Seite:Marsh Hallig 1856.djvu/220

220THE HALLIG.

could I so long refuse to acknowledge him ! How of-
ten has he called me ! I see him now, from the begin-
ning, so careful for my soul ; I now understand that
voice in my heart, whose tones were once disregarded.
My whole past life lies before me, as an uninterrupted
succession of claims on my heart, of warnings from my
conscience, of directions into the right way, of the men-
aces of God's judgment. How could I have been so
deaf and so blind!"
  " We baptize our children with water," said Hold to
himself ; "but God chooses his own time to baptize them
with his Holy Spirit. And shall we question that grace,
when we see that our preparation for this baptism has
been longer and more painful, and the baptism itself not
richer in gifts than that of another child whom God has
chosen for a witness of the wonderful power of his love ?"
  Was this soliloquy of the pastor, who, only through
circuitous ways, and hard conflicts, had attained the
heights of faith on which he now stood, the result of a
feeling akin to envy, or of a cautious distrust of so
sudden a change in one who had till now been so com-
pletely a stranger to God ? There might have been
some little mixture of both, without the pastor's being
able to distinguish quite clearly the one from the other.
  The next morning Oswald declared his intention of
preparing himself to become a missionary.
  "I must go out," said he, "among the heathen. I
must preach the Gospel. I would stretch out my arms
to all those who are wandering in darkness, and call out
to them, Enter into the peace of your Lord ! The love
which I have experienced will become heavy and bur-
densome to me, if I can not suffer something for it. It