ually, it
was disheartening to be met by some hoary member of his flock, whom
perhaps he had borne particularly in mind, and to be greeted cheerfully
with, "Capital sermon, Mr. Johns! those are the sort that do the
business! I like those, parson!" The poor man, humiliated, would bow his
thanks. He lacked the art (if it be an art) to press the matter home,
when he met one of his parishioners thus. Indeed, his sense of the
importance of his calling and his extreme conscientiousness gave him an
air of timidity outside the pulpit, which offered great contrast to that
which he wore in the heat of his sermonizing. Not that he forgot the
dignity of his position for a moment, but he wore it too trenchantly; he
could never unbend to the free play of side-talk. Hence he could not
look upon the familiar spirit of badinage in which some of his brethren
of the profession indulged, without serious doubts of their complete
submission to the Heavenly King. Always the weight of his solemn duties
pressed sorely on him; always amid pitfalls he was conducting his little
flock toward the glories of the Great Court. There is many a man
narrowed and sharpened by metaphysical inquiry to such a degree as to
count the indirection and freedom of kindly chat irksome, and the
occasion of a needless blunting of that quick mental edger with which he
must scathe all he touches. But the stiffness of Mr. Johns was not that
of constant mental strain; he did not refine upon his dogmas; but he
gave them such hearty entertainment, and so inwrapped his spirit with
their ponderous gravity, that he could not disrobe in a moment, or
uncover to every chance comer.

It is quite possible that by reason of this grave taciturnity the
clergyman won more surely upon the respect of his people. "He is
engrossed," said they, "with greater matters; and in all secular affairs
he recognizes our superior discernment." Thus his inaptitude in current
speech was construed by them into a delicate flattery. They greatly
relished his didactic, argumentative sermonizing, since theirs was a
religion not so much of the sensibilities as of the intellect. They
agonized toward the truth, if not by intense thinking, yet by what many
good people are apt to mistake for it,--immense endurance of the prolix
thought of others.

If the idea of universal depravity had been ignored,--as it sometimes is
in these latitudinarian days,--or the notion of any available or worthy
Christian culture, a