“In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody but unbowed.”
At the hour for service he entered the church, robed himself, and followed the poor remnant of his choir to the chancel in reverent processional. But when he looked out upon his congregation he experienced a shock more painful to him than that caused by the rioter’s brick. There was but a handful of worshipers in the church. Pew after pew was empty. Great sections of pews were wholly devoid of occupants. Men and women whose devotion to the Church had led them, up to this time, against their inclinations, to continue their attendance on its services, were unwilling to-day, after the events of the past week, to hear the prayers and lessons read, or a sermon preached, by a priest who had so forgotten the duty and the dignity of his sacred calling. And of the toilers who had crowded the pews and overflowed into the aisles scarcely more than a month before, only a beggarly few were here to-day. Rich and poor alike had deserted and repudiated him. Even Ruth Tracy was not in her accustomed place, nor could his searching eyes discover her anywhere in the church. Mary Bradley, too, was absent. Had both these women, from whom he had drawn so much comfort and inspiration in the past, on whom he had leaned in absolute confidence, of whose supreme loyalty he had never had the shadow of a doubt; had they too fallen by the wayside, too weak and skeptical to follow him to the end of the heaven-ordained path he had chosen to tread? Would God Almighty be the next to desert him?
For the first time in all his hapless crusade his heart began to fail him, a strange and insidious weakness, crept in upon him. His hand trembled as he lifted the book and read:
“The Lord is in His holy temple. Let all the earth keep silence before Him.”
The sound of his voice came back to him in dull echoes from the waste of vacant pews.
“Dearly beloved brethren, the Scripture moveth us in sundry places——” His voice failed him, and he paused. But it was only for a moment. With stern resolution he fought back his weakness, gathered new strength, and went on with his service.
His sermon that morning—he had prepared it early the preceding week—was based upon the parable of the householder and the tares.