"Who is that man?" one of the ladies at the tea table asked one night.
"He is a Socialist agitator," I answered.
"Why don't you ask him to talk?"
The man was Sol Fieldman and I asked him to speak for five minutes. He did so and from that time the character of the after-meeting changed. The first few evenings after the change the speaking was very informal: any one of note who happened to be in the meeting was asked to speak. Later, the invitation was enlarged and any one who desired to speak could do so. Then came a time limit. A workingman asked that the refreshments be cut out. The table took up valuable space and the time consumed in "serving" was "a pure waste," so he said. Then we arranged for a formal presentation of a topic and a discussion to follow it.
The Socialists were always in the majority. Every Socialist is a propagandist—not always an intelligent propagandist. Intelligent and leading Socialists are generally engaged Sunday evenings, so the majority of those who came to us were of the hard-working kind—limited, very limited, in the literary expression of the social soul flame that so passionately moves them.
Some of our church officers who took an active part in the first year's meetings were somewhat alarmed at the brusqueness of these men and women, and undertook to correct their manners.
The Rector understood. And with great patience and tact he heard all. The Church of the Ascension has in its membership some of the country's biggest leaders in industry; some of these men came to the meetings. What they saw and heard was different to what they expected. They fraternized with the men of toil. It was a fraternity utterly devoid of patronage. There were free exchanges of thought. The average labouring man is incapable of such conference, for no matter how many years a member of a labour union it is only when he becomes a Socialist that he becomes an intelligent advocate of anything.
The Church of the Ascension[ToList]