So, when Priscilla was not with her, she usually sat with Mant's Bible
before her, and after following the text with her eyes for a little
while, she would gradually permit them to wander as her thoughts had
already insisted on wandering.
But Nancy's Sunday thoughts were rarely quite out of keeping with
the devout and reverential intention implied by the book spread open
before her. She was not theologically instructed enough to discern
very clearly the relation between the sacred documents of the past
which she opened without method, and her own obscure, simple life; but
the spirit of rectitude, and the sense of responsibility for the
effect of her conduct on others, which were strong elements in Nancy's
character, had made it a habit with her to scrutinize her past
feelings and actions with self-questioning solicitude. Her mind not
being courted by a great variety of subjects, she filled the vacant
moments by living inwardly, again and again, through all her
remembered experience, especially through the fifteen years of her
married time, in which her life and its significance had been doubled.
She recalled the small details, the words, tones, and looks, in the
critical scenes which had opened a new epoch for her, by giving her
a deeper insight into the relations and trials of life, or which had
called on her for some little effort of forbearance, or of painful
adherence to an imagined or real duty- asking herself continually
whether she had been in any respect blameable.
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