402 THE SCHOOL BOARDS xv 



cient Bible whicli belonged to my grandmother. 

 There were splendid pictures in it, to be sure; 

 but I recollect little or nothing about them save 

 a portrait of the liigli priest in his vestments. 

 What come vividly back on my mind are remem- 

 brances of my delight in the histories of Joseph 

 and of David; and of my keen a])preciation of the 

 chivalrous kindness of Abraham in his dealing 

 with Lot. Like a sudden tlash there returns back 

 upon me, my utter scorn of the pettifogging mean- 

 ness of Jacob, and my sympathetic grief over the 

 heartbreaking lamentation of the cheated Esau, 

 " Hast thou not a blessing for me also, my 

 father?" And I see, as in a cloud, pictures 

 of the grand phantasmagoria of the Book of Reve- 

 lation. 



I enumerate, as they issue, the childish impres- 

 sions which come crowding out of tlie pigeon-holes 

 in my brain, in Mhieh they have lain almost un- 

 disturbed for forty years. I prize them as an 

 evidence that a child of five or six vears old, left 

 to his own devices, may be deeply interested in 

 the Bible, and draw sound moral sustenance from 

 it. And I rejoice that I was left to deal with the 

 Bible alone; for if I had had some theological 

 " explainer " at my side, he might have tried, as 

 such do, to lessen my indignation against Jacob, 

 and thereby have warped my moral sense for ever; 

 while the great apocalyptic spectacle of the ulti- 

 mate triumph of right and justice might have been 



