Crestlands: A Centennial Story of Cane Ridge

  CHAPTER X.

  AFTERNOON IN THE GROVE

  One afternoon toward the close of the revival, Betsy and John CalvinGilcrest and Henry and Susan Rogers took their lunch-baskets to a shadygrove near the big spring, with the intention of spending the afternoonin the woods.

  "I'm completely worn out," declared Susan, throwing herself down upon agrassy knoll and tossing her bonnet aside. "I've had enough excitementfor one while."

  "And I, too," assented Betsy, as she uncovered her lunch-basket. "Everynerve in my body is on the war-path. We'll be having the 'jerks,' ifthis meeting lasts much longer."

  "If you do," remarked John Calvin, as he attacked the wing of a friedchicken, "I suppose you'll think it an 'evidence of conversion,' as oldDaddy Stratton shouted out this morning when Billy Hinkson fell to theground foaming at the mouth."

  "'Evidence of conversion,' indeed!" rejoined Betty. "I never feltfurther from it in my life. My head is like a ragbag stuffed tooverflowing with all sorts of odds and ends of doctrinal wisdom, andwhen I want to get at any one sensible idea, out tumble a dozen or morethat are of no use whatever."

  "My head's all confused, too," acknowledged Susan. "Yesterday Dr.Poague preached on 'Saved by Grace,' and showed that all we have to dois just to sit still and wait for the Lord's call. I felt realcomfortable under that discourse. But last night old Brother Steadman'stext was, 'Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,' and hemade me dreadfully uneasy. Now, are there two plans of salvation, oronly one?"

  "Why, two, of course," said John Calvin, with laughing assurance. "Oneteaches that if you mean to get to heaven, you must keep your horseeverlastingly hittin' the road; the other, that the best way to getthere is just to sit still. I like the 'sittin'-still plan' best,myself," he declared, with boyish frivolity.

  "This is what puzzles me," said Betsy, ignoring her brother'sirreverent summary of the two seemingly conflicting doctrines, "grace"and "works": "if it be true, as so many of our learned brethren teach,that nothing good that one can do merits salvation, then it seems to methat, in accordance with every principle of justice, nothing bad thatone can do ought to merit damnation. Therefore, why should not I do thething that pleaseth me best, whether it be good or bad? If I'm one ofthe 'elect,' nothing will keep me out of heaven, anyway."

  "If you're of the elect, Betsy, you won't ever want to be wicked,"Henry said gravely, speaking for the first time.

  "Then, I fear I'm not of the elect."

  "Oh, yes, I hope you are--only you're not yet converted. When you are,you'll see things differently." Henry was of a devout, reverenttemperament, with a vivid imagination in spite of his quiet,self-contained manner. He had been greatly stirred by what he had seenand heard during the last ten days.

  "But, Henry," began Betsy, argumentatively, "if I'm among the chosen atall, I'm as much chosen now as I will ever be; for I'm a sheep, not agoat--'Once a sheep, always a sheep,' you know."

  "Well, sis," teasingly interrupted John Calvin, "if you're a sheep,you're surely one of the black ones; and it'll take a mighty heap o'scrubbin', I tell you, to get you white."

  "And you," rejoined his sister, playfully, "I fear must be agoat--judging by the way you're always butting in, and interruptingserious converse."

  "Oh," answered John Calvin, lightly, "I ain't bad enough to be classedwith the goats, nor good enough to be a sheep, even a black one. Thatother parable about the wheatfield fits my case better. I reckon I'mjust one of those useless tares."

  His sister retorted: "The parable also declares that 'he who sows thetares is the devil,' and I hardly believe you are prepared to call yourparents the devil, although they put you into the church by having youbaptized in infancy." Then, resuming her conversation with Henry, shesaid, "If I am of the elect at all, Henry, I am elected already, beforeconversion, am I not?"

  "To be sure," Henry replied. "God chose his people before thefoundation of the world."

  "Bosh!" exclaimed Susan, impatiently. "You don't know what God wasdoing before the foundation of the world, and I doubt if any of thosewise brethren up at the camp do, either."

  "Besides," added the irrepressible John Calvin, "the catechism sayswe're made of the dust of the earth; and before the foundation of theworld, there wasn't any dust. So, the elect must mean some otherfolks--not us of this world, at all."

  "Doubtless the inhabitants of Mars or Jupiter," observed Betty,laughing in spite of herself at John's flippant remark.

  "Betsy," presently said Henry very earnestly, "I've watched you andSusan closely all during this revival, and I do believe that you bothare really under conviction. The belief in your own wickedness and inthe total depravity of the human heart is the first link in thechain--as Brother Weaver says."

  "But I do not believe in 'total depravity,'" maintained Betsy, stoutly."If the human race was utterly depraved to start with, how could onekeep growing worse and worse all the time?"

  "Ah, Betty," said Henry, "I reasoned just as you do, once; but now Iunderstand these things better. Although I am of myself utterly vileand worthless, the mercy of God has taken hold of me and clothed andhidden me in the righteousness of his dear Son, and now I----"

  "Henry," interrupted Betsy, with sudden sweetness, for the time soberedby his earnest face and voice, "you mustn't feel hurt by anything Ihave said. You know I jest over the most solemn subjects, and see theludicrous side of everything; but I can be impressed by realearnestness, and I have never doubted that you are sincere in all yousay."

  "Yes," said Susan, "I'd sooner doubt my own eyesight than yoursincerity, Henry. I can understand and believe in that at least; but inother things I must be a bigger simpleton than even the 'wayfaringman'; for the way of salvation is anything but plain, if it includesthe doctrines of our churches. I can't understand them at all."

  "Understand them!" exclaimed Betsy. "Who can? Why, whenever one of ourlearned ministers is on the subject of 'reprobation,' 'predestination,'or 'effectual calling,' his reasoning is so subtle and his logic soingenious that it must puzzle the elect angels themselves to understandhis arguments."

  "But you surely believe in the beautiful doctrine of grace?" Henryasked earnestly. "You believe that the saints will persevere and gethome at last to glory, don't you?"

  "We'll tell you more about that when we get there ourselves--if we everdo," replied Susan.

  "If the saints do persevere to glory," remarked John Calvin, "some of'em are makin' a mighty poor start of it here below. Look at SamRuddell, drunk half his time, and too lazy and mean to do any honestwork at any time; yet he claims to be one of the elect, and the churchaccepts him as such."

  "And, Henry," Betty pursued mischievously, "in spite of your hopefulview about Sue and me, I, for one, am not under conviction, if everytruly convicted penitent believes himself a 'sinner above allGalilee'--that's the orthodox phrase, isn't it? I'm not nearly so badas Sam Ruddell, nor as Zebuel Simmons, who beats his wife."

  "Ah, but my dear little girl," said Barton Stone, who, with Dudley, hadjust come up, and had laid his hand gently upon the girl's shoulder,"you must remember that training and environment are the measure ofguilt or innocence."

  "You'll think me a reckless girl, I'm afraid, Brother Stone," Betsyanswered, laughing and coloring. "I shouldn't have made that speech hadI known that you and Mr. Dudley were within hearing. But, nevertheless,I do not believe that I am the chief of sinners; others who have hadjust as good opportunities are as bad as I am, I'm sure."

  "Besides, if everybody who gets up in meeting and says he's the chiefof sinners, is really so, there would be more chiefs in thisneighborhood than in all the Indian tribes taken together," put in JohnCalvin, pertly, unabashed by the presence of parson and schoolmaster.

  "The trouble with so many ministers," said Dudley, as Betty, Susan andJohn Calvin strolled away, "is that they seem to think that furnishingpeople with doctrine is equivalent to awakening them to conviction andsupplying them with faith."

  "Too true," assented Stone rather sa
dly. "Dogma and doctrine containvery little of the true essence of faith. But the time is coming whenpeople will begin to search the Scriptures for themselves; and then,just as the walls of Jericho fell before the blasts of the trumpets, sowill the whole superstructure of human theology, whose fourcorner-stones are bigotry, intolerance, superstition and speculativedoctrine, crumble into nothingness. Even now the walls are beginning totremble. When this human-built edifice shall have fallen, and all thedebris shall have been cleared away, then shall arise upon the one truefoundation, Jesus Christ, a glorious structure, pure, consecrated anduntrammeled, the church of the living God."

  "Do you really believe," inquired Dudley, "that there will ever be aunion of all the sects of Christendom?"

  "A union of sects? Never!" replied Stone, emphatically. "Such a thingis impossible from the very nature and meaning of sect. But union, orrather unity, of Christian people there will surely be. Our Saviour'sprayer was that all his people might be one. That petition willcertainly be answered."

  "We seem very far from the realization of that prayer now," saidDudley, thoughtfully.

  "Yes!" assented Stone. "That evil spirit of intolerance, the curse ofthe Corinthian church, besets the churches to-day. We must firstovercome that foe before unity is possible. But some day--and I praythat it may be in my day," he continued with flashing eyes--"when thestorm and stress of this battle are over, there will ring out, minglingwith the shouts of victory from every rank and company of the Lord'shosts, this one clear, dominant note, 'Unity of all of Christ'speople!'"

  After a moment, he continued: "Clergy nor presbytery nor synod has theright to stand between the people and the Bible, with authoritativecreeds and confessions of faith; for the Bible is its own interpreter;and 'Equal rights to all, special privileges to none,' is a doctrinethat will some day be adopted in religion as well as in civil andpolitical matters."

  "Ah, Stone," Dudley replied, "that is indeed laying the ax to the veryroot of the tree of denominational intolerance. If you make public suchopinions, you will be branded as a heretic."

  "I can stand that," Stone answered simply. "'Orthodoxy' and 'heresy,'"he continued after a pause, "are in truth variable terms in religion.The 'orthodoxy' of this generation may perhaps be considered by thenext as ignorance and superstition; and what is to-day denounced as'heresy' in the father, may become 'orthodoxy' in the son."

  Henry Rogers, who for some time had remained a deeply interested butsilent listener, sitting with his back against a tree, his hat shadinghis eyes, presently asked Stone what he thought of the singularmanifestations at the camp-meeting.

  "I hardly know what to reply," said Stone. "Many things connected withthis revival are mystifying to me; and, besides," he went on,smilingly, "your question places me in an embarrassing position, as,you know, I was largely instrumental in starting the meeting at thisplace. If I say I do not believe that these manifestations areconducive to good, you, Henry, I can see by the quickening sparkle inyour eye, will immediately impale me upon one horn of my dilemma byasking me why, after seeing a similar excitement at the southernKentucky revival, I should help to start this one. And if I say I donot believe that these manifestations are the work of God, there sitsAbner, ready to confound me with arguments, psychological,philosophical and common-sensical. So what am I to answer?"

  "But, Stone," Abner exclaimed, "you surely do not deny the work of theSpirit in conversion, do you?"

  "Certainly not," Stone replied. "The Bible plainly teaches that withoutthe unceasing instrumentality of the Holy Spirit there can be no realconversion; but nowhere in the Bible can I find it taught that weshould seek in supernatural signs and special revelations, rather thanin the clear and unchangeable testimonies and promises of the gospel,for evidence of our acceptance with God. In fact, I can find in the NewTestament no account of any miraculous manifestation being sent for thesole purpose of converting any one, although there are instances wherea miracle did attend the conversion."

  "What about Paul?"

  "The voice and the great light were, I think, sent more for the purposeof making him an apostle than for the purpose of converting him."

  Abner smiled. "You certainly dispose of Paul's case in a cool, offhandway; but how about the 'Philippian jailer'?"

  "You misunderstand me," said Stone; "whether Paul and the Philippianjailer were miraculously converted or not, I am not prepared to say. Mystatement was, that when a miracle did accompany any case ofconversion, it was sent for some other purpose. Incidentally themiracle may have converted the jailer, but I do not think it was sentfor that purpose."

  "Then, in the name of reason and common sense, what do you think it wassent for?" asked Dudley.

  "To free the two apostles. Through their imprisonment the gospel wasenchained. For example, suppose some malicious boy hurls a stone tobreak a neighbor's window, and, in so doing, hits some one inside thehouse. He did not therefore throw the stone for the purpose of hittingthe person, did he?"

  "You're a Stone too many for me," laughed Abner. "Your subtlereasonings and hair-splitting distinctions are too much for me toattempt to disprove, on such a broiling hot day as this."

  "Brother Stone! Brother Stone!" shouted a voice from the brow of thehill back of them. Looking up, they espied among the trees a man wavingand beckoning.

  "Coming!" shouted Stone in reply. "I have an appointment at threeo'clock with some of the brethren," he explained. "It must be fullythat hour now; so I must hurry back. After all this excitement is over,I will talk further with you, Dudley, on the subject we werediscussing. Will you return with me now?"

  "No," replied Abner, throwing himself down at full length on the grassunder the big elm, and drawing his hat over his face. "I'd rather stayhere and commune with nature. I want to think over what you've beensaying--and see if I can't find arguments to confute you."