‘That were impossible,’ said the Presence, ’you know not peace.  You pride yourself on your possessions; but how can you have life or possessions, if they are not recorded in my book?  The earth, that you love so well, has faded away.  It will return to you for a brief moment, and then it will fade forever.  What you now possess is but a shadow, like a sun-gilt cloud in a summer sky—­changing and changing, and fading and fading, till at last it disappears.  You have, if God wills, a few more years of mortal existence, and then, oh! then, you must exchange shadows for realities.’

‘Leave me, oh! leave me!’ cried Moses.

’Not yet; my mission is not fulfilled.  Here in this book your name was written sixty years age, as one to be born.  Here your ledger has been kept, though you knew it not.  Read the pages with your soul, and see how your account stands.’

Oh! how dark the page.  A line was drawn through the middle, from top to bottom, and the good deeds were recorded on one side, in letters of gold, and the bad deeds on the other side in letters of ink.  As the pages were turned, Moses looked eagerly for the bright letters, but they were few—­too few; while every page was almost filled with the black records of selfish and sinful deeds.  Every page made Moses Grant sicker at heart, and he would gladly have withdrawn his eyes from the book, but they were riveted, and he could not.

‘O poor man!’ exclaimed the Presence, in pity; ’how poor do you find yourself, you who were a little while ago so rich!  But you must read no more, lest you sink in despair.’

And the book was closed.  Moses Grant said not a word; his heart was too full to speak—­too full of grief—­too empty of hope.

‘Despair not,’ continued the strange Presence.  ’Your record is not yet completed.  You may yet cancel all those black letters by writing golden ones over them—­which is to pray with your remaining strength and days for forgiveness.  You have been a hard, selfish man, for sixty years.  Men, for their own interests, have called you respectable; but before God you have merited displeasure and disapprobation.  In the little time you have left, perhaps you may not be able to leave the world as pure as you began it; but you may hope for wonderful mercy and forbearance from God our Father.  Have courage, and faith, and hope, and you will yet be rich indeed—­rich in love and joy and peace undefiled, that fadeth not away.’

Then the Presence vanished.  Still Moses sat in his chair.  But a hand was laid on his forehead, and he awoke as he heard Mary say:  ’Father, supper is ready.’  He drew his hand across his eyes, and arose from his chair.  He looked from his arbor-door.  The world was all bathed in the light of the declining sun.  As he came out and looked on the landscape, he thought that never before had he seen it so dreamy—­never before had he seen it so beautiful and so glorious, for never before had he so felt the use of this world as a place in which to attain to the good and to shun the evil, to overcome temptation and to aspire to life.