The Old Stone House, Constance Fenimore Woolson [e book free reading txt] 📗

them with a smile, and when they were seated, she opened her Bible, and read in her clear voice the seventeenth chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, the beloved disciple of our Lord. Then Sibyl went to the cabinet organ, and all the young voices joined in singing a morning hymn, simple and cheerful like the praise of creation at the dawn of day, when from the forest ascends the song of thousands of God’s creatures, praising their Maker in the only way they know. The hymn ended, Aunt Faith knelt down, and they all joined in the Lord’s prayer. Then came the petition for the day, for a better realization of God’s goodness, and a reverent spirit in the worship of this temple; for forgiveness of sins and aid in forgiving the faults of others; and above all, for a spirit of hearty thankfulness and praise to the Maker of the universe, and loving remembrance of His Son the Saviour of mankind. With a final petition for the aid of the Holy Spirit, Aunt Faith closed her prayer, and the morning worship was concluded by the ancient ascription of praise to Jehovah. The conversation at the breakfast-table was bright and happy; there was no gloomy or sullen look, no fault-finding. When the children were little, their tempers often showed themselves on Sunday as well as on other mornings, but patience overcomes many obstacles, and Aunt Faith’s unvarying effort had been so far crowned with success, that as they grew older, they grew to remember and even love the brightness of the Sunday morning breakfast-table. Habit is a powerful agent, and perhaps also the fact that Aunt Faith did not severely rebuke every manifestation of ill temper on week days, but allowed them to come naturally to the surface, helped to produce the placid atmosphere of Sunday morning. Her children were not afraid of her; they never hurried out of her presence to vent their bad feelings; she saw the worst of it, whatever it was, and at some quiet hour she sought the offender alone, and reasoned or rebuked as the case required. The cousins loved her dearly, and as her rule was easy, it was generally obeyed; love is a great aid to authority where children are concerned.

Aunt Faith, on her part, also, never transgressed her own rules; no matter what her cares, feelings, or bodily ailments might be, she never allowed them to darken the opening of the Lord’s day. They were thrown aside as far as possible, and, in after years when the old stone house was tenantless and its inmates dispersed, their thoughts often turned with affectionate regret towards the bright Sunday morning breakfast table.

An hour later, the faint sound of the church-bells brought the family together again in the front hall, and, as every one was dressed for the day before breakfast, there was no hurry, no confusion. Aunt Faith had in early life seen much of tardiness, haste, and consequent ill temper on Sunday morning; at the last moment somebody would be late, something lost, and everybody cross in consequence; little biting speeches would be spoken, unnecessary comments made, and the result was, that the family almost always arrived at the church-door in anything but a peaceful state. Indeed, “Sunday headaches,” and “Sunday temper,” were by-words in the house, and, as a child once expressed it, “everybody’s cross on Sunday.”

With this example, (and it is a very common one) before her, Aunt Faith had striven to bring about; a different order of things in the old stone house. She had not confined herself to theory, but, for years she had made it a rule to examine personally on Saturday all the clothes to be worn on Sunday, to inspect the strings and buttons which are apt to give way under impatient, childish fingers, and to see that all was in order from the hat to the shoe-strings. She superintended the Saturday-night bath, for she was rigid in her ideas of personal neatness, and the five little children always tumbled into their five little beds on Saturday night, as fresh and clean as it was possible to make them. Not that this was the only cleansing time in the week, for they were taught to jump into their bath-tubs daily, but on Saturday more time was given to the work, and it was made pleasant with nice soaps, soft towels, and all the little luxuries that children love; for children are made as happy by gentle purification as other little animals, and it is a mistake to suppose they dread the water. It is the rough hand they dread; to be caught up roughly, smeared with coarse soap, sent into a shivering fit with cold water, rubbed the wrong way with torturing towels, rasped against the grain with stiff hair-brushes, and left to stand on an icy oil-cloth, naturally excites their terror. I imagine there are few grown persons who could endure it with equanimity. But Aunt Faith had no such method. She made the bathing-hour a happy time, and showed the little children all the luxuries of personal neatness, so that as they grew older, they kept up themselves all the habits she had taught them, as matters of necessity for their own comfort.

Thus, trained in these habits, the children grew into men and women with physical health to help them in their contest with evil. And it, is a great help. Aunt Faith knew that all the cleanliness in the world could not compensate for the lack of godliness, but she reasoned that while first attention should be paid to the inside of the platter, certainly second attention should be given to the outside that both may be clean together. A clean heart in a clean body, she thought, was better than a clean heart in a dirty body; health and steady nerves help a man to be orderly and even-tempered, while nervousness, dyspepsia and weakness are so many additional temptations besetting him on every side.

This July Sunday, the cousins started from the old stone house with time enough for a leisurely walk amid the music of the bells, arriving at the church-door before the service commenced, without hurry, quiet and composed, and ready to join in the worship without distracting thoughts. The church was full, Aunt Faith had two pews, one for herself with Gem and Tom, another immediately behind for Sibyl, Bessie, and Hugh. As the organ was pealing out the opening voluntary, a young girl came up the aisle and entered the first seat; Aunt Faith looked up and recognizing Margaret Brown, she smiled and pressed her hand cordially. When she visited Margaret, she asked her to accept a seat in her pew when ever she desired to come to that church, but the invitation had passed from her mind among the occupations of her busy life, so that she was surprised as well as pleased when the young girl appeared. Aunt Faith had no respect for persons; she thought of them only as so many souls sent into the world, all equally dear to the Creator, and precious to the Saviour of mankind. That there were great differences in their lot on earth, that some were more easily tempted than others, that, some had apparently small chance for improvement and religious privileges while others found all ready to their hand, that some suffered trouble, affliction, sickness and hard labor while others seemed to pass through life without a cloud, she well knew, but she did not attempt to explain it. She left it all in the hands of a Higher Wisdom and addressed herself to the evident duty that lay before her. Some of her friends said that she was narrow minded, that she had no interest in the progress of humanity; it is true that she cared more about having the children of the Irish laborer, down on the flats, washed and comfortably dressed, than about an essay on philanthropy, and took more pleasure in aiding Margaret Brown than in talking about the sufferings of human nature; but perhaps she was none the worse for that. Once when an enthusiastic lady called to ask her aid in establishing an International Society for Reform, Aunt Faith listened quietly, and then said, “I will join you, Mrs. B––, when I have the leisure time at my disposal.” She never found the time, but in her answer, she was not insincere. If she had been left unemployed, she might have joined some organization for religious work, and esteemed it a pleasant privilege, but as it was, her daily home duties stood first, and as long as they surrounded her, she did not lift her eyes beyond.

The minister was an old man, who had officiated in the same church many years of his life, and hoped to die, as he expressed it, “in the harness.” The people loved him, and respected his wishes with more unanimity than they might have given to a younger man; there was no discord, no restless desire for novelty among the congregation, and the various good works connected with the church moved forward at a steady pace, growing with the growth of the town, but not running into any violent extremes to the right hand or the left.

Mr. Hays, the venerable minister, was a gentle, kind-hearted man; the children in the Sunday school listened to him with attention, and their parents loved to hear his sermons. He had the rare faculty of interesting children, and when he addressed them, the teachers had no difficulty in keeping their classes in order, because the children really wished to hear what he said. In church, among older hearers, the effect was the same; his sermons were simple, but all liked to hear them. As he grew older, he seemed to think more and more of the beautiful words, “God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son;” on this text all that he said and did was founded, and he never wearied of telling his hearers about this great love, and urging them to give their reverent affection in return.

“If we were all like Mr. Hays, the world would be a very different place, Aunt Faith,” said Hugh, as they walked home together; “I suppose he has had nothing but love all his life.”

“You are greatly mistaken, Hugh. He has endured severe suffering, and no doubt the want of earthly affection has taught him to appreciate the dearer worth of heavenly love.”

“I thought he had lived here in Westerton for forty years without anything to disturb his quiet,” said Hugh.

“Because his troubles came to him long ago, they were none the less heavy to bear, Hugh. Before he came here, a half-brother to whom he had trusted all his little fortune, disappeared, carrying the whole with him; and not only that, but upon hearing of his loss, the young girl to whom he was engaged, broke her promise and married another. Thus he was left doubly bereft; not only forsaken and injured, but also wounded by the discovery of treachery in those he trusted with all his heart.”

“I could never recover from such a blow,” said impulsive Hugh; “the thought of being deceived and betrayed by those we love and trust is fearful to me.”

“It was fearful to Mr. Hays also, Hugh; after a short time he came to Westerton, and threw his whole strength into his work. It may have been a hard struggle at first, but you can yourself see how he has conquered at last; love is the groundwork of all he says and all he does, and his sufferings instead of turning his heart into bitterness, seem rather to have given it a new sweetness.”

“Yes, that is why I like Mr. Hays. He is not censorious. He does not denounce sin so continually that he