A flutter ran through the assembly, and a moment of waiting ensued; then David rose, while every eye was fixed on him.

“My friends,” he said, in a voice whose gentleness and sweetness stirred their hearts; “you have refrained from inquiring into the story of my life during the three years of my absence.  I would be glad if I could withhold it from your knowledge; but I feel that I must make a confession of my sins.”

In the death-like stillness he began.  The narrative was in itself dramatic, but the deep feeling of him who told it, his natural oratory and the hearers’ intent interest, lent to it a fascination that at times became almost unendurable.  Sighs were often heard, tears were furtively wiped away, criticism was disarmed, and the tenderness of this illicit but passionate and determined love, blinded even those calm and righteous listeners to its darker and more desperate phases.  By an almost infallible instinct we discover true love amid fictitious, unworthy and evil elements; and when seen there is something so sublimely beautiful that we prostrate ourselves before it and believe against evidence, even, that sooner or later it will ennoble and consecrate those who feel it.

When David had completed the narrative he continued as follows:  “It is now necessary that I should convince you, if I can, that with my whole soul I have repented of this evil that I have done, and that I have sought, and I hope obtained, pardon for what is irreparable, and am determined to undo what I can.  It is with awe and gratitude, my friends, that I acknowledge the aid of heaven.  From the logical and well-deserved consequences of this sin I did not escape alone!  I was snatched from it like a brand from the burning!  No mortal-mind could have planned or executed my salvation.  It is marked by evidences of Divine power and wisdom.  Through a series of experiences almost too strange to be credible, I have been drawn back here to the scenes of my childhood, to encounter the one I have wronged and to find myself, so far as I know, able not only to make reparation, but to enjoy the bliss of a love of which I am unworthy.  If I were wise enough, I would set before you the spiritual meaning of this terrible experience, but I am not.  Three years ago I stood here in boyish confidence and boldly expounded the mysteries of our human life.  It is only when we know nothing of life that we feel able to interpret it!  Now that I have seen it, tasted it, drunk the cup almost to the dregs—­I am speechless.  Three facts, however, stand out before my vision—­sin, punishment, pardon!  I have sinned; I have suffered; I have been forgiven.  I have been fully pardoned, but I feel that I have not been fully punished!  There are issues of such an experience as this that cannot be brought to light in a day, a year, perhaps not in a lifetime.  Whatever they are, I must await them and meet them; but as it is permitted a man to know his own mind, when he is determined so to do, I know that I have