a pew well forward--the pew of Cyrus
Browett--looked up at him in trembling, loving wonder. Then a little
tender half-smile of perfect faith went dreaming along her just-parted
lips. Let the many prototypes of Dives in St. Antipas--she could see the
relentless profile of their chief at her right--be offended by his
rugged speech: he should find atoning comfort in her new love. Like
Luther, he must stand there to say out the soul of him, and she was
prostrate before his brave greatness.

When, at last, he came to read the biting verses of the parable, her
heart beat as if it would be out to him, her face paled and hardened
with the strain of his ordeal.

"And it came to pass that the beggar died and was carried by
the angels into Abraham's bosom; the rich man also died and
was buried.

"And in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and
seeth Abraham afar off and Lazarus in his bosom.

"And he cried and said, 'Father Abraham, have mercy on me and
send Lazarus that he may dip the tip of his finger in water
and cool my tongue; for I am tormented in this flame.'

"But Abraham said, 'Son, remember that thou in thy lifetime
receivedst thy good things, and likewise Lazarus evil things;
but now he is comforted and thou art tormented.'"

The sermon began. Unflinchingly the preacher pointed out that Dives,
apparently, lay in hell for no other reason than that he had been a rich
man; no sin was imputed to him; not even unbelief; he had not only
transgressed no law, but was doubtless a respectable, God-fearing man of
irreproachable morals--sent to hell for his wealth.

And Lazarus appeared to have won heaven merely by reason of his poverty.
No virtue, no active good conduct, was accredited to him.

Reading with the eye of common understanding, Jesus taught that the
rich merited eternal torment by reason of their riches, and the poor
merited eternal life by reason of their poverty, a belief that one
might hear declared even to-day. Nor was this view attested solely by
this parable. Jesus railed constantly at those in high places, at the
rich and at lawyers, and the chief priests and elders and those in
authority--declaring that he had been sent, not to them, but to the
poor who needed a physician.

But was there not a seeming inconsistency here in the teachings of the
Master? If the poor achieved heaven automatically by their mere poverty,
_why were they still