PREFACE. JUST as in the first volume of these little "Tales of Kirkbeck," so in the second, the reader must be prepared to pursue his way through scenes of sorrow and of sin. The reason was given in the Preface to the first volume; and the same reason that was good then is good now. It is merely this—that the brighter and more joyous scenes of life have not the same points of observation about them as those which turn upon affliction. Men are not real in prosperity. Men laugh, and triumph, and exult, for a thousand reasons, which none but GOD can see. But when the chastisement of the Lord's Hand is upon them-when they fret under shame, or under sorrow-when they stand self-convicted in the counsels of the ungodly-then they do not care for concealment; there is a sort of reckless truthfulness about them, as though it were useless any longer to appear other than they are. So it is that we never know a person thoroughly until we have seen him in affliction ; nor do we even know ourselves. So it is that we never even love a person thoroughly till we have had dealings with him in some passage of woe-until we have seen his inner soul under some process of suffering. Adversity is a microscope by which things which were invisible before are made plain to our wondering eye. Try it. Try the banquet and the feast-try the joyous assemblies of the court-try the vast concourses of men in scenes of festive pleasure. Was it there that you found the friend of your bosom, or the child of your heart? Was it there that you poured forth to each other, as heart to heart, the communings of your spirit? Was it there that you touched those sweet chords of sympathy which drew you together, and made you see each other's character in its essence and principle? No: that was the dress, the mask, the "acting" of life. It was not till you saw the sick-chamber-the burning of anguish for |