“Depends on how you look at it,” sez I. “He took a club away from the gambler an’ spanked him with it; but he didn’t injure him a mite.”
“Humph,” sez Horace, “I guess the name won’t rust much while it’s in his keepin’. He took other methods at this vestry meetin’, though I don’t say they were any more befittin’. Hugo—such was the name of my friend—said it was the quietest, but the most dramatic thing he ever saw.
“They started in by treatin’ him like the boy he was, gave him a lot o’ copy-book advice, especially as to the value o’ patience, how that Paul was to do the plantin’, Appolinaris, the waterin’; but that the size an’ time o’ the harvest depended on the Lord, Himself; and that it was vanity to think ’at a young boy just out o’ college could rush things through the way he was tryin’ to.
“The’ was a hurt look about Carmichael’s eyes; but the hurt had come from the letter, not from them, so he sat quiet and smiled down at ’em in a sort of super-human calmness. They thought he was bluffed speechless, so they girded up their loins, an’ tied into him a little harder, tellin’ him that his conduct in walkin’ home nights with a café-singer was little short of immoral, although they wouldn’t make no pointed charge again’ the woman herself. Then they wound up by sayin’ ’at they feared he was too young to spend so much time amid the environs o’ sin, and that they would put an older man in charge o’ the annex, and this would leave him free to attend strictly to cu-ratin’.
“When they had spoke their piece, they were all beamin’ with the upliftin’ effect of it; and they settled back with beautiful smiles o’ satisfaction to listen to Carmichael’s thanks and repentance. He sat there smilin’ too—not smilin’ the brand o’ smiles ’at they were, but still smilin’. It would strain a dictionary to tell all there is in some smiles.
“Presently he rose up, swept his eyes over ’em for a time, and said in a low tone: ‘Then I am to understand that I am to follow in the Master’s footsteps only as far as personal chastity goes?’ said he. ‘That I may respectably pity the weak and sinful from a distance; but must not dismount from my exalted pedestal to take ’em by the hand an’ lift ’em up—Is that what you mean?’ sez he.
“They still thought he was whipped, so one of ’em pulled a little sarcasm on him: ‘Takin’ the weak an’ sinful by the hand an’ liftin’ ’em up is all right,’ said he; ‘but it’s not necessary to go home with ’em after midnight.’
“Carmichael bit his lips; he tried to hold himself down, he honestly tried for some time; but he wasn’t quite able. His hands trembled an’ his lip trembled while he was fightin’ himself; but when he kicked off his hobbles an’ sailed into ’em, his tremblin’ stopped an’ the words shot forth, clear an’ hot an’ bitish. Hugo sat back in a corner durin’ this meetin’, without speakin’ a single word; and he was glad of it. It saved him from gettin’ his feelin’s kicked into flinders about him, an’ interferin’ with the view; and it gave him a chance to take his notes.
“‘As a matter o’ faith,’ said Carmichael, ‘we believe that Jesus never sinned; but we cannot know this as a matter of fact. Yet we can know, and we do know, as a matter of history, that He mingled an’ had fellowship with the fallen, the sinful, the outcast, and the disreputable. With these He lived, and with these and for these He left the power and the life and the glory of His religion—and you say that I must live in a glass case, may only look in holy dignity down at the weak and sinful; but that I mustn’t go home with ’em after midnight. With God, a thousand years is but as a day—and yet it would be wrong for me to be in a sinner’s company after midnight!’
“Carmichael paused here to give ’em a comeback at him; but their mouths were dry, and they only hemmed an’ hawed. ‘Every Sunday, in the service of this refined an’ respectable church, hunderds of you admit that you have no health because of your sins—and yet, because of my youth, you say I must remain with you where sin is robed in silk and broadcloth, and not risk my soul where sin is robed in rags.’