XIX
THE TAINT OF HERESY
Our son was growing into a goodly lad (everything happened either before or after baby was born) when it first actually broke on me that Gordon's Doctorate had been a dear-bought prize. For Gordon was now a Doctor of Divinity—and he had won it by examination, too, long years of severe study and wide reading having gone before. I didn't begrudge the time, and the seclusion, this had implied; but I just hated the whole thing when I found out how it had affected Gordon's views. I never did believe much in ministers being such terrible students as many of them are; I verily believe as many preachers are spoiled by books as are helped by them, for they often grow less human while they're growing more profound. The Bible and the daily paper—truth and human life—some great preacher pronounced his two main books, and I'm inclined to agree with him. Gordon gave me one of his deep books to read once—Harnack, I think, was the name of the man who wrote it—and I went to sleep over it for my husband's sake but not for Mr. Harnack's. Gordon may call that kind of theology new, I thought, but it's not interesting.
The whole thing—about Gordon's views, I mean—came out this way. Of course I fancy a good many already suspected he was rather modern in his creed; especially Mr. Ashton, who became more orthodox every time he cut the wages of the poor girls in his factory. But I never knew, nor any one else, how far Gordon had drifted from the old moorings, till a certain evangelist came to hold a mission in Hertford. He was a converted prize-fighter—changed from a pounder into an ex-pounder, so to speak—and he loved to give us a whiff of his malodorous past every time he got a chance; I reckon he fancied any one who had had such a violent attack of sin was immune for the rest of his days. I went to hear him several times; but one night he said if he had to choose between a pack of cards in his house or a rattlesnake turned loose among his children, he'd take the snake. I knew then he was either a fool or a liar, one—and I had no mind to listen to either—so I never went near him again.
However, Gordon was presiding one night when this man was preaching; and the evangelist suddenly broke out with the statement that the most moral, or the most philanthropic, man in the whole world would get as hot a place in hell as the worst murderer or thief, if he didn't believe what he ought to believe.
"Isn't that so, Dr. Laird?" he said, turning to my husband.
"No," said Gordon, "it's not."
Well, as you may understand, there was something pretty to pay. The evangelist nearly fainted on the spot; as soon as he came to himself he asked them all to join in prayer—and he prayed that Gordon might be converted that very night. Gordon! whose shoe's latchet he was not worthy to unloose.
"You've denied your Master, sir," Mr. Ashton accused Gordon afterwards, having waited for him at the door; "you've repudiated the great doctrine of salvation—in the presence of a thousand people, sir."
Gordon motioned him aside. When he told me all about it afterwards, he avowed himself ashamed of the degree of temper he had shown, but I said I'd have been ashamed of him if he hadn't.
"What's this you accuse me of?" demanded Gordon.