1863 3J7 father settle finally at Lew, giving her just over ten years of rest before death, against fifteen of unsettlement. My father was a very reserved man, and of a cold nature, and my mother felt greatly this reticence. His was a firm character and he had no patience with weakness of any sort, and shrank from every exhibition of tenderness, regarding it as a token of feebleness. This, I think, my mother felt. We did so, as children. Spiritual sensitiveness was strongly marked in my mother. It was like a delicate nervous network enveloping her mind and soul, that shrank as with real pain from all that was evil, unlovely, and immodest. I am convinced that she never looked on a flower, or mused on a glowing sunset, or drew a hasty breath at the vision of a fair landscape, without a lifting of her heart to God in recognition. Just as from the mignonette a delicate odour is exhaled, though the plant itself is lowly and insignificant, so did the fragrance of her pure and loving spirit rise ever to the Creator. In many young people the spiritual eye is present and sees, but gradually it is as though cataract comes over and darkens it, till they perceive the things of God no more. Some are like puppies born blind, but never open their eyes and acquire sight. It is possible for one to live several years in a house, in daily association with those dear to us, through their mental powers and acquirements, their social qualities, their kindliness, yet with no intimate accord with them, more than general regard, because they lack the spiritual faculty that really ties one to another, like mortar in a wall, distinguishing it from a hedge. We are bound to believe that all human beings have souls, or have had the rudiments of souls, but it exacts an effort to believe it, so large a number of individuals afford us no indication that they possess any. The things of the spirit in no wise appeal to them, possess to them no interest whatsoever, not so much by a long way as the composition of a cheese-cake and the frilling of a bodice. If they were given souls, these souls have bocome inarticulate. I said one day to a Brightlingsea oyster-grower : " Are you aware that these bivalves were born with eyes ? " " Impossible, I have not seen them." " Because through non-use they have been absorbed," I replied. " Whither then have they gone ? ' " Into their stomachs," was my answer.
