My quest for God . f-conquest as self-development! But I did not know it, and sothrew myself desperately into the struggle. I devoted myselfmore entirely to religious work, taught with greater earnestnessin the Sunday School, visited my scholars assiduously, took partin evangelistic services, attended revivalist prayer-meetings. Meanwhile, beneath this continuous strain, my strength col-lapsed. Doctors could not discover what was the matter withme. There were no indications of disease, yet I grew incapableof doing anything. On two occasions I spent about three monthswith relatives in Liverpool
My quest for God . f-conquest as self-development! But I did not know it, and sothrew myself desperately into the struggle. I devoted myselfmore entirely to religious work, taught with greater earnestnessin the Sunday School, visited my scholars assiduously, took partin evangelistic services, attended revivalist prayer-meetings. Meanwhile, beneath this continuous strain, my strength col-lapsed. Doctors could not discover what was the matter withme. There were no indications of disease, yet I grew incapableof doing anything. On two occasions I spent about three monthswith relatives in Liverpool, but on returning to work soon be-came as bad as ever. Before this I had a ten-day trip up theRhine with a relative. These holidays were a very great gain tome, in enlarging my narrow world ; but a gain of which I couldnot then reap the advantage. Nothing short of a completeinward revolution could save me, and enable me to enter intopossession of myself. But I still had not lived out completely the religion I pro-. {To face p. 41. CHRISTIANITY IN LODGINGS. 41 fessed. I had not yet gone thoroughly through with it. It wasthe teaching of Mr. and Mrs. Pearsall Smith on the subject ofHoHness through Faith that enabled me to do this. Further helpcame from a growing companionship of thought with the womanI afterwards loved. Also my mind had begun to open to thecharms of literature. The first consciousness of this came to mein reading David Elginbrod. It was during one of my times ofphysical collapse. I was sitting in my uncles large and beautifulgarden, surrounded by wooded slopes and grass and a profusionof flowers. The August sun fell warmly on me, and the breezekept me from feeling overcome with the heat. In this lap ofluxury, with David Elginbrod for my more definite inspiration,I realised for the first time, though but dimly, that I had a soulin communion with Nature, and my love went out to Nature,and we began to grow one. This would be in the middle periodof my time at Norwich
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