And then she hoped, she sincerely hoped, to be able by this awful _coup de main_ to awaken Julia to a sense of her sinfulness.

For there was such a jumble of mixed motives in her mind, that one could never distinguish her sincerity from her hypocrisy.
Mrs.Anderson's conscience was quite an objective one.

As Jonas often remarked, "she had a feelin' sense of other folkses unworthiness." And the sins which she appreciated were generally sins against herself.
Julia's disobedience to herself was darker in her mind than murder committed on anybody else would have been.

And now she sat deliberating, not on the limit of the verbal punishment she meant to inflict--that gave her no concern--but on her ability to do the matter justice.

Even as a tyrannical backwoods school-master straightens his long beech-rod relishfully before applying it.
Not that Mrs.Anderson was silent all this time.