"Well— He seems kind of a nice fellow." Mr. Styles was uncomfortable. "But if you're right about him being really an infidel, don't know's I could stand that."
"How'd it be if you and some of your deacons and Shallard came and had dinner with me in a private room at the Athletic Club next Friday evening?"
"Well, all right—"
Frank was so simple as to lose his temper when Elmer had bullied him, roared at him, bulked at him, long enough, with Frank's own deacons accepting Elmer as an authority. He was irritated out of all caution, and he screamed back at Elmer that he did not accept Jesus Christ as divine; that he was not sure of a future life; that he wasn't even certain of a personal God.
Mr. William Dollinger Styles snapped, "Then just why, Mr. Shallard, don't you get out of the ministry before you're kicked out?"
"Because I'm not yet sure— Though I do think our present churches are as absurd as a belief in witchcraft, yet I believe there could be a church free of superstition, helpful to the needy, and giving people that mystic something stronger than reason, that sense of being uplifted in common worship of an unknowable power for good. Myself, I'd be lonely with nothing but bleak debating-societies. I think—at least I still think—that for many souls there is this need of worship, even of beautiful ceremonial—"
"'Mystic need of worship!' 'Unknowable power for good!' Words, words, words! Milk and water! That, when you have the glorious and certain figure of Christ Jesus to worship and follow!" bellowed Elmer. "Pardon me, gentlemen, for intruding, but it makes me, not as a preacher but just as a humble and devout Christian, sick to my stomach to hear a fellow feel that he knows so blame' much he's able to throw out of the window the Christ that the whole civilized world has believed in for countless centuries! And try to replace him with a lot of gassy phrases! Excuse me, Mr. Styles, but after all, religion is a serious business, and if we're going to call ourselves Christians at all, we have to bear testimony to the proven fact of God. Forgive me."
