A Life for a Love by L.T. Meade

Some people concern themselves vey much with the mysteries of life, others take what good things fall into their way without question or wonder. These latter folk are not of a speculating or strongly reasoning turn; if sorrow arrives they accept it as wise, painful, inevitable -- if joy visits them they rejoice, but with simplicity. They are the people who are naturally endowed with faith -- faith first of all in a guiding providence, which as a rule is accompanied by a faith in their fellow men. The world is kind to such individuals, for the world is very fond of giving what is expected of it -- to one hate and distrust, to another open-handed benevolence and cordiality. People so endowed are usually fortunate, and of them it may be said, that it was good for them to be born.

All people are not so constituted -- there is such a thing as a noble discontent, and the souls that in the end often attain to the highest, have nearly suffered shipwreck, have spent with St. Paul a day and a night in the deep -- being saved in the end with a great deliverance -- they have often on the road been all but lost. Such people often sin very deeply -- temptation assails them in the most subtle forms, many of them go down really into the deep, and are never in this life heard of again -- they are spoken of as "lost," utterly lost, and their names are held up to others as terrible warnings, as examples to be shunned, as reprobates to be spoken of with bated breath.