The outcome of this short visit was an invitation to the clerk to visit at Rutledge Inn and tell some of the Cartwright stories.
Rutledge Inn was the largest building in the town except the mill. None of the other homes had more than two rooms, some only one. Rutledge Inn had four rooms and a sort of porch made by an extension of roof over a hardly packed, cleanly swept, dirt floor. It was here Mentor Graham, Doctor Allen, John Rutledge, William Green and other of the intelligent citizens gathered to discuss news, matters of education, religion and politics.
Quite pleased with his invitation, Abe Lincoln went to the Inn and found in addition to the family, Mentor Graham and Doctor Allen.
It was a night in late August. The stars twinkled above the dark outlines of the trees that crested the bluff. The one road of New Salem, that wound its way down the hill, lay like a gray ribbon and log houses made the darker spots that at irregular intervals marked it. Occasionally the call of a night bird sent ripples of wave-melody onto the stillness, or sometimes the tinkle of a bell stirred the ocean of the night silence, while the fall of the dam water sent out its rhythm in never-ending cadences.
The discussion turned to religion, a most fruitful topic of argument, for Mentor Graham was a Hard Shell and Doctor Allen was a Predestinarian. This night there was the uncommon Abe Lincoln to be heard from. Stories of Peter Cartwright were first on the program, and from these the conversation turned to a discussion of religion in particular and its uses to mankind.
"One of the best uses of religion," Dr. Allen said, "is to cast out fear. Medicine won't work when fear is present and there's been many a man scared to death. I was called out once to see a child who had been bitten by a rattlesnake. She died and her father nearly lost his mind. Later he got bit in the night by something—a spider, I think. He was sure it was a rattlesnake. There was no need of the man dying, but he did die—actually frightened to death. It's an awful condition for a soul to be in that fears eternal punishment for sin. Religion takes away this fear."
"Just what is religion?" asked Abe Lincoln. "From what I've been able to gather, it's preachin' purgatory and damnation till you get up a panic, offerin' the mercy of God as a way of escape, and then takin' up a collection for the good advice you have given—is this religion?"
The men laughed.