Who is it that says, "After all, let a bad man take what pains he may
to push it down, a human soul is an awful, ghostly, unique possession
for a bad man to have?" During the time that had elapsed between the
death and burial of his father and wife, Philip had become thoroughly
acquainted with the truth of this remark.
Do what he would, he could never for a single hour shake himself free
from the recollection of his father's death; whenever he shut his
eyes, his uneasy mind continually conjured up the whole scene with
uncanny distinctness; the gloomy room, the contorted face of the dying
man, the red flicker of the firelight on the wall--all these things
were burnt deep into the tablets of his memory. More and more did he
recognize the fact that, even should he live long enough to bury the
events of that hour beneath the debris of many years, the lapse of
time would be insufficient to bring forgetfulness, and the recognition
brought with it moral helplessness. He had, too, sufficient religious
feeling to make him uneasy as to his future fate, and possessed a
certain amount of imagination, which was at this time all directed
towards that awful day when he and his dead father must settle their
final accounts.
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