He rose from his knees, and without once looking back left the rocks
and came through the thicket to the ride. It grew darker, the clouds
dropped still lower, and the wind again blew fierce and strong. He
left the broad ride and sauntered along one of the narrow tracks. He
could hear the wind as it tore through slender branches high above his
head, but down here it did not touch him; and he strolled on slowly,
feeling extraordinarily calm, full of a great reverence and wonder,
not noticing external things because he wished to maintain this
strange inward peace.

Then soon the voluminous but indefinite sensations of mental
tranquillity concentrated their soothing messages to make the comfort
of one definite thought, and Dale said to himself: "Christ has
returned to me."

And then he saw Him--not for an instant believing that he really saw
Him, that he had passed from the order of common facts into the realm
of miracles, that the usual laws of heaven had been broken by a
special material manifestation, or anything of that sort; but that he
saw Him with the beautifully clear visualization for which he had
longed and prayed. And it seemed to him that the power of his thoughts
took a splendid leap, and that he could now understand everything that
hitherto had been unintelligible and inexplicable. Very God, and very
man. Yes, this was the man--a man after his own heart--the comrade
with whom one could work shoulder to shoulder and never know
fatigue--the unfailing friend whom one dared not flatter or slobber
over, but the grip of whose hand gave self-respect and the glance of
whose eyes swept the evil out of one's breast. And this was God
too--the only God that men can worship without fear; Whose power is so
great that it makes one's head split to think of, and Whose love is
greater than His power.

And the voice of Christ seemed to speak to him, not by the channel of
crudely imagined words, but in a transcendent joy that was sent
thrilling through and through him.

"Then I need not despair," he said to himself. "That was the voice of
Christ telling me to hope."

He strolled on with bowed head, and remembered the night when he sat
in Mr. Osborn's little room, staring at the carpenter's bench, and
struggling between belief and doubt. He had said: "I want to be saved.
I want the day when you can tell me I have gained everlasting
salvation." And Mr. Osborn had answered him: "The day will come; but
it will not be my vo