Children -- Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction; Orphans -- Juvenile fiction; Sunday school literature
"I'm very sorry too," said John Heedman, seriously--"very sorry. I am
afraid when you were making your good resolutions about coming straight
home, you forgot that you might be tempted to break them, and did not
ask for His help who alone can give you strength to resist temptation
and choose duty before pleasure. Don't you remember the words, 'My son,
if sinners entice thee, consent thou not,'and the exhortation to pray
lest ye enter into temptation? Wipe away your tears now, and get some
tea; we will talk about it afterwards."
CHAPTER V.
TURNING OVER A NEW LEAF.
Charlie's heart felt a little lighter for the explanation. When the
tea-things were cleared away, and a nice little bright fire made up--for
it was a chilly evening--Mrs. Heedman sat down to her needlework, and
Charlie drew his chair close to his father's, waiting for him to speak.
Taking Charlie's hand in his, he began in a kind tone, "I want you to
tell me just how you felt while Tom Brown was persuading you, as you
call it, to go with him."
"Well," said Charlie, hesitatingly, "I felt I wanted to go very much,
and I thought I would only stay five minutes, there would still be
plenty of time to meet you; and something in my heart kept on
whispering, 'Don't go;' but I did go, you know," he went on, in a
saddened tone, "and then the little voice did not whisper again."
"Now," said his father, "you must think well, and tell me what sins your
sad way of thinking there's time enough has led you to be guilty of in
one short hour."
Charlie thought a moment, and then answered, without looking up,
"Disobedience and ingratitude."
"Yes," said his father; "but there is one more--presumption. You know
quite well, Charlie, that warning voice in your heart was placed there
by God to teach and guide you; yet you would not listen; you turned a
deaf ear; you knew better than the great God who made you; you put your
own will before His, and treated His Holy Spirit with contempt. It is a
most solemn and awful thought that God's Holy Spirit will not always
strive with us.
"What a terrible fate!" exclaimed Mrs. Heedman, "to be left entirely at
the mercy not only of the temptation of the world, but the sinful wishes
and inclinations of our own evil hearts!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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