"
"Could _you_ respect her?" Mercy asked, sadly. "Can such a mind
as yours understand what she has gone t hrough?"
A smile, kind and momentary, brightened his attentive face.
"You forget my melancholy experience," he answered. "Young as I
am, I have seen more than most men of women who have sinned and
suffered. Even after the little that you have told me, I think I
can put myself in her place. I can well understand, for instance,
that she may have been tempted beyond human resistance. Am I
right?"
"You are right."
"She may have had nobody near at the time to advise her, to warn
her, to save her. Is that true?"
"It is true."
"Tempted and friendless, self-abandoned to the evil impulse of
the moment, this woman may have committed herself headlong to the
act which she now vainly repents. She may long to make atonement,
and may not know how to begin. All her energies may be crushed
under the despair and horror of herself, out of which the truest
repentance grows. Is such a woman as this all wicked, all vile? I
deny it! She may have a noble nature; and she may show it nobly
yet. Give her the opportunity she needs, and our poor fallen
fellow-creature may take her place again among the best of
us--honored, blameless, happy, once more!"
Mercy's eyes, resting eagerly on him while he was speaking,
dropped again despondingly when he had done.
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