d. But were they safe even then? Did not sooner
or later the sea deliver up its dead, the earth what was buried in it,
the wild woods what its depths had hidden? Was not the foolish secret,
the guilty secret, the forgotten sin, sure to be disclosed? Then if they
could not fly from the testimony of His works, if they could not evade
even their fellow-man, why did they not first turn to Him? Why, from the
penitent child at his mother's knee to the murderer on the scaffold, did
they only at THE LAST confess unto Him?

His voice and manner had suddenly changed. From the rough note of
accusation and challenge it had passed into the equally rough, but
broken and sympathetic, accents of appeal. Why did they hesitate longer
to confess their sin--not to man--but unto Him? Why did they delay?
Now--that evening! That very moment! This was the appointed time! He
entreated them in the name of religious faith, in the name of a human
brotherly love. His delivery was now no longer deliberate, but
hurried and panting; his speech now no longer chosen, but made up
of reiterations and repetitions, ejaculations, and even incoherent
epithets. His gestures and long intonations which began to take the
place of even that interrupted speech affected them more than his
reasoning! Short sighs escaped them; they swayed to and fro with the
rhythm of his voice and movements. They had begun to comprehend
this exacerbation of emotion--this paroxysmal rhapsody. This was the
dithyrambic exaltation they had ardently waited for. They responded
quickly. First with groans, equally inarticulate murmurs of assent,
shouts of "Glory," and the reckless invocation of sacred names. Then a
wave of hysteria seemed to move the whole mass, and broke into tears
and sobs among the women. In her own excited consciousness it seemed
to Cissy that some actual struggle between good and evil--like unto
the casting out of devils--was shaking the little building. She cast a
hurried glance behind her and saw Mr. Braggs sitting erect, white and
scornful. She knew that she too was shrinking from the speaker,--not
from any sense of conviction, but because he was irritating and
disturbing her innate sense of fitness and harmony,--and she was pained
that Mr. Braggs should see him thus. Meantime the weird, invisible
struggle continued, heightened and, it seemed to her, incited by the
partisan groans and exultant actions of those around her, until suddenly
a wild despairing cry arose ab