and music and ceremony: and it is so afraid of vagueness, so
considerate of man's feeble grasp and small outlook, that it is afraid of
recognising all the channels by which that sense is communicated, for fear
of weakening a special effect. I'll tell you two or three of the
experiences I mean. You know old Mrs. Chetwynd, who is fading away in that
little cottage beyond the churchyard. She is poor, old, ill. She can hardly
be said to have a single pleasure, as you and I reckon pleasures. She just
lies there in that poky room waiting for death, always absolutely patient
and affectionate and sweet-tempered, grateful for everything, never saying
a hard or cross word. Well, I go to see her sometimes--not as often as I
ought. She shakes hands with that old knotted-looking hand of hers which
has grown soft enough now after its endless labours. She talks a
little--she is interested in all the news, she doesn't regret things, or
complain, or think it hard that she can't be out and about. After I have
been with her for two minutes, with her bright old eyes looking at me out
of such a thicket, so to speak, of wrinkles,--her face simply hacked and
seamed by life,--I feel myself in the presence of something very divine
indeed,--a perfectly pure, tender, joyful, human spirit, suffering the last
extremity of discomfort and infirmity, and yet entirely radiant and
undimmed. It is then that I feel inclined to kneel down before God, and
thank Him humbly for having made and shown me so utterly beautiful a thing
as that poor old woman's courage and sweetness. I feel as I suppose the
devout Catholic feels before the reserved Sacrament in the shrine--in the
presence of a divine mystery; and I rejoice silently that God is what He
is, and that I see Him for once unveiled.
"And then the sight of a happy and contented child, kind and spirited and
affectionate, like little Molly Akers, never making a fuss, or seeming to
want things for herself, or cross, or tiresome--that gives me the same
feeling! Then flowers often give me the same feeling, with their cleanness
and fresh beauty and pure outline and sweet scent--so useless in a way,
often so unregarded, and yet so content just to be what they are, so apart
from every stain and evil passion.
"And then in the middle of that you see a man like Barlow stumbling home
tipsy to his frightened wife and children, or you read a bad case in the
papers, or a letter from a man of virtue finding fault with e
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