Oh, how he wanted to see Nanna! Oh, how he wanted to see her! Just to hold her hand, and kiss her face, and sit by her side for an hour or two! He did not wish either her conscience or his own less tender, but he thought that now, perhaps, they might be cousins and friends, and so comfort and help each other in the daily trials of their hard, lonely lives. One day, when he was much stronger, as he sat by the open window thinking of these things, John Priestly came to read to him. John had a faculty of choosing the sweetest and most comfortable portions of the Book in his hand. This selection was not without purpose. He had learned from David's delirious complainings the intense piety of the youth, and the spiritual despair which had intensified his sufferings. And he hoped God, through him, would say a word of comfort to the sorrowful heart. So he chose, with the sweet determination of love, the most glorious and the most abounding words of the divine Father. David listened with a reserved acceptance. It was in a measure a new Scripture to him. It appeared partial. When John read, with a kind of triumph, that the Lord "is long-suffering to us-ward, not willing that _any_ should perish, but that _all_ should come to repentance," David made a slight movement of dissent; and John asked: "Is not that a noble love? Thee believes in it, David?" "No." The word was softly but positively uttered. "What then, David?" "'Some men and angels are predestined unto everlasting life, and others foreordained to everlasting death; and their number is so certain and definite that it cannot be either increased or diminished.'" And David quoted these words from the Confession of Faith with such confidence and despair that John trembled at them. "David! David!" he cried. "Jesus Christ came to seek and to save the lost." "It is impossible for the lost to be saved," answered David, with a somber confidence; "only the elect, predestined to salvation." "And the rest of mankind, David? what of them?" "God has been pleased to ordain them to wrath, that his justice may be satisfied and glorified." "David, who made thee such a God as this? Where did thee learn about him? How can thee love him?" "It is in the Confession of Faith. And, oh, John Priestly, I do love him! Yes, I love him, though he has hid his face from me and, I fear, cast me off forever." "Dear heart," said John, "thee is wronging thy best Friend." "If I could think so! Oh, if I could think so!" "Well, then, as we are inquiring after God, and nothing less, is it not fair to take him at his own word?" David looked inquiringly at John, but made no answer. "I mean, will it not be more just to believe what God says of himself than to believe what men,--priests,--long ago dead, have said about him?" "I think that."