made sausages, pickles, and mince pie in which Elmer suspected, and gratefully suspected, the presence of unrighteous brandy, were only part of the stout trencher-work required of the young prophets. Mr. Bains roared every three minutes at the swollen and suffering Frank, "Nonsense, nonsense, Brother, you haven't begun to eat yet! What's the matter with you? Pass up your plate for another helpin'."
Miss Baldwin, the spinster, two other deacons and their wives and a young man from a near-by farm, one Floyd Naylor, were present, and the clergy were also expected to be instructive. The theories were that they cared to talk of nothing save theology and the church and, second, that such talk was somehow beneficial in the tricky business of enjoying your sleep and buggy-riding and vittles, and still getting into heaven.
"Say, Brother Gantry," said Mr. Bains, "what Baptist paper do you like best for home reading? I tried the Watchman Examiner for a while, but don't seem to me it lambastes the Campbellites like it ought to, or gives the Catholics what-for, like a real earnest Christian sheet ought to. I've started taking the Word and Way. Now there's a mighty sound paper that don't mince matters none, and written real elegant—just suits me. It tells you straight out from the shoulder that if you don't believe in the virgin birth and the resurrection, atonement, and immersion, then it don't make no difference about your so-called good works and charity and all that, because you're doomed and bound to go straight to hell, and not no make-believe hell, either, but a real gosh-awful turble bed of sure-enough coals! Yes, sir!"
"Oh, look here now, Brother Bains!" Frank Shallard protested. "You don't mean to say you think that the Lord Jesus isn't going to save one single solitary person who isn't an orthodox Baptist?"
"Well, I don't perfess to know all these things myself, like I was a high-toned preacher. But way I see it: Oh, yes, maybe if a fellow ain't ever had a chance to see the light—say he was brought up a Methodist or a Mormon, and never heard a real dyed-in-the-wool Baptist explain the complete truth, then maybe God might forgive him 'cause he was ignorant. But one thing I do know, absolute: All these 'advanced thinkers' and 'higher critics' are going to the hottest pit of hell! What do you think about it, Brother Gantry?"
