Читать книгу Katherine's Sheaves - Georgie Mrs. Sheldon - Страница 8

The midwinter term at Hilton Seminary had opened on Wednesday, and the remainder of the week passed quickly and uneventfully as Katherine fell easily into the ways of the institution and found herself getting well started in her various studies.

Her relations with her roommate were most harmonious, but the majority of the students either ignored her altogether or treated her with a coldness that, had she not had her "Science" to sustain and comfort her, would have made her lot hard indeed to bear.

She had not met the professor again, except in the class room, where he had seemed to be wholly absorbed in his duties as instructor and oblivious of the personality of the students.

On Saturday afternoon she was introduced to Mrs. Seabrook while strolling in the grounds with Miss Reynolds, between whom and herself a growing friendliness was asserting itself. The professor's wife was walking beside a wheel-chair, which was being propelled by a nurse in cap and apron, and in which was seated— propped up by pillows—a young girl who appeared to be about seven or eight years of age, although her serious, pain-lined face and thoughtful eyes seemed, by right, to belong to an older person.

Miss Reynolds paused on meeting this trio and introduced Katherine to Mrs. Seabrook, who greeted her with a sweet cordiality that at once won the girl's heart.

"I heard that we had a new student among us," she said, as she warmly clasped Katherine's hand, "and I hope you are going to be very happy with us, Miss Minturn."

"Thank you; not 'going to be'—I already am happy here," she cheerily and truthfully replied, for she had become deeply interested in her work, and, as she dearly loved to study, she was content to leave her social relations to be governed by the love she was "trying to live."

"This is my daughter," Mrs. Seabrook continued, as she turned a fond look upon the pale, pinched face among the pillows. "Dorothy, this is the young lady whom you have been wishing to see."

Katherine bent down, took the small mittened hand that was extended to her and smiled into the grave, searching eyes that were earnestly studying her face.

"And I also have been wishing to see Dorothy," she said, with a note of tenderness in her tone that caused the slender fingers inside the mitten to close more firmly over her own. "I am very fond of little people."

"I should not be so 'little' if I were well," Dorothy returned, with a faint sigh. Then, glancing up at her attendant, she added: "This is my nurse, Alice, and she has to wheel me about because I cannot walk."

Katherine bestowed a friendly look and nod upon Alice; then a great wave of compassion for the little cripple swept over her heart and softened her earnest brown eyes as she turned back to her and remarked, in a cheery tone:

"You have a lovely chair. These rubber tires must cause it to roll very smoothly and make it easy for Alice to wheel you about."

"Yes, I like my chair very much—my Uncle Phillip brought it to me from Germany—and Alice is very nice about taking me everywhere I want to go; but it would be so much nicer if I could walk and run about like other girls," and Dorothy's yearning tone smote painfully upon every listening ear.

"It certainly would, dear," Katherine returned, giving the small hand that still clung to hers a loving pressure, adding, softly: "And sometime you will, I hope."

The child's face glowed at the term of endearment; but her pale lips quivered slightly at the hopeful assurance.

"Oh! no," she said, shaking her head slowly; "I have a double curvature of the spine, and all the doctors say I never can. I—I- -think I could bear that—not being able to walk—but the dreadful pain sometimes makes me wish I wasn't here at all."

Katherine did not make any reply to this pathetic information. For a moment or two she seemed to be oblivious to everything, even to the presence of her companions, and stood looking off towards the western sky, as if communing with some unseen presence there.

Then, suddenly arousing herself, she detached a beautiful pink rosebud from the lapel of her jacket, saying, brightly: "Do you love flowers, Dorothy? will you let me fasten this on your coat? It is fresh from the greenhouse and will last some time yet. There—see!" as she deftly pinned it in place. "What a pretty contrast it makes against the dark-blue cloth."

"It is lovely," said the girl, bending forward to inhale its perfume. "How perfect it is! Do you ever wonder, Miss Minturn, why God makes the flowers and things that grow so perfect and beautiful, and people—so many of them—imperfect and ugly?"

"My dear," Mrs. Seabrook here smilingly interposed, though a quickly repressed sigh arose to her lips, "I hope you are not going to involve Miss Minturn in a metaphysical discussion during this first meeting! Dorothy has acquired a habit of philosophizing and asking profound questions that are not always easily answered," she explained to Katherine.

"Surely, dear, you do not think that God ever made anyone, or anything, imperfect or ugly?" Katherine gently inquired.

The child hesitated a moment, as if pondering the question.

"Well," she presently asserted, with a positive intonation and nod of her head, "there are a lot of deformed, sick and ugly people in the world, and the Bible tells us that He made everything."

"The Bible tells us, in Genesis, that 'everything that God made was good'; and, in Psalms, that 'all His ways are perfect,'" quoted Katherine.

"Yes, I know it; that was in the beginning, though," said Dorothy; "but if He could make things perfect in the first place I don't see why He didn't keep them so if He is God."

"Come, come, dearie; I think we must go on now—we are keeping Miss Reynolds and Miss Minturn from their walk," Mrs. Seabrook again interposed, with a note of gentle reproof in her tone, as she stooped to tuck the robe more closely around the girl.

A sunny smile, like a burst of sunshine from under a cloud, suddenly broke over Dorothy's face, at once dispelling its unnatural gravity and perplexity.

"I didn't think how naughty that was going to sound, mamma dear," she said, as, with a deprecating air, she softly patted her mother's hand. "I'm afraid Miss Minturn will think I am not very good; but, truly, things do seem awfully mixed up sometimes when I get to thinking this way. I like you very, very much, though," she added, nodding brightly at her new acquaintance. "I wish you would come to see me in mamma's apartments when you are not too busy."

"I shall be very glad to—if I may," Katherine replied, with an inquiring glance at Mrs. Seabrook.

"Yes, do come, Miss Minturn, whenever you can find time; we are very glad to have the young ladies visit Dorothy, who has many lonely hours. Now come, Alice," and, with a parting smile and bow, she signaled the nurse to move on.

"Good-by, Miss Minturn, and thank you for my lovely rose," cried the child, looking back over her shoulder and waving her small hand in farewell.

"Poor child," sighed Miss Reynolds, as she and Katherine passed out of the grounds to the highway, "she has a continual struggle to live, yet she is a remarkable girl, in spite of her many infirmities, with a mind bright and keen far beyond her years."

"How old is she?"

"Thirteen, a month or two ago."

"Is it possible? She does not look to be over seven or eight, although, mentally, she seems more mature."

"That is true. She had a bad fall when she was six years old, and her body has never grown any since the accident," Miss Reynolds explained. "She suffers a great deal—sometimes the pain is almost unbearable; but, as a rule, she is very lovable and patient, though, now and then, a remark like what she made to you just now, shows that she thinks deeply and is perplexed—like some children of larger growth—over the knotty problems of life," she concluded, with a sigh.

"How is it, Miss Minturn," she went on, after a moment of silence, "how do you Scientists account for the fact that a perfect and all-merciful God—'the Father of mercies, the God of all comfort,' as Paul puts it—has created a world of such confusion, wherein evil and suffering, instead of peace and harmony, are the predominant elements?—where, for ages, sickness and death have relentlessly mown down generation after generation, until one becomes heart-sick and weary, and even filled with despair, at times, in view of their probable continuance for ages to come?"

The woman's face was flushed, her eyes somber, and there was a note of passionate protest in her voice which moved Katherine deeply; while what she had said proved to her that these problems had been pondered o'er and o'er until her mind was almost in a state of chaos regarding them.

While she was debating with herself what reply she could make that would best meet her thought, her companion resumed:

"I am a dear lover of children, but when I see anyone like Dorothy; when I see mothers grieving for their darlings, whom God gave them for a little while, then ruthlessly snatched from their embrace for no apparent reason, I feel sure that something is very wrong; and, of late years, my heart is filled with indignant protest whenever I hear of the birth of a dear little innocent. 'Oh!' I cry within myself, 'it is born only to repeat the struggle with sin, suffering and death.' Of what use is its life? of what use the advent of future generations if there is no way to rise above, or conquer, such adverse conditions? Is God good—if there is a God—to create only to destroy? to arbitrarily force these little innocents into the world to fight the unequal battle with evil? Millions have faced it bravely—nobly, trusting God's promises, but they have never succeeded in removing one iota of the curse, 'Thou shalt surely die.' The whole problem of life is a mystery which I am tired of trying to solve," and Katherine was sure the woman stifled a sob as she concluded.

"Surely, dear Miss Reynolds, you do not doubt the existence of

God?" she gently inquired.

"No, child; don't think me quite an atheist," said her teacher, with a deprecatory smile and gesture. "Life, nature, the universe, with their teeming and ever-unfolding wonders tell me that there is a Force—a controlling power and intelligence behind them. We call that force 'God.' We say that God is omnipotent, all wise and good; and certainly, in the government of the universe, everything points that way, everything is exact and perfect. But how to reconcile God as good, merciful, loving, with the creation and manifestation of evil as we find it on this planet? Ah! that is beyond me."

"Can evil come out of good?" briefly queried Katherine.

Miss Reynolds started slightly.

"No," she returned, positively; "no more than a lie can spring out of truth; those are self-evident facts."

"Then dare we say that God—which is but another term for good,

Supreme Good—created evil?"

"Oh, do you believe in the serpent or devil? I know he comes forward from some mysterious source in the narrative and is held responsible. Then naturally follows the question, 'Who created his satanic majesty?' Well, who did? If God created everything, and evil cannot come out of good, where did evil come from? What a paradox it seems!" she went on, without waiting for a reply. "Yet evil does exist in the world—look at Dorothy! Think of the sin, misery and crime all about us! Where did they come from? There are some who contend that God did not create evil, but permits it for some wise purpose; but that, to me, seems like a weak attempt to clear the Almighty from the terrible responsibility of having made sin and its deadly results without detracting from His omnipotence."

"If a person tells you a lie, where does it come from?" Katherine quietly inquired.

"From his own evil desire to deceive, of course."

"Exactly; it was an invention of his own evil thought, prompted by some selfish motive. You can say the same of theft, murder—in fact of all crime. But God—Good—is not the author of the lie, or crime, neither does He 'permit them for some wise purpose,' as you have quoted, any more than a just and loving human father would teach, or permit, his son to become a criminal, claiming that he needed such discipline to fit him for future happiness; or, any more than you, a teacher, would put demoralizing literature into the hands of a student as a method of discipline for higher education."

"How perfectly absurd that sounds! And yet it is parallel to the doctrine that has been taught for ages," said Miss Reynolds, thoughtfully. "But I do not see how you can apply the same logic to disease and suffering."

"The Scriptures tell us that sin brought death.' Sickness and disease are the seeds of death; then they are the results of sin- evil. God not being the author of sin and disease, they, like the lie, can only originate in the evil thought or mind of the sinner," Katherine explained.

"Then you believe that we mortals are alone responsible for all the suffering and evil there is in the world?"

"Yes; evil is a mortal concept."

"Then how does God—-What is God, from your standpoint, Kath—may I call you Katherine?" and Miss Reynolds laid a caressing hand upon the girl's arm as she made this request.

"Do—I should so like to have you," she replied, turning to her with a luminous smile. "Now for your question. God is Spirit, and 'What the Scriptures declare Him to be—Life, Truth and Love,'" [Footnote: "'Science and Health," page 330.] she added, quoting from her text-book.

"You say Spirit, instead of 'a spirit.' Now what is this Spirit?"

"Infinite Mind, Intelligence, Omnipotent Good."

"Ah!" Miss Reynolds began, then paused abruptly. "But intelligence, life, truth, love are characteristics, attributes which anyone may possess and cultivate."

"Yes, considered in that sense they are attributes. But whence came they?" Katherine demanded, with glowing eyes. "The source of life must be Life itself, must it not? The same must also be true of truth and love. So Life, Truth, Love, Mind, Intelligence constitute, in Science, the Divine Principle, or God, the controlling and governing power of the universe and man."

"Divine Principle! Mind! Intelligence! Life! Truth! Love! God!" repeated Miss Reynolds, and dwelling thoughtfully upon each word. Then, turning a wondering look upon her companion, she exclaimed, almost breathlessly:

"Why, Katherine, if that is true I can understand how God can be omnipresent! That is a doctrine of my church, that has been a tantalizing mystery to me all my life. My dear girl," she went on in an eager tone, "I begin to see a ray of light—I must think more about it, though. I have always thought of Deity as a 'personal God,' and, yes"—smiling—"I used to believe in a personal devil, too; with a very vague conception that although the latter had always managed to keep the preponderance of power in his hands, God would, in some miraculous manner, win the battle in the end. But, even now"—with a look of perplexity—"I do not grasp where or how, according to your logic, God comes in as supreme, infinite, so long as evil exists."

"Let us go back to the lie for an illustration," said Katherine. "You said that it originated in the person's own evil thought and desire to deceive. Well, what happens when you turn the light of truth upon a lie?"

"Why, it disappears—vanishes; you learn the fact and are no longer affected by, or conscious of, the falsehood."

"Then truth has destroyed, annihilated it; it has become nothing to you. As long as you believe a lie you are its victim and suffer from it; but once learn the truth you are free from that illusion and its power over you is gone. Now, you would not say that truth created the lie, permitted it, or was in any way responsible for it, or your suffering on account of it?"

"N-o; so God, being good—infinite good—knows nothing of evil in any form. Is that your point, Katherine?"

"Yes; so it follows He could neither create nor permit what He knows nothing about."

"Why!" exclaimed Miss Reynolds, turning a glowing face to the girl, "those same arguments must hold good for everything! Then sickness and suffering must be the outcome of wrong thought on the part of mortals! What unlimited possibilities that suggests! Divine Principle! I begin to understand why you call yourselves 'Scientists'—you think and live in accord with this infinite, absolute Principle—you demonstrate it, as—as I demonstrate mathematics."

"Yes," said Katherine, smiling; "so you see that Christian Science is, as some one has aptly said, 'the Science of sciences.'"

"That is a very sweeping assertion," responded her teacher in a somewhat doubtful tone. "I'll have to ruminate on that. However, this little glimpse of a better way than I have hitherto known, seems like an olive leaf of hope and promise to me, for I have been tossing on a restless sea of doubt and skepticism for years, reaching out and groping after some substantial plank that would float me into a haven of peace and rest. But how is it that you, so young, argue so clearly and logically about these things that have puzzled older and wiser heads for ages?"

"I have never known anything else," said Katherine, simply. "When I was a very little child my mother was healed of a disease which several physicians had pronounced incurable. She at once became an earnest student of Christian Science, and, later, a successful practitioner; consequently its principles, as far as I have gone, are as clear to me as those that govern your own dear mathematics are to you. But"—a blank look suddenly sweeping over her face—"I am afraid I have been guilty of rank disobedience in discussing these problems with you."

"How so?" asked her teacher, in surprise.

"Prof. Seabrook has strictly forbidden me to talk of Christian

Science while I am a student at Hilton."

"Of course, he meant that you must not talk it to the other students," said Miss Reynolds, "and it would be unwise, for, doubtless, the parents of many, if not of all, would object. But I, as your teacher, feel at liberty to ask you whatever questions I choose, and you are perfectly justified in answering them."

"Ye-s, I believe you are right on that point," Katherine thoughtfully returned. "But I would not willfully disobey the professor in any way. I owe him perfect loyalty as long as I am a pupil in his school, and I mean to yield it to him."

"That is right," her companion affirmed; "but you do not need to condemn yourself for what has occurred this afternoon, for, at my age, I am capable of judging for myself upon all moral and religious questions, and I think you may feel at liberty to give me any information that I may seek from you. I have not done with you, either," she added, with a significant smile, "for you have given me to-day a glimpse of something which I believe will change the universe for me. Ah! whom have we here?"

She checked herself suddenly as a gentleman came into view around a curve in the road, a short distance ahead of them.