One cannot in a moment break through the
self-consideration of a lifetime. But whereas, before, my dim
sense that happiness could not be found by deliberately searching
for ease made me half rebellious, half uncomfortable, I know now
that it is true, and I will turn my back if I can upon that lonely
and unsatisfied quest. I did indeed--I can honestly say that--
desire with a passionate intentness the happiness of Maud and the
children; but I think I desired it most in order that the sunshine
of their happiness should break in warmth and light upon myself. It
will be hard enough--I can see that--not to labour still for the
sake of the ultimate results upon my own peace of mind. But in my
deepest heart I do not desire to do that, and I will not, God
helping me.
And so to-day, having read the whole record once again, with
blinding tears, tears of love, I think, not tears of self-pity, I
will close the book and write no more. But I will not destroy it,
because it may help some soul that may come after me, into whose
hands it may fall, to struggle on in the middle of sorrow and
darkness. To him will I gladly reveal all that God has done for my
soul. That poor, pitiful, shrinking soul, with all its faint
desires after purity and nobleness and peace, all its self-wrought
misery, all its unhappy failures, all its secret faults, its
undiscerned weaknesses, I put humbly and confidently in the hands
of the God who made me.
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