The asceticism occasionally showed itself a
vein of hardness, or rather of severity in his treatment of others. He
did what he thought it his duty to do, but he forgot that few could
see the right so clearly as he, and very few of those few could so
calmly obey the least command of conscience. I confess I was a little
afraid of him, for I think I never could be severe.
In the long winter evenings I often read to Prue the story of some old
father of the church, or some quaint poem of George Herbert's--and
every Christmas-eve, I read to her Milton's Hymn of the Nativity.
Yet, when the saint seems to us most saintly, or the poem most
pathetic or sublime, we find ourselves talking of our cousin the
curate. I have not seen him for many years; but, when we parted, his
head had the intellectual symmetry of Milton's, without the puritanic
stoop, and with the stately grace of a cavalier.
Such a boy has premature wisdom--he lives and suffers prematurely.
Prue loves to listen when I speak of the romance of his life, and I do
not wonder. For my part, I find in the best romance only the story of
my love for her, and often as I read to her, whenever I come to what
Titbottom calls "the crying part," if I lift my eyes suddenly, I see
that Prue's eyes are fixed on me with a softer light by reason of
their moisture.
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