FullReads

To such declarations, in answer to arguments, and sometimes earnest entreaties made by his friends to induce him to renew his pledge, Mrs. Marshall would listen in silence, but with a sinking, sickening sensation of mind and body. All and more than she could say, was said to him, but he resisted every appeal–and what good could her weak persuasions and feeble admonitions do?

Day after day passed on, and Marshall gradually gained more use of his limbs. In six weeks, he could walk without the aid of his crutches.

“I think I must try and get down to the store to-morrow,” he said, to his wife, about this time. “This is a busy season, and I can be of some use there for two or three hours, every day.”

“I don’t think I would venture out yet,” Mrs. Marshall said, looking at him, with an anxious, troubled expression of countenance, that she tried in vain to conceal.

“Why not, Jane?”

“I don’t think you are strong enough, dear.”

“O, yes, I am. And, besides, it will do me good to go out and take the fresh air. You know that it is now six weeks since I have been outside of the front door.”

“I know it has. But–“

“But what, Jane?”

“You know what I would say, Jonas. You know the terrible fear that rests upon my heart like a night-mare.”

And Mrs. Marshall covered her face with her hands, and gave way to tears.

A long silence followed this. At length Marshall said,

“I hope, Jane, that I shall be able to restrain myself. I am, at least, resolved to try.”

“O, husband, if you will only try!” Mrs. Marshall ejaculated eagerly, lifting her tearful eyes, and looking him with an appealing expression in the face–“If you will only try!”

“I will try, Jane. But do not feel too much confidence in my effort. I am weak–so weak that I tremble when I think of it–and remember what an almost irresistible influence I have to contend with.”

“Why not take the pledge, again, Jonas?” said his wife, for the first time she had urged that recourse upon him.

“You have heard my reasons given for that, over and over again.”

“I know I have. But they never satisfied me.”

“You would not have me add the sin of a double violation of a solemn pledge to my already overburdened conscience?”

“No, Jonas. Heaven forbid!”

“The fear of that restrains me. I dare not again take it.”

“Do you not deeply repent of your first violation?” the wife asked, after a few moments of earnest thought. “Heaven knows how deeply.”

“And Heaven, that perceives and knows the depth and sincerity of that repentance, accepts it according to its quality. And just so far as Heaven accepts the sincere offering of a repentant heart, conscious of its own weakness, and mourning over its derelictions, is strength given for combat in future temptations. The bruised reed he will not break, nor quench the smoking flax. Hope, then, dear husband! you are not cast off–you are not rejected by Heaven.”

“O, Jane, if I could feel the truth of what you. say, how happy I should be!–For the idea of sinking again into that hopeless, abandoned, wretched condition, out of which this severe affliction has lifted me, as by the hair of the head, is appalling!” was the reply, to his wife’s earnest appeal.

“Trust me, dear husband,–there is truth in what I say. He who came down to man’s lowest, and almost lost condition, that he might raise him up, and sustain him against the assaults of his worst enemies, has felt in his own body all the temptations that ever can assail his children, and not only felt them, but successfully resisted and conquered them; so that, there is no state, however low, in which there is an earnest desire to rise out of evil, to which he does not again come down, and in which he does not again successfully contend with the powers of darkness. Look to Him, then, again, in a fixed resolution to put away the evils into which you have fallen, and you must, you will be sustained!”