" And I say, "Polly dear, I guess we're a-goin' to
have rain, for that plaguy cute rheumatis has seized my foot and it
does antagonize me so I have no peace. It always does so when it's
like for a change." "Dear heart," she says (the poor simple critter),
"then I guess I had better rub it, hadn't I, Sam?" and she crawls out
of bed and gets her red flannel petticoat, and rubs away at my foot
ever so long. Oh, Sam, if she could rub it out of my heart as easy as
she thinks she rubs it out of my foot, I should be in peace, that's a
fact.
"'What's done, Sam, can't be helped, there is no use in cryin' over
spilt milk, but still one can't help a-thinkin' on it. But I don't
love schisms and I don't love rebellion.
"'Our revolution has made us grow faster and grow richer; but Sam,
when we were younger and poorer, we were more pious and more happy.
We have nothin' fixed either in religion or politics. What connection
there ought to be atween Church and State, I am not availed, but some
there ought to be as sure as the Lord made Moses. Religion when left
to itself, as with us, grows too rank and luxuriant. Suckers and
sprouts, and intersecting shoots, and superfluous wood, make a
nice shady tree to look at, but where's the fruit, Sam? That's the
question--where's the fruit? No; the pride of human wisdom, and the
presumption it breeds will ruinate us.
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