u will think of your aunt and uncle and be very lonely. When you go to
your room for the night I want you to sit down all by yourself and read
what I shall write. They will be, I think, the most impressive words
ever written. You will think them over, but you will not understand them
for a long time. Ask every wise man you meet to explain them to you, for
all your happiness will depend upon your understanding of those few
words in the envelope.'

The words in the sealed envelope!

What are the mysterious words in the envelope?

And what if the sealed envelope contains a _text_?

III

In the morning, when Barton rose, the Senator was gone, and Aunt Deel
handed the boy the sealed envelope. It was addressed: 'Master Barton
Baynes; to be opened when he leaves home to go to school.' That day soon
came. At the Canton Academy, under the care of the excellent Michael
Hacket, Bart felt terribly lonely, and, in accordance with the Senator's
instructions, he opened the note. And this is what he read:

'Dear Bart, I want you to ask the wisest man you know to explain these
words to you. I suggest that you commit them to memory and think often
of their meaning. They are from Job: "_His bones are full of the sin of
his youth, which shall lie down with him in the dust._" I believe that
they are the most impressive in all the literature I have read.--Silas
Wright.'

Bart soon learned to love and admire the schoolmaster; _he_ was the
wisest man he knew; to _him_, therefore, he went for an explanation of
the words.

'All true!' exclaimed Mr. Hacket, after reading the note. 'I have seen
it sinking into the bones of the young, and I have seen it lying down
with the aged in the dust of their graves. Your body is like a sponge;
it takes things in and holds them and feeds upon them. A part of every
apple that you eat sinks down into your blood and bones. You can't get
it out. It's the same with the books that you read and the thoughts that
you enjoy. They go down into your bones and you can't get them out. _A
man's bones are full of the sin of his youth, which lies down with him
in the dust!_'

IV

But the best exposition of the text is not Michael Hacket's, but Irving
Bacheller's. The whole book is a vivid and arresting and terrible
forth-setting of the impressive words that Barton found in his sealed
envelope.

All through the book two dreadful characters move side by side--Benjamin
Grimshaw and Silent Kate. Benjamin Grims