"There's
another question, more important, and one which you must ask
yourself: '_Should I care if they did?_' After all, the matter's in
your own hands. Your soul's always your own till you do something
wrong."
"Yes, I understand that." Lemuel sat silently thoughtful, fingering
his hat-band. It seemed to Sewell that he wished to ask something
else, and was mustering his courage; but if this was so, it exhaled
in a sigh, and he remained silent.
"I should be sorry," pursued the minister, "to have you dwell upon
such things. There are certain ignoble facts in life which we can
best combat by ignoring them. A slight of almost any sort ceases to
be when you cease to consider it." This did not strike Sewell as
wholly true when he had said it, and he was formulating some
modification of it in his mind, when Lemuel said--
"I presume a person can help himself some by being ashamed of caring
for such things, and that's what I've tried to do."
"Yes, that's what I meant----"
"I guess I've exaggerated the whole thing some. But if a thing is
so, thinking it ain't won't unmake it."
"No," admitted Sewell reluctantly. "But I should be sorry, all the
same, if you let it annoy--grieve you. What has pleased me in what
I've been able to observe in you, has been your willingness to take
hold of any kind of honest work.
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