Joyce Morrell's Harvest. Emily Sarah Holt
I were as good as Father!” said I; and I believe I fetched a sigh.
“Go a little higher, Nell, while thou art a-climbing,” quoth Aunt Joyce. “ ‘I would I were as good as Christ.’ ”
“Eh, Aunt, but who could?” said I.
“None,” she made answer. “But, Nell, he that shoots up into the sky is more like to rise than he that aims at a holly-bush.”
“Methinks Father is higher than I am ever like to get,” said I.
“And if thou overtop him,” she made answer, “all shall see it but thyself. Climb on, Nell. Thou wilt not grow giddy so long as thine eyes be turned above.”
I am so glad that Aunt Joyce seeth thus touching Nym!
Selwick Hall, October ye ii.
There goeth my first two pence for a blank week. In good sooth, I have been in ill case to write. This weary Nym would in no wise leave me be, but went to Anstace and Hal, and gat their instance (persuaded them to intercede) unto Father and Mother. Which did send for me, and would know at me if I list to wed with Nym or no. And verily, so bashful am I, and afeared to speak when I am took on the sudden thus, that I count they gat not much of me, but were something troubled to make out what I would be at. Nor wis I what should have befallen (not for that Father nor Mother were ever so little hard unto me, good lack! but only that I was stupid), had not Aunt Joyce come in, who no sooner saw how matters stood than she up and spake for me.
“Now, Aubrey and Lettice,” saith she, “both of you, fall a-catechising me in the stead of Nell. The maid hath no list to wed with Nym Lewthwaite, and hath told me so much aforetime. Leave her be, and send him away the other side of Jericho, where he belongs, and let him, an’ he list, fetch back a Syrian maiden with a horn o’er her forehead and a ring of her nose.”
“Wherefore didst thou not tell us so much, Nell, my lass?” saith Father right kindlily, laying of his hand on my shoulder.
But in the stead of answering him thankfully, as a dutiful daughter should, what did I but burst forth o’ crying, as though he had been angered with me: yea, nor might I stop the same, but went on, truly I knew not wherefore, till Mother came up and put her arms around me, and hushed me as she wont to do when I was a little child.
“The poor child is o’erwrought,” quoth she, tenderly. “Let us leave her be, Aubrey, till she calms down.—There, come to me and have it out, my Nelly, and none shall trouble thee, trust me.”
Lack-a-daisy! I sobbed all the harder for a season, but in time I calmed down, as Mother says, and when so were, I prayed her of pardon for that I could be so foolish.
“Nay, my lass,” saith she, “we be made of body and soul, and either comes uppermost at times. ’Tis no good trying to live with one, which so it be.”
“Ah, the old monks made that blunder,” saith Father, “and thought they could live with souls only, or well-nigh so. And there be scores of other that essay to live with nought but bodies. A man that starves his body is ill off, but a man that starves his soul is yet worser. No is it thus, Mynheer?”
Mynheer van Stuyvesant had come in while Father was a-speaking.
“Ah!” saith he, “there be in my country certain called Mennonites, that do starve their natures of yonder fashion.”
“Which half of them—body or soul?” saith Father.
“Nay, I would say both two,” he makes answer. “They run right to the further end of every matter. Because they read in their Bibles that ‘in the multitude of words there wanteth not sin,’ therefore they do forbid all speech that is not of very necessity—even a word more than needful is sin in their eyes. If you shall say, ‘Sit you down in that chair to your comfort,’ there are eight words more than you need. You see?—there are eight sins. ‘Sit’ were enough. So, one mouthful more bread than you need—no, no!—that is a sin. One drop of syrup to your bread—not at all! You could eat your bread without syrup. All that is joyous, all that is comfortable, all that you like to do—all so many sins. Those are the Mennonites.”
“What sinful men they must be!” saith Father.
“Good lack, Master Stuyvesant, but think you all those folks tarried in Holland?” saith Aunt Joyce. “Marry, I could count you a round dozen I have met in this country. And they be trying, I warrant you. My fingers have itched to shake them ere now.”
“How do they serve them when they would get them wed?” saith Father. “Quoth Master John to Mistress Bess, ‘Wed me’ and no more?—and saith she, ‘Ay’ and no more? A kiss, I ween, shall be a sin, for ’tis no wise necessary.”
I could not help to laugh, and so did Aunt Joyce and Mother.
“Wed!” makes answer Mynheer, “the Mennonites wed? Why, ’tis the biggest of all their sins, the wedding.”
“There’ll not be many of them, I reckon,” saith Aunt Joyce.
“More than you should think,” saith he. “There be to join them every year.”
“Well, I’ll not join them this bout,” quoth she.
“Now, wherein doth that differ from the old monks?” saith Father, as in meditation. “Be we setting up monasteries for Protestants already?”
Mynheer shrugged up his shoulders. “They say, the Mennonites,” he made answer, “that all pleasing of self is contrary unto God’s Word. I must do nothing that pleases me. Are there two dishes for my dinner? I like this, I like not that. Good! I take that I love not. Elsewise, I please me. A Christian man must not please himself—he must please God. And (they say) he cannot please both.”
“Ah, therein lieth the fallacy,” saith Father. “All pleasing of self counter unto God, no doubt, is forbidden in Holy Scripture. But surely I am not bid to avoid doing God’s commandments, if He command a thing I like?”
“Why, at that rate,” quoth Aunt Joyce, “one should never search God’s Word, nor pray unto Him—except such as did not love it. Methinks these Mennonites stand o’ their heads, with their heels in air.”
“Ah, but they say it is God’s command that thou shalt not please thyself,” saith Mynheer. “Therefore, that which pleases thee cannot be His will. You see?”
“They do but run the old monks’ notions to ground,” quoth Father. “They go a bit further—that is all. I take it that whensoever my will is contrary unto God’s, my will must go down. But when my will runneth alongside of His, surely I am at liberty to take as much pleasure in doing His will as I may? ‘Ye have been called unto liberty,’ saith Paul: ‘only, let not your liberty be an occasion to the flesh, but in love serve one another.’ ”
“And if serving one another be pleasant unto thee, then give o’er,” quoth Aunt Joyce. “Good lack, this world doth hold some fools!”
“Pure truth, Joyce,” saith Father. “Yet, for that of monks, in good sooth I do look to see them back, only under other guise. Monachism is human nature: and human nature will out. If he make not way at one door, trust him to creep forth of an other.”
“But, Aubrey, the Church is reformed. There is no room for monks and nuns, and such rubbish,” saith Aunt Joyce.
“The Church is reformed—ay,” saith he: “but human nature is not. That shall not be until we see the King in His beauty—whether by our going to Him in death, or by His coming to us in the clouds of heaven.”