Coming, as he did, to the direction of one of New York's most influential churches, a congregation which included many people of great wealth, many people of great influence in the world of business and politics.... Mrs. Blake coughed.
"I'm sure Cousin Arnold knows about the church."
"Yes, my dear. I was about to say...."
He was about to say that he felt it his duty to try to utilize this great force in the cause of human betterment. In a few minutes Mrs. Drake coughed again and said, "Naturally." He had given a good deal of consideration, prayerful consideration, to the subject: personally he was opposed to the church going into politics. He spoke of several well-known clergymen who had gone into the fight against Tammany Hall, he doubted their wisdom. Of course if one could be sure that all their congregation were republicans.... The lunch was finished at this point and we went into the sumptuous library. Mrs. Drake took the subject out of his hand.
"You see, Cousin Arnold," she said, "we think that the role of the church should be conciliating. It is our object to attract people—all people to the church—not to alienate anyone. And the church cannot mix in any of the issues which are vexed—which have partisans on each side—without offending and driving people away. It is evident that the church must interest itself in social questions, must show that it is a power to overcome this horrible unrest. But it is very hard to find a social problem which is consistent with the conciliatory rôle which the church must preserve.
"When Oliver and I read your book, we both had the same inspiration. Here is just the very problem. What you wrote about the prisons is awful. And no one can object to the church taking a definite attitude on this question. The Master, himself has instructed us to visit those who are in prison."
"Exactly," Oliver put in.
But she did not give him time to go on. She rapidly laid before me their plan. Oliver was to call together a group of a dozen fellow clergymen, the most influential—I presume she meant the most fashionable—in each denomination. I was to speak to them and help him to get them interested. They would organize a committee, they would give out interviews to the newspapers, preach sermons on the subject, get some good bills introduced into the legislature—and make a great splash!
I sat back and listened to it with grim amusement. This was to be Oliver's debut in New York. In vulgar phrase it was a "press agent campaign." Oliver—the progressive, the fighting clergyman—was to get columns of free advertising. There would surely be a great mass meeting in one of the theaters and Oliver would get his chance to cast the spell of his oratory over fashionable New York. It was an admirable scheme. No attack on Tammany Hall, was not one of his deacons a director in the street car company? Did not the real owner of the gas company rent the most expensive pew in the church and did not complaisant Tammany Hall arrange to have the gas company's ashes removed by the city's street cleaning department? No support to the campaign for decent tenements, some of the congregation were landlords. And of course no playing with the dangerous subject of labor unions.
"J. H. Creet doesn't belong to your church, does he?" I asked.