The Infidel: A Story of the Great Revival

by M. E. Braddon

  CHAPTER XVIII.

  "AS A GRAIN OF MUSTARD SEED."

  John Wesley was not without compassion for a friend and disciplefor whom he had something of a fatherly affection. He too had beencalled upon to renounce the woman he loved, the excellent, gifted,enthusiastic Grace Murray, whose humble origin was forgotten in theforce and purity of her character. He had been her affianced husband,had thought of her for a long time as his future wife, lived in dailycompanionship with her on his pious pilgrimages, made her his helpmeetin good works; and yet, on the assertion of a superior claim, he hadgiven her to another. That bitter experience enabled him to measure thepain of Stobart's renunciation. He watched his friend's course withanxious care, lest heart should fail and feet stumble on the stony roadof self-sacrifice; and their intercourse, while the great itinerantremained in London, was even closer than it had been before.

  Mr. Wesley had much to do that winter at his home by the FounderyChapel. He had his literary work, the preparation of his books forthe press, since each year of his life added to the list of thosereligious works, some of them written, others only edited, by himself,which were published at his risk, and which for several years resultedin pecuniary loss, though they were afterwards a revenue. He had theservices of the chapel, which were numerous and at different hours, andhe had his work abroad, preaching in many other parts of London.

  It was in the early morning after one of his five-o'clock services atthe Foundery that he was told a lady desired to see him. He had butjust come in from the chapel, and his breakfast was on the table inthe neat parlour where he lived and worked, a Spartan breakfast ofoatmeal porridge, with the luxury of a small pot of tea and a littledry toast. It was only half-past six, and Mrs. Wesley had not left herchamber--a fortunate circumstance, perhaps, since the visitor was youngand beautiful.

  Mr. Wesley had many uninvited visitors, and it was nothing new for himto be intruded on even at so early an hour. He rose to receive thelady, and motioned her to a seat with a stately graciousness. He wasa small man, attired with an exquisite neatness in a stuff cassockand breeches, and black silk stockings, and shoes with large silverbuckles. His benign countenance was framed in dark auburn hair thatfell in waving masses, like John Milton's, and at this period showed notouch of grey.

  "In what matter can I have the honour to serve you, madam?" he asked,scanning the pale face opposite him, and wondering at its beauty.

  It had not the bloom of health which should have gone with the lady'syouth, but it was as perfect in every line as the Belvidere Apollo, andthe eyes, with their look of mournful deprecation, were the loveliesthe had ever seen--lovelier than Grace Murray's, which had once been_his_ loveliest.

  "I have come to you in great trouble of mind, sir," the lady began in alow voice, but with such perfect enunciation, such beauty of tone, thatevery syllable had full value. "I am a very unhappy woman."

  "Many have come to me in the same sad plight, madam, and I have foundbut one way of helping them. 'Tis to lead them to the foot of theCross. There alone can they find the Friend who can make their sorrowshere their education for heaven."

  "Oh, sir, if I believed in heaven, and that I should meet the dead whomI love there, I should have no sorrows. I should only have to wait."

  "Alas, madam, can it be that you are without that blessed hope--thatthis world, with its cruel inequalities and injustices, is the onlyworld your mind can conceive? Can you look upon the martyrdom ofso many of your fellow creatures--diseased, deformed, blind, dumb,imbecile, or held for a lifetime in the bondage of abject poverty,never knowing respite from toil, or the possibility of comfort,--canyou contemplate these outcasts, and yet believe there are nocompensations hereafter, and that a God of infinite mercy can overlooktheir sufferings?"

  "You believe in a heaven for these--a land of Beulah, where _they_ willhave the fat things? But what if one of these be a blasphemer? What ifhe curse God and die? What will be his destiny then, sir? Oh, I knowyour answer. The worm that dieth not--the fire that is not quenched.What of your scheme of compensations then, sir?"

  "Did you come here to shake my faith, madam, or to ask for spiritualaid from me?" Wesley asked severely.

  His searching gaze had taken in every detail of her appearance: thelovely face, whose ivory pallor was accentuated by a black silk hood;the grey lute-string gown, whose Quaker hue could not disguise therichness of the fabric; the diamond hoop-rings that flashed from undera black silk mitten. Dress, bearing, accent stamped the woman ofquality.

  "I meant no affront, sir. I talk at random, as women mostly do. I camehere in weariness of spirit, and I scarce know how you can help me. Icame because I have heard much of your merits, your amiable character,your willingness to befriend sinners. And I have listened to yoursermons at West Street Chapel in the month last past with admirationand respect."

  "But without belief in Him whose message I bring? Oh, madam, you mightas well be at the playhouse laughing at that vulgar buffoon SamuelFoote. My sermons can do you no good."

  "Nay, sir, if I thought that I should not be here this morning. I roseafter a sleepless night and came through the darkness to hear youpreach. If I cannot believe all that you believe, I can appreciate thewisdom and the purity of your discourse."

  "Look into your heart, madam, and if you can find faith there; but as agrain of mustard seed----"

  "Alas, sir, I look into my heart and find only emptiness. My sorrowsare not such as the world pities. My heart aches with the monotonyof life. I stand alone, unloved and unloving. I have tasted all thepleasures this world can offer, have enjoyed all, and wearied of all. Icome to you in my weariness as the first preacher I have ever listenedto with interest. Mr. Whitefield's discourse, whom I heard but once,only shocked me."

  "Come, and come again, madam, and may my poor eloquence lead you toChrist. I should rejoice for more reasons than I can tell you, if,among the many souls that I have been the means of snatching from thebrink of hell, Lady Kilrush should be one."

  "What, Mr. Wesley, you know me?"

  "Yes, madam, I remember the Bartolozzi head which was in all theprintsellers' windows two years ago; and I should be more a stranger tothis town than I am if I had not heard of the beautiful Lady Kilrushand her infidel opinions."

  "You have heard of me from my lord's cousin, Mr. Stobart, perhaps."

  "Mr. Stobart has spoken of your ladyship, deploring, as I do, the gulfthat yawns between you and him."

  "That gulf has widened, sir; for I have seen Mr. Stobart only oncesince he came from America."

  "He has been travelling about England with me--and only came to Londonlast October. I know, madam, that his respect for your person is onlyless than his grief at your unhappy opinions."

  "We cannot change the fabric of our minds, sir."

  "_We_ cannot; but God can."

  "You believe in instantaneous conversions--in a single act of faiththat can make a Christian in a moment?"

  "The Scriptures warrant that belief, madam. All the conversions relatedin the Gospel were instantaneous. Yet I will own that I was onceunwilling to believe in the miracle of Christian perfection attained bya single impulse of the soul. But in the long course of my ministry Ihave seen so many blessed examples that I can no longer doubt that theDivine Spirit works wonders as great in this degenerate age as on thatday of Pentecost, the birthday of the Christian Church. Instead of themiracle of fiery tongues, we have the miracle of changed hearts."

  "And you think that Christian perfection attained in a moment willstand the wear and tear of life, and be strong enough to resist theworld, the flesh, and the devil?" Antonia asked, with an increduloussmile.

  "Nay, madam, I dare not affirm that all who think themselves justifiedare secure of salvation. These sudden recruits are sometimes deserters.I do not hold the tenets of the Moravians, who declare that theconverted sinner cannot fall away, whereas, after our justification byfaith, we are every moment pleasing or displeasing unto God accordingto our works, according to the whole of our p
resent inward tempers andoutward behaviour. But I have never despaired of a sinner, madam; norcan I believe that a spirit so bright as yours will be lost eternally.Long or late the hour of sanctifying Grace must come."

  "Perhaps, Mr. Wesley, had you been reared as I was--taught to doubtthe existence of a God before I was old enough to read the Gospel--youwould be no less a sceptic than I am."

  "I was indeed more fortunate--for I was born into a household offaith. Yet I have never hardened my heart against the man or womanwhose education has only taught them to doubt, for I have sometimesthought, with unspeakable fear, that, had I given my mind to the studyof mathematics or geometry, I too might have been one of those nicephilosophers who will accept no creed that cannot be demonstrated likea proposition in Euclid. I thank God that I learnt to love Him, andto walk in His ways, before I learnt to pry into the mysteries of HisBeing or to question His dealings with mankind."

  "No doubt that is happiest, sir--to shut one's mind against facts andbelieve in miracles."

  And then, gradually won to fullest confidence by his quick sympathy,Antonia told John Wesley much of her life story, only avoiding, withan exquisite delicacy, all those passages which touched the secrets ofa woman's heart. She told him how she had been left alone in the worldwith all the power that riches can give to a young woman, how she hadtried all the resources of wealth, and found all wanting, even herexperience of mission work among the outcast poor.

  "I doubt you were happier engaged in that work than you have ever beenin the mansions of the great," he said.

  "No, Mr. Wesley, I will not pretend as much. While the pleasures of thegreat world were new I loved them dearly; but a third season broughtsatiety, and I sickened of it all. I know not why I sickened of myvisits to the poor, for my heart was ever touched by their sufferings,and sometimes by their patience. It may be that it was because I wasalone, and without an adviser, after Mr. Stobart left England."

  "Will you resume that work now, madam? I doubt you are familiar withthe parable of the talents, and know that to have youth and wealth,intellect and energy, and not to use them for others' good----"

  "Oh, it is hateful! Be sure, sir, I know what a wretch I am. I spentlast summer in Ireland, where the poor love me; but I hardly ever wentnear them. I did not let them starve. My steward and my waiting-womancarried them all they wanted, while I dawdled in my rose-garden oryawned over a novel. I was discouraged somehow. Those poor creaturesare all Roman Catholics. They would talk to me of a creed which I hadbeen taught to despise. There was a gulf between us."

  "But you will resume your charitable work in London, where the people'sreligion need not offend you, since they are mostly heathens."

  "Not at Lambeth! I cannot go back to Lambeth Marsh."

  She knew that Stobart was spending all his days in the old places. Notfor worlds could she go back to the work which she had shared with him,and which had once been so full of innocent happiness.

  "Your ladyship can choose your district. The field is wide enough. Willyou visit the sick poor in this neighbourhood, and will you accept myhelp and counsel?"

  "With a glad heart, sir. I sorely need a friend."

  "But you will not go as a heathen among heathens? You will carry theGospel with you."

  "Yes, sir. If it will help your views that I should read the NewTestament to your people, I would as leave do so as not. Indeed, I haveread the Gospel to those who have asked me; and be sure I have neverbeen so foolish as to obtrude my opinions upon them. 'Tis only by closequestioning they have ever discovered my barren creed." And then shewent on with a sigh, "Ah, sir, if you knew how I envy you the faithwhich opens new worlds, now that I have lost all interest in this one."

  "Do not despair of yourself, madam. I do not despair of you. The LadyKilrush I had pictured to myself was an arrogant unbeliever, possessedby a devil of pride, and glorying in her infidelity. There is hope forthe sceptic who has discovered how poor a thing this life is when wethink it is all."

  She rose to take leave, and Wesley conducted her to the street, where ahackney coach was in waiting. He begged her to call upon him as oftenas she pleased during his stay in London, which would not be long; andhe promised to send her the names and addresses, and particulars as tocharacter and necessities, of the invalids whom he would advise her tovisit.

  "On second thoughts I will not send you amongst the unconverted," hesaid, "but to some faithful Christians whose piety I doubt you willadmire, however you may despise their simplicity."

  He went back to his study full of thought. Antonia's conversation hadsurprised and interested him. Unlucky as he had been in his own toohasty choice of a wife, he was a shrewd judge of women, and he feltassured that this was a good woman. Would it not then be a hard measurewere he to come between George Stobart and an attachment which deathhad legitimatised? And what better chance could there be for thiswoman's conversion than her union with an honest, believing Christian?The Society's stringent rule had been inspired by the evil wrought bywomen of a very different stamp from this one.

  And yet was not this avowed infidel, so beautiful, so winning in herproud gentleness, only the Philistine Delilah in a new guise? Thetemptress, the lying spirit that betrayed the strong man of old, wasthere, perhaps, waiting to ensnare George Stobart's soul.

  "I must see of what spirit she is," Wesley told himself, "and if shemay yet be numbered among the children of light."

  * * * * *

  A new phase of Antonia's life began after her interview with JohnWesley. All that she had done in the past, in those dens of misery andcrime by the Marsh, was as nothing compared with her work under hisdirection. At Lambeth she had but exercised a fine lady's capriciousbenevolence, obeying the whim of the moment: a creature of impulse,too lavish where her heart was touched, too easily revolted by theugliness of vice. In the squalid regions that lay around the Founderyher charities were administered upon a different system. One of Mr.Wesley's best gifts was the faculty of order, and all things doneunder his direction were done with an admirable method and proportion.His Loan Society, which made advances of twenty shillings and upwardsto the respectable poor--to be repaid in weekly instalments--hisDispensary, his day and night-classes all testified to his powerof organization. From the days when a poor scholar at Oxford, helived like an anchorite of the desert in order that he might feedstarving prisoners and rescue fallen women, he had been experienced insystematic charity. From him, in the hours he could spare her beforestarting on his northern pilgrimage, she learnt how to distribute heralms with an unfailing justice, and how to make the best use of hertime. Her visits in those homes of sickness and penury, which mighthave been hopelessly dreary without his directing spirit, became fullof interest in the light of his all-comprehending mind.

  She sold three of her dress carriages and dismissed her secondcoachman. A hackney coach carried her to Moorfields every day, and sheemployed the greater part of the day in visiting the poor. She wasoften among Wesley's hearers at the evening service at the Foundery.His sermons touched her heart and almost convinced her reason. Hissimplicity of style and force of argument impressed her more thanWhitefield's dramatic oratory. Mr. Wesley had no deep-drawn "Oh!" forGarrick to envy. His action was calm and pleasing, his voice clear andmanly. He appealed to the heart and mind of his hearers by no studiedeffects, no flights of rhetoric, yet he never failed to hold them inthe spell of that simple eloquence.

  Antonia was interested in the congregation as well as in the preacher.She was moved by the spectacle of all those fervent worshippers--mostlyin the lower ranks of life--men and women of scantiest leisure, whogave much when they spent their evenings in the chapel; instead of atthe playhouse, or by the fireside in the cosy parlour with cards andcongenial company. For the first time she began to understand whatthe religious life meant, the life in which all earthly things aresecondary. The earnest faces, the voices of a vast concourse singingCharles Wesley's exquisite hymns, moved her deeply.

  Her work
took her mostly among the humble members of that MethodistSociety which had begun twenty years before by the gathering togetherof eight or ten awakened souls, yearning for help and counsel, groaningunder the burden of sin, and which was now so widespread a multitude.In the garrets and cellars, where she sat beside the bed of the sickand the dying, she found a fervour of unquestioning faith that startledand touched her. For these sufferers the Gospel she read was no historyof things long past and done with, no story of a vanished life. It wasthe message of a living Friend, a Redeemer waiting to give them welcomein the Kingdom of the just made perfect, the world where there is nodeath. He who had promised the penitent thief a dwelling in Paradisewas at the door of the death chamber; and to die was to pass to a lifemore beautiful than a child's dream of heaven.

  As the days and weeks went by, that Gospel story read so often undersuch solemn influences, with death hovering near, took a deeper holdupon Antonia's imagination. The message that she carried to otherswas for her also. She learnt to love the wise Teacher, the beneficentHealer, the Saviour of mankind. That name of Saviour pleased her. Fromthe theologian's point of view she was, perhaps, no more a Christianthan she had ever been. She dared not tell John Wesley, whom sherevered, and who now accepted her as a brand snatched from the burning,that her faith was not his faith, that she was neither convinced of sinnor assured of Grace.

  Her awakening had been no sudden act, like the descent of the Spiritat Pentecost, but a gradual change in her whole nature, the wideningof her sympathies, the growth of pity and of love. It was not ofChrist the Sacrifice she thought, not of His atoning blood; but ofJesus the Great Exemplar, of Jesus who went about doing good. Shewould not question how it came to pass, but she believed that, in thedim long-ago, Divinity walked among mankind and wore the shape ofman; to what end, except to make men better, she knew not. In all herconversation with Wesley's converts, however exalted their ideas mightbe, that earthly image was in her mind, Jesus, human and compassionate,the Comforter of human sorrows, the Sinless One who loved sinners.

  Wesley rejoiced with exceeding joy in her conversion. He had met herfrom time to time in the dwellings of the poor, had sat with her besidethe bed of the dying, had seen her often among his congregation; andhe believed that the work of Grace had begun, and that it needed butgood influences to ensure her final perseverance and justification byfaith. He wrote to George Stobart the night before he left London forthe North.

  * * * * *

  "You have passed through a fiery trial, dear friend, andI admire your fortitude in renouncing a passion that wasstronger than all things, except your hope of salvation. Thelady you love has become my friend and fellow-worker, and Idare venture to believe that she has escaped from darknessinto light, and that you may now enjoy her society withoutperil to your soul. Let me hear by-and-by how your suitprospers. Her ladyship is a woman of rare gifts, and of anoble character.

  "Yours in Christ,

  "J. W."