The best and kindest man of all who have said their say in my story, and not thrust their merits forward, John Rosedew, still leads his quiet life, nearer and nearer to wisdomʼs threshold, nearer and nearer to the door of God. His temper is as soft and sweet, his memory as bright and ready, and his humour as playful, as when he was only thirty years old, and walked every day to Kidlington. As for his shyness, that we must never ask him to discard; because he likes to know us first, and then he likes to love us. But of all the people in the world, next to his own child Amy, most he loves and most he honours his son–in–law, Cradock Nowell— Cradock Nowell, so enlarged and purified by affliction, so able now to understand and feel for every poor man. He, when placed in large possessions and broad English influence, never will forget the time of darkness, grief, and penury, never will look upon his brethren, as under another God than his. It is true that we must have hill and valley, towering oak and ragged robin, zenith cloud overlooking the sun, and mist crouching down in the hollows. And true as well that we cannot see all the causes and needs of the difference. But is it not still more true and sure, that the whole is of one universal kingdom (bound together by one great love), the high and low, the rich and poor, the powerful and the helpless? And in the spreading of that realm, beyond the shores of time and space, when at last it is understood what the true aim of this life has been, not greatness, honour, wealth, or science, no, nor even wisdom—as we unwisely take it—but happiness here and hereafter, a flowing tide whose fountain is our love of one another, then shall we truly learn by feeling (whereby alone we can learn) that all the cleaving of our sorrow, and cuts into the heart of us, were nothing worse than preparation for the grafts of God. THE END. LONDON: PRINTED BY C. WHITING, BEAUFORT HOUSE, STRAND. TRANSCRIBERʼS NOTES: —Obvious print and punctuation errors were corrected. —A Table of Contents was not in the original work; one has been produced and added by Transcriber End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Cradock Nowell, Vol. 3 (of 3), by Richard Doddridge Blackmore