“Dear friends,” she said at last, “brothers
and sisters, whom I love as those for whom my Lord
has died, believe me, I know what this great blessedness
is; and because I know it, I want you to have it too.
I am poor, like you: I have to get my living
with my hands; but no lord nor lady can be so happy
as me, if they haven’t got the love of God in
their souls. Think what it is—not
to hate anything but sin; to be full of love to every
creature; to be frightened at nothing; to be sure that
all things will turn to good; not to mind pain, because
it is our Father’s will; to know that nothing—no,
not if the earth was to be burnt up, or the waters
come and drown us—nothing could part us
from God who loves us, and who fills our souls with
peace and joy, because we are sure that whatever he
wills is holy, just, and good.
“Dear friends, come and take this blessedness;
it is offered to you; it is the good news that Jesus
came to preach to the poor. It is not like the
riches of this world, so that the more one gets the
less the rest can have. God is without end; his
love is without end—”
Its streams the whole
creation reach,
So plenteous is the
store;
Enough for all, enough
for each,
Enough for evermore.
Dinah had been speaking at least an hour, and the
reddening light of the parting day seemed to give
a solemn emphasis to her closing words. The stranger,
who had been interested in the course of her sermon
as if it had been the development of a drama—for
there is this sort of fascination in all sincere unpremeditated
eloquence, which opens to one the inward drama of
the speaker’s emotions—now turned
his horse aside and pursued his way, while Dinah said,
“Let us sing a little, dear friends”;
and as he was still winding down the slope, the voices
of the Methodists reached him, rising and falling
in that strange blending of exultation and sadness
which belongs to the cadence of a hymn.
Chapter III
After the Preaching
In less than an hour from that time, Seth Bede
was walking by Dinah’s side along the hedgerow-path
that skirted the pastures and green corn-fields which
lay between the village and the Hall Farm. Dinah
had taken off her little Quaker bonnet again, and
was holding it in her hands that she might have a
freer enjoyment of the cool evening twilight, and
Seth could see the expression of her face quite clearly
as he walked by her side, timidly revolving something
he wanted to say to her. It was an expression
of unconscious placid gravity—of absorption
in thoughts that had no connection with the present
moment or with her own personality—an expression
that is most of all discouraging to a lover.
Her very walk was discouraging: it had that quiet
elasticity that asks for no support. Seth felt
this dimly; he said to himself, “She’s
too good and holy for any man, let alone me,”
and the words he had been summoning rushed back again
