Question

What did Ernest coincide after comparing the general face with the stone face?

Answer 1

Ernest never forgot the story that his mother told him. It was always in his mind, whenever he looked upon the Great Stone Face.

Answer 2

.......Ernest says he hopes that he will live to see the great person.
.......“Perhaps you may,” says the mother.
.......Ernest grew up as a quiet, thoughtful, intelligent child devoted to his mother. He performed many chores for her and worked hard in the fields under the hot sun. Although he had no teacher to nurture his intelligence, he spent many hours observing the Great Stone Face. With its benevolent countenance, it seemed to impart to him the importance of love.
.......Meanwhile, a rumor circulates saying that the prophecy has been fulfilled in a man who left the valley years before and became a shopkeeper in distant seaport. Having a good mind for business and blessed with good luck, he worked his way into ownership of a fleet of ships that brought him ivory, furs, precious gems, tea, spices, whale oil, and other commodities that earned him vast sums of money. His name is Gathergold, but the narrator is not sure whether that is his surname or a nickname. 
.......After accumulating more money than he could count in a century, he decides to move back to his native valley. He sends ahead an architect to construct for him on the site of his father's old farmhouse an opulent marble dwelling with a portico and columns in the front. When the building is under construction, its magnificence leaves the people with the impression that the rumor must be true. After completion of the mansion, servants arrive to begin preparing for their famous master, who is expected in the evening. Some time later, while Ernest is outside gazing upon the valley, a carriage comes into view with an old man looking out the window. A woman beggar and two of her children stand near with their hands out. The old man drops copper coins down to them. When people awaiting his arrival see him, they shout that he is indeed the likeness of the Great Stone Face. But Ernest notices that Gathergold does not look at all like the mountain wonder. He looks up at it and it seems to say, “"He will come! Fear not, Ernest; the man will come!"
.......Years pass. Ernest is now a young adult. He works hard and is a good neighbor but is otherwise quite ordinary except for his habit of meditating on the Great Stone Face. The people of the valley are unaware that it “had become a teacher to him, and that the sentiment which was expressed in it would enlarge the young man's heart, and fill it with wider and deeper sympathies than other hearts,” the narrator says.
.......Meanwhile, Gathergold dies after losing all his wealth, and the people realize that his face did not resemble the one on the mountain after all. His marble mansion becomes a hotel for tourists visiting the valley to see the Great Stone Face. The attention of the people then shifts to another native of the valley—an aging war hero known as Old Blood and Thunder—who decides to return to the place of his birth. Childhood acquaintances of the general testify that in his youth his face was the very likeness of the Great Stone Face. On the day he arrives, the people welcome him at a public banquet in a field surrounded by trees except for an open space that allows a view of the Great Stone Face. After the general arrives, the Rev. Dr. Battleblast pronounces a blessing. Ernest is there to get a look at the general, but the crowd that gather around him block his view. He can hear comments, however.
......." 'Tis the same face, to a hair!" says one man.
    Others make similar statements, and celebratory shouts resound. All of this fanfare makes the general think he must be the long-awaited one. When he stands to give a speech, his epaulets glittering, Ernest is able to see him. But Old Blood and Thunder's face does not resemble the great stone countenance in the distance. When Ernest looks at the Great Stone Face, it seems to say to him, "Fear not, Ernest; he will come." 
.......Many more years pass. Ernest is still the hard-working good neighbor he has always been—but more so. The narrator says, 

Not a day passed by, that the world was not the better because this man, humble as he was, had lived. He never stepped aside from his own path, yet would always reach a blessing to his neighbor. Almost involuntarily too, he had become a preacher. The pure and high simplicity of his thought, which, as one of its manifestations, took shape in the good deeds that dropped silently from his hand, flowed also forth in speech. He uttered truths that wrought upon and moulded the lives of those who heard him. 

.......It so happens