Beside Still Waters

He had his reward in an immediate and simple tranquillity of spirit. He never doubted nor looked back. Those who saw him, and thought regretfully what he might have been, what h...

There came into Hugh's mind the thought that this deep thirst for peace might somehow yet be satisfied. How could he otherwise conceive of it, how could he dream so clearly of i...

The time came for Hugh to go to school. He drifted, it seemed to him afterwards, with a singular indifference and apathy of mind, into the new life, though the parting from home...

One morning when he was sitting in his rooms at Cambridge, Hugh heard a knock at the door; there presently entered a clergyman, whom at first sight Hugh thought to be a stranger...

Hugh was seized, one bright February morning of clear sun and keen winds, with a sudden weariness of his work. This rebellious impulse did not often visit him, because he loved...

Hugh was indeed not yet, if ever, to learn the force of these large words--patriotism, honour, self-surrender, public spirit; he remained an individualist to the end. His countr...

Women, on the other hand, found their real life in these things, desired to please, to win and retain affection, to admire and to be admired, to love and be loved; and they tend...

Hugh was pleasantly entertained by these sights, and went home in a very blithe frame of mind; a little later he sat down to write in his own cool study. He was working at a tas...

And therefore Hugh felt that he was on the side of the individual; and that he touched life in that relation. Literature then must be for him, in some form or other, an attempt...

The charm of the Cambridge life was to Hugh the alternation of society and solitude. He was soon fortunate enough to obtain a post at his old college, and to be allotted a set o...

The return of the sweet spring days, with the balmy breath of warm winds, soft sunshine on the pastures, the songs of contented birds in thicket and holt, brought to Hugh an ast...

The question which, when he resigned his appointment, occupied Hugh, was where he should live. He would have preferred to settle in the country, loving, as he did, silence and p...

Hugh felt that Sheldon was probably speaking the truth. He thought long and earnestly over his words. But the practical outcome of his reflections was that he realised the usele...

Where was it all gone? In the clear fresh air he felt like a man awaked from a nightmare, and restored to cheerful life again. What did past failures, future anxieties, matter t...

Moreover he acquired a very serviceable and lucid style, a power of clear statement, which afterwards stood him in good stead. His official work gave him the power of seeing the...

Yes, it was wise sometimes, Hugh felt sure! to have refused it would have been like refusing to drink from a cool and bubbling wayside spring, as one fared on a hot noon over th...

The thought of the happy, quiet-minded people that might be living there, leading their simple lives, so little affected by the current of the world, brought much peace into Hug...

"_Your conversation with me the other day gave me a good deal to think about. What you said practically amounted to a charge of hedonism. Of course much depends upon the way in...

And then Hugh saw in a flash that the essence of the Gospel itself was like that. When he read the sacred record in the light of Plato, it seemed to him as if it must in some su...

I The Family--The Scene--The Church--Childhood--Books II The Schoolmaster--School Life--Companions III The Public School--Friendships--The Opening Heart--The Mould--The Last Mor...

It seemed strange to Hugh to sit there as he did, in his quiet house beside the stream, with an active professional life behind him, and wonder what the next act would be. His t...

It seemed to Hugh, when the sad rites were done, and he was left alone, that there was but one solution possible; the thought shaped itself dimly and wistfully out of the dark--...