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Chris Dannen

Introducing Ethereum and

Solidity
Foundations of Cryptocurrency and
Blockchain Programming for
Beginners
Chris Dannen
Brooklyn, New York, USA
Any source code or other supplementary material referenced by the
author in this book is available to readers on GitHub via the book’s
product page, located at www.apress.com/9781484225349 . For
more detailed information, please visit
http://www.apress.com/source-code .

ISBN 978-1-4842-2534-9 e-ISBN 978-1-4842-2535-6

DOI 10.1007/978-1-4842-2535-6

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017936045

© Chris Dannen 2017

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved by the

Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned,
specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations,
recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other
physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar
methodology now known or hereafter developed.

Trademarked names, logos, and images may appear in this book.

Rather than use a trademark symbol with every occurrence of a
trademarked name, logo, or image, we use the names, logos, and
images only in an editorial fashion and to the benefit of the
trademark owner, with no intention of infringement of the
trademark. The use in this publication of trade names, trademarks,
service marks, and similar terms, even if they are not identified as
such, is not to be taken as an expression of opinion as to whether or
not they are subject to proprietary rights.

While the advice and information in this book are believed to be true
and accurate at the date of publication, neither the authors nor the
editors nor the publisher can accept any legal responsibility for any
errors or omissions that may be made. The publisher makes no
warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained
herein.

Printed on acid-free paper

Distributed to the book trade worldwide by Springer

Science+Business Media New York, 233 Spring Street, 6th Floor,
New York, NY 10013. Phone 1-800-SPRINGER, fax (201) 348-4505,
e-mail [email protected], or visit
www.springeronline.com. Apress Media, LLC is a California LLC and
the sole member (owner) is Springer Science + Business Media
Finance Inc (SSBM Finance Inc). SSBM Finance Inc is a Delaware
corporation.
Many thanks to Brandon Buchanan, Christopher McClellan, Dr.
Solomon Lederer, and the entire Iterative Instinct team for their
support and enthusiasm. Thanks also to Joseph Lubin and the team
at ConsenSys for acting as a sounding board during the writing of
this book .
Contents
Chapter 1:​Bridging the Blockchain Knowledge Gap

Blockchain Roll Call!

What Ethereum Does

Three Parts of a Blockchain

Ethereum Assumes Many Chains

This Is a Scam, Just Like Bitcoin!

Ether as a Currency and Commodity

Gresham’s Law

The Path to Better Money

Cryptoeconomics and Security

Back to the Good Old Days

Cryptochaos

The Power Is in the Protocol

You Can Build Trustless Systems

What Smart Contracts (Really) Do

Objects and Methods for Value

Just Add Commerce

Content Creation
 Where’s the Data?​

What Is Mining?​

Ether and Electricity Prices

Going Inside the EVM

The Mist Browser

Browser vs.​Wallet or Keychain

Solidity Is Kind of Like JavaScript, But …

What Ethereum Is Good For

A Critical Take

State of Smart Contract Development Today

Deciding Where You Fit In

A Note to New Programmers

Ethereum Is Free and Open Source

The EVM Is Here to Stay

What You Can Build Today

Private and Public Chains

The Promise of Decentralized Databases

What’s Next:​New Ways of Working

Summary

Chapter 2:​The Mist Browser

Wallets as a Computing Metaphor

Your Address Is What?​

Where Is My Ether?​

The Bank Teller Metaphor

In Cryptocurrency, You Hold Your Own Assets

Visualizing Ethereum Transactions

Breaking with Banking History

How Encryption Leads to Trust

System Requirements

More about Eth.​guide and This Book

Tools for Developers

CLI Nodes

Recommended:​Using Parity with Geth

Finally, into the Mist!

Downloading and Installing Mist

Configuring Mist

Finding Your New Address

Sending and Receiving Ether

Understanding Ethereum Account Types

Backing Up and Restoring Your Keys

 Using Paper Wallets

Using Mobile Wallets

Working with Messages and Transactions

So, What Is a Blockchain?​

Paying for Transactions

Understanding Denominations

Getting Ether

Anonymity in Cryptocurrency

Blockchain Explorers

Summary

Chapter 3:​The EVM

The Central Bank Network of Yesterday

What are Virtual Machines, Exactly?​

The Role of the Ethereum Protocol in Banking

Anyone Can Make a Banking Platform

What the EVM Does

EVM Applications Are Called Smart Contracts

The Name “Smart Contracts”

The EVM Runs Bytecode

Understanding State Machines

 Digital vs.​Analog

“State-ments”

Data’s Role in State

How the Guts of the EVM Work

The EVM Constantly Checks for Transactions

Creating a Common Machine Narrative of What ­‐

Happened

Cryptographic Hashing

What Hash Functions (or Hash Algorithms) Do

Blocks:​The History of State Changes

Understanding Block Time

The Drawbacks of Short Blocks

“Solo Node” Blockchain

Distributed Security

Mining’s Place in the State Transition Function

Renting Time on the EVM

Hello, Gas

Why Is Gas So Important?​

Why Isn’t Gas Priced in Ether?​

Fees as Regulation
 Working with Gas

Gas Specifics

How Gas Relates to Scaling the System

Accounts, Transactions, and Messages

Externally Owned Accounts

Contract Accounts

Transactions and Messages

Characteristics of Transactions

Characteristics of Messages

Estimating Gas Fees for Operations

Opcodes in the EVM

Summary

Chapter 4:​Solidity Programming

Primer

Global Banking Made (Almost) Real

Extra-Large Infrastructure

Worldwide Currency?​

Complementary Currency

The Promise of Solidity

Browser Compiler
Learning to Program the EVM

Easy Deployment

The Case for Writing Business Logic in Solidity

Code, Deploy, Relax

Design Rationale

Writing Loops in Solidity

Expressiveness and Security

The Importance of Formal Proofs

Historical Impact of a Shared Global Resource

How Attackers Bring Down Communities

Hypothetical Attack Written in Solidity

Automated Proofs to the Rescue?​

Determinism in Practice

Lost in Translation

Testing, Testing, Testing

Command Line Optional!

Formatting Solidity Files

Tips for Reading Code

Statements and Expressions in Solidity

What Is an Expression?​
 What Is a Statement?​

Functions, Public and Private

Value Types

Booleans

Signed and Unsigned Integers

Addresses

Members of Addresses

Address-Related Keywords

Less-Common Value Types

Complex (Reference) Types

Global Special Variables, Units, and Functions

Block and Transaction Properties

Operators Cheat Sheet

Global Functions

Exceptions and Inheritance

Summary

Chapter 5:​Smart Contracts and Tokens

EVM as Back End

Smart Contracts to Dapps

Assets Backed by Anything

 Bartering with Fiat Currency

Ether as Glass Beads

Cryptocurrency Is a Measure of Time

Asset Ownership and Civilization

Coins are Collectibles

The Function of Collectibles in Human Systems

Early Counterfeiting

Jewelry and Art as Money

The Step Toward Banknotes

Platforms for High-Value Digital Collectibles

Tokens Are a Category of Smart Contract

Tokens as Social Contracts

Tokens Are a Great First App

Creating a Token on the Testnet

Getting Test Ether from the Faucet

Registering Your Tokens

Deploying Your First Contract

Same House, Different Address

Playing with Contracts

Summary
Chapter 6:​Mining Ether

What’s the Point?​

Ether’s Source

Defining Mining

Versions of the Truth

Difficulty, Self-Regulation, and the Race for Profit

How Proof of Work Helps Regulate Block Time

What’s Going on with the DAG and Nonce?​

All This for Faster Blocks?​

Making Fast Blocks Work

How Ethereum Uses Stale Blocks

Uncle Rules and Rewards

The Difficulty Bomb

Miner’s Winning Payout Structure

Limits on Ancestry

The Block Processing Play by Play

Evaluating the Ancestry of Blocks and Transactions

How Ethereum and Bitcoin Use Trees

Merkle-Patricia Trees

Contents of an Ethereum Block Header

 Forking

Mining Tutorial

Installing Geth on macOS

Installing Geth on Windows

Getting Comfortable with the Command Line

Installing Geth on Ubuntu 14.​04

Executing Commands in the EVM via the Geth Console

Launching Geth with Flags

Fire Up Your Miner!

Mining on the Testnet

GPU Mining Rigs

Mining on a Pool with Multiple GPUs

Summary

Chapter 7:​Cryptoeconomics Survey

How We Got Here

New Technologies Create New Economies

Rules of the Game

Why Is Cryptoeconomics Useful?​

Understanding Hashing vs.​Encryption

Encryption
 Hashing

Why the Speed of Blocks Matters

Ether Issuance Scheme

Common Attack Scenarios

Social Proof Between Machines

Security as the Network Scales

More About Cryptoeconomics

Summary

Chapter 8:​Dapp Deployment

Seven Ways to Think About Smart Contracts

Dapp Contract Data Models

How an EVM Back End Talks to a JS Front End

JSON-RPC

Web 3 Is Here (Almost)

Experimenting with the JavaScript API

Using Geth for Dapp Deployment

Using Meteor with the EVM

Install Web3.​js to Build an Ethereum-Enabled Web ­‐

Application

Executing Contracts in the Console

 How Contracts Expose an Interface

Recommendations for Prototyping

Third-Party Deployment Libraries

Summary

Chapter 9:​Creating Private Chains

Private and Permissioned Chains

Setting Up a Local Private Chain

Optional Flags to Use with New Chains

Private Blockchains in Production Usage

Summary

Chapter 10:​Use Cases

Chains Everywhere

The Internet of Ethereum Things

Retail and E-Commerce

Community and Government Financing

Human and Organizational Behavior

Financial and Insurance Applications

Inventory and Accounting Systems

Software Development

Gaming, Gambling, and Investing

 Summary

Chapter 11:​Advanced Concepts

Who Is Leading Software Developers Toward

Decentralization​?​

Vitalik’s Best Technical Blog Posts

The Ethereum Release Schedule

Whisper (Messaging)

Swarm (Content Addressing)

What the Future Holds

Other Interesting Innovations

Full Ethereum Roadmap

Frontier Release (2015)

Homestead Release (2016)

Metropolis (2017)

Serenity (2018)

Summary

Index
Contents at a Glance
About the Author

About the Technical Reviewer

Chapter 1:​Bridging the Blockchain Knowledge Gap

Chapter 2:​The Mist Browser

Chapter 3:​The EVM

Chapter 4:​Solidity Programming

Chapter 5:​Smart Contracts and Tokens

Chapter 6:​Mining Ether

Chapter 7:​Cryptoeconomics Survey

Chapter 8:​Dapp Deployment

Chapter 9:​Creating Private Chains

Chapter 10:​Use Cases

Chapter 11:​Advanced Concepts

Index
About the Author and About the
Technical Reviewer
About the Author
Chris Dannen
is a partner and founder at Iterative Instinct,
a hybrid investment fund focused on
cryptocurrency trading and seed-stage
venture investments. He first began working
with Bitcoin and Ethereum as a miner, and
became gradually more enthralled in
researching how smart contracts could be
used to automate business logic and create
new kinds of experiences with software. He
was formerly a corporate strategist for
Fortune 500 companies. A self-taught
programmer in Objective-C and JavaScript,
he holds one computer hardware patent. This is his fourth book.
Chris is an avid traveler who has trekked across 20 countries,
bicycled from Rome to Barcelona in 30 days, and summited Mount
Fuji in under six hours. He was formerly a senior editor at Fast
Company and today consults on technical content for major
publishers such as Quartz and Bloomberg . He graduated from the
University of Virginia and now resides in New York, NY.

About the Technical Reviewer

Massimo Nardone
has more than 22 years of experience in
security, web/mobile development, and cloud
and IT architecture. His true IT passions are
security and Android. He has been
programming and teaching how to program
with Android, Perl, PHP, Java, VB, Python,
C/C++, and MySQL for more than 20 years.
He holds a master of science degree in
computing science from the University of
Salerno, Italy.
He has worked as a project manager,
software engineer, research engineer, chief security architect,
information security manager, PCI/SCADA auditor and senior lead IT
security/cloud/SCADA architect for many years. Technical skills
include security, Android, cloud, Java, MySQL, Drupal, Cobol, Perl,
web and mobile development, MongoDB, D3, Joomla, Couchbase,
C/C++, WebGL, Python, Pro Rails, Django CMS, Jekyll, Scratch, and
more.
He currently works as chief information security officer (CISO) for
CargotecOyj. He worked as visiting lecturer and supervisor for
exercises at the Networking Laboratory of the Helsinki University of
Technology (Aalto University). He holds four international patents
(PKI, SIP, SAML and Proxy areas).
Massimo has reviewed more than 40 IT books for various
publishing companies. He is the coauthor of Pro Android Games
(Apress, 2015).
© Chris Dannen 2017
Chris Dannen, Introducing Ethereum and Solidity, DOI 10.1007/978-1-4842-2535-
6_1
1. Bridging the Blockchain Knowledge
Gap
Chris Dannen1
(1) Brooklyn, New York, USA

Acclimating to the fast-moving blockchain world can be challenging.

This book is your guide. Before we get started, let’s define some of
the terms you’ll encounter ahead
A blockchain is a fully-distributed, peer-to-peer software network
which makes use of cryptography to securely host applications, store
data, and easily transfer digital instruments of value that represent
real-world money. Cryptography is the art of communication via
coded messages. In Bitcoin and Ethereum, cryptography is used to
conjur one secure computing environment out of thousands of
similar machines, running with no central authority and no single
owner. With that kind of potential, it’s obvious why the technology
has been subject to unprecedented speculation, hype, confusion,
and prognostication.
The term “Ethereum” can be used refer to three distinct things:
the Ethereum protocol, the Ethereum network created by computers
using the protocol, and the Ethereum project funding development
of the aforementioned two. On the heels of Bitcoin, Ethereum has
become its own macrocosm, attracting enthusiasts and engineers
from numerous industries. Many of civilization’s most nagging
imperfections could become the domain of blockchain’s killer apps,
and the Ethereum protocol (which was derived from Bitcoin, and
extended) is widely considered to be the network where these
“distributed” apps will spring up. For developers, designers, and
product managers, there’s no better time to begin prototyping
applications for the Ethereum network.
Blockchain Roll Call!
Two big groups of thinkers are interested in blockchain systems, and
Ethereum more specifically: application developers interested in
building products and services, and nonprogrammers who are
curious about the potential of Ethereum, perhaps owing to work or
interest in financial services, consulting, insurance, law, game
creation, government, logistics, product design, or IT.1 This book is
similarly cross-disciplinary. It provides a contextual guide for
programmers and non-programmers alike to develop ideas about
what to build, and how to build it. It fills a gap between computer
science, economics, financial services, and where necessary, banking
history.
For programmers, the challenging thing about Ethereum isn’t
usually the code; like most open source software projects, this one
has on-ramps for people who already program in other
environments. Rather, the challenge is wrapping your head around
the concept of “cryptoeconomics,” or the system of incentives and
disincentives which secure the network.
For nonprogrammers, the challenge is divining how the
ecosystem will develop, and how you fit in. Claims that blockchains
will modernize the banking system, revolutionize insurance, and lay
waste to counterfeiting may be overblown—but by how much?2
What Ethereum Does
In the abstract, open source blockchain networks such as Ethereum
and Bitcoin are kits that allow you to pop up an economic system in
software, complete with account management and a native unit of
exchange to pass between accounts. Kind of like the game Monopoly
. People call these native units of exchange coins, tokens, or
cryptocurrencies, but they’re no different from tokens in any other
system: they’re a form of money (or scrip) that is usable only within
that system.
Blockchains work something like mesh networks or local area
networks (LANs); they are merely connected to other “peer”
computers running the same software. When you want to make one
of these peer-to-peer (P2P) networks accessible through a web
browser, you need to use special software libraries such as Web3.js
to connect an application’s front end (the GUI you see in a browser),
via JavaScript APIs, to its back end (the blockchain).
In Ethereum, you can take this concept one step further by easily
writing financial contracts with other users inside the system. As
you’ll see, these financial contracts are called smart contracts .

The key component is this idea of a Turing-complete blockchain.

… As a data structure, it works kind of the same way that
Bitcoin works, except the difference in Ethereum is, it has this
built-in programming language.
—Vitalik Buterin, inventor of Ethereum3

In Ethereum, smart contracts are written in the programming

language Solidity, which you’ll learn about in Chapter 4. Turing
completeness was an advantage that many developers quickly
latched onto, but more important is Ethereum’s ability to save state.
In computing, a simple definition of a stateful system is one that can
detect changes to information and remember them over time.
Exploring the Variety of Random
Documents with Different Content
 CHAPTER XIII.
A DREAM OF ETERNAL REST.
D
" O you see that young man with the dark, delicate features?" she
continued, giving an unexpected turn to the conversation. "I mean
the one with the brown eyes that have so strange a look in them. He
is a poet, and when he was on earth he was blind, but his songs
were sad as the sighing of the wind in the pine trees, and sweet with
sound, and perfume, and the love of woman. He and I were then, as
now, the most devoted of friends, and it was our custom to spend
one evening at least in each week together. Sometimes we talked of
places or of pictures (in both of which, notwithstanding his blindness,
he took a singular interest), sometimes of poetry or flowers. Not
seldom he would sketch out for me the plot of some story he was
writing, and often I would read aloud while he sat listening with
tranquil face and closed eyes in his accustomed place by the
fireside. I remember that on one occasion the piece which we thus
read together was Jean Paul's Dream of the Dead Christ saying
there is no God, and that when next I saw my poet-friend, he told me
that after I had left him, he had fallen asleep, and dreamed a dream
which he spoke of as 'the most impudent piece of plagiaristic
imitation which ever was perpetrated,' and which he called his
'Dream of Eternal Rest.'
"'As I sat here in the darkness which has now become to me like a
house of which I am the only tenant,' he said, 'I fell asleep and
dreamed that I saw my life lying behind me like the line of
phosphorescent light which marks the track of a fallen star—a line
traced in darkness, and which arising in darkness dies away into
darkness again; and in my dream an angel appeared unto me, and,
laying his hand upon my shoulder, said, "Thou who probest the
mysteries of life, and peerest into the time which is to be, arise,
come with me, and I will show thee something of that which thou
seekest." So saying, he stretched forth his hand, which I clasped,
and we set forth on our infinite journey.
"'What abysmal realms of space we passed I know not, for I was as
one bewildered by the swiftness of our flight and by the rushing beat
of the angel's pinions. I remember that ever and anon there swam up
in the darkness a gleam of light that was at first no bigger than a
single star, but which, as I looked, loomed out ever larger and larger,
and each moment seemed to double in magnitude, until I trembled
lest it should break the bounds of the heavens; but even as I
trembled, it swept whirling by with a sound like that of infinite
thunders, and, receding again, lessened before my eyes as visibly
as it had increased, and finally dwindling to a mere point of light, died
away into darkness. Ere long, however, there appeared a flush in the
distant east, and as we drew nearer I saw that, below me and afar,
there lay a land in which the sun shone with such exceeding
splendour, that the atmosphere, light-filled and luminous unto
sparkling, was in colour like unto the colour of a rainbow. And I saw
also that the rays neither dazzled nor scorched, as do the rays of the
earthly sun. And far as the eye could reach stretched shining hills,
seen through soft vistas of purple and gold, and sunny meadows
wherein bloomed flowers beautiful as the blush of a maiden, and
pure as an angel's thought. And winding in and out among the
meadows ran many a rippling river; and fountains also I saw, the
waters of which, as they rose and fell scintillating like a shower of
starbeams or spray of diamonds, discoursed music sweeter than the
sighing of Æolian harps. Then as I looked yet closer, I saw,
wandering hand in hand among the meadows, many white-clad
figures, whereat my soul wept for gladness; and I turned to the angel
saying, "Surely this is that Heaven whereof we read and wherein I
would rest for ever? for I am sore wearied with the toil and the labour
of earth." But he answered me, "Mortal, thou knowest not what thou
askest. Lift up thine eyes, and see if thou beholdest aught else."
"'And I looked to the right hand and to the left, yet saw I only the
sunny meadows and rivers of the land of flowers, and the blue
distance of the bordering hills. Then I turned me round and gazed
whence we came, but could nothing discern save remote plains of
darkness, athwart the gloom of which I saw flash ever and anon (as
one sees flash the eyes of a beast at midnight) the glimmer of a
moving world. Then the angel stretched forth his hand, pointing me
yet again to the distant east, and far away beyond the beauteous
realm I beheld a vast plain of desolation, and beyond that a land
whereof I could nothing see, save that a darkness, as of a twilight in
which there is no moon, brooded above it like a cloud.
"'Whereat a shuddering horror seized me, so that I could look no
more, and turning to the angel, I said, "Alas! lieth the region of
endless night so nigh unto the realm of eternal day?" But he
answered me sternly, "Mortal, thou speakest that of which thou art
ignorant. Come, let us go thither, that thou mayest see, and seeing,
learn." And I cast a longing look upon the beauteous land, and, lo!
on the faces of those who walked therein, I saw a shadow as of
something incomplete—not discontent, neither sorrow nor care, but
the look as of an unfulfilled aspiration; but, even as I gazed, the
angel smote the air with eagle pinion, and I beheld no more until we
came nigh unto our journey's end. Then, every stroke of his wing
bringing us nearer, he turned to me, once again bidding me "See,
and seeing, learn," but at my heart lay such a nameless terror that I
was as one spell-bound, and durst not look upon his face. And with
trembling voice I made answer, "Suffer me rather to depart, I pray
thee! for I would not that mine eyes should behold the horrors
whereof I have heard, and my soul longeth to return to the land of
flowers wherein they toil not, neither sorrow, and where I shall cease
from labour and be at rest."
"'But for the third time he bade me "See, and seeing, learn;" and as I
looked upon the land which lay below me, I saw—instead of the
realm of endless night—a shining city of such unimaginable beauty,
that my heart sank within me in breathless awe. Then the angel
spread forth his wings still and motionless, and we reposed on the
azure air as a planet floats upon the purple bosom of night; and
though neither sun nor moon was set in the peaceful heaven, I saw
that there rested over the city the soft splendour as of a world of far-
off stars. There was but one gate, and over that was written in letters
of light, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work," at which I
marvelled exceedingly; and inside the gate walked beings of such
divine dignity and soul beauty that I could have knelt worshipping
before them, were it not that they too were of human form and
feature; and I saw that all were earnestly but unhastily engaged in
some manner of work, at which they toiled serenely. And on every
forehead was set the seal of a high purpose, and over the city there
rested the calm of an immeasurable peace. Then silently upstole in
the sky the dawnings of a great light, deep and wide as the infinite of
Heaven, and athwart the glory thereof there spread the fore-
splendours as of the approach of an Awful Presence.
"'And around me fell a darkness like unto midnight, and, turning to
me yet again the angel said, "Mortal, thou mayest behold no more.
Return to thy home and to thy labour, never more to murmur or
complain, and when thou longest after the repose of the world to
come, know for a surety that there is no rest either in earth or in
heaven, save in the fulfilment of the work which God would have
thee to do;" and so saying, he too passed away into the darkness,
and—I awoke.'"
"That is a singular dream," I said, "although it was scarcely
necessary to have mentioned that your friend had been making a
study of Jean Paul. But I suppose there really is work to do in
Heaven?"
"It is very much as it is on earth in that respect," she answered,
"excepting that here one loves one's work, and, although here too,
there are alternate periods of labour and repose, it would be difficult
for some of us to say which is the sweeter. I could tell you which I
love the more, but then all our work is of our Father's ordering, and
He knows just what is best for each of us. Some who come here
(never mind my smile! I was thinking of the 'tired woman' who was
'going to do nothing for ever and ever') have to take a very long
holiday before they are allowed to put hand to anything; and others
there are whose first task it is to learn those lessons which, through
unfavourable circumstances or the accidents of their birth, it was
hardly to be expected they could have learned on earth. There are
some of the poorest of the poor in East London, among whom by our
Father's direction I am now working, who I believe have had scarcely
more opportunity of knowing what Christianity means to them than
have the very heathen. Some, when they come here, have to start
from the beginning, so you can believe that for you who can write, as
well as for those who can preach, there is every opportunity for the
exercise of God's gifts—only remember!" she added sadly, but with a
smile, "that the popular preacher of earth, be he poet or parson, is
not always the man who can do most good in heaven, for here one is
expected to practise as well as to preach."
"So you are entrusted with the task of ministering to certain of the
poor in East London?" I said; "I had no idea that our Father permitted
those who had once left the world to return to it again."
"Half of our work, and more, is on earth," she made answer. "It was
to tell you of that that I pointed out my poet-friend, the dreamer of
dreams, to you. Himself a poet, he was the son of a poet, who had
lived to see all else he loved on earth pass away before him; and
when this boy, his darling hope and only companion, was also taken,
the old man was left lonely, desolate and infirm. But not so lonely as
one might imagine, for his boy seldom leaves him, and the work
which God has set apart for the poet-son, and which is to him the
resting-work of heaven, is to be with his father in all sorrow, to
minister to him in all pain, and to be with him in every wakeful or
weary moment, his unseen comforter and friend."
I was interested in what she related, for I remembered that when I
was sitting one evening with the poet-father, he had told me that, for
all his loneliness, he was never alone. "No, I am never lonely," he
said, "although you will perhaps think what I am going to tell you is
but an old mans' fancy. A night or two after my dear boy died, I was
thinking of my dead youth, and of my dead wife, of my dead friends
and my dead children, until it seemed to me as if I, too, ought long
since to have been buried, for I was lingering on (like a spectral
moon when the sun is high) the living ghost of a vanished past. The
generation had departed which I knew, and the one which was
growing up around me was too busy listening to the songs of its own
singers to give ear to mine. As the thought of my loneliness, my
loveless life, and my boy's newly-made grave, away out in the dreary
cemetery, came over me, I did that which was cowardly and
faithless, and dropped my head upon my hands and wept. Then it
was that there came a touch upon my arm, and a voice in my ear,
and though I knew none else was in the room, I was not afraid, but
answered without looking up: 'Who is it?'
"'It is only I, dear father,' the voice replied, 'only your boy. You must
not be unhappy about me, for though I have greatly sinned, yet I
have been greatly forgiven, and am perfectly, peacefully happy.'
"My son then went on to tell me," the old man continued, "that for me
there was to be no more loneliness, for that in all my sleepless nights
and sorrowful days, he would be with me ever and always, my
constant companion and comforter, until for me too the time shall
come when,
"'Midnight waking, twilight weeping, heavy noontide—all are
done.'"

"That is a very touching incident," said my friend, when I had related

this conversation to her. "If all earth-dwellers were as spiritually-
minded as yonder poet's poet-father, and were as capable of
apprehending how real a thing spiritual companionship may be, our
dead would soon cease to be called our 'lost ones,' and death would
no longer be spoken of as the 'great parting.' Death gives us more
friends than he takes from us, and often brings us nearer to those
who have gone before, than we were during their lifetime. Though it
is nineteen hundred years since our Master, Christ, trod the earth a
visible Presence, yet He is more to the world to-day, and nearer to
each separate soul in it, than ever He was to the men and women
who touched garments with Him when He walked the fields of
Palestine. Then such as sought His aid had often to wait His coming
in weariness and weakness of soul, whilst not seldom it happened
that they could not obtain access to him 'because of the throng,' and
we read even of one who was fain to climb a tree to catch a glimpse
of Him in passing. Now He stands by each of us, waiting and willing
to hear. Then they had to go to Him; now He comes to us, and is
with us always and in every place. I tell you that Jesus Christ is as
real a Presence to-day in the streets of London or Boston, as He
was in the homes of Nazareth or Jerusalem. He is as near to us now
as He was to Martha and to Mary, and is as willing to help and hear
you or me, as He was to heal the sick, or to pardon the dying thief;"
and then in a low, sweet voice she repeated the following lines from
Whittier's poem, "Our Master":—
"But warm, sweet, tender, even yet
A present help is He;
And faith has still its Olivet,
And love its Galilee.

"The healing of His seamless dress

Is by our beds of pain;
We touch Him in life's throng and press,
And we are whole again.

"Through Him the first fond prayers are said,

Our lips of childhood frame,
The last low whispers of our dead
Are burdened with His name."
"The thought that the 'last low whispers' of the loved ones who have
left us were 'burdened' with the Name which we first learned to lisp
at our mother's knee is a very tender and beautiful one," she said
reverently, after a moment's silence. "We seem to see our own
fathers and mothers, and their fathers and mothers, linked to
ourselves, and through us to our children and our children's children,
until all the generations of the world—past, present, and future—
become as one family in a great bond of fellowship, even as all the
joy and sorrow of humanity find one common home in the heart of
the Lord Christ who loves us."
"I am not sure that I realize this love of His of which you speak," I
said sadly. "It is so vague and vast that I become lost, and feel that I
have no personal hold upon it. How can He love the whole world,
and yet love each separate individual in it with an affection as distinct
as that which I feel for my wife and children?"
"You cannot realize it as existing in yourself," she made answer,
"although even you love all your children, and yet love each one of
them with a distinct and personal love; but then you cannot order the
succession of the seasons, or stay a planet upon its course, and you
might just as well try to measure God's power by your power, as try
to apprehend the love which passeth understanding by likening it to
your own. But you will know what Christ is to us one day."
"Tell me more of Him," I whispered eagerly; "tell me more of Him. Did
you love Him as earnestly and believe in Him as trustfully when you
were on earth as you do now?"
"Not always," she answered sadly, "not always (and, oh! it was such
'cold comfort'—the talk of the Pantheists and the Deists to whom I
had gone), but I came at last to see that the Cross of Christ is
humanity's only hope. I came, too, to think that I could better bear to
disbelieve in a God at all than to disbelieve in the Saviour. 'By
Atheism,' I said to myself, 'I lose only a Deity of whom (excepting for
the gospel-revelation) I know practically nothing, but in losing Christ I
lose all—this world's hope as well as the next's.' There is not a creed
which has been offered us during the last eighteen hundred years as
a substitute for faith in the Saviour which does not take the very
basis of its being from Christianity."
"Yes," I said; "but many people will tell you that Christianity is nothing
more than a skilfully-framed fable, cunningly devised to adapt itself
to our human needs."
"Christ was, and Christianity was before humanity or its needs came
into being," she made answer; "and the sacrifice of the Cross was no
afterthought given as a concession to our human requirements. On
the contrary, our human requirements were given us that we,
through them, might come by way of Calvary to the feet of Christ;
and it is because it has been God's purpose from all eternity to save
the sinner by the sacrifice of Himself that you and I feel our need of a
Saviour."
"Yes," I said, "I do indeed feel that whatever help comes to me must
be something outside myself, and that no sorrowing of mine can
atone for the past; but I feel also that I, and I only, am responsible for
what I have done, and that to lay that responsibility upon another is
utterly inadequate to satisfy even my limited sense of justice—
besides which I never can and never will believe in the possibility of
the innocent being allowed to suffer for the guilty."
"But the innocent do suffer for the guilty," she said, "even in the very
earth-world, by the laws of which you wish to judge the heavenly
one. You profess yourself willing to abide by the evidence of your
senses, and if you will only look back upon the earth-life which you
have left, you will see that the sins of the fathers are visited upon the
children, and that the innocent are suffering for the guilty every day,
and that God, for some good reason of His own, allows it to be so.
As for what you say about your sense of justice, I agree with you that
if a man run into your debt—run into your debt by wilful and wicked
courses—he must be held answerable for the repayment of the
money. But supposing one comes forward who loves him, and who
has watched his sinnings with sorrow, and says, 'I will pay for my
friend that which he cannot pay for himself,' would not your sense of
justice be satisfied?"
"Even then the moral obligation remains," I objected.
"Yes, but that obligation has been transferred," she said, "although
as a matter of fact, it is against God rather than against man, that our
blackest sins are committed. But, independently of that side of the
question, Christ has taken the consequences of your sin, and of the
wrong you did Dorothy—the consequences to her, as well as to
yourself—upon Himself, and has suffered for you and for her in His
own person, and if He be willing to forgive, then are you forgiven
indeed!
"That reconciliation by the Saviour should at any time have been to
me an intellectual stumbling-block is now beyond my
comprehension," she continued earnestly. "In its very adaptability to
our human needs, Christianity bears the stamp of its divine origin.
Left to himself, the very best of us must feel his inability either to
atone for the evil he has already done, or to withstand the
temptations which yet await him in the future, and though he struggle
right manfully to clamber out of the gulf into which he has fallen, the
dead-weight of his sins, which he carries and must carry chained
log-like about him, is ever the heaviest clog to drag him back. But
Christianity does more for a man than merely forgive him his debts. It
sets the bankrupt upon his legs again, a solvent man and sane, with
a clean bill of health, and with a fresh start in life. It is the religion of
Hope, for none is too sinful for the Saviour to save, and to the man
who brings his sins, as well as his inability to resist his sins, to the
feet of Christ, there is indeed a present Help and Hope in all his
troubles! There is much—very much—in Christianity that I cannot
and do not pretend to understand, but I can understand enough to
make me very loving and very trustful. The only mystery which still
sometimes troubles me is that most terrible of all mysteries—the
mystery of human suffering. But even that I am content to leave, for
is not our God Himself a suffering God? and who that witnessed the
sufferings of Jesus Christ (and what sufferings were ever like to
His?) could have foreseen that the cruel Cross whereon He hung
should hereafter be the finger-post to point the way to heaven? or
that beneath His cry of agony in the garden, God heard the triumph-
song of a ransomed world?"
 CHAPTER XIV.
HOPE.
AT last there came a time, even in hell, when the burden of my sin
lay so heavily upon me, that I felt I could bear it no longer, and that if
succour there came none, the very soul of me must wither away and
die. It was not that I wanted to evade the punishment of my crime,
for I was willing and wished to undergo it to the uttermost. No, that
which was so terrible to me was the thought that not all the
sufferings of eternity could avail to wipe away the awful stain upon
my spirit, or to undo the evil which I had brought upon the woman I
had ruined. Of myself and of my future, save for the continual crying-
out of my soul after its lost purity, I scarcely cared now to think. It
was of Dorothy that my heart was full; it was for Dorothy that I never
ceased to sorrow, to lament, and—sinner, though I was—to pray. I
saw then the inevitable consequences of the wrong I had done her
pictured forth in all their horror. I saw her, with the sense of her sin as
yet but fresh upon her, shrinking from every glance, and fancying
that she read the knowledge of her guilt in every eye. I saw her, "not
knowing where to turn for refuge from swiftly-advancing shame, and
understanding no more of this life of ours than a foolish lost lamb
wandering farther and farther in the nightfall," stealing stealthily forth
at dusk to hide herself from her fellow-creatures.
I saw her, when the secret of her shame could no longer be
concealed, recoiling in mute terror from the glance of coarse
admiration on the faces of sensual men, or shrinking in quivering
agony from the look of curious scorn in the eyes of maids and
mothers, who drew aside their skirts as she passed them, as if
fearful of being contaminated by her touch. And then—driven out
from their midst by the very Christian women who should have been
the first to have held out a hand to save her—I saw her turn away
with a heart hardened into brazen indifference, and plunge headlong
into a bottomless gulf of ignominy and sin.
Nor did the vision pass from me until, out of that seething vortex of
lust and infamy, I saw arise the black phantom of an immortal soul
which was lost for ever, crying out unto God and His Christ for
judgment upon the seducer!

As these hideous spectres of the past arose again before me, I fell to
the ground, and shrieked out under the burden of my sin, as only he
can shriek who is torn by hell-torture and despair. But even as I
shrieked, I felt that burden lifted and borne away from me, and then I
saw, as in a vision, One kneeling in prayer. And I, who had cried out
that I could bear the burden of my sin no longer, saw that upon Him
was laid, not only my sin, but the sins of the whole world, and that
He stooped of His own accord to receive them. And as I looked upon
the Divine dignity of that agonized form—forsaken of His Father that
we might never be forsaken, and bowed down under a burden,
compared to which, all the horrors of hell were but as the passing
phantom of a pain—I saw great beads of blood break out like sweat
upon His brow, and I heard wrung from Him a cry of such unutterable
anguish as never before rose from human lips. And at that cry the
vision passed, and I awoke to find myself in hell once more, but in
my heart there was a stirring as of the wings of hope—the hope
which I had deemed dead to me for ever.
Could it be—O God of mercy! was it possible that even now it might
not be too late?—that there was indeed One who could make my sin
as though it had never been?—who of His great love for Dorothy and
for me, would bear it and its consequences as His own burden? and
who by the cleansing power of the blood which He had shed upon
the cross, could wash her soul and mine whiter than the whiteness of
snow?
But to this hope there succeeded a moment when the agonized
thought: "How if there be no Christ?" leapt out at me, like the
darkness which looms but the blacker for the lightning-flash; a
moment when hell gat hold on me again, and a thousand gibbering
devils arose to shriek in my ear: "And though there be a Christ, is it
not now too late?"
I reeled at that cry, and the darkness seemed once more to close in
around. A horde of hideous thoughts, the very spawn of hell,
swarmed like vermin in my mind; there was the breath as of a host of
contending fiends upon my face; a hundred hungry hands laid hold
on me, and strove to drag me down and down as to a bottomless pit;
but with a great cry to God, I flung the foul things from me; and
battling, beating, like a drowning man for breath, I fell at the feet of a
woman, white-veiled, and clad in robes like the morning, whose hand
it was that had plucked me from the abyss in which I lay.
 CHAPTER XV.
HEAVEN.
IT seemed to me then that I fell into a sleep, deep, and sweet, and
restful, in which I dreamt that I was a child lying upon the bosom of
God. I remember that, as I lay, I stirred in my slumber, and, raising
myself, chanced in opening my eyes to look below, but that with a
cry of terror I turned and clung like a frighted babe to my Father's
breast,—for beneath me and afar, there yet yawned the mouth of
hell, from which, ever and anon, rolled dense clouds of hot and
hissing smoke, that seemed to twist and writhe like souls in agony,
and which in colour were like unto the colour of blood.
And I thought that, seeing my fear, my Father stooped to me as a
mother stoops to comfort her frightened babe, and that as He
stooped I beheld His face, and knew it for the face of the Lord Jesus,
and that He bade me be of good cheer, "for underneath thee are the
everlasting arms."
As He so spake I awoke, and saw that she whose hand had plucked
me out of the abyss of horror into which I had fallen, yet knelt beside
me in tender ministry and prayer, and that she was singing a hymn
softly to herself whereof I heard only a verse:—
"I know not where His islands lift
Their fronded palms in air;
I only know I cannot drift
Beyond His love and care."
She ceased, and I arose, but ere I had time to question her, I was
conscious of a sudden stillness, like the hush which follows
benediction after prayer. "Don't you hear it?" she whispered eagerly,
as with upraised hand enjoining silence, she turned her head as if to
catch some far-off murmur, "Don't you hear it? They are praying for
you at home: kneel down!" And as her words died away, there
seemed to float towards me the sound of air-borne music that stayed
for one moment to fold me round with the sweet consolations of
loving companionship and of peace, and in the next stole swiftly and
softly away as if journeying onward and upward to the throne of God.
And with a great cry of anguish I fell to my knees and prayed: "O
Lord Christ! I am foul and selfish and sinful! I do not know that I love
Thee! I do not know that I have repented of my sins even! I only
know that I cannot do the things I would do, and that I can never
undo the evil I have done. But I come to Thee, Lord Jesus, I come to
Thee as Thou biddest me. Send me not away, O Saviour of sinners.
Amen."
As I ended, it seemed that my companion turned to leave me, and I
fell to sobbing and sorrowing, until at last for very anguish I could
sob no more. But soon I heard again her returning footsteps, and,
looking up, I saw One who stood beside her, thorn-crowned, and
clad in robes of white. His features were the features of a man, but
His face was the face of God!
And as I looked upon that face, I shrank back dazed and breathless
and blinded;—shrank back with a cry like the cry of one smitten of
the lightning; for beneath the wide white brow there shone out eyes,
before the awful purity of which my sin-stained soul seemed to
scorch and shrivel like a scroll in a furnace. But as I lay, lo! there
came a tender touch upon my head, and a voice in my ear that
whispered, "Son."
And as the word died away into a silence like the hallowed hush of
listening angels, and I stretched forth my arms with a cry of
unutterable longing and love, I saw that He held one by the hand—
even she who had plucked me out of the abyss into which I had
fallen—and I saw that she was no longer veiled. It was Dorothy—
Dorothy whom He had of His infinite love sought out and saved from
the shame to which my sin had consigned her, and whom He had
sent to succour me, that so He might set upon my soul the seal of
His pardon and of His peace. And to Him be the praise. Amen.
THE END.
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