What was the remorse of Reuben? It was that through his weakness,
his complaisance, he had missed his chance of protecting what was
secretly dear to him. He loved the boy, I think, or at all events
he loved his father, and would not willingly have hurt the old man.
And now, even in his moment of yielding, of temporising, the worst
had happened, the child was gone, delivered over to what baseness
of usage he could not bear to think. He himself had been a traitor
to love and justice and light; and yet, in the fruitful designs of
God, that very traitorous deed was to blossom into the hope and
glory of the race; the deed itself was to be tenderly forgiven, and
it was to open up, in the fulness of days, a prospect of greatness
and prosperity to the tribe, to fling the seed of that mighty
family in soil where it was to be infinitely enriched; it was to
open the door at last to a whole troop of great influences,
marvellous events, large manifestations of God.
Even so, in a parable, the figure came insistently before me all
day, shining and fading upon the dark background of the mind.
It was at the loss of my own soul that I had connived; not at its
death indeed--I had not plotted for that--but I had betrayed
myself, I saw, year by year.
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