Goodness and Gayety
a pitiless strain. When we read in the diary of Henry Alline, quoted by Dr. William James in his "Varieties of Religious Experience," "On Wednesday the twelfth I preached at a wedding, and had the happiness thereby to be the means of excluding carnal mirth," we are not merely sorry for the wedding guests, but beset by doubts as to their moral gain.
Why should Henry Martyn, that fervent young missionary who gave his life for his cause with the straight-forward simplicity of a soldier, have regretted so bitterly an occasional lapse into good spirits? He was inhumanly serious, and he prayed by night and day to be saved from his "besetting sin" of levity. He was consumed by the flame of religious zeal, and he bewailed at grievous length, in his diary, his "light, worldly spirit." He toiled unrestingly, taking no heed of his own physical weakness, and he asked himself (when he had a minute to spare) what would become
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