consideration. For a while he sat looking at his own doings only by the
light, as it were, of two candles--the one, of expediency; the other, of
rectitude. Had he been wise? Had he been good?

Not being of a contemplative or egotistical disposition, he soon
fidgeted. Thinking he heard a sound outside, which might be wind rising,
or might be the distant approach of the iron snow-plough, he got up to
look out. The small panes of his window were so obscured by frostwork
that he did not attempt to look through the glass, but opened his door.
Far or near there was no sign of rising wind or coming engine; only,
above, the glowing stars, with now and then a shaft of northern light
passing majestically beneath them, and, below, the great white world,
dim, but clearly seen as it reflected the light. The constellations
attracted his attention. There hung Orion, there the Pleiades, there
those mists of starlight which tell us of space and time of which we
cannot conceive. Standing, looking upwards, he suddenly believed himself
to be in the neighbourhood of God.

When the keen air upon his bare head had driven him indoors, he sat down
again to formulate his good resolutions, he found that his candles of
expediency and morality had gone out. The light which was there instead
was the Presence of God; but so diffused was this light, so dim, that it
was as hard for him now to see distinction between right and wrong as
it would have been outside upon the snow to see a shadow cast by rays
which had left their stars half a century before. All, all of which he
could think seemed wrong, because it was not God; all, all of which he
could think seemed right, because it was part of God. The young man's
face sank on his arms and lay buried there, while he thought, and
thought, and thought, trying to bring a life of which he could think
into relation with that which is unthinkable.