Mechanically she took her New Testament,
and, seating herself in a low chair by the fire, tried to read;
but she could not fix her thoughts, or get the meaning of a
sentence: when she had read it, there it lay, looking at her just
the same, like an unanswered riddle.
The region of the senses is the unbelieving part of the human
soul; and out of that now began to rise fumes of doubt and
question into Mary's heart and brain. Death was a fact. The loss,
the evanishment, the ceasing, were incontrovertible--the only
incontrovertible things: she was sure of them: could she be sure
of anything else? How could she? She had not seen Christ rise;
she had never looked upon one of the dead; never heard a voice
from the other bank; had received no certain testimony. These
were not her thoughts; she was too weary to think; they were but
the thoughts that steamed up in her, and went floating about
before her; she looked on them calmly, coldly, as they came, and
passed, or remained--saw them with indifference--there they were,
and she could not help it--weariedly, believing none of them,
unable to cope with and dispel them, hardly affected by their
presence, save with a sense of dreariness and loneliness and
wretched company. At last she fell asleep, and in a moment was
dreaming diligently. This was her dream, as nearly as she could
recall it, when she came to herself after waking from it with a
cry.
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