all the
evening.

But the next day, early, I was in my usual place: near the river side,
among the rocks, with my Bible; and I resolved to settle the question
there as it ought to be settled. I was resolved; but to do what I had
resolved was difficult. For I wanted to go to the hop that evening
very much. Visions of it floated before me; snatches of music and
gleams of light; figures moving in harmony; words and looks; and--my
own white little person. All these made a kind of quaint mosaic with
flashes of light on the river, and broad warm bands of sunshine on the
hills, and the foliage of trees and bushes, and the grey lichened
rocks at my foot. It was confusing; but I turned over the leaves of my
Bible to see if I could find some undoubted direction as to what I
ought to do, or perhaps rather some clear permission for what I wished
to do. I could not remember that the Bible said anything about
dancing, _pro_ or _con_; dancing, I thought, could not be wrong; but
this confusion in my mind was not right. I fluttered over my leaves a
good while with no help; then I thought I might as well take a chapter
somewhere and study it through. The whole chapter, it was the third of
Colossians, did not seem to me to go favourably for my pleasure; but
the seventeenth verse brought me to a point,--"Whatsoever ye do in
word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus."

There was no loophole here for excuses or getting off, "_Whatsoever ye
do._" Did I wish it otherwise? No, I did not. I was content with the
terms of service; but now about dancing, or rather, the dancing party?
"In the name of the Lord Jesus." Could I go there in that name? as the
servant of my Master, busy about His work, or taking pleasure that He
had given me to take? That was the question. And all my visions of
gay words and gay scenes, all the flutter of pleased vanity and the
hope of it, rose up and answered me. By that thought of the pretty
dress I would wear, I knew I should not wear it "in the name of the
Lord Jesus;" for my thought was of honour to myself, not to Him. By
the fear which darted into my head, that Mr. Thorold might dance with
Faustina if I were not there, I knew I should not go "in the name of
the Lord," if I went; but to gratify my own selfish pride and
emulation. By the confusion which had reigned in my brain these two
days, by the tastelessness of my Bible, by the unaptness for prayer, I
knew I could not go in the name of my Lord, for it