Blair Collection > Rhys Lewis, minister of Bethel

240 RHYS LEWIS.
" Your mother, who is to-day, I am pretty sure, in heaven
— she and I were great friends; and I promised her, before her
death, I would take care of you and do my best for you. She
had a high opinion of you— too high, I fear; but I warrant me
she was judging you would turn out as you should have done,
after all the care she took of you— all the religious instruction
she gave you, and all her prayers on j'our behalf. "When you
were telling me your story last night, I felt very thankful that
your mother was in her grave. I never remember meeting one
who could possess her soul in patience under the bitterest trials
like your mother ; and, as you know, she had an abundance of
them. But I firmly believe if she had lived to see your de-
basement—and she surely would have seen it, because she was
sharper sighted than I — it would be more than even she could
have borne. It would have broken her heart. I recollect, at
this minute, how she used to tell me, with brightening face,
what a help she got in forgetting all her trouble with your
father, all her poverty and hardship, from seeing you grow up
in the way she liked ; how you would learn chapters from the
Bible unasked and could repeat parts of sermons while you
were yet a mere child. When you were not within hearing,
she would talk about you by the hour; and often did she
ask me whether I thought you would ever make a preacher.
Were she alive to-day she would a thousand times have
preferred to hear that you had died of starvation by the road-
side, than that you had fallen off to the extent you have done.
But she was spared all this, and went to her grave believing
her only son would not disgrace her teaching. Well, I must
say I have been sadly deceived in you. I believe, however,
you have made an honest confession. And, mark this — I
believe you. If you thought I did not, you would be doing
yourself a great wrong. I am pretty certain you have told me
the truth. But have you told me the whole ? "
" Yes, the whole, I think," replied I.
"Very well. Have you spoken to anyone besides my sister
and myself?"
" Not a word to any living soul," was my answer.
" Better still. You have made a clean breast of it, and I do
not see that any good can come of your telling anybody else.