sometimes thrill through me with a sharp and bitter pain. I have reason
to thank God that this fear no longer troubles me. Nothing that is
really valuable and necessary for us can ever be lost. The present will
live hereafter; memory will bridge over the gulf between the two worlds;
for only on the condition of their intimate union can we preserve our
identity and personal consciousness. Blot out the memory of this world,
and what would heaven or hell be to us? Nothing whatever. Death would
be simple annihilation of our actual selves, and the substitution
therefor of a new creation, in which we should have no more interest
than in an inhabitant of Jupiter or the fixed stars."

The Elder, who had listened silently thus far, not without an occasional
and apparently involuntary manifestation of dissent, here interposed.

"Pardon me, my dear friend," said he; "but I must needs say that I look
upon speculations of this kind, however ingenious or plausible, as
unprofitable, and well-nigh presumptuous. For myself, I only know that
I am a weak, sinful man, accountable to and cared for by a just and
merciful God. What He has in reserve for me hereafter I know not, nor
have I any warrant to pry into His secrets. I do not know what it is to
pass from one life to another; but I humbly hope that, when I am sinking
in the dark waters, I may hear His voice of compassion and
encouragement, 'It is I; be not afraid.'"

"Amen," said the Skipper, solemnly.

"I dare say the Parson is right, in the main," said the Doctor. "Poor
creatures at the best, it is safer for us to trust, like children, in
the goodness of our Heavenly Father than to speculate too curiously in
respect to the things of a future life; and, notwithstanding all I have