Thomas Wingfold. Volume II by George MacDonald

It was some moments before either of them spoke, and it did not help / Wingfold that she sat clouded by a dark-coloured veil. At length he / said,

"You must not fear to trust me because I doubt my ability to help / you. I can at least assure you of my sympathy. The trouble I have / myself had enables me to promise you that."

"Can you tell me," she said, from behind more veils than that of / lace, "how to get rid of a haunting idea?"

"That depends on the nature of the idea, I should imagine," answered / the curate. "Such things sometimes arise merely from the state of / the health, and there the doctor is the best help."

Helen shook her head, and smiled behind her veil a grievous smile. / The curate paused, but, receiving no assistance, ventured on again.

"If it be a thought of something past and gone, for which nothing / can be done, I think activity in one's daily work must be the best / aid to endurance."

"Oh dear! oh dear! " sighed Helen -- "when one has no heart to endure, / and hates the very sunlight! -- You wouldn't talk about work to a man / dying of hunger, would you?"

"I'm not sure about that."

"He wouldn't heed you."

"Perhaps not."

"What would you do then?"

"Give him some food, and try him again, I think."

"Then give me some food -- some hope, I mean, and try me again. / Without that, I don't care about duty or life or anything."

"Tell me, then, what is the matter; I MAY be able to hint at some / hope," said Wingfold, very gently. "Do you call yourself a / Christian?"

The question would to most people have sounded strange, abrupt, / inquisitorial; but to Helen it sounded not one of them all.

"No," she answered.

"Ah! " said the curate a little sadly, and went on. "Because then I / could have said, you know where to go for comfort. -- Might it not be / well however to try if there is any to be had from him that said / 'COME UNTO ME, AND I WILL GIVE YOU REST?"

"I can do nothing with that. I have tried and tried to pray, but it / is of no use. There is such a weight on my heart that no power of / mine can lift it up. I suppose it is because I cannot believe there / is anyone hearing a word I say. Yesterday, when I got alone in the / park, I prayed aloud: I thought that perhaps, even if he might not / be able to read what was in my heart, he might be able to hear my / voice. I was even foolish enough to wish I knew Greek, because / perhaps he would understand me better if I were to pray in Greek. My / brain seems turning. It is of no use! There is no help anywhere!"

She tried hard, but could not prevent a sob. And then came a burst / of tears.

"Will you not tell me something about it? " said the curate, yet more / gently. Oh, how gladly would he relieve her heart if he might! / "Perhaps Jesus has begun to give you help, though you do not know it / yet," he said, "His help may be on the way to you, or even with you, / only you do not recognize it for what it is. I have known that kind / of thing. Tell me some fact or some feeling I can lay hold of. / Possibly there is something you ought to do and are not doing, and / that is why you cannot rest. I think Jesus would give no rest except / in the way of learning of him."