There was something, even then, which kept me from being
with them while I looked, and I know that at that moment, at the moment
I looked up and met your eyes, I know that there was no vulgar thought
in my heart."
"Dear," she said, "with every word you make me the more inclined to
persist. I honestly believe that father and Mr. Bomford are right. It
is your duty. You owe it to yourself to accept their offer."
He sat for several minutes without speech.
"If I could only make you understand!" he went on at last. "Somehow, I
feel as though it would be making almost a vulgar use of something which
is to me divine. These strange little things which Mr. Bomford would
have me barter for money, brought me out of the unclean world and showed
me how beautiful life might be--showed me, indeed, what beauty really
is. There is no religion has ever brought such joy to the heart of a
man, nor any love, nor any of the great passions of the world have
opened such gates as they have done for me. You can't imagine what the
hideous life is like--the life of vulgar days, of ugly surroundings, the
dull and ceaseless trudge side by side with the multitude across the
sterile plain, without the power to raise one's eyes, without the power
to stretch out one's arms and feel the throb of freedom in one's pulses.
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