" He was answered by a clatter as half a stick full
of type dropped from the trembling hand of the stranger. "Thank you,"
the poor fellow tried to say, as he staggered toward the kind-hearted
infidel, and then, as he fell, Dick's outstretched fingers just touched
Udell's feet.
CHAPTER IV
It was a strange coincidence that the Rev. James Cameron should have
preached his sermon on "The Church of the Future," the Sunday following
the incidents which have been related in the preceding chapters. If
he had only known, Rev. Cameron might have found a splendid
illustration, very much to the point, in the story of Dick Falkner's
coming to Boyd City and his search for employment. But the minister
knew nothing of Dick or his trouble. He had no particular incident in
mind; but simply desired to see a more practical working of
Christianity. In other words, he wished to see Christians doing the
things that Christ did, and using, in matters of the church, the same
business sense which they brought to bear upon their own affairs. He
thought of the poverty, squalor and wretchedness of some for whom
Christ died, and of the costly luxuries of the church into whose hands
the Master had given the care of these. He thought of the doors to
places of sin, swinging wide before the young, while the doors of the
church were often closed against them. He thought of the secret
societies and orders, doing the work that the church was meant to do,
and of the honest, moral men, who refused to identify themselves with
the church, though professing belief in Jesus Christ; and, thinking
of these things and more like them, he was forced to say that the
church must change her methods; that she must talk less and do more;
that she must rest her claims to the love of mankind where Christ
rested his; upon the works that He did.
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