ought to have done, but to tell them what they must do now, and hell
will no longer fascinate them. Tell them that there is no refuge from
the compelling Love of God, save that Love itself--that He is in hell
too, and that if they make their bed in hell they shall not escape him,
and then, perhaps, they will have some true presentiment of the worm
that dieth not and the fire that is not quenched.

'Father, it will be of use in hell,' said Robert. 'God will give you no
rest even there. You will have to repent some day, I do believe--if not
now under the sunshine of heaven, then in the torture of the awful world
where there is no light but that of the conscience. Would it not be
better and easier to repent now, with your wife waiting for you in
heaven, and your mother waiting for you on earth?'

Will it be credible to my reader, that Andrew interrupted his son with
the words,

'Robert, it is dreadful to hear you talk like that. Why, you don't
believe in the Bible!'

His words will be startling to one who has never heard the lips of a
hoary old sinner drivel out religion. To me they are not so startling as
the words of Christian women and bishops of the Church of England, when
they say that the doctrine of the everlasting happiness of the righteous
stands or falls with the doctrine of the hopeless damnation of the
wicked. Can it be that to such the word is everything, the spirit
nothing? No. It is only that the devil is playing a very wicked prank,
not with them, but in them: they are pluming themselves on being selfish
after a godly sort.

'I do believe the Bible, father,' returned Robert, 'and have ordered my
life by it. If I had not believed the Bible, I fear I should never have
looked for you. But I won't dispute about it. I only say I believe that
you will be compelled to repent some day, and that now is the best time.
Then, you will not only have to repent, but to repent that you did
not repent now. And I tell you, father, that you shall go to my
grandmother.'

CHAPTER XVI. CHANGE OF SCENE.

But various reasons combined to induce Falconer to postpone yet for a
period their journey to the North. Not merely did his father require an
unremitting watchfulness, which it would be difficult to keep up in his
native place amongst old friends and acquaintances, but his health was
more broken than he had at first supposed, and change of air and scene
without excitement was most desirable. He was anxious too that