The first was an invitation from the Synod of True Believers to deliver the set discourse at the Annual Congress.
It was a great, an unexpected, and an embarrassing honour; for the set discourse, by unwritten tradition, was always given in defiance of modern theology and in defence of the literal interpretation of Scripture.
If he did this to the satisfaction of the True Believers, his secession to the Ministry of Free Evangelicalism in the immediate future would become almost impossible.
But Mr. Trimblerigg, though his other virtues might be fleeting or fluctuating, had a nimble courage which stayed fixed. After humbly and fervently informing me of his intention, under the guise of a request for guidance, he accepted the invitation and sat down to write the thesis which precipitated his career two years ahead of the course he had planned for it.
The second circumstance, embarrassing but helpful to the same end, was the reappearance of Isabel Sparling, heading a deputation of women who, feeling called to the ministry, now saw an opportunity which they were not going to let slip. As select preacher before the Assembly it was, they told him, his bounden duty to crown his allegiance to their cause in public advocacy of the ministration of women; and when he pleaded that the literal interpretation of Scripture must be his theme, they replied by requiring him to concentrate on the literal interpretation of certain texts—mainly in the Old Testament—conclusive of their claim.
In the discussion that followed, the deputation saw their opportunity slipping away from them. Mr. Trimblerigg was willing to support their cause, but only, as he said, ‘in his own time and in his own way.’ And that time was not now, and his way was not theirs. Tempers grew hot, words flew, the deputation went forth in dudgeon; Isabel Sparling gave him a parting look; it meant business, it also meant mischief. She was, he knew, a woman of high ability, and a determined character: and now, on public and on private ground, she was become his enemy.
In the six months which intervened before the day of Congress, the women’s spiritual movement broke into flame and heat, and they began that phenomenal campaign of Church Militancy which has since made history. They began by entering a motion for Congress in support of their claim; but as women, though congregational electors, could not sit in the Assembly, and as they could get no member to give his name to their motion, it was ruled out of order and returned to them.
Then in the chapels of the True Believers the word of the Lord was heard by the mouths of women; what Congress sought to silence, at meeting they made known; they went forth in bands of three or four, or sometimes they went solitary, and entering into the congregations like lambs became as wolves.
When it seemed good to them that the preacher should end his prayer, they cried ‘Amen’, and in the midst of his discourse they spoke as the spirit gave them utterance. It was a demonstration that the gift of prophecy, like murder, must out, and that if a place in order be not found for it, it must come by disorder. So they presented their case, by example and not by argument, and the congregations of True Belief dealt with them, or tried to deal with them, in various ways painful or persuasive, but none prevailed. For this phenomenon, they claimed, was spiritual, and could only be cured spiritually in the granting of their demand; while the coercion practised on them, being merely material, must necessarily fail.
And so spiritually chaining themselves to their chairs, they were materially carried out, and spiritually interrupting the eloquence of others were materially suppressed under extinguishers which deprived them of breath; and for what they truly believed to be their unconquerable right True Belief could find no remedy.