am I to do? Nothing. I can do nothing.
'Until death us do part.' Do I wish for death--my death, of course--to
come and part us?"

She could not, even to herself, answer that question.

"What was he saying--that God teaches us by our very errors--that there
is no such thing as 'might have been?' He thinks so, and he is very
wise, far wiser and better than I am. I might have loved him. Oh that I
had only waited till I did really love him, instead of fancying it enough
that he loved me. But I must not think. I have done with thinking. It
would drive me out of my senses."

She started up, and stood gazing round the cheerful, bright, handsome
room, where every luxury that a comfortable income could give had
been provided for her comfort, every little fancy and taste she had been
remembered, with a tender mindfulness that would have made the heart
of any newly-married wife, married for love, leap for joy, and look
forward hopefully to that life which, with all its added cares, a good
man's affection can make so happy to the woman who is his chosen
delight. But in Christian's face was no happiness; only that white, wild,
frightened look, which had come on her marriage day, and then settled
down into what she now wore--the aspect of passive submission and
endurance.

"But I will do my duty. And he will do his, no fear of that! He is so
good--far better than I. Yes, I shall do my duty?"

_"Faith, hope, and charity, these three; but the greatest of these is
charity."_

There is a deeper meaning in this text than we at first see. Of "these
three," two concern ourselves; the third concerns others. When faith
and hope fail, as they do sometimes, we must try charity, which is love
in action. We must speculate no more on our duty, but simply do it.
When we have done it, however blindly, perhaps Heaven will show us
the reason why.

Christian went down stairs slowly and sadly, but quite calmly, to
spend--and she did spend it, painlessly, if not pleasantly--the first
evening

Christian's Mistake

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