"No, Uncle; I do not think I could." "You may rest assured, my dear, that unless He be an utter Stranger, you will never feel so towards the Lord. When you come to know Him, you must either love or hate Him. You cannot help yourself." It almost frightened me to hear my Uncle Drummond say that. It must be such a dreadful thing to go wrong on that road! "Cary," he added suddenly, but very softly, "would you find it difficult to love a man who was going to die voluntarily instead of you?" "I do not see how I could help it, Uncle," cried I. "Then how is it," he asked in the same tone, "that you have any difficulty in loving the Man who has died in your stead?" I thought a minute. "Uncle," I said, "it does not seem real. The other would." "In other words, Cary--you do not believe it." "Do not believe it!" cried I. "Surely, Uncle, I believe in our Lord! Don't I say the Creed every Sunday?" "Probably you do, my dear." "But I do believe it!" cried I again. "You do believe--what?" said my Uncle Drummond. "Why, I believe that Christ came down from Heaven, and was crucified, dead, and buried, and rose again, and ascended into Heaven. Of course I believe it, Uncle--every bit of it." "And what has it to do with you, my dear? It all took place a good while ago, did it not?" I thought again. "I suppose," I said slowly, "that Christ died to save sinners; and I must be a sinner. But somehow, I don't quite see how it is to be put together. Uncle, it seems like a Chinese puzzle of which I have lost a piece, and none of the others will fit properly. I cannot explain it, and yet I do not quite know why." "Listen, Cary, and I will tell you why." I did, with both my ears and all my mind. "Your mistake is a very common one, little lassie. You are trying to believe what, and you have got to believe whom. If you had to cross a raging torrent, and I offered to carry you over, it would signify nothing whether you knew where I was born, or if I were able to speak Latin. But it would signify a great deal to you whether you knew me; whether you believed that I would carry you safe over, or that I would take the opportunity to drop you into the water and run away. Would it not?" "Of course it would," I said; "the whole thing would depend on whether I trusted you." My Uncle Drummond rose and laid his hand on my head--not as Mr Digby used to do, as though he were condescending to a little child; but as if he were blessing me in God's name. Then he said, in that low, soft, solemn tone which sounds to me so very high and holy, as if an angel spoke to me:--"Cary, dear child, the whole thing depends--your soul and your eternity depend--on whether you trust the Lord Jesus." Then he went out of the room, and left me alone, as if he wanted me to think well about that before he said anything more. ------------------------------------------------------------------------