The World's Greatest Books - Volume 6 Part 10

Mrs. Lynn Linton, daughter of a vicar of Crosthwaite, was born at Keswick, England, Feb. 10, 1822. At the age of three-and-twenty she embarked on a literary career, and as a journalist, magazine contributor, and novelist wrote vigorously for over fifty years. Before her marriage, in 1858, to W.J. Linton, the eminent wood-engraver, who was also a poet, she had served on the staff of the "Morning Chronicle," as Paris correspondent.

Later, she contributed to "All the Year Round," and to the "Sat.u.r.day Review." After nine years of married life, the Lintons parted amicably. In 1872 Mrs. Lynn Linton published "The True History of Joshua Davidson," a powerfully simple story that has had much influence on working-cla.s.s thought.

"Christopher Kirkland," a later story, is largely autobiographical. Mrs. Linton died in London on July 14, 1898.

She was a trenchant critic of what she regarded as tendencies towards degeneration in modern women.

_I.--A Cornish Christ_

Joshua Davidson was the only son of a village carpenter, born in the small hamlet of Trevalga, on the North Cornwall coast, in the year 1835.

There was nothing very remarkable about Joshua's childhood. He was always a quiet, thoughtful boy, and from his earliest years noticeably pious. He had a habit of asking why, and of reasoning out a principle, from quite a little lad, which displeased people, so that he did not get all the credit from the schoolmaster and the clergyman to which his diligence and good conduct ent.i.tled him.

He was never well looked on by the vicar since a famous scene that took place in the church one Sunday. After catechism was over, Joshua stood out before the rest, just in his rough country clothes as he was, and said very respectfully to the vicar, "Mr. Grand, if you please I would like to ask you a few questions."

"Certainly, my lad. What have you to say?" said Mr. Grand rather shortly.

"If we say, sir, that Jesus Christ was G.o.d," said Joshua, "surely all that He said and did must be real right? There cannot be a better way than His?"

"Surely not, my lad," Mr. Grand made answer.

"And His apostles and disciples, they showed the way, too?" said Joshua.

"And they showed the way, too, as you say; and if you come up to half they taught you'll do well, Joshua."

The vicar laughed a little laugh as he said this, but it was a laugh, Joshua's mother said, that seemed to mean the same thing as a "scat"-- our Cornish word for a blow--only the boy didn't seem to see it.

"Yes; but, sir, if we are Christians, why don't we live as Christians?"

said Joshua.

"Ah, indeed, why don't we?" said Mr. Grand. "Because of the wickedness of the human heart; because of the world, the flesh, and the devil."

"Then, sir, if you feel this, why don't you and all the clergy live like the apostles, and give what you have to the poor?" cried Joshua, clasping his hands and making a step forward, the tears in his eyes.

"Why do you live in a fine house, and have grand dinners, and let Peggy Bray nearly starve in that old mud hut of hers, and Widow Tregellis there, with her six children, and no fire or clothing for them? I can't make it out, sir!"

"Who has been putting these bad thoughts into your head?" said Mr. Grand sternly.

"No one, sir. I have been thinking for myself. Michael, out by Lion's Den, is called an infidel--he calls himself one. And you preached last Sunday that no infidel can be saved. But Michael helped Peggy and her child when the orphan fund people took away her pension; and he worked early and late for Widow Tregellis and her children, and shared with them all he had, going short for them many a time. And I can't help thinking, sir, that Christ would have helped Peggy, and that Michael, being an infidel and such a good man, is something like that second son in the parable who said he would not do his Lord's will when he was ordered, but who went all the same------"

"And that your vicar is like the first?" interrupted Mr. Grand angrily.

"Well, yes, sir, if you please," said Joshua quite modestly, but very fervently.

There was a stir among the ladies and gentlemen when Joshua said this; and some laughed a little, under their breath, and others lifted up their eyebrows and said, "What an extraordinary boy!" But Mr. Grand was very angry, and said, in a severe tone, "These things are beyond the knowledge of an ignorant lad like you, Joshua. I consider you have done a very impertinent thing to-day, and I shall mark you for it!"

"I meant no harm. I meant only the truth and to hear the things of G.o.d,"

repeated Joshua sadly, as he took his seat among his companions, who t.i.ttered.

And so Joshua was not well looked on by the clergyman, who was his enemy, as one may say, ever after.

"Mother," said Joshua, "I mean, when I grow up, to live as our Lord and Saviour lived when He was on the earth."

"He is our example, lad," said his mother. "But I doubt lest you fall by over-boldness."

_II.--Faith That Moveth Mountains_

Joshua did not leave home early. He wrought at his father's bench, and was content to bide with his people. But his spirit was not dead if his life was uneventful. He gathered about him a few youths of his own age, and held with them prayer-meetings and Bible readings, either at home in his father's house, or in the fields when the throng was too great for the cottage.

No one ever knew Joshua tell the shadow of a lie, or go back from his word, or play at pretence. And he had such an odd way of coming right home to us. He seemed to have felt all that we felt, and to have thought all our thoughts.

The youths that Joshua got together as his friends were as well-conditioned a set of lads as you would wish to see--sober, industrious, chaste. Their aim was to be thorough and like Christ.

Joshua's great hope was to bring back the world to the simplicity and broad humanity of Christ's acted life, and he could not understand how it had been let drop.

He was but a young man at this time, remember--enthusiastic, with little or no scientific knowledge, and putting the direct interposition of G.o.d above the natural law. Wherefore, he accepted the text about faith removing mountains as literally true. And one evening he went down into the Rocky Valley, earnest to try conclusions with G.o.d's promise, and sure of proving it true.

He prayed to G.o.d to grant us this manifestation--to redeem His promise.

Not a shadow of doubt chilled or slacked him. As he stood there in the softening twilight, with his arms raised above his head and his face turned up to the sky, his countenance glowed as Moses' of old. He seemed inspired, transported beyond himself, beyond humanity.

He commanded the stone to move in G.o.d's name, and because Christ had promised. But the rock stood still, and a stonechat went and perched on it.

Another time he took up a viper in his hand, quoting the pa.s.sage, "They shall take up serpents." But the beast stung him, and he was ill for days after.

"Take my advice," said the doctor. "Put all these thoughts out of your head. Get some work to do in a new part of the country, fall in love with some nice girl, and marry as soon as you can make a home for her.

That's the only life for you, depend upon it."

"G.o.d has given me other thoughts," said Joshua, "and I must obey them."

The doctor said afterwards that he was quite touched at the lad's sweetness and wrong-headedness combined.

The failure of these trials of faith perplexed us all, and profoundly afflicted Joshua. "Friends," he said at last, "it seems to me--indeed, I think we must all see it now--that His Word is not to be accepted literally. The laws of nature are supreme, and even faith cannot change them. Can it be," he then said solemnly, "that much of the Word is a parable--that Christ was truly, as He says of Himself, the corner-stone, but not the whole building--and that we have to carry on the work in His spirit, but in our own way, and not merely to try and repeat His acts?"

It was after this that we noticed a certain restlessness in Joshua. But in time he had an offer to go up to London to follow his trade at a large house in the City, and got me a job as well, that I might be alongside of him. For we were like brothers. A few days before he went, Joshua happened to be coming out of his father's workshop just as Mr.

Grand was pa.s.sing, driving the neat pair-horse phaeton he had lately bought.

"Well, Joshua, and how are you doing? And why have you not been to church lately?" said the parson, pulling up.

"Well, sir," said Joshua, "I don't go to church, you know."

"A new light on your own account, hey?" and he laughed as if he mocked him.

"No, sir; only a seeker."

"The old path's not good enough for you?"

"I must answer for my conscience to G.o.d, sir," said Joshua.

"And your clergyman, appointed by G.o.d and the state to be your guide, what of him? Has he no authority in his own parish?"