An American Tragedy - Theodore Dreiser (librera reader txt) š
- Author: Theodore Dreiser
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But worse yet, if anything, Mrs. Griffiths, because of what the Reverend McMillan had saidā āor failed to say, in answer to the final question asked by Governor Walthamā āand although subsequently in answer to an inquiry of her own, he had repeated the statement, she was staggered by the thought that perhaps, after all, Clyde was as guilty as at first she had feared. And because of that asking at one point:
āClyde, if there is anything you have not confessed, you must confess it before you go.ā
āI have confessed everything to God and to Mr. McMillan, Mother. Isnāt that enough?ā
āNo, Clyde. You have told the world that you are innocent. But if you are not you must say so.ā
āBut if my conscience tells me that I am right, is not that enough?ā
āNo, not if Godās word says differently, Clyde,ā replied Mrs. Griffiths nervouslyā āand with great inward spiritual torture. But he chose to say nothing further at that time. How could he discuss with his mother or the world the strange shadings which in his confession and subsequent talks with the Reverend McMillan he had not been able to solve. It was not to be done.
And because of that refusal on her sonās part to confide in her, Mrs. Griffiths, tortured, not only spiritually but personally. Her own sonā āand so near death and not willing to say what already apparently he had said to Mr. McMillan. Would not God ever be done with this testing her? And yet on account of what McMillan had already saidā āthat he considered Clyde, whatever his past sins, contrite and clean before the Lordā āa youth truly ready to meet his Makerā āshe was prone to rest. The Lord was great! He was merciful. In His bosom was peace. What was deathā āwhat lifeā āto one whose heart and mind were at peace with Him? It was nothing. A few years (how very few) and she and Asa and after them, his brothers and sisters, would come to join himā āand all his miseries here would be forgotten. But without peace in the Lordā āthe full and beautiful realization of His presence, love, care and mercyā āā ā¦ā! She was tremulous at moments now in her spiritual exaltationā āno longer quite normalā āas Clyde could see and feel. But also by her prayers and anxiety as to his spiritual welfare, he was also able to see how little, really, she had ever understood of his true moods and aspirations. He had longed for so much there in Kansas City and he had had so little. Thingsā ājust thingsā āhad seemed very important to himā āand he had so resented being taken out on the street as he had been, before all the other boys and girls, many of whom had all the things that he so craved, and when he would have been glad to have been anywhere else in the world than out thereā āon the street! That mission life that to his mother was so wonderful, yet, to him, so dreary! But was it wrong for him to feel so? Had it been? Would the Lord resent it now? And, maybe, she was right as to her thoughts about him. Unquestionably he would have been better off if he had followed her advice. But how strange it was, that to his own mother, and even now in these closing hours, when above all things he craved sympathyā ābut more than sympathy, true and deep understandingā āeven nowā āand as much as she loved and sympathized with, and was seeking to aid him with all her strength in her stern and self-sacrificing wayā āstill he could not turn to her now and tell her, his own mother, just how it all happened. It was as though there was an unsurmountable wall or impenetrable barrier between them, built by the lack of understandingā āfor it was just that. She would never understand his craving for ease and luxury, for beauty, for loveā āhis particular kind of love that went with show, pleasure, wealth, position, his eager and immutable aspirations and desires. She could not understand these things. She would look on all of it as sinā āevil, selfishness. And in connection with all the fatal steps involving Roberta and
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