University of Virginia Library

17. XVII.

“Carl felt better and happier in the embraces of
his wife when he reached home, than he had felt
for some days before. The principle of love was
reviving within him. The conversation of their
aged guest contributed largely to this improvement.
They could not but acknowledge the influence
which they could not but feel. Yet he
could scarcely be said to converse. His words
seemed so many laws settling doubts and silencing
controversy. He spoke from authority—from
an authority, seemingly, even beyond that of strong
common sense and great experience. Carl was
surprised and pleased to find himself able to listen
to his words; and though the terrible strifes which
he had recently undergone were still busy in his
mind, he yet found pleasure in his new companion.
Much of the old man's conversation seemed,
indeed, to be intended for his particular case. He
spoke of the `various encounters to which mortals
were subject. The necessity of confidence in

heaven's justice—the willingness to wait—the
readiness to endure. He then spoke of the principle
of love as he had spoken to Matilda. He
insisted upon it as sufficiently strong to withstand
the opposite principle of hate, and to trample over
it in the end. The conflict, he said, would be
long and perilous, and it would be continued
through nations and individuals to the end of
time; — patience, he said, and perseverance,
prompted by the spirit of love, which is eternal,
would be certain to achieve the victory. In the
meantime, it would be necessary that the labors of
love should be increased and strengthened. We
should strive to love one another, as the best policy,
and the noblest moral economy. Every falling off
in our affections from each other, was a gain to
the rebelling principle of hate, and kept back humanity
from its hope of heaven. Every increase in
the amount of human love, was a succor to the
sovereign principle; as much so, as, in the warfare
among men, would be the accession of new numbers.
To love one another is to conquer evil, for
as evil toils through the principle of hate, it can
only be successful over us, by engendering in our
bosoms hostility to our fellows, and a general
faithlessness of each other, which must produce
hostility. To confide, should be the first lesson,
as it is always the first and noblest proof of
love!'

“This counsel strengthened Carl Werner and
his wife, and made them both think. Carl felt
calmer as he thought, and retired to his chamber
with new and better resolutions. The old man
prayed with the two before they retired; but though
Carl knelt with the rest, he yet found it impossible
to pray. He could only think, and his
thoughts were confused, apprehensive, and not
given, as he felt himself, to the sovereign principle
of love. When he retired to his chamber, he resolved
to pray alone; but he could not. He
knelt by the bedside in vain. His tongue seemed
to cleave to the roof of his mouth. His brain
seemed to glow like fire, and he longed once more
for the presence and the conversation of the aged
man. He slept but little during the night, and
when Matilda awakened at intervals, she heard
nothing but his groans.

“The next day the old man sought an opportunity
of conversation with Matilda in secret.

“`My daughter,' he said, `your husband
must not go forth to-night. You must exert all
your strength—all the strength of your love;
spare no prayers, no solicitations, but you must
keep him at home. He goes to pay homage to

the principle of hate. He must break his bondage.
He must withhold his homage; and he must prove
that he renounces the hateful worship, ere the principle
of love will come certainly to his aid. He will
not find relief — he cannot be happy — till then;
and he must do this himself. We can do nothing
towards it, save by our prayers, and these will be
of little avail, until, of his own resolve, he breaks
to you the secret of his sorrow. When he freely
and voluntarily declares to you the trouble of his
mind, he will find relief. To confide our wo to a
beloved one, is to find healing. He must acknowledge
this truth, ere he can hope for healing; and
it is a truth that he must teach himself. I warn
you, therefore, unfold nothing that I have said to
you, which shall move him to this determination,
else it will be of no avail. We may tremble, but
we must be silent; and if our fears become
stronger than our hopes, we must then only resort
to our prayers.'

“That day the old man gave Carl himself a
lesson which had its effect in promoting the wishes
of all, though, to the passing thought, it would
seem to have no necessary connexion with the misfortunes
of the latter. He saw him in a condition
of stupor, sitting upon the threshold, and evidently
unconscious of all things around him.

“`My son,' he said, `we do not all our duties
when we have said our prayers. Indeed, we may
be said to do none of them, if we do but this. Our
prayers are offered that we may have strength and
judgment to perform our duties rightly and thoroughly.
The first of these is industry. The decree
of God — one of the first — is one of the elements
of religion. “Thou shalt earn thy bread
in the sweat of thy face.” He who prays merely,
and toils none, is a hypocrite, and though he may
deceive himself and his fellow men, he cannot deceive
God by his professions.'

“`Alas! my father — I would work,' said the
unhappy Carl, `but I cannot — I am sick — I am
sad — too sad — too sick to work.'

“`Hast thou tried, my son.'

“`Of what use to try, my father. I feel that I
should do nothing.'

“`The will is the service, my son. God tasks
not your service, but he receives the free tribute
of your heart, and if the will is free to serve him,
the amount of your body's service is of little regard.
Try — let the will govern the limbs, and
they will do much. Certainly, thy labor will lessen
the troubles of thy mind, which, in most cases,
spring from the tyrannous imbecility of the frame.

Try, my son — thy labors will avail thee much
more in thy sadness than all thy prayers.'

“Carl obeyed, and strove diligently to labor,
and though he did but little, yet he felt better from
what he did. The old man conversed with him
while he toiled, and he gathered goodly counsel,
and pleasant consolation, from his words. But as
the day waned, the agonizing apprehensions of
Carl were renewed. The fascinating spells of the
demon began to work upon his mind, and his increasing
disquiet became visible to his household.
At supper he was unconscious of the meats before
him, until the words of the aged guest aroused his
consideration, while he prayed for a blessing upon
the repast. Carl gradually grew fixed in mute
attention as he listened to the terms of this prayer,
which was, in some respects, peculiar. The old
man prayed that `the fond husband might ever be
heedful of the affections with which he had been
endowed by the confiding wife — that he might
heed the meaning of her pale cheek, her tearful
eye, and laboring bosom — that he might never
estrange himself from one who looked so much, so
entirely to him, for countenance and comfort — and
that the ways of error into which frail mortality
was ever but too prone to fall, might never seduce

the regards of the comforter, from the weak but
confiding heart to which they were entirely due.'

“Much more after this fashion was said by the
old man, but these words had their effect. Carl
looked upon his wife with eyes of closer inquiry
than he had fixed upon her for many days. He
saw, for the first time, that her cheek was pale —
as if death had set his hand upon it — that her eye
was full of tears — and that her bosom heaved
with an anguish which her lips had never spoken.
Her eye caught the glance of his own while he
gazed, and she burst into a flood of tears — rose
from the table — rushed to the spot where her
husband sat, and threw herself at his feet. How
dreadfully was he shocked by this movement!
How bitterly did he reproach himself! He felt
that he had been selfish — that, heedful of his own
sufferings only, he had given neither eye nor
thought to hers. He sank down upon the floor
beside her; and he muttered broken words, imploring
forgiveness. The venerable guest saw that
the moment was come, when love was to obtain
the mastery or forever fail; and without being
seen by the two, he left the apartment. But his
words had been deeply impressed upon the mind
of Matilda, and she needed not his presence to
prompt her in the performance of her task. She

poured out her full heart to her husband, told him
of her fears during his absence, of her sufferings
as she beheld the sapping and overcoming character
of his, and implored him, for the love which he
had once vowed her, as earnestly as if she had
lost it. Long and trying was their conference,
and more than once the wife despaired of her object.
But though she trembled, she yet implored,
and the principle of love prevailed. The heart of
Carl was touched — the seal removed from the
fountain — and he poured forth, in her astounded
but unshrinking senses, the whole strange and
dreadful secret.