There were, indeed, more urgent matters to think about. June had come; and every succeeding day brought closer to hand the ordeal3 of his first Quarterly Conference in Octavius. The waters grew distinctly rougher as his pastoral bark neared this difficult passage.
He would have approached the great event with an easier mind if he could have made out just how he stood with his congregation. Unfortunately nothing in his previous experiences helped him in the least to measure or guess at the feelings of these curious Octavians. Their Methodism seemed to be sound enough, and to stick quite to the letter of the Discipline, so long as it was expressed in formulae. It was its spirit which he felt to be complicated by all sorts of conditions wholly novel to him.
The existence of a line of street-cars in the town, for example, would not impress the casual thinker as likely to prove a rock in the path of peaceful religion. Theron, in his simplicity4, had even thought, when he first saw these bobtailed cars bumping along the rails in the middle of the main street, that they must be a great convenience to people living in the outskirts5, who wished to get in to church of a Sunday morning. He was imprudent enough to mention this in conversation with one of his new parishioners. Then he learned, to his considerable chagrin6, that when this line was built, some years before, a bitter war of words had been fought upon the question of its being worked on the Sabbath day. The then occupant of the Methodist pulpit had so distinguished7 himself above the rest by the solemnity and fervor8 of his protests against this insolent9 desecration10 of God's day that the Methodists of Octavius still felt themselves peculiarly bound to hold this horse-car line, its management, and everything connected with it, in unbending aversion. At least once a year they were accustomed to expect a sermon denouncing it and all its impious Sunday patrons. Theron made a mental resolve that this year they should be disappointed.
Another burning problem, which he had not been called upon before to confront, he found now entangled13 with the mysterious line which divided a circus from a menagerie. Those itinerant14 tent-shows had never come his way heretofore, and he knew nothing of that fine balancing proportion between ladies in tights on horseback and cages full of deeply educational animals, which, even as the impartial15 rain, was designed to embrace alike the just and the unjust. There had arisen inside the Methodist society of Octavius some painful episodes, connected with members who took their children “just to see the animals,” and were convicted of having also watched the Rose-Queen of the Arena16, in her unequalled flying leap through eight hoops17, with an ardent18 and unashamed eye. One of these cases still remained on the censorial19 docket of the church; and Theron understood that he was expected to name a committee of five to examine and try it. This he neglected to do.
He was no longer at all certain that the congregation as a whole liked his sermons. The truth was, no doubt, that he had learned enough to cease regarding the congregation as a whole. He could still rely upon carrying along with him in his discourses20 from the pulpit a large majority of interested and approving faces. But here, unhappily, was a case where the majority did not rule. The minority, relatively22 small in numbers, was prodigious23 in virile24 force.
More than twenty years had now elapsed since that minor21 schism25 in the Methodist Episcopal Church, the result of which was the independent body known as Free Methodists, had relieved the parent flock of its principal disturbing element. The rupture26 came fittingly at that time when all the “isms” of the argumentative fifties were hurled27 violently together into the melting-pot of civil war. The great Methodist Church, South, had broken bodily off on the question of State Rights. The smaller and domestic fraction of Free Methodism separated itself upon an issue which may be most readily described as one of civilization. The seceders resented growth in material prosperity; they repudiated28 the introduction of written sermons and organ-music; they deplored29 the increasing laxity in meddlesome30 piety31, the introduction of polite manners in the pulpit and classroom, and the development of even a rudimentary desire among the younger people of the church to be like others outside in dress and speech and deportment. They did battle as long as they could, inside the fold, to restore it to the severely32 straight and narrow path of primitive33 Methodism. When the adverse34 odds35 became too strong for them, they quitted the church and set up a Bethel for themselves.
Octavius chanced to be one of the places where they were able to hold their own within the church organization. The Methodism of the town had gone along without any local secession. It still held in full fellowship the radicals36 who elsewhere had followed their unbridled bent37 into the strongest emotional vagaries38—where excited brethren worked themselves up into epileptic fits, and women whirled themselves about in weird39 religious ecstasies40, like dervishes of the Orient, till they fell headlong in a state of trance. Octavian Methodism was spared extravagances of this sort, it is true, but it paid a price for the immunity41. The people whom an open split would have taken away remained to leaven42 and dominate the whole lump. This small advanced section, with its men of a type all the more aggressive from its narrowness, and women who went about solemnly in plain gray garments, with tight-fitting, unadorned, mouse-colored sunbonnets, had not been able wholly to enforce its views upon the social life of the church members, but of its controlling influence upon their official and public actions there could be no doubt.
The situation had begun to unfold itself to Theron from the outset. He had recognized the episodes of the forbidden Sunday milk and of the flowers in poor Alice's bonnet43 as typical of much more that was to come. No week followed without bringing some new fulfilment of this foreboding. Now, at the end of two months, he knew well enough that the hitherto dominant44 minority was hostile to him and his ministry45, and would do whatever it could against him.
Though Theron at once decided46 to show fight, and did not at all waver in that resolve, his courage was in the main of a despondent47 sort. Sometimes it would flutter up to the point of confidence, or at least hopefulness, when he met with substantial men of the church who obviously liked him, and whom he found himself mentally ranging on his side, in the struggle which was to come. But more often it was blankly apparent to him that, the moment flags were flying and drums on the roll, these amiable48 fair-weather friends would probably take to their heels.
Still, such as they were, his sole hope lay in their support. He must make the best of them. He set himself doggedly49 to the task of gathering50 together all those who were not his enemies into what, when the proper time came, should be known as the pastor's party. There was plenty of apostolic warrant for this. If there had not been, Theron felt that the mere51 elementary demands of self-defence would have justified52 his use of strategy.
The institution of pastoral calling, particularly that inquisitorial form of it laid down in the Discipline, had never attracted Theron. He and Alice had gone about among their previous flocks in quite a haphazard53 fashion, without thought of system, much less of deliberate purpose. Theron made lists now, and devoted54 thought and examination to the personal tastes and characteristics of the people to be cultivated. There were some, for example, who would expect him to talk pretty much as the Discipline ordained—that is, to ask if they had family prayer, to inquire after their souls, and generally to minister grace to his hearers—and these in turn subdivided55 themselves into classes, ranging from those who would wish nothing else to those who needed only a mild spiritual flavor. There were others whom he would please much better by not talking shop at all. Although he could ill afford it, he subscribed56 now for a daily paper that he might have a perpetually renewed source of good conversational57 topics for these more worldly calls. He also bought several pounds of candy, pleasing in color, but warranted to be entirely58 harmless, and he made a large mysterious mark on the inside of his new silk hat to remind him not to go out calling without some of this in his pocket for the children.
Alice, he felt, was not helping59 him in this matter as effectively as he could have wished. Her attitude toward the church in Octavius might best be described by the word “sulky.” Great allowance was to be made, he realized, for her humiliation60 over the flowers in her bonnet. That might justify61 her, fairly enough, in being kept away from meeting now and again by headaches, or undefined megrims. But it ought not to prevent her from going about and making friends among the kindlier parishioners who would welcome such a thing, and whom he from time to time indicated to her. She did go to some extent, it is true, but she produced, in doing so, an effect of performing a duty. He did not find traces anywhere of her having created a brilliant social impression. When they went out together, he was peculiarly conscious of having to do the work unaided.
This was not at all like the Alice of former years, of other charges. Why, she had been, beyond comparison, the most popular young woman in Tyre. What possessed62 her to mope like this in Octavius?
Theron looked at her attentively63 nowadays, when she was unaware64 of his gaze, to try if her face offered any answer to the riddle65. It could not be suggested that she was ill. Never in her life had she been looking so well. She had thrown herself, all at once, and with what was to him an unaccountable energy, into the creation and management of a flower-garden. She was out the better part of every day, rain or shine, digging, transplanting, pruning66, pottering generally about among her plants and shrubs67. This work in the open air had given her an aspect of physical well-being68 which it was impossible to be mistaken about.
Her husband was glad, of course, that she had found some occupation which at once pleased her and so obviously conduced to health. This was so much a matter of course, in fact, that he said to himself over and over again that he was glad. Only—only, sometimes the thought WOULD force itself upon his attention that if she did not spend so much of her time in her own garden, she would have more time to devote to winning friends for them in the Garden of the Lord—friends whom they were going to need badly.
The young minister, in taking anxious stock of the chances for and against him, turned over often in his mind the fact that he had already won rank as a pulpit orator69. His sermons had attracted almost universal attention at Tyre, and his achievement before the Conference at Tecumseh, if it did fail to receive practical reward, had admittedly distanced all the other preaching there. It was a part of the evil luck pursuing him that here in this perversely70 enigmatic Octavius his special gift seemed to be of no use whatever. There were times, indeed, when he was tempted71 to think that bad preaching was what Octavius wanted.
Somewhere he had heard of a Presbyterian minister, in charge of a big city church, who managed to keep well in with a watchfully72 Orthodox congregation, and at the same time establish himself in the affections of the community at large, by simply preaching two kinds of sermons. In the morning, when almost all who attended were his own communicants, he gave them very cautious and edifying73 doctrinal discourses, treading loyally in the path of the Westminster Confession74. To the evening assemblages, made up for the larger part of outsiders, he addressed broadly liberal sermons, literary in form, and full of respectful allusions75 to modern science and the philosophy of the day. Thus he filled the church at both services, and put money in its treasury76 and his own fame before the world. There was of course the obvious danger that the pious11 elders who in the forenoon heard infant damnation vigorously proclaimed, would revolt when they heard after supper that there was some doubt about even adults being damned at all. But either because the same people did not attend both services, or because the minister's perfect regularity77 in the morning was each week regarded as a retraction78 of his latest vagaries of an evening, no trouble ever came.
Theron had somewhat tentatively tried this on in Octavius. It was no good. His parishioners were of the sort who would have come to church eight times a day on Sunday, instead of two, if occasion offered. The hope that even a portion of them would stop away, and that their places would be taken in the evening by less prejudiced strangers who wished for intellectual rather than theological food, fell by the wayside. The yearned-for strangers did not come; the familiar faces of the morning service all turned up in their accustomed places every evening. They were faces which confused and disheartened Theron in the daytime. Under the gaslight they seemed even harder and more unsympathetic. He timorously79 experimented with them for an evening or two, then abandoned the effort.
Once there had seemed the beginning of a chance. The richest banker in Octavius—a fat, sensual, hog-faced old bachelor—surprised everybody one evening by entering the church and taking a seat. Theron happened to know who he was; even if he had not known, the suppressed excitement visible in the congregation, the way the sisters turned round to look, the way the more important brethren put their heads together and exchanged furtive80 whispers—would have warned him that big game was in view. He recalled afterward81 with something like self-disgust the eager, almost tremulous pains he himself took to please this banker. There was a part of the sermon, as it had been written out, which might easily give offence to a single man of wealth and free notions of life. With the alertness of a mental gymnast, Theron ran ahead, excised82 this portion, and had ready when the gap was reached some very pretty general remarks, all the more effective and eloquent83, he felt, for having been extemporized84. People said it was a good sermon; and after the benediction85 and dispersion some of the officials and principal pew-holders remained to talk over the likelihood of a capture having been effected. Theron did not get away without having this mentioned to him, and he was conscious of sharing deeply the hope of the brethren—with the added reflection that it would be a personal triumph for himself into the bargain. He was ashamed of this feeling a little later, and of his trick with the sermon. But this chastening product of introspection was all the fruit which the incident bore. The banker never came again.
Theron returned one afternoon, a little earlier than usual, from a group of pastoral calls. Alice, who was plucking weeds in a border at the shady side of the house, heard his step, and rose from her labors86. He was walking slowly, and seemed weary. He took off his high hat, as he saw her, and wiped his brow. The broiling87 June sun was still high overhead. Doubtless it was its insufferable heat which was accountable for the worn lines in his face and the spiritless air which the wife's eye detected. She went to the gate, and kissed him as he entered.
“I believe if I were you,” she said, “I'd carry an umbrella such scorching88 days as this. Nobody'd think anything of it. I don't see why a minister shouldn't carry one as much as a woman carries a parasol.”
Theron gave her a rueful, meditative89 sort of smile. “I suppose people really do think of us as a kind of hybrid90 female,” he remarked. Then, holding his hat in his hand, he drew a long breath of relief at finding himself in the shade, and looked about him.
“Why, you've got more posies here, on this one side of the house alone, than mother had in her whole yard,” he said, after a little. “Let's see—I know that one: that's columbine, isn't it? And that's London pride, and that's ragged91 robin92. I don't know any of the others.”
Alice recited various unfamiliar93 names, as she pointed12 out the several plants which bore them, and he listened with a kindly94 semblance95 of interest.
They strolled thus to the rear of the house, where thick clumps96 of fragrant97 pinks lined both sides of the path. She picked some of these for him, and gave him more names with which to label the considerable number of other plants he saw about him.
“I had no idea we were so well provided as all this,” he commented at last. “Those Van Sizers must have been tremendous hands for flowers. You were lucky in following such people.”
“Van Sizers!” echoed Alice, with contempt. “All they left was old tomato cans and clamshells. Why, I've put in every blessed one of these myself, all except those peonies, there, and one brier on the side wall.”
“Good for you!” exclaimed Theron, approvingly. Then it occurred to him to ask, “But where did you get them all? Around among our friends?”
“Some few,” responded Alice, with a note of hesitation98 in her voice. “Sister Bult gave me the verbenas, there, and the white pinks were a present from Miss Stevens. But most of them Levi Gorringe was good enough to send me—from his garden.”
“I didn't know that Gorringe had a garden,” said Theron. “I thought he lived over his law-office, in the brick block, there.”
“Well, I don't know that it's exactly HIS,” explained Alice; “but it's a big garden somewhere outside, where he can have anything he likes.” She went on with a little laugh: “I didn't like to question him too closely, for fear he'd think I was looking a gift horse in the mouth—or else hinting for more. It was quite his own offer, you know. He picked them all out for me, and brought them here, and lent me a book telling me just what to do with each one. And in a few days, now, I am to have another big batch99 of plants—dahlias and zinnias and asters and so on; I'm almost ashamed to take them. But it's such a change to find some one in this Octavius who isn't all self!”
“Yes, Gorringe is a good fellow,” said Theron. “I wish he was a professing100 member.” Then some new thought struck him. “Alice,” he exclaimed, “I believe I'll go and see him this very afternoon. I don't know why it hasn't occurred to me before: he's just the man whose advice I need most. He knows these people here; he can tell me what to do.”
“Aren't you too tired now?” suggested Alice, as Theron put on his hat.
“No, the sooner the better,” he replied, moving now toward the gate.
“Well,” she began, “if I were you, I wouldn't say too much about—that is, I—but never mind.”
“What is it?” asked her husband.
“Nothing whatever,” replied Alice, positively101. “It was only some nonsense of mine;” and Theron, placidly102 accepting the feminine whim103, went off down the street again.
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rev
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| v.发动机旋转，加快速度 | |
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ware
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| n.(常用复数)商品，货物 | |
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ordeal
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| n.苦难经历，（尤指对品格、耐力的）严峻考验 | |
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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outskirts
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| n.郊外，郊区 | |
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chagrin
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| n.懊恼；气愤；委屈 | |
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distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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fervor
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| n.热诚；热心；炽热 | |
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insolent
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| adj.傲慢的，无理的 | |
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desecration
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pious
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| adj.虔诚的；道貌岸然的 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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entangled
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| adj.卷入的；陷入的；被缠住的；缠在一起的v.使某人（某物/自己）缠绕，纠缠于（某物中），使某人（自己）陷入（困难或复杂的环境中）( entangle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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itinerant
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| adj.巡回的；流动的 | |
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impartial
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| adj.(in,to)公正的，无偏见的 | |
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arena
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| n.竞技场，运动场所；竞争场所，舞台 | |
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hoops
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| n.箍( hoop的名词复数 )；（篮球）篮圈；（旧时儿童玩的）大环子；（两端埋在地里的）小铁弓 | |
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ardent
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，强烈的，烈性的 | |
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censorial
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| 监察官的，审查员的 | |
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discourses
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| 论文( discourse的名词复数 )； 演说； 讲道； 话语 | |
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minor
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relatively
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prodigious
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virile
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schism
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rupture
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hurled
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repudiated
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| v.（正式地）否认( repudiate的过去式和过去分词 )；拒绝接受；拒绝与…往来；拒不履行（法律义务） | |
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deplored
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meddlesome
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piety
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| n.虔诚，虔敬 | |
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severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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primitive
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adverse
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odds
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radicals
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bent
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vagaries
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| n.奇想( vagary的名词复数 )；异想天开；异常行为；难以预测的情况 | |
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weird
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| adj.古怪的，离奇的；怪诞的，神秘而可怕的 | |
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ecstasies
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| 狂喜( ecstasy的名词复数 )； 出神； 入迷； 迷幻药 | |
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immunity
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| n.优惠；免除；豁免，豁免权 | |
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leaven
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| v.使发酵；n.酵母；影响 | |
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bonnet
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| n.无边女帽；童帽 | |
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dominant
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| adj.支配的，统治的；占优势的；显性的；n.主因，要素，主要的人(或物)；显性基因 | |
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ministry
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| n.(政府的)部；牧师 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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despondent
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| adj.失望的，沮丧的，泄气的 | |
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amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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doggedly
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| adv.顽强地，固执地 | |
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gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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haphazard
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| adj.无计划的，随意的，杂乱无章的 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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subdivided
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| 再分，细分( subdivide的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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subscribed
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| v.捐助( subscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；签署，题词；订阅；同意 | |
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conversational
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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justify
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| vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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attentively
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| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
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unaware
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| a.不知道的，未意识到的 | |
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riddle
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| n.谜，谜语，粗筛；vt.解谜，给…出谜，筛，检查，鉴定，非难，充满于；vi.出谜 | |
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66
pruning
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| n.修枝，剪枝，修剪v.修剪（树木等）( prune的现在分词 )；精简某事物，除去某事物多余的部分 | |
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shrubs
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| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
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well-being
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| n.安康，安乐，幸福 | |
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orator
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| n.演说者，演讲者，雄辩家 | |
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perversely
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| adv. 倔强地 | |
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tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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watchfully
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| 警惕地，留心地 | |
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edifying
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| adj.有教训意味的，教训性的，有益的v.开导，启发( edify的现在分词 ) | |
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confession
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| n.自白，供认，承认 | |
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allusions
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| 暗指，间接提到( allusion的名词复数 ) | |
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treasury
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| n.宝库；国库，金库；文库 | |
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regularity
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| n.规律性，规则性；匀称，整齐 | |
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retraction
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| n.撤消；收回 | |
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timorously
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| adv.胆怯地，羞怯地 | |
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furtive
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| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
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afterward
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| adv.后来；以后 | |
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excised
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| v.切除，删去( excise的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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extemporized
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| v.即兴创作，即席演奏( extemporize的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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benediction
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| n.祝福；恩赐 | |
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labors
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| v.努力争取(for)( labor的第三人称单数 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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broiling
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| adj.酷热的，炽热的，似烧的v.（用火）烤（焙、炙等）( broil的现在分词 )；使卷入争吵；使混乱；被烤（或炙） | |
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scorching
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| adj. 灼热的 | |
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meditative
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| adj.沉思的，冥想的 | |
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hybrid
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| n.(动，植）杂种，混合物 | |
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ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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robin
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| n.知更鸟，红襟鸟 | |
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unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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semblance
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| n.外貌，外表 | |
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clumps
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| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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fragrant
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| adj.芬香的，馥郁的，愉快的 | |
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hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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batch
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| n.一批(组，群)；一批生产量 | |
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professing
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| 声称( profess的现在分词 )； 宣称； 公开表明； 信奉 | |
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positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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102
placidly
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| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
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103
whim
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| n.一时的兴致，突然的念头；奇想，幻想 | |
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