. It was one of Mrs.
Brown's trials of life, this secret, strange quality in her neighbor,
who stood apparently so far below her in worldly goods. Even the quiet,
positive style of Mrs. Katy's knitting made her nervous; it was an
implication of independence of her sway; and though on the present
occasion every customary courtesy was bestowed, she still felt, as she
always did when Mrs. Katy's guest, a secret uneasiness. She mentally
contrasted the neat little parlor, with its white sanded floor and
muslin curtains, with her own grand front-room, which boasted the then
uncommon luxuries of Turkey carpet and Persian rug, and wondered if
Mrs. Katy did really feel as cool and easy in receiving her as she
appeared.

You must not understand that this was what Mrs. Brown _supposed_
herself to be thinking about; oh, no! by no means! All the little, mean
work of our nature is generally done in a small dark closet just a
little back of the subject we are talking about, on which subject we
suppose ourselves of course to be thinking;--of course we are thinking
of it; how else could we talk about it?

The subject in discussion, and what Mrs. Brown supposed to be in her
own thoughts, was the last Sunday's sermon on the doctrine of entire
Disinterested Benevolence, in which good Doctor H. had proclaimed to
the citizens of Newport their duty of being so wholly absorbed in the
general good of the universe as even to acquiesce in their own final
and eternal destruction, if the greater good of the whole might thereby
be accomplished.

"Well, now, dear me!" said Mrs. Twitchel, while her knitting-needles
trotted contentedly to the mournful tone of her voice,--"I was tellin'
the Deacon, if we only could get there! Sometimes I think I get a
little way,--but then ag'in I don't know; but the Deacon he's quite
down,--he don't see no evidences in himself. Sometimes he says he don't
feel as if he ought to keep his place in the church,--but then ag'in he
don't know. He keeps a-turnin' and turnin' on't over in his mind, and
a-tryin' himself this way and that way; and he says he don't see
nothin' but what's selfish, no way.

"'Member one night last winter, after the Deacon got warm in bed, there
come a rap at the door; and who should it be but old Beulah Ward,
wantin' to see the Deacon?--'twas her boy she sent, and he said Beulah
was sick and hadn't no more wood nor candles. Now I know'd the Deacon
had carried that crittur half a cord of wood, i