“Does sheep ate fish?” asked Father McClosky with a look of inquiring innocence; but Mr. Clare frowned him into silence, and answered quickly,—
“The crying defect—perhaps I should say the worst heresy—of our day is, that it divides Christ. He is, we are told, perfect man and perfect God; but in practice we clergy, and Christians generally, represent Him as God only, leaving the beauty of His manhood, the religion of humanity, to those who deny His Godhead.”
“I don’t think I quite understand you,” said the High-Churchman.
“If you find a family starving,” said Mr. Clare, “you, as a man, relieve them to the extent of your last penny, and call upon your congregation to help. It is true that you do this because He says, ‘Inasmuch as ye do it unto these, ye do it unto me;’ but if the poor people themselves ask, ‘Why does God let us suffer when there is so much wealth in the world, and He is Almighty?’ you reply, ‘My dear friends, we must not dispute God’s decrees. He makes some men rich and others poor, and He doth all things well. But He feeds all with the bread of heaven who call upon Him, and when you come to that land where we shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, He shall wipe away all tears from off all faces.’”
The High-Churchman laughed good-humoredly. “In that connection it sounds very like a satire, or would, to the starving family,” he said. “But it is sound doctrine for all that, Mr. Clare.”
“It has saved the world for nearly nineteen centuries,” said Mr. Clare. “Yet the inevitable deduction of the starving family would be, either that God understood nothing of human needs and desires, or that, however good His meaning and intentions, His power was limited.”
“But things of earth are as dust to Him,” said the rector of St. Andrew’s. “It is the things of heaven that are permanent and real. What will be to us a little more or less hunger or sorrow or cold or nakedness, when we awake up satisfied, after His likeness?”
Mr. Clare regarded the speaker with a glance of reverent tenderness. “Most true,” he said gently, “and therefore you never give to any temporal needs?”
“You’ve got him there,” said the evangelist. “Well, I see what you mean, Mr. Clare, but I don’t see what you are going to do about it. Now, I, for one, don’t think Socialism a practicable thing; I may wish it was, but I think it ain’t; so do you expect me to preach a kingdom that I don’t believe would run two months?”
“People said that our present form of government was impracticable,” replied Mr. Clare, “and there were many prophecies as to the length of time it would last.”