The preacher had come down from the pulpit
with a certain exhilaration, as of duty done. He was inspired to hope,
and even certainty, by the greatness of the theme. Helen should see the
truth, his silence should no longer mislead her, she should believe in
the justice of God. He had forgotten his sin of cowardice in the
onward-sweeping wave of his convictions; he seemed to yield himself up to
the grasp of truth, and lost even personal remorse in the contemplation
of its majesty.

Mrs. Grier had four noisy children, who all spoke at once, and needed
their mother's constant care and attention, so John and Helen could at
least be silent; yet it was hard to sit through the dinner when their
hearts were impatient for each other.

In a little breathing space at the end of the meal, when two of the
children had clambered down from their high chairs and been dismissed,
Mrs. Grier began to speak of the sermon.

"It was a wonderful discourse, sir," she said; "seems as if nobody could
stand against such doctrine as you gave us. I could have wished, though,
you'd have told us your thoughts about infants being lost. There is a
difference of opinion between Mr. Grier and two of our elders."

"What does Brother Grier hold?" asked the preacher.

"Well," Mrs. Grier answered, shaking her head, "he does say they are all
saved. But the elders, they say that the confession of faith teaches that
elect infants are saved, and of course it follows that those not elect
are lost. My father, Mr. Ward, was a real old-fashioned Christian, and I
must say that was what I was taught to believe, and I hold by it. There
now, Ellen, you take your little sister and go out into the garden, like
a good girl."

She lifted the baby down from her chair, and put her hand into that of
her elder sister.

"Mrs. Grier," Helen said, speaking quickly, "you say you believe it, but
if you had ever lost a child, I am sure you could not."

"I have, ma'am,"--Mrs. Grier's thin lip quivered, and her eyes reddened
a little,--"but that can't make any difference in truth; besides, we have
the blessed hope that she was an elect infant."

It would have been cruel to press the reason for this hope, and Helen
listened instead with a breath of relief to what John was saying,--he, at
least, did not hold this horrible doctrine.

"No, I agree with your husband," he said. "True, all children are born in
sin, and are despised and abhorred as sinners by God. Jonathan Edwards,