Page:War; or, What happens when one loves one's enemy, John Luther Long, 1913.djvu/38

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WAR

David and Goliath, the Battle of Jericho, the slaughter of the Amalekites, the crossing of the Red Sea, the battle of Armageddon—all of these typifying the present struggle of the South for liberty. We are two to one and we demand that you preach of wars and rumors of wars, two sermons out of three, or else—"

Well, "or else" meant that the pastor wouldn't get his salary the next month if he didn't—and, maybe, be wearing feathers instead of clothes—and he began, by preaching a hummer—calling upon the secessionists to blow their trumpets and throw down the abolition walls of Washington!

He got a cheer from "Africa"—the first cheers, I suppose, that old church ever heard—and afterward it was worse than ever—until "Africa" outnumbered "Lincoln's Pen" four to one, and the pastor kept on thundering war-sermons, never one about peace and doves, and not down the aisle, in "Kentucky"—where no one was—but straight into "Africa", with his back turned on "Lincoln's Pen".

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