Such was the course of things, until Dolly had reached her seventeenth year and was half through it. Then, in the spring, long before school term ended, came a sudden summons for her. Mr. Copley had received the appointment of a consulship in London; he and his family were about to transfer themselves immediately to this new sphere of activity, and Dolly of course must go along. Her books were hastily fetched from school, her clothes packed up; and Dolly and her kind friends in Walnut Street sat together the last evening in a very subdued frame of mind.
"I don't see what your father wanted of a consulship, or anything else that would take him out of his country!" Mr. Eberstein uttered his rather grumbling complaint. "He has enough to satisfy a man without that."
"But what papa likes is precisely something to take him out of the country. He likes change"--said Dolly sorrowfully.
"He won't have much change as American Consul in London," Mr. Eberstein returned. "Business will pin him pretty close."
"I suppose it will be a change at first," said Dolly; "and then, when he gets tired of it, he will give it up, and take something else."
"And you, little Dolly, you are accordingly to be shoved out into the great, great world, long before you are ready for it."
"Is the world any bigger over there than it is on this side?" said Dolly, with a gleam of fun.
"Well, yes," said Mr. Eberstein. "Most people think so. And London _is_ a good deal bigger than Philadelphia."
"The world is very much alike all over," remarked Mrs. Eberstein; "in one place a little more fascinating and dangerous, in another a little less."
"Will it be more or less, over there, for me, Aunt Harry?"
"It would be 'more' for you anywhere, Dolly, soon. Why you are between sixteen and seventeen; almost a woman!" Mrs. Eberstein said with a sigh.
"No, not yet, Aunt Harry. I'll be a girl yet awhile. I can be that in England, can't I, as well as here?"
"Better," said Mr. Eberstein.
"But the world, nevertheless, _is_ a little bigger out there, Ned," his wife added.
"In what way, Aunt Harry? And what do you mean by the 'world' anyhow?"
"I mean what the Lord was speaking of, when He said to His disciples, 'If ye were of the world, the world would love his own; but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.'"
"That means, bad people?"
"Some of them are by no means bad people. Some of them are delightful people."
"Then I do not quite understand, Aunt Harry. I thought it meant not only _bad_ people, but gay people; pleasure lovers."
"Aren't you a lover of pleasure, Dolly?"
"Oh yes. But, Aunt Harry," Dolly said seriously, "I am _not_ a 'lover of pleasure more than a lover of God.'"
"No, thanks to His goodness! However, Dolly, people may be just as worldly without seeking pleasures at all. It isn't that."
"What is it, then?"
"I don't know how to put it. Ned, can you?"
"Why, Hal," said Mr. Eberstein pondering, "it comes to about this, I reckon. There are just two kingdoms in the world, upon earth I mean."
"Yes. Well? I know there are two kingdoms, and no neutral ground. But what is the dividing line? That is what we want to know."
"If there is no neutral ground, it follows that the border line of one kingdom is the border line of the other. To go out of one, is to go into the other."
"Well? Yes. That's plain."
"Then it is simple enough. What belongs to Christ, or what is done for Him or in His service, belongs to His kingdom. Of course, what is _not_ Christ's, nor is done for Him, nor in His service, belongs to the world."
There was a silence here of some duration; and then Dolly exclaimed, "I see it. I shall know now."
"What, Dolly?"
"How to do, Aunt Harry."
"How to do what?"
"Everything. I was thinking particularly just then"--Dolly hesitated.
"Yes, of what?"
"Of dressing myself."
"Dressing yourself, you chicken?"
"Yes, Aunt Harry. I see it. If I do not dress for Christ, I do it for the world."
"Don't go into another extreme now, Dolly."
"No, Aunt Harry. I cannot be wrong, can I, if I do it for Christ?"
"I wonder how many girls of sixteen in the country have such a thought?
And I wonder, how long will you be able to keep it, Dolly?"
"Why not, Aunt Harry?"
"O child! because you have got to meet the world."
"What will the world do to me?" Dolly asked, half laughing in her simple ignorance.
"When I think what it will do to you, Dolly, I am ready to break my heart. It will tempt you, child. It will tempt you with beauty, and with pleasant things; pleasant things that look so harmless! and it will seek to persuade you with sweet voices and with voices of authority; and it will show you everybody going one way, and that not your way."
"But I will follow Christ, Aunt Hal."
"Then you will have to bear reproach."
"I would rather bear the world's reproach, than His."
"If you don't get over-persuaded, child, or deafened with the voices!"