Chapter I

"To me, what 's greatness when content is wanting?
Or wealth, raked up together with much care,
To be kept with more, when the heart pines,
In being dispossessed of what it longs for
Beyond the Indian mines?"

MASSINGER.

Arthur Lloyd was about twenty-two when, by his father's death, he came into possession of property worth, at least, a million. His father died somewhat suddenly, and the young man, who was then in Paris, partly on business for his father, partly to see the world, was summoned home by the cares which such an inheritance naturally involved. There are few scenes that more deeply try the spirit of a man than a return to a desolate home. The mind can support the separations which the common current of human affairs renders inevitable without much suffering. One may even dwell in the midst of strangers, and not feel lonely, if the heart has a resting-place elsewhere. But when we open the solitary apartments, where everything we see calls up associations of dear friends we can hope to meet no more forever, a blight falls on our path of life, and we know that whatever of happiness may await us, our enjoyments can never be as in days past.

It was late on Saturday night when Arthur Lloyd reached the elegant mansion in ---- street, New York, of which he was now the sole proprietor. The domestics had been expecting his arrival, and every arrangement had been made, as far as they knew his wishes and tastes, to gratify him. Wealth will command attention, but in this case there was more devotion to the man than his money; for Arthur was beloved, and affection needs no prompter.

"How sorry I am that this pretty _mignonette_ is not in blossom!" said Mrs. Ruth, the housekeeper; "you remember, Lydia, how young Mr. Lloyd liked the _mignonette_."

"Yes, I remember it well; but I always thought it was because Miss Ellen called it her flower, and he wanted to please the pretty little girl."

"That might make some difference, Lydia, for he has such a kind heart. And now I think of it, I wonder if Miss Ellen knows he is expected home so soon."

"She does," said Lydia, "for I told her yesterday, but she didn't seem to care. And I do not think she likes him."

"She is melancholy, poor child! and who can blame her when she has lost her best friend?"

"Why, Mrs. Ruth, cannot young Mr. Lloyd be as good a friend as his father? I am sure he will be as kind."

"Yes, no doubt of that. But, Lydia, it will not do for a young man to be so kind to a pretty girl; Miss Ellen is now quite a young lady; the world would talk about it."

"I wonder who would dare to speak a word against Mr. Arthur?" said Lydia, reddening with indignation.

When a man's household are his friends, he hardly need care for the frowns of the world; and even the gloom of sorrow was relieved as Arthur shook hands with the old and favored domestics, whose familiar faces glowed with that honest, hearty welcome which no parasite can counterfeit. But when he retired to his chamber, the silence and solitude brought the memory of his lost friends sadly and deeply on his mind. He felt alone in the world. What did it avail that he had wealth to purchase all which earth calls pleasures, when the disposition to enjoy them could not be purchased? The brevity of life seemed written on every object around. All these things had belonged to his parents. And now they had no part in all that was done beneath the sun.

"And yet," thought Arthur, "who knows that their interest in earthly things is annihilated by death? Why may not a good man receive much of his heavenly felicity from witnessing the growth of the good seed he has planted in living hearts? Why may he not be gladdened, even when singing the song of his own redemption, by seeing that the plans he had devised for the improvement of his fellow-beings are in progress, carried forward by agents whom God has raised up to do their share of the labor in fitting this world for the reign of the just? If--if my good parents are ever permitted to look down upon the son they have trained so carefully, God grant they may find he has not departed from the way their precepts and example have alike made plain before him."

There is no opiate, excepting a good conscience, like a good resolution. And Arthur slept soundly that night, and passed the Sabbath in the tranquillity which a spirit resigned to the will of heaven, and yet resolved to do all that earth demands of a rational being, cannot but enjoy. But one thought would intrude to harass him. His father's death had occurred while Arthur was far away. He had not heard the parting counsel, the dying benediction. Perhaps his father had, in his last moments, thought of some important suggestion or warning for his son, but there was no ear tuned by affection to vibrate at the trembling sound, and catch and interpret the whispered and broken sentence, and so the pale lips were mute.

With such impressions on his mind, Arthur was prepared to read eagerly a letter, directed to himself, which he found deposited in his father's desk, purposely, as it appeared, to meet the notice of his son, before beginning the inspection of those papers business would render necessary. I shall give the entire letter, because the character of the father must be understood in order to comprehend the influences which had modelled that of the son.

It is on the very rich and the very poor that domestic example and instruction operate with the most sure and abiding effect. We find the children of parents in the middling class, removed from the temptation of arrogance on the one hand, and despair on the other, are those who admire and endeavor to imitate the models of goodness and greatness history furnishes, or the world presents. Such may become what is termed self-educated; but this process the very rich think unnecessary, and the very poor impossible. Therefore, when the early training of these two classes has inclined them to evil, they rarely recover themselves from the contamination. But the letter; it ran thus:--

MY DEAR AND ONLY SON: I informed you in my last letter that my
health was declining. I felt even then, though I did not express
it, that I should never see you again in this world; still I did
not anticipate the rapid progress which my disease has since made.
However, I have much cause for thankfulness. I endure little pain,
and my mind was never more calm and collected. I have resolved,
therefore, to arrange some of my thoughts and reflections for your
perusal, knowing that you will prize them as the last expression
of your father's love.

I have often endeavored, in my hours of health, to bring the final
scene of departure from this world vividly before my mind. I have
thought I had succeeded. But the near approach to the borders of
eternity wonderfully alters the appearance of all earthly things.
I often find myself saying, "What shadows we are, and shadows we
pursue!"

Shadows indeed! But it would not be well that the veil should
be removed from the eyes of those whose journey of life is,
apparently, long before them. The duties which prepare us for
heaven must be done on earth. It is this moral responsibility
which makes the importance of every action we perform. Considered
in this light, the example of every rational being is invested
with a mighty power for good or evil; and that good is productive
of happiness, and evil of misery, we need not the award of the
last judgment to convince us. The history of the world, our
observation, our conscience, and our reason, all prove that to
deal justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly before God is the
perfection of man's felicity. The great error lies in mistaking
our true interest. We separate earth from heaven by an impassable
gulf, and in our labors for the body think the spirit's work has
no connection. This false philosophy makes us selfish while we
are young, and superstitious when we are old, and of consequence
unhappy through life. But these things may be remedied. If the
wise man spoke truth, there is a _way in which we should go_, and
we may be so _trained_ as to walk in it when we are _young_, and
prefer it when _we_ are _old_.

It has, my son, since you were given me, been the great aim of my
life to educate you in such habits and principles as I believe
will insure your present and final felicity. When I speak of what
I have done, it is with a humble acknowledgment of the mercy and
goodness of God who has supported and blessed me; and I would
impress it on your heart that Heaven's blessing will descend on
every one who seeks it with patience and with prayer. But I did
not always have these views. I was not educated as you have been,
and it is for the purpose of explaining to you the motives which
have governed my conduct towards you that I shall enter into a
recital of some incidents, which you may know as facts, but of
their consequences you are not aware.

My father, as you have often heard, left a handsome fortune to
each of his ten children; but as he acquired his property late
in life by lucky speculations, we were none of us subjected to
the temptations of luxury in our childhood. We were all educated
to be industrious and prudent, and an uncommon share of these
virtues had, as the eldest, been inculcated on me. So that when,
in addition to my well-won thrift, the share I received from my
father's estate made me a rich man, I felt no disposition to enjoy
it in any other mode than to increase it. I did not mean to drudge
always in the service of mammon; but I thought I must wait till I
was somewhat advanced, before I could retire and live honorably
without exertion; but, in the mean time, I would heap pleasures on
my family.

Your mother was a lovely, amiable woman, whom I had married
from affection, and raised to affluence; and she thought, out
of gratitude to me, she must be happy as I chose. The only
path of felicity before us seemed that of fashion; and so we
plunged into all the gayeties of our gay city. And for eight
or ten years we lived a life of constant bustle, excitement,
show, and apparent mirth. Yet, Arthur, I declare to you I was
never satisfied with myself, never contented during the whole
time. I do not say I was wretched--that would be too strong an
expression--but I was restless. The excitements of pleasure
stimulate; they never satisfy. And then there was a constant
succession of disagreements, rivalries, and slanders, arising from
trifling things; but those whose great business it was to regulate
fashionable society contrived to make great matters out of these
molehills. Your mother was a sweet-tempered woman, forbearing and
forgiving, as a true woman should be; but, nevertheless, she used
sometimes to be involved in these bickerings, and then what scenes
of accusation and explanation must be endured before the matter
could be finally settled, and harmony restored! and what precious
time was wasted on questions of etiquette which, after all, made
no individual better, wiser, or happier.

We lived thus nearly ten years, and might have dreamed away our
lives in this round of trifling, had not Heaven awakened us by a
stroke, severe indeed, but I trust salutary. We had, as you know,
Arthur, three children, a son and two daughters. Fashion had never
absorbed our souls so as to overpower natural affection. We did
love our children most dearly, and every advantage money could
purchase had been lavished upon them. They were fair flowers, but,
owing to the delicacy of their rearing, very frail. One after
the other sickened; the croup was fatal to our little Mary; the
measles and the scarlet fever destroyed the others. In six months
they were all at peace.

Never, never can the feeling of desolation I then experienced be
effaced from my heart. A house of mourning had no attraction for
our fashionable friends. They pitied, but deserted us; the thought
of our wealth only made us more miserable; the splendor which
surrounded, seemed to mock us.

"For what purpose," I frequently asked myself, "for what purpose
had been all my labor? I might heap up, but a stranger would
inherit." My wife was more tranquil, but then her disposition
was to be resigned. Still she yielded, I saw, to the gloom of
grief, and I feared the consequences. But her mind was differently
employed from what I had expected.

She asked me one day if there was no method in which I could
employ my wealth to benefit others.

I inquired what she meant.

"I am weary," said she, "of this pomp of wealth. It is
nothingness; or worse, it is a snare. I feel that our children
have been taken from the temptations of the world, which we were
drawing around them. There is surely, my husband, some object more
worthy the time and hearts of Christians than this pursuit of
pleasure."

These observations may seem only the commonplace remarks of a
saddened spirit; but to me they were words fitly spoken. They
opened a communion of sentiment between us, such as we had never
before enjoyed. I had often felt the vanity of our fashionable
life, but thought my wife was happier for the display, and that it
would be cruel for me to deprive her of amusements I could so well
afford, and which she so gracefully adorned. And I did not see
what better use to make of my riches. But the spell of the world
was broken when we began to reason together of its folly, and
strengthen each other to resist its enticements.

Man is _sovereign_ of the world; but a virtuous woman is the crown
of her husband; and this proverb was doubtless intended to teach
us that the highest excellences of the human character, in either
sex, are attainable only by the aid of each other.

I could fill a volume with our conversations on these subjects;
but the result is the most important; we resolved to make the aim
of doing good the governing principle of our lives and conduct.

And these resolutions, by the blessing of God, we were enabled,
in a measure, to fulfil. Our fashionable friends ascribed the
alteration in our habits and manners to melancholy for the loss
of our children; but it was a course entered on with the firm
conviction of its superior advantages both of improvement and
happiness. We realized more than we anticipated. There is a
delight in the exertion of our benevolent faculties which seems
nearly allied to the joy of the angles in heaven--for these are
ministering spirits. And this felicity the rich may command.

In a few years after we had entered on our new mode of life, you,
my son, were bestowed to crown our blessings. We felt that the
precious trust was a trial of our faith. To have an heir to our
fortune was a temptation to selfishness; to have an heir to our
name was a cord to draw us again into the vortex of the world.
But we did not look back. We resolved to train you to enjoy
active habits and benevolent pleasures. It was for this purpose
I used to take you, when a little child, with me to visit the
poor, permitting you to give the money you had earned of me by
feats of strength or dexterity to those you thought needed it.
And when you grew larger you recollect, probably, how steadily
you would work in the shop, with your little tools, finishing
tiny boxes, &c., that your mother or I paid you for at stated
prices, which money you appropriated to the support of the poor
families in ---- Street. By these means we gave you a motive for
exertions which improved your health and made you happy, and we
gave you, also, an opportunity of taking thought for others,
and enjoying the pleasure of relieving the destitute. The love
for our fellow-beings, like all other feelings, must be formed
by the wish, and improved by the habit of doing them good. We
never paid you for mental efforts or moral virtues, because we
thought these should find their reward in the pleasure improvement
communicated to your own heart and mind, aided by our caresses and
commendations which testified the pleasure your conduct gave us.

Thus you see, my son, that in all the restrictions we imposed, and
indulgences we permitted, it was our grand object to make you a
good, intelligent, useful, and happy man. We endeavored to make
wisdom's ways those of pleasantness to you; and I feel confident
that the course your parents have marked will be followed by you
so far as your conscience and reason shall approve.

You will find yourself what the world calls rich. To human
calculation, had I rigidly sought my own interest in all my
business, I should have left you a much larger fortune. But who
knows that the blessing which has crowned all my enterprises would
not have been withdrawn had such selfish policy governed me? I
thank my Saviour that I was inspired with a wish to serve my
fellow-men. And my greatest regret now arises from the reflection
that with such means I have done so little good. Endeavor, my son,
to exceed your father in righteousness. The earth is the Lord's;
consider yourself only as the steward over the portion he has
assigned you. Enter into business, not to add to your stores of
wealth, but as the best means of making that wealth useful to the
cause of human improvement. And let the honorable acquisition and
the generous distribution go on together. The man, whose heart
of marble must be smitten by the rod of death before a stream of
charity can gush forth, deserves little respect from the living.
_To give what we can no longer enjoy_ is not charity; that
heavenly virtue is only practised by those who _enjoy what they
give_.

I do not undervalue charitable bequests. These may be of great
public utility; and, when they harmonize with the example of the
testators, they deserve grateful acknowledgment and everlasting
remembrance. But I cannot commend as a model the character of a
man who has been exclusively devoted all his life to amassing
property, because he acquires the means of leaving a large
charitable donation at his decease. This seems to be making virtue
a penance rather than a pleasure.

I wish you, my son, to frame for yourself a system of conduct,
founded on the rational as well as religious principle of doing to
others as you would they should do to you; and then your life as
well as death will be a public blessing. Another great advantage
will be, you can hold on your consistent, Christian course to
the end. You need never retire from business in order to enjoy
yourself. But I must shorten what I would wish to say were my own
strength greater, or my confidence in your character less firm.
There is one other subject to which I must refer.

Your dear mother, as you well know, adopted Ellen Gray, and
intended to educate the girl in every respect like a child. After
your mother's death, I placed the child under the care of Mrs. C.,
where she has ever since remained. You know but little of Ellen,
for you entered college soon after she came to our house, and have
been mostly absent since; but when you return it will be necessary
you should, as her guardian and the only friend she has a claim
upon, become acquainted with her. She is now at the winning age of
seventeen, and very lovely in person and disposition; one that I
should be proud to call _my daughter_.

Her mother was the dear friend of your mother, and that
circumstance, which first induced us to take the orphan, joined
with her own sweetness and affectionate gratitude, has deeply
endeared her to me. And now, when I am gone, she will feel her
loneliness, for she has no blood relation in the world. You,
Arthur, will have a delicate part to act as the son of her
benefactor, and the person whom in the singleness and simplicity
of her pure heart she will think she has a right to confide in,
to preserve that just measure of kindness and dignity which will
satisfy her you are her friend, and make the world understand you
intend never to be more. I have secured her an independence, and
provided that she shall remain, for the present, with Mrs. C. May
the Father of the orphan guard her and bless her! She loved your
mother, Arthur, and for that you must be to her a brother.

And now, my son, farewell! I feel my hour has nearly come; and I
am ready and willing to depart. My last days have been, by the
blessing of the Almighty, made my best. I have _lived_ to the
last, and been able to accomplish most of the plans which lay
nearest my heart. Do not grieve that I am at rest; but arouse all
your energies for the work that is before you. In a country and
age distinguished by such mighty privileges, it requires warm
hearts, and strong minds, and liberal hands, to devise, and dare,
and do. May God preserve, strengthen, and bless you!

Your affectionate father,
J. LLOYD.

I am glad, thought Arthur, as he wiped away his tears, after reading the letter for the third time in the course of the day--I am glad my father has left me perfectly free respecting Ellen. Had he expressed a wish that I should marry her, it would have been to me sacred as the laws of the Medes and Persians. Yet I might have felt it a fetter on my free will; and so capricious is fancy, I should not, probably, have loved the girl as I now hope to love her, that is, if she will love me--as a brother.