The Story of a Country Town

by E. W. Howe

The sacrifices he made for religion were tasks, and his reward was a conviction that those who refused to make them would be punished, for he regarded it as an injustice of which the Creator was incapable to do as well by His enemies as by His friends. I believe that he would rather have gone to heaven without the members of his family than with them, unless they had earned salvation as he had earned it, and travelled as steadily as himself the hard road marked on his map as leading heavenward.

One of the best evidences to his mind of a compassionate and loving Saviour was the belief that all thought of unfortunate friends in torment was blotted from the memory of the redeemed, and the lake of fire he thought of as a remedy for the great number of disagreeable people with whom he was compelled to come in contact below, and of whom he would be happily rid above. Religion was a misery to be endured on earth, that a reward might be enjoyed after death. A man must spend the ages of his future either in a very pleasant place, with comfortable surroundings and pleasant associates, or in a very unpleasant place, with uncomfortable surroundings and all the mean people turned into devils and imps for companions. It was the inevitable law; every man of moderate sense should be able to appreciate the situation at a glance, and do that which would insure his personal safety. If there was a doubt—the thought was too absurd for his contemplation, but admitting a doubt—his future would be equal to that of the worldly man, for one cannot rot more easily than another, or be more comfortable as dust; but if there was no doubt—and all the authorities agree that there was none—then the difference would be in his favor.

It was the best thing offering under the circumstances, and should therefore be accepted without hesitation. If the conditions were hard, he could not help it; he might have suggested changes in the plan of salvation had his judgment been invited, but the plan had been formulated before his time, and there was nothing left for him but obedience. If he thought he deserved credit for all he possessed (and he was a man very likely to be seized with that suspicion), the Bible said it came from God; that settled the matter finally and forever—he gave thanks (for a punishment was provided if he did not, and a reward if he did), and pretended to have had nothing to do with accumulating his property.

Religion was a matter of thrift and self-interest as much as laying away money in youth and strength for old age and helplessness, and he called upon sinners to flee the wrath to come because he had been commanded to go out and preach to all the world, for it mattered little to him whether the people were saved or not. They had eyes, therefore let them see; ears, therefore let them hear. The danger was so plain that they ought to save themselves without solicitation.

That which he most desired seldom came to pass; that which he dreaded, frequently, but no matter; he gave thanks to the Lord because it was best to do so, and asked no questions. There were jewels for those who earned them, and as a thrifty man he desired a greater number of these than any other citizen of Fairview. He was the principal man in his neighborhood below, and desired to be a shepherd rather than a sheep above; therefore he was foremost in the church, and allowed no one to be more zealous in doing the service of the hard master he had, after careful thought and study, set out to serve, believing the reward worth the service, and determined to serve well if he served at all, as was his custom in everything else.

If I do him an injustice I do not intend it, but I have thought all my life that he regarded children as troublesome and expensive—a practical sort of punishment for sin, sent from time to time as the case seemed to require; and that he had been burdened with but two was no doubt evidence to his mind that his life had been generally blameless, if, indeed, this opinion was not confirmed by the circumstance that one of them had been taken from him in return for good service in the holy cause. Once they had arrived, however, he accepted the trust to return them to their Maker as nearly like they came as possible, for that was commanded of him.

Because he frequently referred to the road to heaven as narrow and difficult, and the highway in the other direction as broad and easy, I came to believe that but for his religion he would have been a man much given to money-getting, and ambitious for distinction, but he put such thoughts aside, and toiled away at his work as if to get out of temptation’s way. When he talked of the broad and easy road it was with a relish, as though he could enjoy the pleasant places by the way-side if he dared; and in his preaching I think he described the pleasures of the world so vividly that his hearers were taken with a wish to enjoy them, though it is not probable that he knew anything about them except from hearsay, as he had always been out of temptation’s way—in the backwoods during his boyhood, and on the prairie during his maturer years. But when he talked of the narrow and difficult path, his manner changed at once; a frown came upon his face; he looked determined and unforgiving, and at every point he seemed to build sign-posts marked “Duty!” It has occurred to me since that he thought of his religion as a vigorous, healthy, successful man thinks in his quiet moments of a wife sick since their marriage; although he may deserve a different fate, and desire it, he dares not complain, for the more wearisome the invalid, the louder the call of duty.

I think he disliked the necessity of being religious, and only accepted and taught religion because he believed it to be the best thing to do, for it did not afford him the peace he professed. To all appearances he was a most miserable man, although he taught that only the sinful are miserable, and the few acquaintances he had who were not equally devout (strangers passing through, or those he met at the country town, for all were pious in Fairview) lived an easy and contented life which he seemed to covet, but nobody knew it, for he reproved them with all the more vigor because of his envy.

When not engaged in reading at night, as was his custom, he sat for hours looking steadily into the fire, and was impatient if disturbed. I never knew what occupied his thoughts at these times; it may have been his preaching, or his daily work, but more likely he was seeing glimpses of forbidden pictures; caravans of coveted things passing in procession, or of hopes and ambitious dwarfed by duty. Perhaps in fancy he was out in the world mingling with people of a class more to his taste than Fairview afforded, and was thinking he could enjoy their pleasures and occupations if they were not forbidden, or wondering if, after all, his principles were not mistakes. I believe that during these hours of silent thinking he was tempted and beckoned by the invisible and mysteriously potent forces he pretended to despise, and that he was convinced that, to push them off, his religion must be made more rigorous and pitiless.

That he coveted riches could be easily seen, and but for his fear of conscience he could have easily possessed himself of everything worth owning in Fairview, for with the exception of Theodore Meek, the next best man in the neighborhood, he was about the only one among the people who read books and subscribed for newspapers. None of them was his equal in intelligence or energy, and had he desired he could have traded them out of what little they possessed, and sold it back again at a comfortable profit. But, “do unto others as you would have others do unto you,” was commanded of him by his inexorable master, and he was called upon to help the weak rather than rob them; therefore he often gave them assistance which he could but poorly afford. This limited him so much that he had no other hope of becoming well-to-do than that the lands which he was constantly buying would finally become valuable by reason of the development and settlement of the country. This he regarded as honorable and fair, and to this work he applied himself with great energy.