“It is painfully true,” said Heuck, “that the world stands in sad need of reform, if souls are to be rescued from their spiritual perils only by the means proposed in the magnificent sheep-skin scheme of Brother Giestfacher.” It was horrible to think that the immortal part of man was doomed to perish, to be snuffed out, as it were, in eternal darkness, because soldiers had an unholy appetite for mutton.
Braunn said the work could be started on three or four thousand hides, and ere they were used up a new supply might arrive from some unexpected quarter.
Esch said that they ought to have faith; the Hand that fed the patriarch in the desert would provide vellum if he was prayerfully besought for assistance. He would be willing to commence on one sheet, feeling convinced there would be more than enough in the end.
Blum did not take altogether so sanguine a view of things as Brother Esch. He was especially dubious about that vellum supply; not that he questioned the power of Providence at all, but it struck him that it would be just as well and as easy for the society to prayerfully ask for an ample supply of ready-made Bibles as to expect a miracle in prepared sheep-skin; and he was still further persuaded that if the books were absolutely necessary to one’s salvation, they would be miraculously given. But he did not put the movement on that ground. It is very easy for men, and particularly idiotic men, to convince themselves that God will answer all their whims and caprices by the performance of a miracle. We are going upon the theory that the work is good, just as it is good to feed the hungry and clothe the naked. We expect to find favor in heaven because we endeavor to do a work of charity according to our honest impression.
“How many persons,” inquired Heuck, “do you propose to supply with complete copies of the Scriptures?”
“Every one in the district,” replied Giestfacher.
“Brother Dusch,” continued Heuck, “how many heads of families are there in the district? Your abbot had the census taken a few month’s ago, while you were yet in grace and favor at the monastery.”
Brother Dusch said he heard there were twenty-two thousand from the Drachenfels to within six miles of Cologne, but all of them could not read.
“We will send out,” said Giestfacher enthusiastically, “an army of colporteurs, who will distribute and read at the same time.”
“I perceive,” said Blum, “that this discussion will never stop. New avenues of thought and new mountains of objection are coming to view at every advance in the debate. Let us do something first, and talk afterwards. To supply twenty-two thousand persons with expensive volumes will require considerably more than mere resolves and enthusiasm. I propose that we buy up all the vellum in the city to-day, and that we all go security for the payment. I propose also that we employ Brothers Braunn, Schwartz, Werner, and Reudlehuber to commence transcribing, and that we all go security for their pay. Unless we begin somewhere, we can never have anything done. What says Brother Giestfacher?”