. "The water is
drawn, and ready. All that is needed is your outstretched hand to take
it. Christ giveth the Living Water; Christ is the Door by which, if any
man enter in, he shall be saved; Christ is our peace with God. You have
not to make peace; for them that take Christ's salvation, peace is made.
You can never make peace: it took Christ to make it. Your salvation--
if you be saved at all--was finished thirteen hundred years ago. God
hath provided this salvation for you, and all your life He hath been
holding it forth to you--hath been calling you by all these your sorrows
to come and take it. So many years as you have lived in this world, so
many years you have grieved Him by turning a deaf ear and a cold heart
towards His great heart and open hand held forth to you--towards His
loving voice bidding you come to Him. Oh grieve Him no longer! Let
your own works, your own goodness, your own sufferings, drop from you as
the cast-off rags of a beggar, and wrap yourself in the fair white robe
of righteousness which the King giveth you--which He hath wrought
Himself on purpose for you,--for which He asks no price from you, for He
paid the price Himself in His own blood. He came not to live, and work,
and suffer, for Himself, but for you. You complain that none loveth
you: all these years there hath been love unutterable waiting for you,
and you will not take it."

It seemed to Philippa a very fair picture. Never before had the Garden
of God looked so beautiful, to her who stood waiting without the gate.
But there appeared to be barriers between it and her, which she could
not pass: and in especial one loomed up before her, dark and
insuperable.

"But--must I forgive my father?"

"You must come to Christ ere you do any thing. After that--when He hath
given you His forgiving Spirit, and His strength to forgive--certainly
you must forgive your father."

"Whatever he hath done?"

"Whatever he hath done."

"I can never do that," replied Philippa, yet rather regretfully than
angrily. "What he did to me I might; but--"

"I know," said the Grey Lady quietly, when Philippa paused. "It _is_
easier to forgive one's own wrongs than those of others. I think your
heart is not quite so loveless as you would persuade yourself."

"To the dead--no," said Philippa huskily. "But to any who could love me
in return--" and she paused again, leaving her sentence unended as
before. "No, I never could forgive him."