Intra Muros
By
REBECCA RUTER SPRINGER
DAVID C. COOK PUBLISHING CO.
ELGIN, ILLINOIS
Copyright, 1898,
By David C. Cook Publishing Co.
Elgin, Illinois.
AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
The pages of this little volume contain no fancy sketch, written towhile away an idle hour; but are the true, though greatly condensed,record of an experience during days when life hung in the balancebetween Time and Eternity, with the scales dipping decidedly toward theEternity side.
I am painfully aware of the fact that I can never paint for others thescenes as they appeared to me during those wonderful days. If I canonly dimly show the close linking of the two lives—the mortal with thedivine—as they then appeared to me, I may be able to partly tear theveil from the death we so dread, and show it to be only an open doorinto a new and beautiful phase of the life we now live.
If any of the scenes depicted should seem irreverent in view of ourreligious training here, I can only say, "I give it as it came to me."In those strange, happy hours the close blending of the two lives, sowrapped about with the Father's watchful care and tender love; thereunion of friends, with the dear earth-ties unchanged; the satisfieddesires, the glad surprises and the divine joys, all intensified andillumined by the reverence and love and adoration that all hearts gaveto the blessed Trinity, appeared to me the most perfect revelation ofthat "blessed life" of which here we so fondly dream. With the hopethat it may comfort and uplift some who read, even as it then did, andas its memory ever will do, for me, I submit this imperfect sketch of amost perfect vision.
R.R.S.
"Shall we stop at that poor line, the grave, which all ourChristianity is always trying to wipe out and make nothing of, andwhich we always insist on widening into a great gulf? Shall we notstretch our thought beyond, and feel the life-blood of this holychurch, this living body of Christ, pulsing out into the saints who areliving there, and coming back throbbing with tidings of their gloriousand sympathetic life?"
—Rt. Rev. Phillips Brooks, D. D.
When the holy angels meet us,
As we go to join their band,
Shall we know the friends that greet us,
In the glorious spirit-land?
Shall we see the same eyes shining
On us, as in days of yore?
Shall we feel their dear arms twining
Fondly 'round us as before?
Shall we know each other there?
—[Rev. R. Lowry.
I was many hundred miles away from home and friends, and had been veryill for many weeks. I was entirely among strangers, and my onlyattendant, though of a kindly disposition, knew nothing whatever of theduties of the sick room; hence I had none of the many delicateattentions that keep up an invalid's failing strength. I had taken nonourishment of any kind for nearly three weeks, scarcely even water,and was greatly reduced in both flesh and strength, and consciousnessseemed at times to wholly desert me. I had an unutterable longing forthe presence of my dear distant ones; for the gentle touch of belovedhands, and whispered words of love