THE next day she awoke, out of spirits and out of temper. She did not see why she should always work, while Kitty was enjoying herself in bed. She forgot the joy of serving others, and thought it very hard others should not try to serve her. We are apt to be very strict about other people’s duties when we forget our own. So Amy lay in bed until the last moment, and then hurried on her clothes, and hurried over her work, and what was worse, hurried over her prayers, and thus went out to meet the day’s temptations unarmed.

It never improves the temper to be hurried; and Amy was still further tried this morning by her father, who was in haste to be off to his work, and wondered why she was so slow.

“It’s of no use,” grumbled Amy to herself, “to try to do right and please everybody. The more one does, the more people expect. Nobody thinks of scolding Kitty for being slow.”

A day so begun seldom grows bright of itself. There is a sunshine which can scatter even such clouds, but Amy did not look up to that; it did not seem to shine for her; it never does, if you will not look up. She felt very discontented and ill-used; it seemed as if no one cared for her, and everything worked together to torment her; and so things got darker and darker, and Amy’s temper more bitter and her heart sorer every moment.

At last her mother went out, and Kitty was sent to the bakehouse, and Amy was left alone to rock the cradle and watch that the kettle did not boil over.

Amy had much rather not have been left alone just then; her own thoughts were not at all pleasant; but as she was alone she could not help thinking. At first she thought how unkind every one was, and of all the wrongs she had had to bear,—of Kitty’s laziness, of her mother’s rebukes, and then of her beautiful rose, and the naughty baby. “Kitty and the baby might do just what they liked, but if she did the least thing wrong she was scolded and punished.” But this thought of the rose led her back to Mrs. Mordaunt’s lesson on Sunday. Had the good seed borne good fruit this week,—this week that was to have been the beginning of a new life? Had it led her to overcome one fault, to be a step nearer to God and goodness than before? Yet she had prayed and tried. What was then wanting? She was afraid she never should be God’s happy child, she was so full of faults, and no one helped her to overcome them; and yet it was wretched to be as she was. What should she do?

So she sat rocking the cradle, and thinking of her resolutions and her failures until the tears rolled fast over her cheeks, and all the proud heart within her was melted into sorrow. As she sat thus, her elbows on her knees and her hands hiding her face, she heard a gentle voice at the door. She looked up. It was Mrs. Mordaunt asking for her mother. Amy was ashamed to be seen crying, and rose quickly, and answered as briskly as she could. But Mrs. Mordaunt saw she was unhappy, and she came forward, and laying her hand kindly on her shoulder she asked what was the matter.

Amy’s tears flowed faster than ever now, and as soon as she could speak she sobbed out in a faint voice, “O ma’am, I cannot do right,—I cannot be good.” Mrs. Mordaunt sat down beside her and said, “Don’t despair, my child; you know the little song you sing in school. Try again and again until you succeed. Every one succeeds who goes on trying.”

“But I have tried again and again,” said poor Amy, “and I only get worse and worse. In the very moment when I want it, the strength goes away.”

“Our own strength always will,” said the lady. “Have you remembered to ask God for his strength? Do you remember what I told you about the little seed? its enemies are stronger than itself, but God is stronger than its enemies.”

“I have prayed, ma’am,” said Amy mournfully, “but I am ashamed to ask God any more. I have done what he tells us not so very often, I am afraid he never can love me;” and Amy cried bitterly.

“My child,” said Mrs. Mordaunt, taking her hand, “if you had disobeyed your mother, and she were angry with you, would you run away from the house in the night, and choose rather to starve or die of cold than ask her forgiveness?”

Amy was silent.

“And if your mother could not bear to see you in want, and were to come out to you in the cold night with food and kind words, would you turn away from her and say, ‘I know she can never love me, I have been so naughty;’ and would you refuse to receive her kindness, and ask her forgiveness?”

Amy bent down her head.

“Or would you say,” continued Mrs. Mordaunt, “as you saw her coming, ‘I will not go to meet her now; I will go and try to earn a few pence, and then I will come back to her and say, “Mother, I am very sorry, but here are some pence I have earned. Will you take them and forgive me, and let me be your child again?”’ Would that be humility and gratitude, or pride and ingratitude, Amy?”

“Pride and ingratitude,” said Amy in a low voice.

“And when the Lord Jesus says to you, ‘You have sinned against me and wronged me, and broken my laws; but I have come down from heaven to earth to seek you; come back to me, and I will receive and forgive you,’ would it be humility or pride to say, ‘Thou canst not forgive me, I am too sinful; but wait a little while, and I will do something good, and make myself better, and then I will come back to thee’?”

“Pride,” said Amy. “But I thought God only loved good children, ma’am; and I am not good.”

“God does only love good children, Amy,” said Mrs. Mordaunt very seriously, “and God knows you cannot be good.” Amy looked up in wonder.

“Who was Jesus Christ, Amy?” “The Son of God,” said Amy.

“And what did he become man and come into this world for?”

Amy answered as she had been taught, “Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners.”

“To save whom?”

“Sinners.”

“Not those who thought themselves good, but those who knew they had been sinful. What did he save them from?”

“From punishment,” said Amy thoughtfully.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Mordaunt, “from punishment, and from sin. He came to suffer, that we might be delivered and freely forgiven, and to make us holy. Did it cost him nothing to do this, Amy?”

“He died for it on the cross,” said Amy softly.

“He did indeed. And did he suffer all that pain and anguish of mind for nothing?” Amy did not answer.

“It would have been for nothing,” said Mrs. Mordaunt, “if we had still to earn forgiveness for ourselves. Jesus bore the punishment for us just because we could not have borne it; and he has borne it so that we shall never have to bear it now. If, then, you go and give yourself up to the blessed Saviour as He calls you to do, God will receive you for his sake, as if you had been always a good and obedient child, and Jesus will give you his Holy Spirit to abide with you always, and to make you good and obedient and happy.”

“I must not wait until I am better for God to love me, then,” said Amy doubtfully.

“Again, do you obey your mother in order to become her child; or do you obey her because she loves you and is your mother, Amy?”

“Because she is my mother,” said Amy. “And will your obedience make you more her child than you are, Amy?”

“No, ma’am.”

“But because you are her child and she loves you, does that make you careless of obeying her?”

“If I only could be a better child to please her!” said Amy, the tears gathering in her eyes.

“It is so with God, my child,” said Mrs. Mordaunt. “He loves you, not because you are good, but because he is good—because he is love, and so loved you that he gave his Son that you might be saved. Before you can love him, you must believe his word—that he loves you; and believing he loves you, he will make you good and happy. God has given the Bible to tell of his love to you. Read it, my child; believe it.”

Mrs. Harrison came in just then, and Mrs. Mordaunt, after saying a few words to her, rose to leave. That evening Amy took out her Bible with a new interest. “Can it be possible, indeed,” thought she, “that God has written in this book that he loves me—me, a little sinful child! I will look and see.” She read some of the passages she had learned before for Mrs. Mordaunt: “Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price” (Isa. lv. 1). “May I, indeed, come without anything to offer, and will God give me all I want?” Then: “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John iii. 14, 15). “He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life” (John v. 24). “Can I not now hear his words,” she thought, “and do I not believe?” She had read the words often before, but now a new light seemed to stream forth from them. She wanted forgiveness, and here was forgiveness offered; she wanted God to love her, and here in every page was some message of love from him. The Spirit of God opened the little child’s heart to the Word of God, and she read on as if she never could hear enough of this blessed news. “We have known and believed the love that God hath to us; we love him because he first loved us.”

“I do believe!” she thought; and that evening, as she fell on her knees, she felt for the first time what it was to call God Our Father. Her whole heart glowed with gratitude and love to him who had so loved her. She laid her down to sleep with the eye of her heavenly Father upon her. She awoke in the morning and felt that he was near. Everything made her happy, because God sent everything, and God loved her. The streams, the woods, the flowers—they had never looked half so bright, for she felt that God had made them, and God had so loved her. At school, at her tasks,—everywhere she was happy as a bird, for God was everywhere. She could not feel cross, for God was near, and he loved her. She could fight with her faults now, for the Almighty was by to help her.

Little children! thousands of little children have had their hearts changed and made happy, just as Amy’s was; and so may yours. Only believe the love that God has to you, and you must love him; and be his dear and happy child.

Transcriber's Note

Minor punctuation errors have been repaired.

Hyphenation has been made consistent.

The author uses both "a hundred fold" and "an hundred fold". These instances have been preserved as printed.