We should be thankful that such conditions as those described below no
longer exist:
No religious meetings outside the ordinary services of the
Church could be held without a license under the Toleration Act;
and those taking part in such meetings, in order to secure the
right to hold them, had to register themselves as Dissenters.
This law extended to America, and so the first Methodist Church
in the United States was adorned with that very unecclesiastical
bit of architecture--a chimney. When a Methodist church was
built it had to disguise itself as a house in order to secure
the right to exist.--W. H. FITCHETT, “Wesley and His
Century.”
(1667)
* * * * *
In a dark wood where wild beasts lived there once lay a man’s
boot. How it came there, I can not say, for no man had been
there--at least the wild beasts had not seen one in all their
lives. But there the boot was, and when the beasts saw it they
all came round to find out what it was. Such a thing was quite
new to them; but they were not much at a loss for all that.
“Well, there is no doubt as to what it is, I say,” said the bear.
“Oh, of course not,” said the wolf and the goat and all the
beasts and birds in one breath.
“Of course,” said the bear, “it is the rind of some kind of
fruit off a tree--the fruit of the cork, I should say. This is
cork, it is plain to see,” and he showed the sole of the boot.
“Oh, just hear him! just hear him!” cried all the beasts and
birds.
“It is not that at all,” said the wolf, with a glance of scorn
at the bear. “Of course it is some kind of nest. Look; here is
the hole for the bird to go in at, and here is the deep part for
the eggs and young ones to be safe. No doubt at all, of course
not!”
“Oh, oh!” cried the bear and the goat and all the birds and
beasts, “just hear what he says! It is not that at all.”
“I should think not,” said the goat. “It is quite a plain case.
Look at this long root,” and he showed the string at the side of
the boot. “It is the root of a plant, of course.”
“Not a bit of it,” cried the wolf and the bear; “not a bit of
it. A root? How can you say so? It is not that, we can all see.”
“If I might speak,” said an old owl, who sat in a tree near, “I
think I can tell you what it is. I have been in a land where
there are more of such things than you could count. It is a
man’s boot.”
“A what?” cried all the beasts and birds. “What is a man? and
what is a boot?”
“A man,” said the owl, “is a thing with two legs that can walk
and eat and talk, like us; but he can do much more than we can.”
“Pooh, pooh!” cried they all.
“That can’t be true,” said the beasts. “How can a thing with two
legs do more than we can, who have four? It is false, of course.”
“Of course it is if they have no wings,” said the birds.
“Well,” went on the owl, “they have no wings, and yet it is
true. And they can make things like this, and they call them
boots and put them on their feet.”
“Oh, oh!” cried all the beasts and birds at once. “How can you?
For shame. Fie on you! That is not true, of course. It can not
be.”
“A likely story!” said the bear.
“Can do more than we can?” said the wolf.
“Wear things on their feet?” cried they all. “On the face of it
your story is not true. We know that such things are not worn on
the feet. How could they be?”
“Of course they could not,” said the bear; “it is false.”
“It must be false,” cried all the birds and beasts. “You must
leave the wood,” they said to the owl. “What you say can not be
true. You are not fit to live with us. You have said what you
know is false. It must be, of course.”
And they chased the poor old owl out of the wood, and would not
let him come back.
“It is true for all that,” said the owl.