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Page 19
Marjorie was very silent for a little; she was trying to understand
what the sunbeam meant, and found it rather difficult. After a while
she gave it up and said,--
"Will you tell me how you are carrying me, and where we are going, and
all about it?"
"Certainly," replied the beam, brightly. "You are in a sort of
hammock made out of threads of sunshine. We sunbeams can weave one in
less than no time, and it is no trouble at all to swing a little mortal
like you way out into the clearness and the light, so that a bit of it
can make its way into your dark little soul, and make you not quite so
blind as you were."
"Why, I 'm not blind at all," said Marjorie, with a surprised pout. "I
can see as well as anything. Did you think I couldn't?"
"I _know_ you can't," replied the beam, calmly. "That is, you can't
see any farther than the outside part of things, and that is almost
worse than seeing none of them at all. But here we are nearing the
court of the king. Now don't expect to see _him_, for that is
impossible. He is altogether too radiant for you; your eyes could not
bear so much glory. It would be just as if you took one of your own
little moles or bats (creatures that are used to the dark) and put them
in the full glare of a noonday sun. The sun would be there, but they
could not see it, because their eyes would be too weak and dim. Even
yourself,--have n't you often tried to look the sun full in the face?
Yes; and you have had to give it up and turn your face away because it
hurt your eyes. Well, his Majesty only lets the world have a glimpse
of his glory. But here we are at our journey's end."
With these words Marjorie felt herself brought to a gentle halt, and
found herself in a place most wondrously clear and light and high, from
which she could look off,--far, far across and over and down to where
something that looked like a dim ball was whirling rapidly.
"That is your earth," whispered the sunbeam in her ear,--"the earth
that you have just left."
Marjorie was so astounded that for a time she was unable to say a word.
Then she managed to falter out: "But it always looked so big and
bright, and now it is nothing but a horrid dark speck--"
"That is just it, Marjorie,--just what I said. When you look at the
world simply as a planet, it is small and dark enough, not nearly so
large as some of the others you see about you; but when you look at it
as a place on which God has put his people to be good and noble, to
work out a beautiful purpose, then-- But wait a moment."
Marjorie felt a strange thrill pass through her; across her eyes swept
something that felt like a caressing hand, and when she looked again
everything was changed, and she seemed gazing at a wonderful sort of
panorama that shifted and changed every moment, showing more lovely
impressions each instant.
"What is it?" she gasped, scarcely able to speak for delight and
breathless with amazement.
"Only pictures of your world as it really is. Pictures taken by his
Highness the Sun, who does not stop at the mere outer form of things,
but reveals the true inwardness of them,--what they are actually. He
does not stop with the likeness of the surface of things; he makes
portraits of their hearts as well, and he always gets exact
likenesses,--he never fails."
Marjorie felt a sudden fear steal over her at these words; she did not
precisely know why, but she had a dim sort of feeling that if the sun
took photographs of more than the outside of things (of the hearts as
well), some of the pictures he got might not be so pretty, perhaps.
But she said nothing, and watched the scroll as it unrolled before her
with a great thrill of wonderment.
With her new vision the world was more beautiful than anything she had
ever imagined. She could see everything upon its surface, even to the
tiniest flower; but nothing was as it had seemed to her when she had
been one of its inhabitants herself. Each blade of grass, each tree
and rock and brook, was something more than a mere blade or tree or
rock or brook,--something so much more strange and beautiful that it
almost made her tremble with ecstasy to see.
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