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Nevertheless he consented, for he was very meek, and when Michaelmas Day came the Kyrkegrim pulled a preacher's gown over his homespun coat, and laid his round hat on the desk by the iron-clamped Bible, and began his sermon. "I shall give no text," said he, "but when I have said what seems good to me, it is for those who hear to see if the Scriptures bear me out."
There was something about his air that impressed me as both lugubrious and humorous; and in this I was right, for I learned later that he was one of those rare people who can sing a comic song with immense success while preserving a sour countenance, like a Puritan preacher's.
It was the sign of a united community. It set the seal of Christ's victory over evil passions, and the young preacher's head bowed in prayer, and they all knelt, while his weak voice returned thanks to the Lord for his gifts. Then they all rose and shook off the oppressive solemnity, and he had time to look around at all the changes.
The lengthy, arduous, and expensive preparation of this mighty ark a vessel which must include forests of timber and consume generations in building; besides the world-be-known collection of all manner of strange animals for the stranger fancy of a fanatical old man; not to mention also the hoary Preacher's own century of exortations: with how great moral force all this living warning would be calculated to act upon the world of wickedness and doom!
"The heat of the furnace doesn't reach as far as the horses," Radbourn moralized, as he aided in unhitching the shivering team. "In the vast, calm spaces of the stars, among the animals, such scenes as we have just seen are impossible." He lifted his hand in a lofty gesture. The light fell on his pale face and dark eyes. The girls were a little indignant and disposed to take the preacher's part.
One reason, therefore, for not choosing this approach to our task is that the preacher's attention, partly because of the excellence of these and other books and lectures, and partly because of the acuteness of the political-industrial crisis which is now upon us, is already focused upon it. Besides, our present moment is changing with an ominous rapidity.
"Can you fathom the sea? Neither can you fathom the depths of the Talmud," as we would put it. We were sure that the highest mathematics taught in the Gentile universities were child's play as compared to the Talmud In the Preacher's Synagogue, then, I spent seven years of my youthful life.
While the young man fancies that there is a vast amount of good things in the world, if he could only come at them, the old man is steeped in the truth of the Preacher's words, that all things are vanity knowing that, however gilded the shell, the nut is hollow. In these later years, and not before, a man comes to a true appreciation of Horace's maxim: Nil admirari.
The choir was perched high above common humanity, and praised God for the congregation in wonderful voices, four in number, the soprano of which cost more than a preacher's salary, and soared half an octave higher than any other voice in the city. To be sure she was often fatigued, for she frequently danced late of a Saturday night.
"I reckon there isn't going to be any preacher's coat for me, Nan; that's one of the things I want to talk to you about. Let's go over yonder and sit down in the sun." The place he chose for her was a flat stone half embedded in the up-climbing slope beyond the great boulder.
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