midday
Having so lately seen the factor going about like a maniac , raving at this piece of damage and that heap of dirt , the few fishers present could never help smiling when Mr Cairns prayed for him as `` the servant of God and his church now lying grievously afflicted -- persecuted , but not forsaken , cast down , but not destroyed ; '' -- having found the fitting phrases he seldom varied them . Through her sorrow , Lizzy had grown tender , as through her shame she had grown wise . That the factor had been much in the wrong only rendered her anxious sympathy the more eager to serve him . Knowing so well what it was to have done wrong , she was pitiful over him , and her ministrations were none the less devoted that she knew exactly how Malcolm thought and felt about him ; for the affair , having taken place in open village and wide field and in the light of midday , and having been reported by eyewitnesses many , was everywhere perfectly known , and Malcolm therefore talked of it freely to his friends , amongst them both to Lizzy and her mother . Sickness sometimes works marvellous changes , and the most marvellous on persons who to the ordinary observer seem the least liable to change . Much apparent steadfastness of nature , however , is but sluggishness , and comes from incapacity to generate change or contribute towards personal growth ; and it follows that those whose nature is such can as little prevent or retard any change that has its initiative beyond them . The men who impress the world as the mightiest are those often who can the least -- never those who can the most in their natural kingdom ; generally those whose frontiers lie openest to the inroads of temptation , whose atmosphere is most subject to moody changes and passionate convulsions , who , while perhaps they can whisper laws to a hemisphere , can utter no decree of smallest potency as to how things shall be within themselves .