The matter now spread like the light. It got into everybody’s ears, and came forth from their mouths much magnified. A great change came over the Church and congregation in regard to Mr. Good. Some said one thing and some said another. The balance, however, went against him. What was being said reached his ears, and he was astonished at the things he heard. It deeply affected him, as we may suppose. He observed a change in the congregation and in the feeling of many of the people towards him. In conversation one day with Mr. Watson, he asked him what he thought was the cause of the changed feeling in the Church towards him. Mr. Watson told him what he had heard, but as he did not as yet believe any of the stories, he would like to hear Mr. Good’s own statement of things. Mr. Good gave him a minute and faithful account of everything that had taken place between him and the Church at Stukely. It was just as Mr. Watson expected. He was confirmed in his confidence in Mr. Good, and used all his influence to suppress the scandal which was spreading, and to restore right feeling in the Church towards their Minister; but Mr. Watson was not equal to this. The fire had burnt too far and too deep to be quenched. The suspicion and prejudice excited could not be destroyed. Mr. Good wept over the state of things. He felt that the tide was too strong for him to stem. He saw that his usefulness was at an end so far as this Church was concerned. He resolved to give in his resignation, and to live a year or two in retirement from the ministry until the storm had swept away into the ocean of air.
A short time after Mr. Good had resigned his ministry, Mr. Webster met with Mr. Watson again.
“You have had fine times,” he said, “in your Church with Mr. Good, haven’t you?”
“What do you mean by ‘fine times’?” asked Mr. Watson.
“O, why, he has been playing the same games with you as he did with the Church at Stukely, hasn’t he?”
“Mr. Good has been playing no games with us, Mr. Webster, nor did he play any with the people at Stukely,” said Mr. Watson, rather warmly.
“Well, I have been informed so, anyhow.”
“So you may have been, Mr. Webster; but your information in this, as in that you brought from Stukely, is almost altogether fabulous. It is scandal which you hear and which you repeat. There is not a word of truth as you state matters. I have heard an account of the whole affair at Stukely from an authority which is as reliable as any you could possibly adduce. I have every reason for thinking that the parties who informed you are influenced by the basest malice and ill-humour. Mr. Good stands as fair now before my eyes and the eyes of all decent people as he did the first day he came amongst us. It is only such as you, who delight in hearing and spreading scandal, that are prejudiced against him; and such, too, as are influenced by your libellous reports. It is a shame, Mr. Webster, that you, a man who pretends to membership in a Christian Church, should be guilty of believing malicious reports respecting a Christian minister, and more particularly that you should spread them abroad in the very neighbourhood where he labours. This is a conduct far beneath a man of honour, of charity, and self-respect.”
“Are you intending this lecture for me, Mr. Watson?” asked Webster, rather petulantly.
“I am, sir: and you deserve it, in much stronger language than I can use. You have been the means of blackening Mr. Good’s character in this place, when it was all clean and unimpeachable. You have been the means of weakening his influence in the pulpit, and out of the pulpit. You have injured him, injured his wife and family; and the good man, through you, has been obliged to give in his resignation as our pastor.”