that makes a man miserable. I say, _your_ God mayn't, but _mine_ does.
It's his _knowledge_ that makes Him compassionate. If He didn't know
what was happening to His own children, that He had created and planned
for, then I'd rather pray to Bob McCartney. Think, sir, what kind of a
mother would your mother a-been, if she hadn't known when you cried,
and you hadn't a-been able to climb up and lay in her arms and be
comforted and forgiven? She wouldn't a-been a mother and God wouldn't
be a God unless He knew what was a-happening to His own children! Why
man alive didn't He make the world; aren't they His, the cattle on a
thousand hills, the lightenin' and the thunder, the sweet grass and the
flowers and all things in and on and under the earth? If He has gone
off and forgotten it all and don't know good and evil, if He don't know
when we're tired and failin' and tryin' again, why what would be the
use o' prayer or, for that matter, for livin' at all?"
The queer man, at this point, removed his rubbers, but made no comment
upon Jim's questions. Perhaps his feet were so warm it was hard for him
to keep his head cool.
"You are utterly deceived," he continued. "You are confusing the real
and the non-real. You are following after shadows that do not exist at
all. You do not know the truth. You are bound. You are looking at the
mist of matter that will disappear as the knowledge of truth develops
within you. If you will begin to deny the existence of evil, you will
begin to banish disease and ultimately you will understand that all
things are but illusions."
"Pears to me," Jim said, as the queer man paused for breath, before
launching more sentences about the truth. "Pears to me, you're sailin'
round in a circle, and havin' a hard time dodging the winds o' logic.
Call the flower, the mountain, and the man, shadows and illusions; if
you will. I don't object to that, only I want you to agree with me
that they are beautiful. The only thing I am afeared of is that you'll
make some folks think this is not _His_ world at all; and I want them
to know that this is His world and that He planned these things you
have re-named shadows and illusions. I callate there's danger in your
statements when you come to follow them out. Then, too, these shadows
have been actin' about uniform for as long ago as the book o' Genesis
and afore that, and I don't propose to try to get much farther back,
for it makes my eyes ache to see back o' that.
"When you tell me this body o' mine is an illusion, it kinder riles me,
for I believe the Good Father planned this body as much as He planned a
soul for me. It's a house for my soul as long as I'm in this earth and
I callate it's to be treated holy while it houses my soul. I know it
will get kinder old and dingy bye and bye and I'll be quitting it, but
that ain't no good reason for neglectin' it now.
"Of course if what you say was true and there was no material and it
was all in thinking, then we wouldn't have to wear clothes, nor eat
food and you wouldn't have to wear your specs, nor your goloshes,
because it's a little damp under feet this morning. You may be
different, Mr. Jewett, with your one, only, real, true religion, but we
Landers up here all get a little older as days go by; we all like to be
cheered by food and fuel, and we all feel the difference between winter
and summer, and we all travel sooner or later to the better land. Seems
to be His plan."
The queer man was gathering words for new statements; but while he was
listening to the last of Jim's replies, he was looking intently at his
hands. If it may be permitted to speak in ordinary fashion of a man of
his philosophy, his hands were dirty and he had become painfully aware
of it. Jim noticed his concern and remarked with a certain acerbity of
tone:
"You don't clean your hands with soap and water, do you?"
The queer man in turn showed some increase of warmth as he replied:
"I certainly do when I need to, that's only common sense."
"Well," mused Jim, this time very slowly, "do you know, I don't believe
in using too much soap, it's caustic and it's harmful sometimes to the
skin, but do you know, once in a while I get a bit riled and dirty
inside o' me and I decide that it's only common sense to clean that
just as I would my hands."
The queer man sniffed and asked for a Bible. "Have you a Bible?"
He won't get ahead very fast, if he thinks Jim doesn't own a Bible and
know its contents, I thought; but I kept my thoughts to myself, for
the man had utterly ignored me, thus far, for Jim was keeping him as
busy as he cared to be. Before Jim could answer he saw his Bible on the
little table and it opened easily and he saw at once the markings and
said:
"Glad you read your Bible, but it needs another book beside it else
you can't understand it and it's a closed book. You need a key to the
Scriptures."
"I callate," replied Jim, "that a man ought to be able to read his
own Bible and interpret it for himself. The Lord has given every man
a key in his own mind and heart. The fathers that have lived and died
didn't have your key, but they got comfort out of this Book. Ever since
the words were uttered they have been helping and some on 'em is so
simple and beautiful that little fellows can read and be blessed in the
reading."
The queer man read now from Jim's Bible:
"And Jesus went about preaching the gospel of the kingdom _and healing
all manner of diseases_."
"Do you believe that? There it is plain, too plain to be contradicted."
"Yes, I believe," answered Jim.
The queer man was surprised and it gave Jim time to add:
"Jesus also said: 'According to your _faith_ be it unto thee. All
things are possible to Him that _believeth_!
"There's an old Indian lives down the road a piece, who was all tied up
with rheumatiz. He got back the other day from New Mexico, all cured.
He'd never heard of you or your key to the Scriptures. He'd been to
a place called Chimayo. Went to a little clay church down there and
scraped up some of the clay from the floor and mixed it with water and
drank it and has come back well. Every year or two somebody goes from
St. John's away to Quebec and out to a place called St. Ann's, where
they got a wrist-bone of hers, so they tell, and some of 'em come back
well again.
"There's an old lady in Quidi Vidi nigh on to eighty-five. She got sick
when she was eighty, grew feeble and pindling. She took to readin' this
Book and praying all by herself and she got her strength back and she
is as chipper as any woman of sixty in the Dominion.
"What was it cured her; what is it that cures lots of folks for a time,
though we mustn't forget that we all go hence according to His plan.
He's evidently got a good many rooms in His big house and He doesn't
intend for us to stay too long in any one.
"Did these folks that drank mud, prayed in front of a wrist-bone, or
just prayed, believe that they was living in the shadows; did they
build up an airy, fairy world and re-name things; not a bit of it; they
was cured just as you and I might be, can be cured. Mr. Jewett, they
had _faith_!
"I believe it's the measure of faith we have that counts. The Lord
speaks about our doing things He did and greater also, and we shall
just as our faith grows. I believe in praying because it makes that
faith grow; I believe in reading the Book for the same reason. If I
had faith enough, I could, like Him, remove mountains or walk upon the
sea; but it don't grieve me because I can't in a moment do the things
the Divine Son did. Faith always seems to me to be a bigger thing than
love. I guess faith is love that has learned how to bring things to
pass.
"Let's not expect too much. Let's remember we and the world have yet
to do a good deal of growing. I don't measure God's greatness nor His
goodness by the number of times He cures my stomach-ache. It may be I'm
pretty careless and a certain amount of pain is about the only handy
Teacher He can find for me. It may be that in this first room some of
us will have to be somewhat ailing, but let's not forget He gives us
grace to bear as well as strength to heal. I only ask to be able to do
my work and not grunt.
"I callate that if your one, only, real, true religion is devoting its
chief thought and its most time to simply curing aches and pains, it
ain't the religion of our Lord for He went about doin' _all kinds of
good_."
The queer man was fidgeting and from his looks I concluded he was about
to seek new pastures. Jim, noticing this, continued:
"I appreciate your coming, sir, proves there's good in your religion.
You've got the missionary zeal and that deserves to be kept. After all
we ain't so far apart, as it might seem, some ways; but we're starting
from different points. I believe this is a real world, an intended
world, with real folks and real facts and that it is a good world,
His World, and it's a goin' to be better; only not all to onct, by
re-naming the old and beautiful things He planned and sent."
Mr. Jewett was wise in withdrawing, for Jim was gaining in power and
facility of expression. Now, as the man edged toward the door, Jim
extended his hand and said:
"Don't lose your logic, 'cause there's no harm in mixin' logic and
religion. If religion is any good it'll stand logic. Remember the Lord
knowed what He was a-doin' and He ain't abandoned His children."
When he was well outside, Mrs. Jim spoke:
"Jim, do you think he has a screw loose in his loft?"
But the queer man was back in a moment, with a less confident air, but
this time he had but one brief sentence:
"Please, I left my rubbers."
_Printed in the United States of America._
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTE:
Inconsistencies in the author's use of hyphens has been left unchanged,
as in the original text. Obvious printer errors have been corrected.
Otherwise, the author's original spelling, punctuation and hyphenation
have been left intact.