East Loontown is a factory village, and the little chapel was standin’ empty for want of funds, but twenty saloons wuz booming, full of the operatives, who spent all of their spare time and most of their money there. So Ernest White stayed right there and preached, at first to empty seats and a few old wimmen, but as they got to know him, the best young men and young wimmen went, and he filled their hearts with aspiration and hope and beauty and determination to help the world. Not being contented with what he wuz doing he spent half his time with the factory hands, who wuz driven to work by Want, and harried by the mighty foe, Intemperance. A saloon on every corner and block, our twin American idols, Intemperance and Greed, taking every cent of money from the poor worshippers, to pour into the greedy pockets of the saloon-keepers, brewers, whiskey men and the Government, and all who fatten on the corpse of manhood.
Well, he jest threw himself into the work of helping those poor souls, and helping them as he did in sickness and health they got to liking him, so that they wuz willing to go and hear him preach, which was one hard blow to the Demon. The next thing he got all the ministers he could to unite in a Church Union to fight the Liquor Power, and undertaking it in the right way, at the ballot-box, they got it pretty well subdued, and as sane minds begun to reign in healthier bodies, better times come.
Elder White not only preached every Sunday, but kep’ his church open every evening of the week, and his boys and girls met there for healthful and innocent amusements. He got a good library, all sorts of good games, music; and had 40 short, interesting lectures and entertainments and his Church of Love rivalled the Idol Temples and drew away its idol worshippers one by one, and besides the ministers, many prominent business men helped him; my son, Thomas J., is forward in helpin’ it along. And they say that besides all the good they’re doing, they have good times too, and enjoy themselves first-rate evenings. They don’t stay out late––that’s another thing Elder White is trying to inculcate into their minds––right living in the way of health as well as morals. Every little while he and somebody else who is fitted for it gives short talks on subjects that will help the boys and girls along in Temperance and all good things. The young folks jest worship him, so they say, and I wuz glad to hear right from him. Phila is a worker in his meetin’ house, and a active member, and so is her pa and ma, and she said that there wuz no tellin’ how much good he had done.
“When he come there,” sez she, “there wuz twenty saloons goin’ full blast in a village of two thousand inhabitants and the mill operatives wuz spendin’ most all they earnt there, leavin’ their families to suffer and half starve; but when Elder White opened his Church of Love week day evenin’s as well as Sunday, you have no idee what a change there is. There isn’t a saloon in the place. He has made his church so pleasant for the young folks that he has drawn away crowds that used to fill the saloons.”
“Yes,” sez I, “Thomas J. is dretful interested in it; he has gin three lectures there.”
“Yes, most all the best citizens have joined the Help Union to fight against the Whiskey Power, though,” sez Phila, “there is one or two ministers who are afraid of contaminating their religion by politics. They had ruther stand up in their pulpits and preach to a few wimmen about the old Jews and the patience of Job than take holt and do a man’s work in a man’s way––the only practical way, grapple 41 with the monster Evil at its lair, where it breeds and fattens––the ballot-box.”
“Yes,” sez I, “a good many ministers think that they can’t descend into the filthy pool of politics. But it hain’t reasonable, for how are you a goin’ to clean out a filthy place if them that want it clean stand on the bank and hold their noses with one hand, and jester with the other, and quote scripter? And them that don’t want it clean are throwin’ slime and dirt into it all the time, heapin’ up the loathsome filth. Somebody has got to take holt and work as well as pray, if these plague spots and misery breeders are ever purified.”
“Well, Elder White is doin’ all he can,” sez Phila. “He went right to the polls ’lection day and worked all day; for the Whiskey Power wuz all riz up and watchin’ and workin’ for its life, as you may say, bound to draw back into its clutches some of the men that Elder White, with the Lord’s help, had saved. They exerted all their influence, liquor run free all day and all the night before, tryin’ to brutalize and craze the men into votin’ as the Liquor Power dictated. But Elder White knew what they wuz about, and he and all the earnest helpers he could muster used all their power and influence, and the election wuz a triumph for the Right. East Loontown went no-license, and not a saloon curses its streets to-day. North Loontown, where the minister felt that he wuz too good to touch the political pole, went license, and five more filthy pools wuz opened there for his flock to fall into, to breed vile influences that will overpower all the good influence he can possibly bring to bear on the souls committed to his care.”
“But,” sez I, “he is writin’ his book, ‘Commentaries on Ancient Sins,’ so he won’t sense it so much. He’s jest carried away with his work.”
Sez Phila, “He had better be actin’ out a commentary on modern sins. What business has he to be rakin’ over the old ashes of Sodom and Gomorrah for bones of antediluvian 42 sinners, and leave his livin’ flock to be burnt and choked by the fire and flames of the present volcano of crime, the Liquor System, that belches forth all the time.”
“Well, he wuz made so,” sez I.
“Well, he had better git down out of the pulpit,” sez Phila, “and let some one git up there who can see a sinner right under his nose, and try to drag him out of danger and ruin, and not have to look over a dozen centuries to find him.”
“Well, I am thankful for Ernest White, and I have felt that he and Waitstill Webb wuz jest made for each other. He thinks his eyes of her I know. When she went and nursed the factory hands when the typhoid fever broke out he said ‘she wuz like a angel of Mercy.’”
“They said he looked like a angel of Wrath ’lection day,” sez Phila. “You know how fair his face is, and how his clear gray eyes seem to look right through you, and through shams and shames of every kind. Well, that day they said his face fairly shone and he did the work of ten men.”
“That is because his heart is pure,” sez I, “like that Mr. Gallyhed I heard Thomas J. read about; you know it sez:
“‘His strength is as the strength of ten
Because his heart is pure.’
“And oh!” sez I agin, “how I would love to see him and Waitstill Webb married, and happy.”
“So would I,” sez Phila. “Oh, it is such a beautiful state, matrimony is.”
“And he needs a wife,” sez I. “You know he wouldn’t stay with his uncle but said he must live with his people who needed him, so he boards there at the Widder Pooler’s.”
“Yes,” sez Phila, “and though she worships him, she had rather any day play the part of Mary than of Martha––she had rather be sittin’ at his feet and learnin’ of him––than 43 cookin’ good nourishin’ food and makin’ a clean, sweet home for him. But he don’t complain.”
“What a companion Waitstill would be for him?” I sez agin.