"It was a long time before I got here; and as for suffering that matters
little. You get experience by it. You are more accomplished and fit for
greater work in the end. It is not for nothing that we are permitted to
wander: and sometimes one goes to the edge of despair--"

She looked at him with such wondering eyes that he answered her without
a word.

"Yes," he said, "I have been there."

And then it seemed to her that there was something in his eyes which she
had not remarked before. Not only the great content that was everywhere,
but a deeper light, and the air of a judge who knew both good and evil,
and could see both sides, and understood all, both to love and to hate.

"Little sister," he said, "you have never wandered far--it is not
needful for such as you. Love teaches you, and you need no more; but
when we have to be trained for an office like this, to make the way of
the Lord clear through all the generations, reason is that we should see
everything, and learn all that man is and can be. These things are too
deep for us; we stumble on, and know not till after. But now to me it is
all clear."

She looked at him again and again while he spoke, and it seemed to her
that she saw in him such great knowledge and tenderness as made her
glad; and how he could understand the follies that men had done, and
fathom what real meaning was in them, and disentangle all the threads.
He smiled as she gazed at him, and answered as if she had spoken.