“But, my dear friend, above all He preached tolerance! He knew human frailty! There’s the great secret of His power.”
“Oh, that’s all true!” said Mills, with courteous forbearance. “But you know very well that few of us—no—I’ll admit that I don’t live the Christian life except where it’s perfectly easy and convenient. Why talk of the perplexities of the ministry when there’s no excuse for any of us to mistake His teachings? You either preach Jesus or you don’t! We lean heavily on His tolerance because we can excuse ourselves with that; it’s only an alibi. But what of His courage? Whatever I may think of Him—divine or merely a foolish idealist—He did die for His convictions! It occurs to me sometimes that He’s served nowadays by a pretty cowardly lot of followers. Oh—not you, my friend!—I don’t mean anyone in particular—except myself! Probably there are other men who think much as I do, but we don’t count. We pay to keep the churches going, but we don’t want to be bothered about our duty to God. That’s a disagreeable subject!”
He ended with a smile that was intended to put Lindley at ease.
“You are absolutely right, Mills!” declared the minister magnanimously. “But as a practical man you realize that there are embarrassments in the way of doing our full duty.”
“No; truly, I don’t!” Mills retorted. “We either do it or we don’t. But please don’t think I meant to quiz you or be annoying. I wouldn’t offend you for anything in the world!”
“My dear Mills!” cried the clergyman with the disdain demanded by so monstrous a suggestion.
“It never occurred to me before,” Mills went on, his good humor only faintly tinged with irony, “it never struck me in just this way before, but I suppose if you were to preach to your congregation just what Jesus preached you’d empty the church.”
“Well, of course——” began Lindley, with difficulty concealing his surprise at the dogged fashion in which Mills was pursuing the subject.
“Of course you can’t do it!” With a bland smile Mills finished the sentence for him. “Jesus is the Great Example of a perfect life; but do we any of us really want to live as He lived?”
“Ah, Mills, we can only approximate perfection; that’s the best we can hope for!”