ance. THE TERRIBLE WAKING. 87 Geraldine never knew how she got through the night. Sometimes she thought and hoped she was going to die, but alas! death comes not to those who woo it most. At last, quite worn out, she sank into one of those heavy, dreamless sleeps which so often follow upon prolonged and agonizing mental excitement. Then came the terrible waking; the dim sense of pain; the unbelief; the wild hope it may have been all a dream; and the dull, heavy, no longer acute agony which the poor sufferer is often to bear through life— the consciousness of a loss which nothing is ever to fill up on this side the grave. head to wonder why she had married. | sation, and after dinner Colonel TreAt the time circumstances had been so velyan fell asleep. strong that it seemed even to herself as if she was unable to offer any resistNow, as an older woman, she had acquired considerable decision of character, and she wished with all her heart that she had been more valiant in the past. What had tempted her to commit the sin of marrying without love? No wonder blessings had been far from her. She must have appeared to others what she hated most- a woman who had sold herself for money and position and the good things of this world. She began to think of herself as a criminal, who had met the punishment she deserved. She forgot that a girl in her teens is virtually as powerless to resist a marriage her parents have planned for her as if it was compulsory. CHAPTER XIX. Pray only that thine aching heart IT was Sunday, and Geraldine went alone to church as usual. She had intended to stay for the sacrament, but she felt too wicked. She had reached, I think, the crowning acme of misery, for she had begun to doubt every thing It was early morning when she entered the room; darkness had come on, and the fire had long been out, ere she fell on her knees; her lips moved, but no words would come; her brain seemed to be on fire; she repeated psalms and collects to herself in parrot-like fashion, trying to find some comfort, and hoping she was not going mad; but in vain. At last, mechani--to call God cruel, and herself irrecally she rang for her maid, who told her it was already seven o'clock, and feared she had had a bad headache. Geraldine allowed her to think so; and when soon afterward the bell rang, she dressed as usual and went down to dinner. The servants always stayed in the room, even when they were alone; so a few commonplaces served for conver claimable. To a nature originally so good, so sweet, and so sunny, it was positive agony to realize the change in herself, to become conscious that the best of us are liable to reap the whirlwind, if we allow our own passions to obtain the mastery over us. And think, my readers, what this woman had gone through before she came to this. Judge her kindly, and pity her deeply, but condemn her not. "Her sins, which were many, are forgiven; for she loved much," are our Saviour's words. God had saved her from sin and from herself; but at that moment, alas! the poor human nature was asserting itself, and she was not grateful. She craved wildly for happiness-happiness at any price. Who among us can say at once, from the heart, "Thy will be done," when God takes away the desire of our heart, the light of our eyes, and leaves us in darkness and alone? so many cases was disgraced by sin, or unbearable from suffering. What was the use of creating people only to suffer? was not life too hard, and death to be dreaded, even when most you welcomed it? 27th Psalm, 5th verse, Prayer-Book version: "For in time of trouble He shall hide me in His Tabernacle; yea, in the secret place of His dwelling shall He hide me, and set me up upon a rock of stone." This was the text. Geraldine had not yet unlearned the simple habits of Just before the sermon, they sang her girlhood, and she carefully looked that beautiful hymn— "Art thou weary? art thou languid? Art thou sore distrest? Come to Me, saith One; and coming, Geraldine felt turned to stone. It was out the verse in her Church-service, keeping her finger on the words; her heart, I fear, little interested in their sense or meaning. But the preacher, though young, was eloquent; and byand-by, as he began to apply his subject to those who that day were in trouble, and who heard the inspired words of the Psalmist with a fresh meaning attached to them, Geraldine raised her drooping head, and listened as she had not done since Mr. Austen spoke from the pulpit at Oldcourt. The preacher began by what sounded dry at first-the history of the Tabernacle, when Moses received the Divine commands concerning it. Its construction given with marvellous minuteness, the protection it afforded, the extraordinary sanctity with which it was invested, and the strict observances connected with all forms of worship in its hallowed precincts, were probably made so severely outward to suit the semi-barbarous state of the epoch-or not semi, for it was wholly barbarous-and the stubborn and rebel THE SERMON. lious nature of the people to whom God spoke in language so terrible, and visited with punishments so unsparing. 89 some details? Have you made any allowance when you have been most inclined to blame them, and rememThe clergyman spoke of the cloud bered that they had not the advanwhich rested upon the Tabernacle- tages which we enjoy-Christianity; "for the cloud of the Lord was upon that is to say, the Doctrine of the the Tabernacle by day, and fire was Cross-the law of self-sacrifice had not on it by night, in the sight of all the come to them? They had lived little house of Israel throughout all their better than slaves in a heathen country, journeys" (40th chapter of Exodus, where the laws were lax, and the king verse 38); a holy and anointed guide an oppressor. Those who have been to the Israelites in their long wander- tyrannized over are proverbially, when ings-ever present to their sight in their turn comes, tyrants; and liberty their journeys-by night terrible in came to these chosen people too sudfire, by day shadowed in a cloud. denly and too violently for them to And when he had amplified at some make a good use of it; they did not length upon this, he said: "Are there like their bondage to Egypt, but they any here in trouble, unknown to them- had grown to a certain extent used to selves almost, not actually in sorrow? the yoke, and the miracles which freed There may be hearts here, which, like them fell upon hearts incapable of the Israelites, refuse to acknowledge understanding, still less of appreciating and obey a protecting and all-righteous their wondrous deliverance. Dare we God. Then to them the text speaks. hope that under like temptations we You all of you from childhood, on should not have succumbed also? Let reading the history in Exodus, Leviti- us try and put ourselves in their place, cus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, have as far as may be. We can imagine we more or less blamed these children of are travelling through a wildernessIsrael; you have wondered at their this world is that to many, and the ingratitude and unbelief; have sighed Canaan of the Israelite is promised to over their hardness of heart, their want all. We find the way long, the rough of spirituality in clinging so tenacious-places are too rough for us; the danly to the pleasures of life, and to its gers which beset us are many, the pribaser enjoyments; their secret mur- vations great. When we were younger murs, their open rebellion because the it was not so; our responsibilities food was manna instead of flesh, be- were not so many, our duties seemed cause water did not flow to meet them easier, clearer, plainer; we had fewer at every halting-place, because they cares, more enticing pleasures; and found the way long, and the hardships we sigh for the Egypt we have left. of the road great. "Have you thought, at the same time, why this history was given to us in its minute, at times almost weari Brethren, in this world we were never meant to pause, to stagnate, and to enjoy only. There is work for all; no time to regret or to look back. We must press onward as the Israel- for two heavens, one here, another hereafter-exactly as the Jews murmured and rebelled because they did not reach the Canaan of their dreams at once. We are only too like them; for we will not understand or make much of the period of probation which God in His all-wise providence has ordered for us, as He did for the Israelites—a probation prepared for us in love, and the only means by which we can hope to be fitted for the home and the happiness which are to be ours when our travel is ended and our haven reached. On a journey, which most of us have some experience of, are we not willing to put up with some inconveniences, privations, and fatigues? Do we not make up our "He speaks to us, if we would but minds to dispense with some of our listen, in language quite as unmistak- usual comforts and luxuries? Do we able. He loves us, but only when our dwell most upon the pains and penalwills are merged in His divine will. ties of travelling, or upon the new Perhaps that will is exercised differscenes through which we are passing; ently for all, but to the same end, and or if all be familiar, and there is no most often utterly unlike what we novelty to awaken our interest, do we should wish for ourselves. The poor not fix our thoughts on the place or fancy money makes happiness, the rich the country whither we are going, and often sigh for the health no money make many pleasant pictures in our can buy for them; the busy man longs mind's-eye if it be our home, build for leisure, and the idle man for work; castles innumerable if it is a strange the old would be young, and the young land to which we are journeying? pine for the experience of age. We Now we are all travelling, and God condemn the discontent of this half- does not wish it to be to a strange educated people, when, in the nine- land. He has told us a great deal teenth century, we are bartering our about it, that it may be familiar to us. souls for the flesh-pots of Egypt as He sent His Son from heaven to bring madly as they did. We are, if not in us thither. He allowed our Saviour open rebellion, repining against God's to live our life here, to realize all its decrees; praying for sunshine when pains, its disappointments, its privaHe judges it best for us to be in shad- tions-worst of all, its bitter unrest; ow; entreating for plenty when penury for did He not say: 'Foxes have must be our portion; in brief, craving | holes, and birds of the air have nests; "LOVE ONE ANOTHER.” · 91 but the Son of man hath not where to | bear, and terror had subdued their lay His head.' will. Is this the worship you would like to give to Him? Is this cold, calculating fear the best homage our hearts can pay to the God who made us, the Saviour who redeemed us? If you are in trouble, come to Him. Happier for you if you have lived with Him in joy, and feel He is your familiar friend, your daily strength and counsellor; One who 'sticketh closer than a brother;' One whose name is Love, and whose most emphatic command to His followers is, 'Love one another, as I have loved you.' "He realized its burden of sin-He realized it in anguished recoil and giant victory; and that we may be victorious likewise, He enjoins us to carry heaven in our hearts here, to make it our own now, at once, and forever; that in all circumstances, under all climes, in poverty or wealth, when youth and joy are ours, or when old age and sorrow come to try us, it may belong to us. 'Bought with a price,' He gives it to us; a passport to that better land-a full and free forgiveness of our past faults and follies. All He asks is, that we should trust Him, and believe in Him. 'Can you drink of the cup that I drink of, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?' was. His answer to those who asked to sit on His right hand and on His left hand in His kingdom. "Brother man! are you in trouble? Has that time come to you? Then all I can say is, if it is too hard to bear, it is because you are fighting with God. You will not see that hovering cloud which rests upon the tabernacle; you will not hear the gracious invitation to hide yourself therein.' You are trying to bear your sorrow alone, and you wonder that it crushes you; or perhaps you turn to the sympathy of friends, and find it cold, and without understanding. You try them first, and God last. "In this again are we not like the Israelites? They only came to God when every thing else failed; when their punishments were too hard to “Then in sorrow you will not be a stranger begging for admission to that tabernacle; you will have known its secrets long, and trusted to its help. Your 'lamp trimmed and burning,' you will enter with joy into the presence of your Lord.' "And what is this added to the promise? 'In the secret place of His dwelling shall He hide me.' What do you understand by this? Does it convey any special meaning to your souls? It has one; and to God's tried servants that meaning becomes most clear when they are most afflicted. Whether the anguish be of body or of soul, or of both, it can be lightened, if not healed, when we become acquainted with the mysterious blessedness of that secret place, especially when we are hidden in it-hidden by God from the strife of tongues, from the war of this world, from the jars of earth; uplifted even in our suffering to get a glimpse of heaven. "Who among you has been afflicted, and at some portion of his life has |