But just think about it quietly.

Don't be in the least afraid; it is all perfectly right." She stood a moment, still looking compassionately down; torn by sympathy and desire.

No! it was no use now; she must wait till the next day.
"I'll look in again presently," she said, "when you have had dinner.
Mother! don't look like that! Kiss me!" It was astonishing, she told herself that evening, how any one could be so blind.

And what a confession of weakness, too, to call only for the priest! It was ludicrous, absurd! She herself was filled with an extraordinary peace.

Even death itself seemed now no longer terrible, for was not death swallowed up in victory?
She contrasted the selfish individualism of the Christian, who sobbed and shrank from death, or, at the best, thought of it only as the gate to his own eternal life, with the free altruism of the New Believer who asked no more than that Man should live and grow, that the Spirit of the World should triumph and reveal Himself, while he, the unit, was content to sink back into that reservoir of energy from which he drew his life.