Now, Lucilla, these are the practical conclusions which any person of sense would arrive at, supposing the texts which relate to the inner evil of the heart were as many, and as prominent, as they are often supposed to be by careless readers.  But the way in which common people read their Bibles is just like the way that the old monks thought hedgehogs ate grapes.  They rolled themselves (it was said), over and over, where the grapes lay on the ground.  What fruit stuck to their spines, they carried off, and ate.  So your hedgehoggy readers roll themselves over and over their Bibles, and declare that whatever sticks to their own spines is Scripture, and that nothing else is.  But you can only get the skins of the texts that way.  If you want their juice, you must press them in cluster.  Now, the clustered texts about the human heart, insist, as a body, not on any inherent corruption in all hearts, but on the terrific distinction between the bad and the good ones.  “A good man, out of the good treasure of his heart, bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man, out of the evil treasure, bringeth forth that which is evil.”  “They on the rock are they which, in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it.”  “Delight thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine heart.”  “The wicked have bent their bow, that they may privily shoot at him that is upright in heart.”  And so on; they are countless, to the same effect.  And, for all of us, the question is not at all to ascertain how much or how little corruption there is in human nature; but to ascertain whether, out of all the mass of that nature, we are of the sheep or the goat breed; whether we are people of upright heart, being shot at, or people of crooked heart, shooting.  And, of all the texts bearing on the subject, this, which is a quite simple and practical order, is the one you have chiefly to hold in mind.  “Keep thy heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.”

Lucilla.  And yet, how inconsistent the texts seem!

L. Nonsense, Lucilla! do you think the universe is bound to look consistent to a girl of fifteen?  Look up at your own room window; —­you can just see it from where you sit.  I’m glad that it is left open, as it ought to be, in so fine a day.  But do you see what a black spot it looks, in the sunlighted wall?

Lucilla.  Yes, it looks as black as ink.

L. Yet you know it is a very bright room when you are inside of it; quite as bright as there is any occasion for it to be, that its little lady may see to keep it tidy.  Well, it is very probable, also, that if you could look into your heart from the sun’s point of view, it might appear a very black hole indeed:  nay, the sun may sometimes think good to tell you that it looks so to Him; but He will come into it, and make it very cheerful for you, for all that, if you don’t put the shutters up.  And the one question for you, remember, is not “dark or light?” but “tidy or untidy?” Look well to your sweeping and garnishing; and be sure it is only the banished spirit, or some of the seven wickeder ones at his back, who will still whisper to you that it is all black.