hen across his dream gleamed some
faint after-glow of that first fair vision of youth--only an
after-glow, for there had passed a glory from the earth.

One day--it was in 1842, and the springtide was struggling merrily with
the May winds of New England--he stood at last in his own chapel in
Providence, a priest of the Church. The days sped by, and the dark
young clergyman labored; he wrote his sermons carefully; he intoned his
prayers with a soft, earnest voice; he haunted the streets and accosted
the wayfarers; he visited the sick, and knelt beside the dying. He
worked and toiled, week by week, day by day, month by month. And yet
month by month the congregation dwindled, week by week the hollow walls
echoed more sharply, day by day the calls came fewer and fewer, and day
by day the third temptation sat clearer and still more clearly within
the Veil; a temptation, as it were, bland and smiling, with just a
shade of mockery in its smooth tones. First it came casually, in the
cadence of a voice: "Oh, colored folks? Yes." Or perhaps more
definitely: "What do you EXPECT?" In voice and gesture lay the
doubt--the temptation of Doubt. How he hated it, and stormed at it
furiously! "Of course they are capable," he cried; "of course they can
learn and strive and achieve--" and "Of course," added the temptation
softly, "they do nothing of the sort." Of all the three temptations,
this one struck the deepest. Hate? He had outgrown so childish a
thing. Despair? He had steeled his right arm against it, and fought
it with the vigor of determination. But to doubt the worth of his
life-work,--to doubt the destiny and capability of the race his soul
loved because it was his; to find listless squalor instead of eager
endeavor; to hear his own lips whispering, "They do not care; they
cannot know; they are dumb driven cattle,--why cast your pearls before
swine?"--this, this seemed more than man could bear; and he closed the
door, and sank upon the steps of the chancel, and cast his robe upon
the floor and writhed.

The evening sunbeams had set the dust to dancing in the gloomy chapel
when he arose. He folded his vestments, put away the hymn-books, and
closed the great Bible. He stepped out into the twilight, looked back
upon the narrow little pulpit with a weary smile, and locked the door.
Then he walked briskly to the Bishop, and told the Bishop what the
Bishop already knew. "I have failed," he said simply. And gaining