III.

The strong and intense Evangelicalism of Miss Marryat colored the whole of my early religious thought.  I was naturally enthusiastic and fanciful, and was apt to throw myself strongly into the current of the emotional life around me, and hence I easily reflected the stern and narrow creed which ruled over my daily life.  It was to me a matter of the most intense regret that Christians did not go about as in the “Pilgrim’s Progress”, armed to do battle with Apollyon and Giant Despair, or fight through a whole long day against thronging foes, until night brought victory and release.  It would have been so easy, I used to think, to do tangible battle of that sort, so much easier than to learn lessons, and keep one’s temper, and mend one’s stockings.  Quick to learn, my lessons of Bible and Prayer Book gave me no trouble, and I repeated page after page with little labor and much credit.  I remember being praised for my love of the Bible, because I had learned by heart all the epistle of St. James’s, while, as a matter of fact, the desire to distinguish myself was a far more impelling motive than any love of “the holy book;” the dignified cadences pleased my ear, and were swiftly caught and reproduced, and I was proud of the easy fashion in which I mastered and recited page after page.  Another source of “carnal pride”—­little suspected, I fear, by my dear instructress—­was found in the often-recurring prayer meetings.  In these the children were called on to take a part, and we were bidden pray aloud; this proceeding was naturally a sore trial, and being endued with an inordinate amount of “false pride”—­the fear of appearing ridiculous, i.e., with self conceit—­it was a great trouble when the summons came:  “Annie dear, will you speak to our Lord”.  But the plunge once made, and the trembling voice steadied, enthusiasm and facility for cadenced speech always swallowed up the nervous “fear of breaking down”, and I fear me that the prevailing thought was more often that God must think I prayed very nicely, than that I was a “miserable sinner”, asking “pardon for the sake of Jesus Christ”.  The sense of sin, the contrition for man’s fallen state, which are required by Evangelicalism, can never be truly felt by any child; but whenever a sensitive, dreamy, and enthusiastic child comes under strong Evangelistic influence, it is sure to manifest “signs of saving grace”.  As far as I can judge now, the total effect of the Calvinistic training was to make me somewhat morbid, but this tendency was counteracted by the healthier tone of my mother’s thought, and the natural gay buoyancy of my nature rose swiftly whenever the pressure of the teaching that I was “a child of sin”, and could “not naturally please God”, was removed.