strength was yet scarcely equal, I laid myself on a bed more inviting than the last which I had pressed, and soon dropped asleep.

The evening was closing, when I was awakened by a strain of music so soft, so low, that it seemed at first like a dream of the songs of spirits. I listened, and distinguished the sounds of the evening hymn. It was sung by Miss Mortimer; and never did humble praise, – never did filial gratitude, – find a voice more suited to their expression. The touching sweetness of her notes, heightened by the stillness of the hour, roused an attention little used of late to fix on outward things. 'These are the sounds of thankfulness,' thought I. 'I saw her this morning thank God, as if from the heart, for the light of a new day; and now, having been spent in deeds of kindness, it is closed as it began in an act of thanksgiving. What does she possess above all women, to call forth such gratitude? She is poor, lonely, neglected. She knows that she has obtained but a short reprieve from a disease which will waste away her life in lingering torture. Good Heaven! What is there in all this to cause that prevailing temper of her mind; that principle as it would appear, of all her actions? – She must have been born with this happy turn of thought. And, besides, she has never known a better fate; – blest, that poverty and solitude have kept her ignorant of the treachery and selfishness of man!'

The strain had ceased, and my thoughts returned to my own melancholy fate. To escape from tormenting recollection, or rather in the mere restlessness of pain, I opened a book which lay upon my table. It was my mother's Bible. The first page was inscribed with her name, and the date of my birth, written with her own hand. Below, my baptism was recorded in the following words: —

'This eleventh of January, 1775, I dedicated my dearest child to God. May He accept and purify the offering, though it be with fire!'

As I read these lines, the half prophetic words of my mother's parting blessing flashed on my recollection. 'Oh, my mother!' I cried, 'couldst thou have foreseen how bitter would be my "chastisement," couldst thou have known, that the "fire" would consume all, would not thy love have framed a far different prayer? Yes! for thou hadst a fellow-feeling in every suffering, and how much above all in mine!'

I proceeded to look for some further traces of a hand so dear. The book opened of itself at a passage to which a natural feeling had often led the parent who was soon to forget even her child in the unconsciousness of the grave; and a slight mark in the margin directed my eye to this sentence: 'Can a mother forget her sucking babe, that she should not have compassion upon the son of her womb? Yea, she may forget, yet will not I forget thee.'

These words had often been read in my hearing, when my wandering mind scarcely affixed a meaning to them; or when their touching condescension was lost upon the proud child of prosperity. But now their coincidence with the previous current of my thoughts seized at once my whole attention. I started as if some strange and new discovery had burst upon my understanding. Again I read the passage, and with a care which I had never before bestowed on any part of the book which contains it. 'Is this,' I enquired, 'an expression of the divine concern in each individual of human kind? – No. It seems merely a national promise. Yet, my mother has regarded it in another light; else why has she marked it so carefully?'

It was in vain that I debated this question with myself. Such was my miserable ignorance of all which it most behoved me to know, that I never thought of explaining the letter of the Scriptures by resorting to their spirit. My habitual propensities resisting every pious impression, my mind revolted from the belief that parental love had adjusted every circumstance of a lot which I accounted so severe as mine. To admit this, was virtually to confess that I had need of correction; that I had, to use Miss Mortimer's words, 'already reached that state when mercy itself assumes the form of punishment.' Yet the soothing beauty of the sentiment, the natural yearning of the friendless after an Almighty friend, made me turn to the same passage again and again, till the darkness closed in, and lulled me to a deep and solemn reverie.

'Does the Great Spirit,' thought I, 'indeed watch over us? Does He work all the changes of this changeful world? Does He rule with ceaseless vigilance, – with irresistible control, whatever can affect my destiny? – Can this be true? – If it be even possible, by what strange infatuation has it been banished from my thoughts till now? But it cannot be so. A man's own actions often mould his destiny; and if his actions be compelled by an extraneous energy, he is no more than a mere machine. The very idea is absurd.' And thus, to escape from a sense of my own past insanity, I entered a labyrinth where human reason might stray for ever,

And find no end, in wandering mazes lost.

But the subject, perplexing as it was to my darkened understanding, had seized upon my whole mind; and sleep fled my pillow, whilst in spite of myself the question again and again recurred; 'If I be at the mercy of a resistless power, why have I utterly neglected to propitiate this mighty arbitrator? If the success of every purpose even possibly depended upon his will, why was that will forgotten in all my purposes?'

As soon as it was day I arose; and, with the eagerness of one who would escape from suspense, I resorted to the book which had so lately arrested my regard. I no longer glanced over its pages in careless haste; for it offered my only present lights upon the questions, interesting by their novelty as well as by their importance – whether I had been guilty of the worse than childish improvidence, which, in attending to trifles, overlooks the capital circumstance? or whether the Creator, having dismissed us like orphans into a fatherless world, is regardless of our improvement, and deaf to our cry? My impatience of doubt made me forget, for a time, that the very fact which confers upon Scripture its authority, supposes a divine interference in human concerns. The great truth, however, shone forth in every page. All spoke of a vigilant witness, a universal, a ceaseless energy. Nor was this all. I could scarcely open the book without finding somewhat applicable to my own character or situation; I was, therefore, no longer obliged to compel my attention, as to the concerns of a stranger; it was powerfully attracted by interests peculiarly my own. The study, indeed, was often painful; but yet I returned to it, as the heir to the deed which is to make him rich or a beggar.

My search, however, produced nothing to elate. I read of benefits which I had forgotten; of duties which I had neglected; of threatenings which I had despised. The 'first and great commandment,' directed every affection of my soul to Him who had scarcely occupied even the least of my thoughts. The most glorious examples were proposed to my imitation, and my heart sunk when I compared them with myself. A temper of universal forbearance, habits of diligent benevolence, were made the infallible marks of a character which I had no right to claim. The happy few were represented as entering with difficulty, and treading with perseverance, the 'strait and narrow way,' which not even self-deceit could persuade me that I had found. That self-denial, which was enjoined to all as an unremitting habit, was new to me almost even in name. The 'lovers of pleasure,' among whom I had been avowedly enrolled, were ranked, by my new guide, with 'traitors and blasphemers.' The pride which, if I considered it at all as an error, I accounted the 'glorious fault' of noble minds, was reprobated as an impious absurdity. The anguish of repentance, – the raptures of piety, – the 'full assurance of hope,' were poured forth; but, with the restless anxiety of him who obtains an imperfect glimpse of the secret upon which his all depends, I perceived, that their language was to me the language of a foreign land.

By degrees, something of my real self was opened to my sight. The view was terrible; but, once seen, I vainly endeavoured to avert my eye. At midnight, and in the blaze of day, in the midst of every employment, in defiance of every effort, my offences stood before me. With the sense of guilt, came the fear before which the boldest spirit fails. I saw the decree already executed which took from me the 'talent buried in the earth;' but, the stroke which had deprived me of all, seemed only a prelude to that more awful sentence which consigns the unprofitable servant to 'outer darkness.' As one who starts from sleep beneath the uplifted sword, – as he to whom the lightning's flash reveals the precipice, – as the mother waked by the struggles of her half-smothered babe, – so I – but what material images of horror can shadow forth the terrors of him who feels that he is by his own act undone? In an overwhelming sense of my folly and my danger, I often sunk into the attitude of supplication; but I had now a meaning to unfold not to be expressed in a few formal phrases which I had been accustomed to hurry over. I saw that I had need of mercy which I had not deserved, and which I had no words to ask. How little do they know of repentance who propose to repay with it, at their own 'convenient season,' the pleasures which they are at all hazards determined to seize!

Meanwhile, though my misfortunes could not be banished from my mind, they no longer held their sullen reign alone. New interests had awakened in my breast; new fears; new regrets. I felt that there is an evil greater than the loss of fame, of fortune, or of friends; that there is a pang compared with which sorrow is pleasure. This anguish I endured alone. The proud spirit could pour into no human ear the language of its humiliation and its dread. I suffered Miss Mortimer to attribute to grief the dejection which at times overpowered me; to impatience of deprivation, the anxious disquiet of one who is seeking rest, and finding none. Yet I no longer shunned her society. I sought relief in the converse of a person rich in the knowledge in which I was wanting, impressed with the only subjects which could interest me now. Miss Mortimer was precisely the companion best calculated to be useful to me. She never willingly oppressed me with a sense of her superiority, – never upbraided my cold reception of doctrines which I was not yet fitted to receive, – never expressed surprise at my hesitation, or impatience with my prejudices, – never aggravated my sense of the danger of my state, nor boasted of the security of her own; but answered my questions in terms direct and perspicuous; opposed my doubts and prejudices with meek reason; represented the condition of the worst of mankind as admitting of hope, – that of the best, as implying warfare.

From the first month of my residence with Miss Mortimer I may date a new era of my existence. My mind had received a new impulse, and new views had opened to me of my actions, my situation, and my prospects. An important step had been made towards a change in my character. But still it was only a step. The tendencies of nature, strengthened by the habits of seventeen years, remained to be overcome, and this was not the work of a month, or a year. I was not, however, of a temper long to endure the sense of helpless misery. Encouraged by the promises which are made to the repentant, and guided now by the example which I had once overlooked or ridiculed, I resolved to associate myself as much as possible, in Miss Mortimer's acts of devotion and of charity. I joined in her family worship, – I visited her pensioners, – and industriously assisted her in working for the poor; an employment to which she punctually devoted part of her time. Little did I then suspect how much the value of the same action was varied by our different motives. She laboured to please a Father, – I to propitiate a hard Master. She was humbly offering a token of gratitude, – I was poorly toiling for a hire.