as a Pharisee; yet she is one of the souls I watch for. "Tis true that even Sarah, the chosen mother of God's people, showed a spirit of unbelief, and perhaps of selfish anger; and it is a passage that bears the unmistakable signet, 'doing honor to the wife or woman, as unto the weaker vessel.' For therein is the greatest check put on the ready scorn of the natural man." CHAPTER V. 1ST CITIZEN. Sir, there's a hurry in the veins of youth 2D CITIZEN. What if the coolness of our tardier veins 1ST CITIZEN. All things cool with time-- A general level, nowhere in excess. 2D CITIZEN. 'Tis a poor climax, to my weaker thought, That future middlingness. In the evening, when Mr. Lyon was expecting the knock at the door that would announce Felix Holt, he occupied his cushionless arm-chair in his sitting-room, and was skimming rapidly, in his short-sighted way, by the light of one candle, the pages of a missionary report, emitting occasionally a slight "Hm-m" that appeared to be expressive of criticism rather than of approbation. The room was dismally furnished, the only objects indicating an intention of ornament being a book-case, a map of the Holy Land, an engraved portrait of Dr. Doddridge, and a black bust with a colored face, which for some reason or other was covered with green gauze. Yet any one whose attention was quite awake must have been aware, even on entering, of certain things that were incongruous with the general air of sombreness and privation. There was a delicate scent of dried rose-leaves; the light by which the minister was reading was a wax-candle in a white earthen-ware candlestick, and the table on the opposite side of the fireplace held a dainty work-basket frilled with blue satin. Felix Holt, when he entered, was not in an observant mood; and when, after seating himself, at the minister's invitation, near the little table which held the work-basket, he stared at the wax-candle opposite to him, he did so without any wonder or consciousness that the candle was not of tallow. But the minister's sensitiveness gave another interpretation to the gaze which he divined rather than saw; and in alarm lest this inconsistent extravagance should obstruct his usefulness, he hastened to say, "You are doubtless amazed to see me with a wax-light, my young friend; but this undue luxury is paid for with the earnings of my daughter, who is so delicately framed that the smell of tallow is loathsome to her." 66 'I heeded not the candle, sir. I thank Heaven I am not a mouse to have a nose that takes note of wax or tallow." The loud abrupt tones made the old man vibrate a little. He had been stroking his chin gently before, with a sense that he must be very quiet and deliberate in his treatment of the eccentric young man ; but now, quite unreflectingly, he drew forth a pair of spectacles, which he was in the habit of using when he wanted to observe his interlocutor more closely than usual. "And I myself, in fact, am equally indifferent," he said, as he opened and adjusted his glasses, "so that I have a sufficient light on my book." Here his large eyes looked discerningly through the spectacles. ""Tis the quality of the page you care about, not of the candle," said Felix, smiling pleasantly enough at his inspector. "You're thinking that you have a roughly-written page before you now." That was true. The minister, accustomed to the respectable air of provincial townsmen, and especially to the sleek, well-clipped gravity of his own male congregation, felt a slight shock as his glasses made perfectly clear to him the shaggy-headed, large-eyed, strong-limbed person of this questionable young man, without waistcoat or cravat. But the possibility, supported by some of Mrs. Holt's words, that a disguised work of grace might be going forward in the son of whom she complained so bitterly, checked any hasty interpretations. "I abstain from judging by the outward appearance only," he answered, with his usual simplicity. "I myself have experienced that when the spirit is much exercised it is difficult to remember neckbands and strings and such small accidents of our vesture, which are nevertheless decent and needful so long as we sojourn in the flesh. And you too, my young friend, as I gather from your mother's troubled and confused report, are undergoing some travail of mind. You will not, I trust, object to open yourself fully to me, as to an aged pastor who has himself had much inward wrestling, and has especially known much temptation from doubt." "As to doubt," said Felix, loudly and brusquely as before, "if it is those absurd medicines and gulling advertisements that my mother has been talking of to you—and I suppose it is-I've no more doubt about them than I have about pocket-picking. I know there's a stage of speculation in which a man may doubt whether a pickpocket is blameworthy-but I'm not one of your subtle fellows who keep looking at the world through their own legs. If I allowed the sale of those medicines to go on, and my mother to live out of the proceeds, when I can keep her by the honest labor of my hands, I've not the least doubt that I should be a rascal." "I would fain inquire more particularly into your objection to these medicines," said Mr. Lyon, gravely. Notwithstanding his conscientiousness and a certain originality in his own mental disposition, he was too little used to high principle quite dissociated from sectarian phraseology to be as immediately in sympathy with it as he would otherwise have been. "I know they have been well re hinder you from seeking whatsoever things are honest and honorable. But your mother is advanced in years; she needs comfortable sustenance; you have doubtless considered how you may make her amends? 'He that provideth not for his own—-' I trust you respect the authority that so speaks. And I will not suppose that, after being tender of conscience toward strangers, you will be careless toward your mother. There be indeed some who, taking a mighty charge on their shoulders, must perforce leave their households to Providence and to the care of humbler brethren; but in such a case the call must be clear." "I shall keep my mother as well-nay, better-than she has kept herself. She has always been frugal. With my watch and clock cleaning, and teaching one or two little chaps that I've got to come to me, I can earn enough. As for me, I can live on bran porridge. I have the stomach of a rhinoceros." "But for a young man so well furnished as you, who can questionless write a good hand and keep books, were it not well to seek some higher situation as clerk or assistant? I could speak to Brother Muscat, who is well acquainted with all such openings. Any place in Pendrell's Bank, I fear, is now closed against such as are not Churchmen. It used not to be so, but a year ago he discharged Brother Bodkin, although he was a valuable servant. Still, something might be found. There are ranks and degrees -and those who can serve in the higher must not unadvisedly change what seems to be a providential appointment. Your poor mother is not altogether-" "Excuse me, Mr. Lyon; I've had all that out with my mother, and I may as well save you any trouble by telling you that my mind has been made up about that a long while ago. I'll take no employment that obliges me to prop up my chin with a high cravat, and wear straps, and pass the livelong day with a set of fellows who spend their spare money on shirt-pins. That sort of work is rea" lower than many handicrafts; it only happens to be 1 out of proportion. That's why I set myself to learn the watch-making trade. My father was a weaver first of all. It would have been better for him if he had remained a weaver. I came home through Lancashire and saw an uncle of mine who is a weaver still. I mean to stick to the class I belong to-people who don't follow the fashions." Mr. Lyon was silent a few moments. This dialogue was far from plain sailing; he was not certain of his latitude and longitude. If the despiser of Glasgow preachers had been arguing in favor of gin and Sabbath-breaking, Mr. Lyon's course would have been clearer. "Well, well,” he said, deliberately, "it is true that St. Paul exercised the trade of tent-making, though he was learned in all the wisdom of the Rabbis." "St. Paul was a wise man," said Felix. "Why should I want to get into the middle-class because I have some learning? The most of the middle-class are as ignorant as the working-people about every thing that doesn't belong to their own Brummagem life. That's how the workingmen are left to foolish devices and keep worsening themselves; the best heads among them forsake their born comrades, and go in for a house with a high door-step and a brass knocker." Mr. Lyon stroked his mouth and chin, perhaps because he felt some disposition to smile; and it would not be well to smile too readily at what seemed but a weedy resemblance of Christian unworldliness. On the contrary, there might be a dangerous snare in an unsanctified outstepping of average Christian practice. Nevertheless," he observed, gravely, "it is by such self-advancement that many have been enabled to do good service to the cause of liberty and to the public well-being. The ring and the robe of Joseph were no objects for a good man's ambition, but they were the signs of that credit which he won by his divinely-inspired skill, and which enabled him to act as a savior to his brethren." |