Then I was comforted and took heart, and I believe I finished that copybook so well that the teacher gave me the prize.
"Now you see, don't you," he continued, the ghost of a smile glimmering about his eyes, "how it was that after my disgrace I couldn't seem to take an interest any more in anything?
Then came the revival, and that gave me a notion that religion might help me.

I had heard, from a child, that the blood of Christ had a power to wash away sins and to leave one white and spotless with a sense of being new and clean every whit.

That was what I wanted, just what I wanted.

I am sure that you never had a more sincere, more dead-in-earnest convert than I was." He paused a moment, as if in mental contemplation, and then the words dropped slowly from his lips, as a dim self-pitying smile rested on his haggard face.
"I really think you would be sorry for me if you knew how very bitter was my disappointment when I found that, these bright promises were only figurative expressions which I had taken literally.

Doubtless I should not have fallen into such a ridiculous mistake if my great need had not made my wishes fathers to my thoughts.