Leonard gently. He felt himself
very helpless and inefficient before this awful terror and frenzy.
He had seen sad death-beds--troubled death-beds--ay, and despairing
death-beds, but never anything like this. "God!" Naomi's voice
shrilled terribly as she uttered the name. "I can't go to God
for help. Oh, I'm skeered of hell, but I'm skeereder still
of God. I'd rather go to hell a thousand times over than face God
after the life I've lived. I tell you, I'm sorry for living wicked--
I was always sorry for it all the time. There ain't never been
a moment I wasn't sorry, though nobody would believe it.
I was driven on by fiends of hell. Oh, you don't understand--
you CAN'T understand--but I was always sorry!"
"If you repent, that is all that is necessary. God will forgive
you if you ask Him."
"No, He can't! Sins like mine can't be forgiven. He can't--
and He won't."
"He can and He will. He is a God of love, Naomi."
"No," said Naomi with stubborn conviction. "He isn't a God of love
at all. That's why I'm skeered of him. No, no. He's a God of wrath
and justice and punishment. Love! There ain't no such thing as love!
I've never found it on earth, and I don't believe it's to be
found in God.
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