in set words put
aside and taken leave of that which she once desired and hoped might have
been her own, sorrowfully indeed, but peremptorily, as firmly persisting
in rejecting it, as she might have persisted in maintaining it; and, if
she died in infidelity, horrible thought! would not the burden lie on him,
and was this to be the token of the love which he pretended to entertain
for her?

What was he living for? what was the work he had set himself to do? Did he
live to plant flowers, or to rear fruit, to maintain himself and to make
money? Was that a time to pride himself on vineyards and oliveyards, when,
like Eliseus, he was one among myriads who were in unbelief? Ah, the
difference between a saint and him? Of what good was he on earth; why
should not he die? why so chary of his life? why preserve his wretched
life at all? Could he not do more by giving it than by keeping it? Might
it not have been given him perchance for the very purpose that he might
sacrifice it for Him who had given it? He had been timid about making a
profession of his faith, which might have led to prison and death; but
perhaps the very object of his life in the divine purpose, the very reason
of his birth, had been that, as soon as he was grown, he should die for
the truth. He might have been cut off by disease; he was not; and why,
except that he might merit in his death, and that what, in the ordinary
course of things, was a mere suffering, might in his case be an act of
service? His death might have been the conversion of thousands, of
Callista; and the fewness of his days here would have been his claim to a
blessed eternity hereafter.

Nor Callista alone; he had natural friends, with nearer claims upon his
charity. Had he been other than he was, he might have prevailed with his
uncle; at least he might have taught him to respect the Christian Faith
and Name, and restrained him from daring to attempt, for he now saw that
it was an attempt, to seduce him into sin. He might have lodged a good
seed in his heart, which in the hour of sickness might have germinated.
And his brother again had learned to despise him; indeed he had raised in
every one who came near him the suspicion that he was not really a
Christian, that he was an apostate (he could not help uttering a cry of
anguish as he used the word), an apostate from that which was his real
life and supreme worship.

Why did he not at once go into the Basilica or the Gymnasium, and proc