I.—THE MOTHER AND HER BABE.
The angels of God look down from the sky to witness the deep tenderness
of a mother's love. The angels of God look down to witness that
sight which angels love to see—a mother watching over her sleeping babe.
Yes, if even these awful intelligences, which are but little above man, and
yet next to God, circling there, deep after deep, far through the homes of
eternity, bend from the sky to witness a scene of human bliss and woe, that
sight is the deep agony of a mother's love as she watches o'er her sleeping
child!
The deep agony of a mother's love? Yes! For in that moment, when
gazing upon the child—smiling upon it as it sleeps—does not a deep agony
seize the mother's soul, as she tries to picture the future life of her babe?—
whether that child will rise in honor and go down to death in glory, or
whether the dishonored life and unwept death will be its heritage?
Ah, the sublimity of the heart is there, in that mother's love, which even
angels bend down to look upon.
One hundred years ago, in a far New England town, a mother, with her
babe in her arms, stole softly through the opened doors of a quaint old village
church, and knelt beside the altar.
Yes, while the stillness of the Sabbath evening gathered like a calm from
heaven around her,—while a glimpse of the green graveyard came through
the unclosed windows, and the last beam of the setting sun played over the
rustic steeple, that mother knelt alone, and placed her sleeping boy upon
the sacramental altar.
That mother's face was not beautiful—care had been too busy there—
yet there was a beauty in that uplifted countenance, in those upraised eyes
of dark deep blue, in that kneeling form, with the clasped hands pressed
against the agitated bosom,—a beauty holier than earth, like that of Mary,
the Virgin Mother.
And why comes this Mother here to this lonely church, in this twilight
hour, to lay her babe upon the altar, and kneel in silence there?
Listen to her prayer.
She prays the Father, yonder, to guide the boy through life, to make him
a man of honor, a disciple of the Lord.
While these faltering accents fall from her tongue, behold! There, on
the vacancy of the twilight air, she beholds a vision of that boy's life, act
crowding on act, scene on scene, until her eyes burn in their sockets, and
the thick sweat stands in beads upon her brow.
First, her pale face is stamped with fear. She beholds her boy, now
grown to young manhood, standing upon a vessel's deck, far out upon the
deep waters. The waves heave around him, and meet above the mast, and
yet that boy is firm. The red lightning from you dark cloud, comes quivering
down the mainmast, and yet his cheek does not pale, his breast does
not shrink. Yes, while the stout sailors fall cowering upon the deck, that
boy stands firm, and laughs at the storm—as though his spirit rose to meet
the lightning in its coming, and grapple with the thunderbolt in its way.
This vision passes.
The mother, kneeling there, beside the sacramental altar, beholds another
scene of her boy's life—another and another. At last, with eyes swimming
in tears of joy, she beholds a scene, so glorious drawn there upon the twilight
air—her boy grown to hardy manhood, riding amid embattled legions,
with the victor's laurel upon his brow—the praises of a nation ringing in his
ears—a scene so glorious, that her heart is filled to bursting, and that deep
“I thank thee, oh my God!” falls tremulously from her lips.
The next scene, right after the scene of glory—it is dark, crushing, horrible!
The mother starts appalled to her feet—her shriek quivers through
the lonely church—she spreads forth her hands over the sleeping babe—
she calls to God!
“Father in Heaven! take, O take this child while he is yet innocent!
Let him not live to be a man—a demon in human shape—a curse to his race!”
And as she stands there, quivering and pale, and cold with horror—look!
That child, laid there on the sacramental altar, opens its clear dark eyes,
and claps its tiny hands, and smiles!
That child was Benedict Arnold.
Near half a century had passed away. It was night in that New England
town, where, forty-five years before, that mother, in the calmness of
the Sabbath evening, brought her babe and laid it on the altar.
It was midnight. The village girl had bidden her lover a last good-night,
that good old father had lifted up his voice in prayer, with his children all
around him—it was midnight, and the village people slept soundly in
their beds.
All at once, rising from the deep silence, a horrid yell went up to the
midnight sky. All at once a blaze of fire burst over the roof. Look yonder!—That
father murdered on his own threshold—that mother stabbed
in the midst of her children—that maiden kneeling there, pleading for life,
as the sharp steel crashes into her brain!
Then the blood flows in the startled streets—then British troopers flit to
and fro in the red light—then, rising in the centre of the town, that quiet
village church, with its rustic steeple, towers into the blaze.
And there—oh, Father of Mercy!—there, in that steeple, stands a soldier,
with a dark cloak half-wrapped around his red uniform—yes, there he stands,
with folded arms, and from that height surveys with a calm joy, the horrid
scene of massacre below.
Now, mother of Arnold, look from Heaven and weep! Forty-five years
ago, you laid your child upon the sacramental altar of this church, and now
he stands in yonder steeple, drinking in with a calm joy, the terrible cries
of old men, and trembling women, and little children, hewn down in hideous
murder, before his very eyes.
Look there, and learn what a devil Remorse can make of such a man!
Here are the faces he has known in Childhood—the friends of his manhood—the
matrons, who were little girls when he was a boy—here they
are, hacked by British swords, and he looks on and smiles!
At last, the cries are stilled in death; the last flash of the burning town
glares over the steeple, and there, attired in that scarlet uniform, his bronzed
face stamped with the conflict of hideous passions—there, smiling still amid
the scenes of ruin and blood, stands Benedict Arnold.
That was the last act of the Traitor on our soil. In a few days he sailed
from our shores, and came back no more.
And now, as he goes yonder, on his awful way, while millions curse the
echo of his name, in yonder lonely room two orphans bless that name.
What is this you say? Orphans bless the name of Arnold? Yes, my
friends—for there was a night when those orphans were without a crust of
bread, while their father lay mouldering on the sod of Bunker Hill. Yes,
the Legislature of Massachusetts had left these children to the cold mercy of
the world, and that when they bore his name who fell on Bunker Hill—
the immortal Warren.
While they sate there, hungry and cold, no fire on the hearth, not a crust
of bread upon the table, their eyes fixed upon the tearful face of the good
woman who gave them the shelter of a roof, a letter came, and in its folds
five hundred dollars from Benedict Arnold.
This at the very moment when he was steeling his soul to the guilt of
Treason. This at the moment when his fortune had been scattered in banquets
and pageants—when assailed by clamorous creditors, he was ready to
sell his soul for gold.
From the last wreck of his fortune, all that had been left from the parasites
who fed upon him, while they could, and then stung the hand that fed
them, he took five hundred dollars and sent them to the children of his
comrade, the patriot Warren.
Is it true, that when the curse of all wronged orphans quivers up yonder,
the Angels of God shed tears at that sound of woe? Then, at the awful
hour when Arnold's soul went up to judgment, did the prayer's of Warren's
orphan children go up there, and like Angels, plead for him with God.
