The other boy also sank like a stone, and also rose again like
a bird, but Smith had no leisure to concern himself with this.
For the collapse of that celestial crest had left him standing
solitary in the sky on a peak like a church spire.
He could see the tiny figures of the boys in the valley below, and he knew
by their attitudes that they were eagerly telling him to jump.
Then for the first time he knew the nature of faith, as he had just
known the fierce nature of charity. Or rather for the second time,
for he remembered one moment when he had known faith before.
It was n when his father had taught him to swim, and he had believed
he could float on water not only against reason, but (what is
so much harder) against instinct. Then he had trusted water;
now he must trust air.
He jumped. He went through air and then through snow with the same
blinding swiftness. But as he buried himself in solid snow like a bullet
he seemed to learn a million things and to learn them all too fast.
He knew that the whole world is a snowball, and that all the stars
are snowballs. He knew that no man will be fit for heaven till
he loves solid whiteness as a little boy loves a ball of snow.
He sank and sank and sank... and then, as usually happens in such cases,
woke up, with a start--in the street. True, he was taken up
for a common drunk, but (if you properly appreciate his conversion)
you will realize that he did not mind; since the crime of drunkenness
is infinitely less than that of spiritual pride, of which he had
really been guilty.
Pages:
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190