The wonderful confidence which his new faith had so long given him, that he was able in God's strength to perform the higher rather than the lower law of his nature, had ebbed away.

God's strength was no longer with him; he was going to the devil; he could do nothing for himself, little for others; but he sympathised as never before with all poor lost souls.

He was a little surprised, as the day wore to a close, that he had been able to control his craving, that he had not taken more rum.

Still, he knew that he would soon be helpless.

It was his doom, for he could awake in himself no further feeling of repentance or desire to return to God.
In the long day's struggle, half conscious and half unconscious, his love for Ann--and it was not a bad sort of love either--had triumphed over what principle he had; it had survived the sudden shock that had wrecked his faith.