The Crucifixion of Philip Strong

by Charles M. Sheldon

"There is plenty of it," answered Philip, gravely. "A minister must be made of cast-iron and fire-brick in order to stand the wear and tear of these times in which we live. I'd like a week to trade ideas with you and talk over the work, Alfred."

"You'd get the worst of the bargain."

"I don't know about that. I'm not doing any thinking lately. But now, as we're going to be only fifty miles apart, what's to hinder an exchange once in a while?"

"I'm agreeable to that," replied Philip's chum; "on condition, however, that you furnish me with a gun and pay all surgeons' bills when I occupy your pulpit."

"Done," said Philip, with a grin; and just then Mrs. Strong forbade any more talk. Alfred stayed until the evening train, and when he left he stooped down and kissed Philip's cheek. "It's a custom we learned when in the German universities together that summer after college, you know," he explained with the slightest possible blush, when Mrs. Strong came in and caught him in the act. It seemed to her, however, like an affecting thing that two big, grown-up men like her husband and his old chum showed such tender affection for each other. The love of men for men in the strong friendship of school and college life is one of the marks of human divinity.

CHAPTER VI.

In spite of his determination to get out and occupy his pulpit the first Sunday of the next month, Philip was reluctantly obliged to let five Sundays go by before he was able to preach. During those six weeks his attention was called to a subject which he felt ought to be made the theme of one of his talks on Christ and Modern Society. The leisure which he had for reading opened his eyes to the fact that Sunday in Milton was terribly desecrated. Shops of all kinds stood wide open. Excursion trains ran into the large city forty miles away, two theatres were always running with some variety show, and the saloons, in violation of an ordinance forbidding it, unblushingly flung their doors open and did more business on that day than any other. As Philip read the papers, he noticed that every Monday morning the police court was more crowded with "drunks" and "disorderlies" than on any other day in the week, and the plain cause of it was the abuse of the day before. In the summer time baseball games were played in Milton on Sunday. In the fall and winter very many people spent their evenings in card-playing or aimlessly strolling up and down the main street. These facts came to Philip's knowledge gradually, and he was not long in making up his mind that Christ would not keep silent before the facts. So he carefully prepared a plain statement of his belief in Christ's standing on the modern use of Sunday, and as on the other occasions when he had spoken the first Sunday in the month, he cast out of his reckoning all thought of the consequences. His one purpose was to do just as, in his thought of Christ, He would do with that subject.

The people in Milton thought that the first Sunday Philip appeared in his pulpit he would naturally denounce the saloon again. But when he finally recovered sufficiently to preach, he determined that for a while he would say nothing in the way of sermons against the whiskey evil. He had a great horror of seeming to ride a hobby, of being a man of one idea and making people tired of him because he harped on one string. He had uttered his denunciation, and he would wait a little before he spoke again. The whiskey power was not the only bad thing in Milton that needed to be attacked. There were other things which must be said. And so Philip limped into his pulpit the third Sunday of the month and preached on a general theme, to the disappointment of a great crowd, almost as large as the last one he had faced. And yet his very appearance was a sermon in itself against the institution he had held up to public condemnation on that occasion. His knee wound proved very stubborn, and he limped badly. That in itself spoke eloquently of the dastardly attempt on his life. His face was pale, and he had grown thin. His shoulder was stiff and the enforced quietness of his delivery contrasted strangely with his customary fiery appearance on the platform. Altogether that first Sunday of his reappearance in his pulpit was a stronger sermon against the saloon than anything he could have spoken or written.

When the first Sunday in the next month came on, Philip was more like his old self. He had gathered strength enough to go around two Sunday afternoons and note for himself the desecration of the day as it went on recklessly. As he saw it all, it seemed to him that the church in Milton was practically doing nothing to stop the evil. All the ministers complained of the difficulty of getting an evening congregation. Yet hundreds of young people walked past all the churches every Sunday night, bent on pleasure, going to the theatres or concerts or parties, which seemed to have no trouble in attracting the crowd. Especially was this true of the foreign population, the working element connected with the mills. It was a common occurrence for dog fights, cock fights, and shooting matches of various kinds to be going on in the tenement district on Sunday, and the police seemed powerless or careless in the matter.

All this burned into Philip like molten metal, and when he faced his people on the Sunday which was becoming a noted Sunday for them, he quivered with the earnestness and thrill which always came to a sensitive man when he feels sure he has a sermon which must be preached and a message which the people must hear for their lives.