Part 18 (1/2)
They started slowly off along the path, John walking unconsciously in it, the parson stumbling along through the gra.s.s and weeds on one side. It had been John's unvarying wont to yield the path to him.
”It is easy to preach,” he muttered with gloomy, sarcastic emphasis.
”If you tried it once, you might think it easier to practise,” retorted the parson, laughing.
”It might be easier to one who is not tempted.”
”It might be easier to one who is. No man is tempted beyond his strength, but a sermon is often beyond his powers. I let you know, young man, that a homily may come harder than a virtue.”
”How can you stand up and preach as you've been preaching, and then come out of the church and laugh about it!” cried John angrily.
”I'm not laughing about what I preached on,” replied the parson with gentleness.
”You are in high spirits! You are gay! You are full of levity!”
”I am full of gladness. I am happy: is that a sin?”
John wheeled on him, stopping short, and pointing back to the church:
”Suppose there'd been a man in that room who was trying to some temptation--more terrible than you've ever known anything about. You'd made him feel that you were speaking straight at him -bidding him do right where it was so much easier to do wrong. You had helped him; he had waited to see you alone, hoping to get more help. Then suppose he had found you as you are now--full of your gladness! He wouldn't have believed in you! He'd have been hardened.”
”If he'd been the right kind of man,” replied the parson, quickly facing an arraignment had the rancour of denunciation, ”he ought to have been more benefited by the sight of a glad man than the sound of a sad sermon. He'd have found in me a man who practises what he preaches: I have conquered my wilderness. But, I think,” he added more gravely, ”that if any such soul had come to me in his trouble, I could have helped him: if he had let me know what it was, he would have found that I could understand, could sympathize.
Still, I don't see why you should condemn my conduct by the test of imaginary cases. I suppose I'm happy now because I'm glad to be with you,”
and the parson looked the school-master a little reproachfully in the eyes.
”And do you think I have no troubles?” said John, his lips trembling. He turned away and the parson walked beside him.
”You have two troubles to my certain knowledge,” said he in the tone of one bringing forward a piece of critical a.n.a.lysis that was rather mortifying to exhibit. ”The one is a woman and the other is John Calvin. If it's Amy, throw it off and be a man. If it's Calvinism, throw it off and become an Episcopalian.” He laughed out despite himself.
”Did you ever love a woman?” asked John gruffly.
”Many a one--in the state of the first Adam!”
”That's the reason you threw it off: many a one!”
”Don't you know,” inquired the parson with an air of exegetical candour, ”that no man can be miserable because some woman or other has flirted his friend? That's the one trouble that every man laughs at--when it happens in his neighbourhood, not in his own house!”
The school-master made no reply.
”Or if it is Calvin,” continued the parson, ”thank G.o.d, I can now laugh at him, and so should you! Answer me one question: during the sermon, weren't you thinking of the case of a man born in a wilderness of temptations that he is foreordained never to conquer, and then foreordained to eternal d.a.m.nation because he didn't conquer it?”
”No--no!”
”Well, you'd better've been thinking about it! For that's what you believe.
And that's what makes life so hard and bitter and gloomy to you. I know! I carried Calvinism around within me once: it was like an uncorked ink-bottle in a rolling s...o...b..ll: the farther you go, the blacker you get! Admit it now,” he continued in his highest key of rarefied persistency, ”admit that you were mourning over the babies in your school that will have to go to h.e.l.l! You'd better be getting some of your own: the Lord will take care of other people's! Go to see Mrs. Falconer! See all you can of her. There's a woman to bring you around!”
They had reached the little bridge over the clear, swift Elkhorn. Their paths diverged. John stopped at his companion's last words, and stood looking at him with some pity.
”I thank you for your sermon,” he said huskily; ”I hope to get some help from that. But you!--you are making things harder for me every word you utter. You don't understand and I can't tell you.”