"Mr. Laicus," said he, "I believe you, but I do not comprehend you.

I believe that you have a faith that is worth the having. I would give all I possess or ever possessed to share it with you in this hour. I do not know-I sometimes think it is only a pleasant dream.

Would G.o.d I could sleep and dream such dreams."

"It is no dream, Mr. Gear, but truth and soberness," said I. "A dream does not last through eighteen centuries, and raise half a world from barbarism to civilization. A dream does not carry mothers through such sorrows as this with outlooking antic.i.p.ations so clear as those which give Mrs. Gear her radiant hope. No! Mr. Gear. It is you who have been dreaming, and life's sorrow has awakened you."

"Mr. Laicus," he cried almost pa.s.sionately, "I said I believed in nothing. But it is not true. I have no creed. I do not even believe in G.o.d or immortality any more. I have no G.o.d. I am without hope.

But I believe in my wife. I believe in you. I believe that you and she have something-I know not what-that supports you in temptation and sustains you in sorrow. Tell me what it is. Tell me how I may get it. I will cast my pride away. I would believe. Help my unbelief."

"Mr. Gear," said I, laying my hand upon his arm, "here in the presence of this dear boy, be the solemn witness of your pet.i.tion and your vow, will you kneel with me to ask of G.o.d what you have asked of me, but what He alone can give you, and record before Him the promise you have made to me, but which He alone can receive at your hands?"

He made no answer-hesitated a moment-then knelt, with the dear boy's hand fast clasped in his, while kneeling at his side I echoed the prayer he had already uttered: "I believe; help Thou mine unbelief."

And as we rose I saw the tears streaming down his softened face, the first tears he had shed since I had entered his house. I knew that Willie had taught him more in his death than by his life, and felt that now, to my own heart though not to his, I could answer the question he had asked me, "How can you reconcile this with the love of G.o.d?"

CHAPTER x.x.xII.

G.o.d said, "Let there be Light."

FROM Mr. Gear's Jennie and I drove directly to Maurice Mapleson's.

Fortunately we found him at home. Briefly I told him of my visit.

"What can we do," I said at the close, "to save this man from the despair of utter skepticism?"

"He is in good hands," said Mr. Mapleson, with calm a.s.surance.

"No! Mr. Mapleson," said I, "I can do nothing more with him. So long as I had only the intellect to deal with, I thought I knew what to say and when to keep silence. But I dare neither speak nor keep silence now."

"I did not mean your hands," said Mr. Mapleson.

"What then?" said I.

"He is in G.o.d's hands," replied the pastor. "G.o.d has taken him out of your hands into His own. Leave him there."

"Is there then nothing more to be done?" I said.

"Yes," said he, "but chiefly prayer."

Then after a moment's pause he added: "I believe, Mr. Laicus, in the oft quoted and generally perverted promise: If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven. I believe it was intended for just such exigencies as this. It is not a general charter, but a special promise. Now is the time to plead it. Who beside yourself in our church is Mr. Gear's most intimate acquaintance and warmest friend?"

I thought a moment before I answered. Then I replied, "To be honest, Mr. Mapleson, I do not believe there is one in the church who understands him. But Deacon Goodsole has had more to do with him than any other, and perhaps understands him better."

"Very well," said Mr. Mapleson. "Will you meet Deacon Goodsole at my house to-morrow evening, half an hour before the prayer-meeting, to unite in special prayer for Mr. Gear? I will see the Deacon. I am sure he will come."

"I am sure he will," I added warmly; "as sure as that I will be there myself."

With that I bade Mr. Mapleson good-night and hurried away. For tea had long been waiting, the children's bed hour was near, and Jennie was growing impatient to be at home.

Wednesday evening Mr. Mapleson, the Deacon and I went into our church prayer-meeting from half an hour spent in Mr. Mapleson's study in prayer for Mr. Gear. Mr. Mapleson had seen Mr. Gear that morning. But the stricken father was very silent; he offered no communication; and Mr. Mapleson had pressed for none. I confess I had hoped much from Mr. Mapleson's interview, and I went into the prayer-meeting burdened and sorrowful.

I think I have already remarked that Mr. Mapleson's conduct of a prayer-meeting is exceedingly simple. He seldom says much. He sets us all an example of brevity. A few words of Scripture, a few earnest words of his own or a simple prayer, usually const.i.tute his sole contribution to the meeting, which is more truly a meeting for prayer than any other prayer-meeting I ever attended.

That evening he seemed loath to open the meeting. We were little late in beginning. When we did begin we were late in getting into the heart of it. He called on one after another to lead in prayer. I did not know but that he was going to omit the reading of Scripture and his own remarks altogether. Our prayer-meeting commences at half-past seven. The pastor never allows it to overrun an hour. And it was after eight when he arose to read. He read from the twelth chapter of Acts, the account of Peter's deliverance from prison. He read it from beginning to end without a comment, and then he spoke substantially as follows. His words were very simple. But that meeting has left an impression upon me that time will never obliterate. I believe I could repeat his words to my dying day.

"A great deal is said and written," said he, "about the apostolic faith. But the apostles were men of like pa.s.sions as we ourselves.

They fought the same doubts. They prayed in the same hesitating, uncertain, unbelieving way. Peter was in prison. His friends could do nothing to effect his deliverance-nothing but pray. So they a.s.sembled for that purpose. They had the promise of the Lord, 'If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in Heaven.' But they did not believe it. They took some comfort in praying-as we do.

But they did not expect any answer to their prayers. The thought that G.o.d might really afford deliverance never seems to have occurred to them. And when Peter, delivered by the angel of the Lord, came knocking at the gate of the house, and the startled disciples wondered what this midnight summons might mean, and the servant returned to report that Peter stood without, they laughed at her. You are mad, said they. And when he persisted in his knocking, and she in her a.s.sertion, they added with trembling and under-breath to one another, in mortal fear, "It is his ghost." Anything was more credible to their minds than that G.o.d should have answered their united prayers.

"The promise of G.o.d is to the prayer of faith. But G.o.d is constantly better than his promise. He does not limit Himself by our expectations. He does exceedingly abundantly more than we can ask or even think. We are not therefore to be driven from our knees by our want of faith. I hear men talk as though prayer were of no avail unless we believe beforehand with a.s.surance that we were going to receive all for which we asked. It is not true. We are not heard for our much asking, nor for much our believing, but for G.o.d's great mercy's sake.

"When the mission was first started at the Mill village, if I have understood aright, it was started on the application of the children themselves. They gathered around the school-house when the Bible-cla.s.s a.s.sembled. They had no expectation of instruction. When the first person came to the door to invite them in, probably half of them scampered away in fright. Did they expect all that has come?

Or would any Christian worker have said, 'They shall not have a Sabbath-school till they ask it, and believe that it will be provided for them?' And our Father does not wait for the prayer of faith. Like the father in the parable he comes while we are yet afar off. If we have faith enough to look wistfully and yearningly for a blessing, He has superabundant love to grant it."

And then he read, and we sang that most beautiful hymn:

"Oh! see how Jesus trusts himself Unto our childish love!

As though by His free ways with us Our earnestness to prove.

His sacred name a common word On earth He loves to hear; There is no majesty in Him Which love may not come near.

The light of love is round His feet, His paths are never dim; And He comes nigh to us when we Dare not come nigh to Him.

Let us be simple with Him, then, Not backward, stiff, nor cold, As though our Bethlehem could be What Sinai was of old."

Mr. Mapleson is very fond of music. Singing is a feature of all our prayer-meetings. I have heard him say that he thought more people had been sung into the kingdom of heaven than were ever preached into it. Usually his rich voice carries the ba.s.s almost alone. But during the singing of this hymn he sat silent, leaning his head upon his hand. This silence was so unusual that it almost oppressed the meeting. When the hymn closed there was a solemn hush, a strange expectancy; it seemed as though no one dared to break the sacred silence.

Our lecture-room occupies half the bas.e.m.e.nt of the church. I sat in a front seat, close by the little desk-a low platform furnished only with a light stand on which rests the minister hymn-book and a small Bible. The room was full, but it had filled up after I came in.

The prolonged silence grew painful. Then I heard a rustle as of one rising to his feet. Then a voice; I startled, half turned round, restrained myself, thank G.o.d, and only cast on Jennie, at my side, a look of wonder and of thanksgiving. The voice was that of Mr. Gear.

"Fellow-townsmen," said he,--he spoke hesitatingly at first as one unused to the place and the a.s.semblage,--"I have come here to make a request. You are surprised to see me here. You will be more surprised to hear my request. I want to ask you to pray for me."

He had recovered from his hesitancy now. But he spoke with an unnatural rapidity as though he were afraid of breaking down altogether if he stopped a moment to reflect upon himself and his position.

"You know me only as an infidel. I am an infidel. At least I was.

Yes! I suppose I still am. My mother died when I was but a babe. My father brought me up. He was orthodox of the orthodox. But oh! he was a hard man. And he had a hard creed. I used to think the creed made the man. Lately I have thought perhaps the man made the creed.

At all events both were hard. And I repudiated both. At fourteen I abhorred my father's creed. At eighteen I had left my father's roof.

I have never returned except on occasional visits."

He had gained more self-possession now, and spoke more slowly and distinctly. The room was as still as that room of death in which the evening before I had prayed with him, kneeling by the corpse of his little boy.

"What I have been at Wheathedge you know. I cannot come here to-night on a false pretence. I cannot call myself a desperate sinner. I have wronged no man. I have lived honestly and uprightly before you all. I owe no man anything. I have depended on my daily labor for my daily bread. Out of it I have provided as I had opportunity for the poor around me. No one ever went hungry from my door away. My creed has been a short and simple one, 'Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.' I have tried to live according to my creed.