Self-salvation, self-elevation,--the ideas that give birth to, and
destroy half of our Christianity, half of our philanthropy! Sometimes
sleeping instincts in the man struggled up to assert a divinity more
terrible than this growing self-existent soul that he purified and
analyzed day by day: a depth of tender pity for outer pain; a fierce
longing for rest, on something, in something, he cared not what. He
stifled such rebellious promptings,--called them morbid. He called it
morbid, too, the passion now that chilled his strong blood, and wrung
out these clammy drops on his forehead, at the mere thought of this girl
below.
He shut the door of his room tightly: he had no time to-day for lounging
visitors.
For Holmes, quiet and steady, was sought for, if not popular, even in
the free-and-easy West; one of those men who are unwillingly masters
among men. Just and mild, always; with a peculiar gift that made men
talk their best thoughts to him, knowing they would be understood; if
any core of eternal flint lay under the simple, truthful manner of the
man, nobody saw it.
He laid the bill of sale on the table; it was an altogether practical
matter on which he sat in judgment, but he was going to do nothing
rashly.
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