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226 sharply divided into sheep and goats; the good are not all good, and the evil are not all evil, for Christianity is a more complex thing than the exuberant satisfaction of Hebrew prophecy, and it touches deeper, tenderer, and more far-sounding chords of human experience. Sad and anxious as life was to Jonathan at this time, it had its glimpses of hope and its hours of happiness, and though Aske and Sykes had been hard to bear, their contrariness had only strengthened Ben Holden's friendship, and drawn to him not only the sympathy and help of Jonas Shuttleworth, but also, in lesser degrees, of many others.

In a way scarcely to be explained, Jonathan realized these facts, and applied them to his own experience as he sat up that night waiting for the answer to his prayer. He had told the servants to go to bed, but none of them had done so. The two men sat with the two women in the kitchen; and they had "a bit of something warm," and as they ate, they talked, not without some genuine pity, of the young squire lying at death's door. Jonathan walked up and down his chamber, solemnly, strangely happy, and softly praying at intervals. He could not help