What is troubling you? You have something on your mind." The words were spoken by an eminent "psychiatrist" to a young man sitting in his office. The patient was a young French nobleman. He had with him letters of introduction from the Emperor. He was a man of wealth as well as rank. He was beloved in his family and esteemed by his friends.
But was he happy? No, a deep gloom hung over his spirits, which neither the charms of a happy family nor the duties of public life could dispel. To the doctor's question, he replied: "Oh, there is nothing particular."
"I know better," said the doctor. "I must know what is troubling you. Perhaps an inordinate ambition may have to do with it?"
"No, I have no desire for great things. I am in the position just suited to my tastes and wishes."
"Some family trouble or bereavement?"
"No, doctor; peace and love reign in my family, and my circle is unbroken."
"Have you any enemies?"
"Not that I am aware of."
"Have you lost any reputation in your country?"
"No."
The doctor studied for a few minutes, and then asked:
"What subject most frequently occupies your mind?"
"You are approaching a matter which I hardly like to speak of, doctor. My father was an infidel; my grandfather was an infidel, and I was brought up an infidel. To me, the ceremonies of religion are as repugnant to common sense as its mysteries are to reason. I do not believe in revelation, and yet, I must confess, one of its dogmas haunts me like a specter. I try to persuade myself that it is the result of a disordered state of the brain, "yet my mind is continually occupied with it."
"Will you tell me what it is."
"Eternity, where shall it find me? For the last three years these words have haunted me. A vision of the last judgment is constantly present to my mind. The end of all things seems to have come, and the great white throne is set up. There is One seated on the throne, whose look of stern justice terrifies me. I try to escape, but heaven and earth have disappeared, and I am left alone. Every moment I expect to hear the awful words.
" 'Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels!' "
"What makes you fear such a sentence?"
"Well, in the eyes of men my life is deemed irreproachable, and not without reason. I have less to accuse myself of than most of my acquaintances. But in the presence of such dazzling glory—such spotless purity—my very best actions appear black and hideous. I feel guilty and condemned, and long to find some spot where I can hide from His presence."
"Is that what causes the melancholy?"
"I suppose so. I cannot get rid of this terrible vision."
"Ah!" said the doctor, "I am afraid you have come to the wrong physician."
"Is there no hope for me?" exclaimed the young man. "I walk about in the daytime: I lie down at night, and it comes upon me continually.
"Eternity, and where shall I spend it? This depression of spirits is endangering my reason. Doctor, do help me if you can."
"Now, just sit down and be quiet. A few years ago I was an infidel. I did not believe in God, and was in the same condition as you are now. I have by me an old Book which contains a remedy for your disease," said the doctor as he took down a Bible. He turned to the fifty-third chapter of Isaiah, and read: " 'Who hath believed our report? And to whom is the arm of the Lord revealed? For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground. He hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see Him, there is no beauty that we should desire Him.' "
"Of whom do these verses speak?"
"Of the Lord Jesus Christ whom God sent into the world, that by His death He might make atonement for sin." The doctor read on: " 'He is despised and rejected of men; a Man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and we hid as it were our faces from Him; He was despised, and we esteemed Him not.' "
"That is indeed true," asserted the young man.
" 'But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with His stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all."
"What does that mean, doctor?"
"That the Son of God took the sinner's place and bore the punishment due to the sinner."
"Is it possible, doctor? What divine beauty and simplicity! The guiltless dies for the guilty!"
The doctor read through the chapter. When he had finished, the young man said, "Do you believe this, that He voluntarily left heaven, came down to this earth, and suffered and died that we might be saved?"
"Yes, I believe it. That brought me out of infidelity, out of darkness into light." And he preached Christ unto him, with the result that the young man was able to do what the doctor had done— put in "my" for "our" and say: "He was wounded for my transgressions, He was bruised for my iniquities: the chastisement of my peace was upon Him; and with His stripes I am healed."
Some time after his return to France the young man wrote to the doctor in London, telling him that the question of "Eternity and where he should spend it," was settled and troubling him no more. He had found "joy and peace in believing."
END