midnight
In the silent watches of the night , when he was alone with God , there came into his mind a flood of unaccustomed thoughts . An hour or two before , standing face to face with death , he had experienced a sensation similar to that which drowning men are said to feel -- a kind of clarifying of the moral faculty , in which the veil of the flesh , with its obscuring passions and prejudices , is pushed aside for a moment , and all the acts of one 's life stand out , in the clear light of truth , in their correct proportions and relations , -- a state of mind in which one sees himself as God may be supposed to see him . In the reaction following his rescue , this feeling had given place for a time to far different emotions . But now , in the silence of midnight , something of this clearness of spirit returned to the sheriff . He saw that he had owed some duty to this son of his , -- that neither law nor custom could destroy a responsibility inherent in the nature of mankind . He could not thus , in the eyes of God at least , shake off the consequences of his sin . Had he never sinned , this wayward spirit would never have come back from the vanished past to haunt him .