never been born. I couldn't look into the future. Lucy's dead painted
face would follow me there, as it did when I looked back into the
past--as it did when I sat down to table with my friends, when I lay down
in my bed, and when I rose up. There was only one thing that could make
life tolerable to me; that was, to spend all the rest of it in trying to
save others from the ruin I had brought on one. But how was that possible
for me? I had no comfort, no strength, no wisdom in my own soul; how
could I give them to others? My mind was dark, rebellious, at war with
itself and with God.'

Mr. Tryan had been looking away from Janet. His face was towards the
fire, and he was absorbed in the images his memory was recalling. But now
he turned his eyes on her, and they met hers, fixed on him with the look
of rapt expectation, with which one clinging to a slippery summit of a
rock, while the waves are rising higher and higher, watches the boat that
has put from shore to his rescue.

'You see, Mrs. Dempster, how deep my need was. I went on in this way for
months. I was convinced that if I ever got health and comfort, it must be
from religion. I went to hear celebrated preachers, and I read religious
books. But I found nothing that fitted my own need. The faith which puts
the sinner in possession of salvation seemed, as I understood it, to be
quite out of my reach. I had no faith; I only felt utterly wretched,
under the power of habits and dispositions which had wrought hideous
evil. At last, as I told you, I found a friend to whom I opened all my
feelings--to whom I confessed everything. He was a man who had gone
through very deep experience, and could understand the different wants of
different minds. He made it clear to me that the only preparation for
coming to Christ and partaking of his salvation, was that very sense of
guilt and helplessness which was weighing me down. He said, You are weary
and heavy-laden; well, it is you Christ invites to come to him and find
rest. He asks you to cling to him, to lean on him; he does not command
you to walk alone without stumbling. He does not tell you, as your
fellow-men do, that you must first merit his love; he neither condemns
nor reproaches you for the past, he only bids you come to him that you
may have life: he bids you stretch out your hands, and take of the
fulness of his love. You have only to rest on him as a child rests on its
mother's arms, and you will be upborne by his div