The gates ajar. By Elizabeth Stuart Phelps.

14 The Gates Ajar.
I looked up. "I thought somebody had
ought to come," continued the Deacon, "to
confer with you as a Christian brother on
your spiritooal condition."
I opened my eyes.
"To confer with you on your spiritooal condition," repeated my visitor. "I understand
that you have had some unfortoonate exercises of mind under your affliction, and I observed that you absented yourself from the
Communion Table last Sunday."
"I did."
"Intentionally? "
Intentionally."
He seemed to expect me to say something
more; and, seeing that there was no help for
it, I answered.
"I did not feel fit to go. I should not have
dared to go. God does not seem to me just
now what He used to. He has dealt very bitterly with me. But, however wicked I may be,
I will not mock Him. I think, Deacon Quirk,
that I did right to stay away."
"Well," said the Deacon, twirling his hat
with a puzzled look, "perhaps you did But
I don't see the excuse for any such feelings as
would make it necessary. I think it my duty