orsake or give
up in order to do good? I don't pretend to know the private affairs of
the family generally, but certainly there are strong rumours afloat that
the maxim, `Be just before you are generous,' is not acted upon by the
young people in their money concerns. I allowed just now that they are
good-natured, but good-nature is a very different thing from
unselfishness. What personal gratification do they surrender in order
to do good? What worldly pleasure or amusement do they deny themselves?
What extravagance do they curtail?"

"I can't say much for them in that respect, certainly," replied the
young man thoughtfully; "indeed, I must frankly confess that I have
heard more than once from the eldest Miss Wilder the expression of her
hope and conviction that the united good deeds of the family would be
accepted, by the world at any rate, as a sort of atonement for follies
and excesses which clearly could not be justified in themselves."

"I can well believe it, my dear nephew: but I have something much
weightier to say on the subject, and it is this. There is manifestly
one great want in all the doings of these kind-hearted people at Holly
House, which would make me at once deny the character of unselfishness
to their best deeds."

"And what is that, dear uncle?"

"The stamp of the Cross, Horace. I know that there are plenty of
crosses about them,--crosses on their prayer-books, crosses round their
necks, crosses on their writing-cases and on their furniture; but _the_
Cross is wanting. In a word, they are not denying self, and seeking to
do good to others from love to that Saviour who gave up so much for
them. I know that they are not without religion in the eyes of the
world; but I cannot, I dare not believe that they are really actuated by
love to the great Master in what they may do to make others happy. Am I
wrong, Horace?"

"No, uncle, I cannot say that you are. Much as I like the girls on many
accounts, I should not be speaking my honest sentiments were I to say
that I believed them to be doing good to others from real Christian
motives. And yet--"

"Ah, my dear nephew, I know what you would say. I know that the world
would embrace such as these within its elastic band as among genuine
unselfish workers, though avowedly on a lower level than that adopted by
the true Christian. But, after all, can God, the searcher of hearts,
approve of anything as being truly unselfish which does not bear