for it is clear you
regard Heaven as a place full of delights, prepared for those who may
be fitted to become inhabitants thereof. But in this you are mistaken.
If you do not enter Heaven before you die, you will never do so
afterward. If Heaven be not formed within you, you will never find it
out of you--you will never _come into it_."

These remarks offended the company, and they spoke harshly to the old
man, who made no reply, but arose and retired, with a sorrowful
expression on his face. He went forth and resumed his daily
occupations, and pursued them diligently. Those who had been assembled
with him, also went forth--one to his farm, another to his
merchandize, each one forgetting all he had thought about Heaven and
its felicities, and only anxious to serve natural life and get gain.
Heaven was above the world to them, and, therefore, while in the
world, they could only act upon the principle that governed the world;
and prepare for Heaven by pious acts on the Sabbath. There was no
other way to do, they believed--to attempt to bring religion down into
life would only, in their view, desecrate it, and expose it to
ridicule and contempt.

The old man, to whom allusion has been made, kept a store for the sale
of various useful articles; those of the pious company who needed
these articles as commodities of trade, or for their own use, bought
of him, because they believed that he would sell them only what was of
good quality. One of the most ardent of these came into the old man's
store one day, holding a small package in his hand; his eye was
restless, his lip compressed, and he seemed struggling to keep down a
feeling of excitement.

"Look at that," he said, speaking with some sternness, as he threw the
package on the old man's counter.

The package was taken up, opened, and examined.

"Well?" said the old man, after he had made the examination, looking
up with a steady eye and a calm expression of countenance.

"Well? Don't you see what is the matter?"

"I see that this article is a damaged one," was replied.

"And yet you sold it to me for good." The tone in which this was said
implied a belief that there had been an intention of wrong.

A flush warmed the pale cheek of the old man at this remark. He
examined the sample before him more carefully, and then opened a
barrel of the same commodity and compared its contents with the
sample. They agreed. The sample from which he had bought and by which
he h