10. The Exhorter
But friends overestimated the change in Mark it quite certain that the critics were equally mistaken. For Mark converted was quite a different Mark. Even the scoffers had to admit so much. A man who finds his excitement in prayer-meetings and love-feasts is not thc same with a man who finds his diversion in gamine; and whisky and all-night dancing. He was not the same Mark ; and yet, and yet, religion is only the co-efficient, and the co-efficient derives its value from that of the quantity, known or unknown, into which it is multiplied. Mark was different but quite the same.
Wicked or pious, he must lead. In politics he had shown himself self-confident, ambitious and fond of publicity. In religious affairs he was let us use the other names for similar traits when they are modified by a noble sentiment bold, zealous and eager for success.
He began to speak in meeting at once, for the Methodists of that day were not slow in giving a new convert opportunity to " testify." Indeed, every man and woman who became a Methodist was exhorted, persuaded, coaxed, admonished, if need be, until he felt himself all but compelled to " witness for Christ." If there was any hesitancy or natural diffidence in the way of a new beginner's " taking up the cross," brethren did not fail to exhort him in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs according to the scripture. They would sing at him such words as these :
" I'm not ashamed to own my Lord
Or to defend his cause," etc.
Or,
" Are there no foes for me to face ?
Must I not stem the flood ?
Is this vile world a friend to grace
To help me on to God ? "
It was a sharp discipline to which the convert was thus subjected. No very clear distinction was made between moral courage and mere effrontery, between natural diffidence and real cowardice. But this discipline made every one bear his share of responsibility. Methodism captured the West by mobilizing its whole force. In time of revival at least there were no reserves, the whole landwehr was in action. Everybody must speak in meeting, or pray, or exhort, or " talk to mourners," or solicit the hesitating in the congregation personally. And so it came about that the clear, flexible voice of Mark Bonamy was heard in the meetings almost immediately. His addresses, if not eloquent, were at least striking and effective. The visible tokens of the influence of his addresses were pleasant to him, there are few men to whom this sort of power would not be gratifying. Mark was active, he enjoyed the excitement, he liked to feel himself at last on the side of the right ; he threw himself more and more into the work of exhorting, he went out of town frequently to address meetings in the country, and as he did not hesitate to brave storm or flood in these expeditions, he soon acquired a reputation for zeal which was quite agreeable to him, for it could not be expected that his natural vanity should have all disappeared under the influence of his piety. For that matter our motives are never quite so good as we think, and never quite so bad as our enemies suppose. Our best is inwoven with evil, and our worst, let us hope, has some strands of good. Only God can unravel the complexity. Mark, for his part, did not attempt it. He was of too complacent a temper to go behind the popular verdict when that was so favorable as in the present case. He often confessed his depravity, his sinfulness, his unworthiness ; but this old heresy that a man is all bad is the devil's own cloak under which one is always prone to hide specific sins.
Of course Mark's religiousness occasioned much gossip in the small political circles of the county. The sheriff, claiming to be intimate with Bonamy, was often inquired of about it.
" Well, you see,'' Lathers replied when the solution was demanded by a crony, " I don't think it's a sharp move. It makes friends and the like for Mark, and gives him the preachers and class-leaders and exhausters and what ye may-call-'ems. But you see he can't ride both horses with their heads and the like turned different ways. And it's the fellers that don't go to class-meetin' and the like that carries elections. How's Mark goin' it with them ? Can't drink, can't dance pshaw ! it ain't the best card Mark had, and I don't see for my life what made him throw it. He ain't too smart at 'lectioneerin' and the like noways. Eft hadn't been for me that dancin' so much with Nance Kirtley would 'a' tripped him last run; I laid myself out to save him from that scrape and lost votes and the like a-doin' it. And he don't appreciate it. But he don't come a-foolin' 'round me with his religion and goin's-oiit and the like, I tell you, now."
Here the astute man took a good bite from a plug of tobacco. Then he expectorated awhile with a deadly, melancholy, meditative aim at the rusty grate.
" Liker'n not, now, I may do Mark injestice," he went on with a suspicious twinkle. " It may be one of them Methodist girls and the like he's after. But then He don't show no signs. That ain't like him. He's a plumb foul wher they's anything of that kind a-goin'. I can't make it out. I don't believe he kin nother! It's like the feller't had measles, and mumps, and janders, and cholery infantu-um all in one heap. ' I can't make it out/ says the doctor, ' but I'll give you a little of everything I've got in the pill-bags, and something'll hit the disease, may be.' I heard that the Kirtley girl had went forrerd and the like in one of the meetin's out on the crick. I know what tree she's a barkin' up. It's like the man said about his dog. ' He's treed a bear," says He ; ' He barks too big fer a 'coon.' Nothing but big game would make Nancy Kirtley put on the pious and the like."
If the sheriff erred in his estimate of Mark, he was more nearly right when it came to Nancy. To marry Mark Bonamy was more to her than heaven itself ; for the bliss of heaven or any other joy long deferred made no impression on her. When Mark became religious she followed him. And her large-eyed beauty became yet more dazzling when she tried to appear religious. It made one hope that, after all, there might be a soul within. So long, indeed, as she said nothing, she was a picture of meditative wisdom, a very Minerva. But when she spoke, it was, after all, only Minerva's bird. Such was the enchantment of the great still eyes in her passively beautiful face, that after many shocking disil lusions brought about by the folly of her tongue, one was sure to relapse again into a belief in her inspiration aa soon as she became silent. I doubt if good John Kaspar Lavater himself could expound to us this likeness of absolute vacuity to deep thoughtfulness. Why do owls and asses seem so wise ?
Nancy's apparent conversion was considered a great triumph. Wherever Mark went he was successful, and nearly everybody praised him. Mrs. Hanks, Roxy's wellto-do aunt, held forth to Jemima upon the admirable ability of the young man, and his great goodness and selfsacrifice in " laying all his advantages of talent, and wealth, and prospects at the foot of the cross."
" I tell what I think, Henriette," replied Jemima, with her customary freedom ; " I think that's all fol-de-rol and twaddle-de-dee." Here she set her iron down with emphasis and raised her reddened face from her work, wiping the perspiration away with her apron. " I think It's all nonsense fer the brethren and sisters to talk that Aay, jest like as ef Mark had conferred a awful favor on his Creater in lendin' him his encouragement. Do you think it's sech a great thing to be Colonel Bonamy's son and a member of the Injeanny legislater, that God must feel mightily obleeged to Mark Bonamy fer bein' so kind hs to let him save his immortal soul? Now, I don't," and here she began to shove her iron again. " You all 'll spile Mark by settin' him up on a spinnacle of the temple," she added, as she paused a moment to stretch out a shirtsleeve, preparatory to ironing it
" Jemima," said Mrs. Hanks, " it's wicked to talk that way. You are always making fun of the gospel. I'm sure Mark's very humble. He calls himself the chief of sinners."
" I s'pose he does. That's nice to set himself up along side of Paul and say : ' See, Paul and me was both greal sinners.' That makes you think he's a-goin' to be like Paul in preachin'. But s'pose one of the brethrenbrother Dale, now was to say : ' Brother Bonamy, you're the biggest sinner in town. You're wuss'n ole Gatlin that went to penitenshry, an' you're wuss'n Bob G ramps that was hung.' D'you think he'd say, ' Amen, that's a fact ' i But ef bein' the chief of sinners means anything, that's what it means."
" Jemima, I tell you, you're wicked. It's right to kill the fatted calf for the returning prodigal."
" Oh yes, I know," and Jemima wiped her face again " But I wouldn't kill all the calves on the place and then bemn on the ye'rlin's so as to make him think it was a nice thing to be a prodigal. I'd be afraid the scamp would go back and try it over again."
And here Jemima broke out with her favorite couplet:
" Oh, hender me not, fer I will serve the Lord,
And I'll praise him when I die."
Mark did find the attention which his piety brought him very pleasant, and indeed his new peace with himself made him happy. His cup would have been full of sweetness if it had not been for the one bitter drop. Nancy would follow him. Wherever he held meetings she availed herself of the abounding hospitality of the brethren to pursue him. She boasted a little, too, of her acquaintance with Brother Bonamy before his conversion. She received much attention on account of her friendship for him. But Mark's worst trouble was that he could not emancipate himseK from her. She attracted him. Struggle as he might with the temptation, her exceeding fairness was a continual snare to his thoughts.
It humbled him, or at least annoyed him, to remembe? that while all the worM thought him a saint, he could not but feel a forbidden pleasure in looking on one, to attach himself to whom would be certain overthrow to all plans for goodness or usefulness. Did there also dawn upon the mind of Mark, unaccustomed as it was to selfanalysis, the thought that this passion for Nancy had nothing to do with what was best in him ? Did he ever reflect that it had no tinge of sentiment about it? Certain it is that he struggled with it, after a fashion ; but his attempts to extinguish it, as is often the case, served to fan it into something like a flame ; for such passions are not to be fought when one fights one thinks, and thought is oil to the flame. They are to be extinguished by the withdrawal of fuel; to be eliminated by substitution of serious purposes. Mark prayed against his passion; re fleeted wisely on the folly of it; did everything but what he ought to have done. He perpetually hid from himself that his conversations with Nancy on the subject of religion were sources of nothing but evil to himself and to her. Was she not a convert of his own labors? Should he not do what he could to strengthen her purpose to do right ?
About this time Dr. Ruter's missionaries in Texas had attracted much attention, and Mark thought of joining them. He would thus undertake a hard thing, and Mark was in the humor of doing something Herculean. He spurned the idea that he was to settle himself to the ordinary and unpoetic duties of life, or that, if he should become a preacher he could be content with doing only what commonplace circuit-riders did. In a general sort of way without wishing for specific martyrdom, he would have liked to brave wild beasts or persecutions. Most of us would be willing to accept martyrdom in the abstract, to have the glory and self-complacency of having imitated Paul, without having our heads specifically beaten with specific stones in the hands of specific heathen, or our backs lacerated with Philippian whips on any definitely specified day.
Bonamy had caught the genuine Methodist spirit, however, and being full of enterprise and daring he was ready for some brave endeavor. Perhaps, too, he found a certain relief in the thought that a mission of some kind would carry him away from the besetment of Nancy, who had lately persuaded him to give her his pocket-testament as an assistance to her religious life.
At any rate, it was soon noised that Bonamy was going to do something. The rumor was very vague; nobody knew just what the enterprise of the young Methodist was to be. Texas, and even Mexico, was mentioned ; Choctaw Indians, the Dakota mission and what not, were presently woven into the village gossip.
Colonel Bonamy debated in himself, how he should de feat this scheme. As a lawyer he was accustomed to manage men. He had but two ways : the one to play what he called " bluff," to sail down on his opponent and appall him by a sudden display of his whole armament; the other was a sort of intellectual ambuscade. With Mark, who had always been under authority, he rhose the first. It is not pleasing to parental vanity to have to take roundabout courses.
" Mark," said the old colonel, as the young man entered his office, " sit down there," and he pointed to a chair.
This was a sign of coming reproof. Mark had been so much flattered by the Whigs on the one hand and his religious associates on the other, that he did not quite like this school-boy position. He seated himself in the chair indicated. The old gentleman did not begin speech at once. He knew that when " bluff " was to be played a preliminary pause and a great show of calmness on his part would tend to demoralize the enemy. So he completed the sentence he was writing, gathered up his papers and laid them away. Then he turned his chair square around toward his son, took off his glasses, stroked the rough, grizzled beard of three days' growth on his chin, and fastened his eyes on Mark.
" What is the use of being an infernal fool ? " said the old man. " I let you take your own course in politics. I didn't say anything against your being a little unsteady ; I was a young man myself once and sowed some wild oats. I knew you would settle after a while. But I never was such a confounded fool as you ! To let a set of -shouting old women and snooping preachers set you off your head till you throw away all your chances in life, is to be the plaguedest fool alive. Now, I tell you, by godamity, Mark Bonamy, that if you go to Texas you may go to the devil, too, for all of me. I'll cut you out of every red cent. I don't waste my money on a jackass, sir. That's all."
The old man had by this time wrought himself into a real passion. But he had mistaken Mark's temper. He was no more a man to yield to threats than his father. Man}' a man with less heart for martyrdom than Mark can burn at the stake when his obstinacy is aroused.
" Keep your money, I don't want it," he said contemptuously, as he strode out of his father's office, mentally comparing himself to Simon Peter rejecting the offer of Simon Magus.
He was of a temper quite earnest enough to have made more real sacrifices than the giving up of a reversionary interest in an estate between him and tie possession of which there stood the vigorous life of his father. Bat the apparent sacrifice was considerable, and it was much extolled. Roxy in particular was lost in admiration of what seemed to her unchecked imagination a sublime self-sacrifice. She rejoiced humbly in the part she had taken in bringing Mark to a religious life, while she esti mated the simplicity and loftiness of his motives by the nobleness of her own. And, indeed, Mark's missionary purpose was in the main a noble one.
