Anna Alice Chapin

“ She was trembling all over.
“Go home,” said the priest, and his voice was more and more altered, more cadenced, richer in inflections. “Go home, and—burn the little brown book.”
“The little brown—— How did you know it was brown?” gasped Philippa, her head whirling under the thought that was taking shape in her.
The priest's voice went on, strongly, and with authority:
“It is not well to live too much in the past, or to grieve unduly over those sins that have been buried—and that, perhaps, have blossomed into good uses. The past is past, do not forget that. ”

“ When she could quiet herself again, the priest was speaking:
“To lead a man into sin is a very grave thing; to hurt a man's ideals a great wrong; to kill a man's spiritual future is, perhaps, the deepest crime of all. But you do not know in truth that you have done this. There are things stronger than all sin. I do not speak of God, but of the power in ourselves. This man—suppose—suppose that from that deep bitterness, that cruel pain ——”
“Ah, father, you do understand!” murmured Pippa.
For the priest's voice was troubled by a very human roughness. ”

“ And reprehensible as literary folk consider the habit of marking a book, it is of infinite value to the student of human nature who comes after. Faint notes of irony, nearly rubbed off the page; vehement bracketings of pungent truths; light, shy underpencilings of sentences full of sentiment or pathos—these are the soul prints that they who run may read.
Pippa stood fingering the litter of books. Her white gloves got dirty, and she did not even notice. The aged book-seller regarded her without apparent interest. ”