It was all right, she supposed; but she, the
outcast child of the swamp, what was there for her to do in the great
world--her, the burden of whose sin--
But then came the voice of the preacher: _"Behold the Lamb of God, that
taketh away the sin of the world_."
She found herself all at once intently listening. She had been to church
many times before, but under the sermons and ceremonies she had always
sat coldly inert. In the South the cries, contortions, and religious
frenzy left her mind untouched; she did not laugh or mock, she simply
sat and watched and wondered. At the North, in the white churches, she
enjoyed the beauty of wall, windows, and hymn, liked the voice and
surplice of the preacher; but his words had no reference to anything in
which she was interested. Here suddenly came an earnest voice addressed,
by singular chance, to her of all the world.
She listened, bending forward, her eyes glued to the speaker's lips and
letting no word drop. He had the build and look of the fanatic: thin to
emancipation; brown; brilliant-eyed; his words snapped in nervous energy
and rang in awful earnestness.
"Life is sin, and sin is sorrow. Sorrow is born of selfishness and
self-seeking--our own good, our own happiness, our own glory. As if any
one of us were worth a life! No, never. A single self as an end is, and
ought to be, disappointment; it is too low; it is nothing.
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