He desired to see Mr. Stanley. He recommended to him his nephew, over whose conduct Mr. Stanley promised to have an eye. He made him and Dr.
Barlow joint executors. He offered to leave them half his fortune. With their usual disinterestedness they positively refused to accept it, and suggested to him a better mode of bestowing it.
He lifted up his hands and eyes, saying, "This is indeed Christianity--pure, undefiled religion! If it be not faith, it is its fruits. If it be not the procuring cause of salvation, it is one evidence of a safe state. O, Mr. Stanley, our last conversation has sunk deep into my heart. You had begun to pull the vail from my eyes; but nothing tears the whole mask off, like the hand of death, like impending judgment. How little have I considered eternity! Judgment was not in all my thoughts, I had got rid of the terrors of responsibility! O, Dr.
Barlow, is there any hope for me?"
"Sir," replied the Doctor, "your sin is not greater because you feel it: so far from it, your danger diminishes in proportion as it is discerned.
Your condition is not worse but better, because you are become sensible of your own sins and wants. I judge far more favorably of your state now, than when you thought so well of it. Your sense of the evil of your own heart is the best proof of your sincerity; your repentance toward G.o.d is the best evidence of your faith in our Lord Jesus Christ."
"Doctor, it is too late," replied the sick man. "How can I show that my repentance is sincere? In this miserable condition how can I glorify G.o.d?"
"Sir," replied Dr. Barlow, "you must lay anew the whole foundation of your faith. That Saviour whom you had unhappily adopted as a subst.i.tute for virtue, must be received as a propitiation for sin. If you recover, you must devote yourself, spirit, soul, and body, to his service. You must adorn his gospel by your conduct; you must plead his cause in your conversation; you must recommend his doctrines by your humility; you must dedicate every talent G.o.d has given you to his glory. If he continue to visit you with sickness, this will call new and more difficult Christian graces into exercise. If by this severe affliction you lose all ability to do G.o.d actual service, you may perhaps glorify him more effectually by casting yourself entirely on him for support, by patient suffering for his sake who suffered every thing for yours. You will have an additional call for trusting in the divine promises; an additional occasion of imitating the divine example; a stronger motive for saying practically, The cup which my Father has given me, shall I not drink it?"
"O, Doctor," said the unhappy man, "my remorse arises not merely from my having neglected this or that moral duty, this or that act of charity, but from the melancholy evidence which that neglect affords that my religion was not sincere."
"I repeat, sir," said Dr. Barlow, "that your false security and unfounded hope were more alarming than your present distress of mind.
Examine your own heart, fear not to probe it to the bottom; it will be a salutary smart. As you are able, I will put you into a course of reading the Scriptures, with a view to promote self-examination. Try yourself by the strait rule they hold out. Pray fervently that the Almighty may a.s.sist you by his Spirit, and earnestly endeavor to suffer as well as to do his whole will."
Dr. Barlow says, he thinks there is now as little prospect of his perfect recovery as of his immediate dissolution; but as far as one human creature can judge of the state of another, he believes the visitation will be salutary.
CHAPTER XLIV.
As we were sitting at supper, after Dr. Barlow had left us, Lady Belfield, turning to me, said, "She had had a governess proposed to her from a quarter I should little expect to hear." She then produced a letter, informing her that Mr. Fentham was lately found dead in his bed of an apoplexy. That he had died insolvent; and his large income ceasing with his life, his family were plunged into the utmost distress. That Mrs. Fentham experienced the most mortifying neglect from her numerous and n.o.ble friends, who now, that she could no longer amuse them with b.a.l.l.s, concerts, and suppers, revenged themselves by wondering what she could ever mean by giving them at all, and declaring what a bore it had always been to them to go to her parties. They now insisted that people ought to confine themselves to their own station, and live within their income, though they themselves had lifted her above her station, and had led her to exceed her income.
"The poor woman," continued Lady Belfield, "is in extreme distress. Her magnificently furnished house will go but a very little way toward satisfying her creditors. That house, whose clamorous knocker used to keep the neighborhood awake, is already reduced to utter stillness. The splendid apartments, brilliant with l.u.s.tres and wax-lights, and crowded with company, are become a frightful solitude, terrifying to those to whom solitude has not one consolation or resource to offer. Poor Mrs.
Fentham is more wounded by this total desertion of those whom she so sumptuously fed, and so obsequiously flattered, than by her actual wants."
"It is," said Sir John, "a fine exemplification of the friendships of the world,
"Confederacies in vice, or leagues in pleasure."
"Lady Denham, when applied to," resumed Lady Belfield, "said, that she was extremely sorry for them; but as she thought extravagance the greatest of faults, it would look like an encouragement to imprudence if she did any thing for them. Their extravagance, however, had never been objected to by her, till the fountain which had supplied it was stopped: and she had for years made no scruple of winning money almost nightly from the woman whose distresses she now refused to relieve. Lady Denham further a.s.signed the misery into which the elopement of her darling child with Signor Squallini had brought her, as an additional reason for withholding her kindness from Mrs. Fentham."
"It is a reason," said I, interrupting Lady Belfield, "which, in a rightly-turned mind, would have had a directly contrary operation. When domestic calamity overtakes us, is it not the precise moment for holding out a hand to the wretched? for diminishing the misery abroad, which at home may be irretrievable?"
"Lady Bab Lawless, to whom Mrs. Fentham applied for a.s.sistance, coolly advised her to send her daughters to service, saying, "that she knew of no acquirement they had which would be of any use to them, except their skill in hair-dressing.""
"It seemed a cruel reproach from a professed friend," said Sir John, "and yet it is a literal truth. I know not what can be done for them, or for what they are fit. Their accomplishments might be turned to some account, if they were accompanied with real knowledge, useful acquirements, or sober habits. Mrs. Fentham wishes us to recommend them as governesses. But can I conscientiously recommend to others, girls with whom I could not trust my own family? Had they been taught to look no higher than the clerks of their father, who had been a clerk himself, they might have been happy; but those very men will now think them as much beneath themselves, as the young ladies lately thought they were above them."
"I have often," said Mr. Stanley, "been amused, with observing what a magic transformation the same event produces on two opposite cla.s.ses of characters. The misfortunes of their acquaintance convert worldly friends into instantaneous strictness of principle. The faults of the distressed are produced as a plea for their own hard-hearted covetousness; while that very misfortune so relaxes the strictness of good men, that the faults are forgotten in the calamity! and they, who had been perpetually warning the prodigal of his impending ruin, when that ruin comes, are the first to relieve him."
It was agreed among us that some small contribution must be added to a little sum that had been already raised, for their immediate relief; but that nothing was so difficult, as effectually to serve persons whose views wore so disproportioned to their deserts, and whose habits would be too likely to carry corruption into families who might receive them from charitable motives.
The conversation then fell insensibly on the pleasure we had enjoyed since we had been together; and on the delights of rational society, and confidential intercourse such as ours had been, where minds mingled, and affection and esteem were reciprocal. Mr. Stanley said many things which evinced how happily his piety was combined with the most affectionate tenderness of heart. Indeed I had always been delighted to observe in him a quality which is not so common as it is thought to be, a thorough capacity for friendship.
"My dear Stanley," said Sir John, "it is of the very essence of human enjoyments, that they must have an end. I observe with regret, that the time a.s.signed for our visit is more than elapsed. We have prolonged it beyond our intention, beyond our convenience: but we have, I trust, been imbibing principles, stealing habits, and borrowing plans, which will ever make us consider this visit as an important era in our lives.
"My excellent Caroline is deeply affected with all she has seen and heard at the Grove. We must now leave it, though not without reluctance.
We must go and endeavor to imitate what, six weeks ago, we almost feared to contemplate. Lady Belfield and I have compared notes. On the most mature deliberation, we agree that we have lived long enough to the world. We agree that it is time to begin to live to ourselves, and to him who made us. We propose in future to make our winters in London much shorter. We intend to remove early every spring to Beechwood, which we will no longer consider as a temporary residence, but as our home; we will supply it with every thing that may make it interesting and improving to us all. We are resolved to educate our children in the fear of G.o.d. Our fondness for them is rather increased than diminished; but in the exercise of that fondness, we will remember that we are to train them for immortality. We will watch over them as creatures for whose eternal well-being a vast responsibility will attach to ourselves.
"In our new plan of life, we shall have fewer sacrifices to make than most people in our situation; for we have long felt a growing indifference for things which we appeared to enjoy. Of the world, we are only going to give up that part which is not worth keeping, and of which we are really weary. In securing our real friends, we shall not regret if we drop some acquaintances by the way. The wise and the worthy we shall more than ever cherish. In your family we have enjoyed those true pleasures which entail no repentance. That cheerfulness which alone is worthy of accountable beings, we shall industriously maintain in our own. I bless G.o.d if we have not so many steps to tread back as some others have who are entering, upon principle, on a new course of life.
"We have always endeavored, though with much imperfection, to fill some duties to each other, to our children, to our friends, and to the poor.
But of the prime duty, the main spring of action, and of all moral goodness, duty to G.o.d, we have not been sufficiently mindful. I hope we have at length learned to consider him as the fountain of all good, and the gospel of his Son, as the fountain of all hope. This new principle, I am persuaded, will never impair our cheerfulness, it will only fix it on a solid ground. By purifying the motive, it will raise the enjoyment.
"But if we have not so many bad habits to correct as poor Carlton had, I question if we have not as many difficulties to meet in another way. His loose course was discreditable. His vices made him stand ill with the world. He would, therefore, acquire nothing but credit in changing his outward practice. Lady Belfield and I, on the contrary, stand rather too well with the world. We had just that external regularity, that cool indifference about our own spiritual improvement, and the wrong courses of our friends, which procure regard, because they do not interfere with others, nor excite jealousy for ourselves. But we have now to encounter that censure, which we have, perhaps, hitherto been too solicitous to avoid. It will still be our trial, but I humbly trust that it will be no longer our snare. Our morality pleased, because it seemed to proceed merely from a sense of propriety; our strictness will offend when it is found to spring from a principle of religion.
"To what tendency in the heart of man, my dear Stanley, is it owing, that religion is commonly seen to excite more suspicion than the want of it? When a man of the world meets with a gay, thoughtless, amusing person, he seldom thinks of inquiring whether such a one be immoral, or an unbeliever, or a profligate, though the bent of his conversation rather leans that way. Satisfied with what he finds him, he feels little solicitude to ascertain what he really is. But no sooner does actual piety show itself in any man, than your friends are putting you on your guard; there is instantly a suggestion, a hint, a suspicion, "Does he not carry things too far?" "Is he not righteous over much?" "Is he not intemperate in his zeal?" "Above all things, is he _sincere_?" and, in short--for that is the centre in which all the lines of suspicion and reprobation meet--"_Is he not a Methodist?_"
"I trust, however, that, through divine grace, our minds will be fortified against all attacks on this our weak side; this pa.s.s through which the sort of a.s.saults most formidable to us will be likely to enter. I was mentioning this danger to Caroline this morning. She opened her Bible, over which she now spends much of her solitary time, and with an emphasis foreign from her usual manner, read,
""Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for wherein is he to be accounted of?""
As Sir John repeated these words, I saw Lucilla, who was sitting next Lady Belfield, s.n.a.t.c.h one of her hands, and kiss it, with a rapture which she had no power to control. It was evident that nothing but our presence restrained her from rising to embrace her friend. Her fine eyes glistened, but seeing that I observed her, she gently let go the hand she held, and tried to look composed. I can not describe the chastised, but not less fervent, joy of Mr. and Mrs. Stanley. Their looks expressed the affectionate interest they took in Sir John"s honest declaration.
Their hearts overflowed with grat.i.tude to him without whom "nothing is strong nothing is holy." For my own part, I felt myself raised
Above this visible diurnal sphere.
Sir John afterward said, "I begin more and more to perceive the scantiness of all morality which has not the love of G.o.d for its motive.
_That_ virtue will not carry us safely, and will not carry us far, which looks to human estimation as its reward. As it was a false and inadequate principle which first set it a going, it will always stop short of the true ends of goodness."
"Sir John," said Lady Belfield, "I have been seriously thinking that I ought not to indulge in the expense of this intended conservatory. We will, if you please, convert the money to the building of a charity school. I can not consent to incur such a superfluous expense for my amus.e.m.e.nt."
"My dear Caroline," replied Sir John, "through the undeserved goodness of G.o.d, my estate is so large, and through your excellent management it is so unimpaired, that we will not give up the conservatory, unless Mr.
Stanley thinks we ought to give it up. But we will adopt Lucilla"s idea of combining a charity with an indulgence--we will a.s.sociate the charity school with the conservatory. This union will be a kind of monument to our friends at the Grove, from whom you have acquired the love of plants, and I of religious charity."
We all looked with anxious expectation at Mr. Stanley. He gave it as his opinion, that as Lady Belfield was now resolved to live the greater part of the year in the country, she ought to have some amus.e.m.e.nts in lieu of those she was going to give up. "Costly decorations and expensive gardens," continued he, "at a place where the proprietors do not so much as _intend_ to reside, have always appeared to me among the infatuations of opulence. To the expenses which they do not _want_, it is adding an expense which they do not _see_. But surely, at a mansion where an affluent family actually _live_, all reasonable indulgences should be allowed. And where a garden and green-house are to supply to the proprietor the place of the abdicated theatre and ball-room; and especially when it is to be a means in her hands of attaching her children to the country, and of teaching them to love home, I declare myself in favor of the conservatory."
Lucilla"s eyes sparkled, but she said nothing.
"It would be unfair," continued Mr. Stanley, "to blame too severely those, who, living constantly in the country, give a little in to its appropriate pleasures. The real objects of censure seem to be those who, grafting bad taste on bad habits, bring into the country the amus.e.m.e.nts of the town, and superadd to such as are local, and natural, and innocent, such as are foreign, artificial, and corrupt."
"My dear Stanley," said Sir John, "we have resolved to indemnify our poor neighbors for two injuries which we have been doing them. The one is, by our having lived so little among them: for I have now learned, that the mere act of residence is a kind of charity even in the uncharitable, as it necessarily causes much money to be spent, even where little is given. The other is, that we will endeavor to make up for our past indifference to their spiritual concerns, by now acting as if we were aware that the poor have souls as well as bodies; and that in the great day of account, the care of both will attach to our responsibility."
Such a sense of sober joy seemed to pervade our little party that we were not aware that the night was far advanced. Our minds were too highly set for much loquacity, when Ph[oe]be suddenly exclaimed. "Papa, why is it that happiness does not make one merry? I never was half so happy in my life, and yet I can hardly forbear crying; and I believe it is catching, sir, for look, Lucilla is not much wiser than myself."
The next day but one after this conversation our valuable friends left us. Our separation was softened by the prospect of a speedy meeting. The day before they set out, Lady Belfield made an earnest request to Mr.
and Mrs. Stanley that they would have the goodness to receive f.a.n.n.y Stokes into their family for a few months previous to her entering theirs as governess. "I can think of no method so likely," continued she, "to raise the tone of education in my own family as the transfusion into it of your spirit, and the adoption of your regulations." Mr. and Mrs. Stanley most cheerfully acceded to the proposal.
Sir John said: "I was meditating the same request, but with an additional clause tacked to it, that of sending our eldest girl with f.a.n.n.y, that the child also may get imbued with something of your family spirit, and be broken into better habits than she has acquired from our hitherto relaxed discipline." This proposal was also cordially approved.
CHAPTER XLV.