But August did not die.  Joy is a better stimulant than wine.  Love is the best tonic in the pharmacopeia.  And from the hour in which August Wehle looked into the eyes of Julia, the tide of life set back again.  Not perceptibly at first.  For two days he was neither better nor worse.  But this was a gain.  Then slowly he came back to life.  But at Andrew’s instance he kept indoors while Humphreys staid.

Humphreys, on his part, like Ananias, pretended to have disposed of all his property, paid his debts, reserved enough to live on until the approaching day of doom, and given the rest to the poor of the household of faith, and there were several others who were sincere enough to do what he only pretended.

Among the leading Adventists was “Dr.”  Ketchup, who still dealt out corn-sweats and ginseng-tea, but who refused to sell his property.  He excused himself by quoting the injunction, “Occupy till I come.”  But others sold their estates for trifles, and gave themselves up to proclaiming the millennium.

Mrs. Abigail Anderson was a woman who did nothing by halves.  She was vixenish, she was selfish, she was dishonest and grasping; but she was religious.  If any man think this paradox impossible, he has observed character superficially.  There are criminals in State’s-prison who have been very devout all their lives.  Religious questions took hold of Mrs. Anderson’s whole nature.  She was superstitious, narrow, and intense.  She was as sure that the day of judgment would be proclaimed on the eleventh of August, 1843, as she was of her life.  No consideration in opposition to any belief of hers weighed a feather with her.  Her will mastered her judgment and conscience.

And so she determined that Samuel must sell his property for a trifle.  How far she was influenced in this by a sincere desire to square all outstanding debts before the final settlement, how far by a longing to be considered the foremost and most pious of all, and how far by business shrewdness based on that feeling which still lurks in the most protestant people, that such sacrifices do improve their state in a future world, I can not tell.  Doubtless fanaticism, hypocrisy, and a self-interest that looked sordidly even at heaven, mingled in bringing about the decision.  At any rate, the property was to be sold for a few hundred dollars.

Getting wind of this decision, Andrew promptly appeared at his brother’s house and offered to buy it.  But Mrs. Abigail couldn’t think of it.  Andrew had always been her enemy, and though she forgave him, she would not on any account sell him an inch of the land.  It would not be right.  He had claimed that part of it belonged to him, and to let him have it would be to admit his claim.

“Andrew,” she said, “you do not believe in the millennium, and people say that you are a skeptic.  You want to cheat us out of what you think a valuable piece of property.  And you’ll find yourself at the last judgment with the weight of this sin on your heart.  You will, indeed!”