The three preachers had
especially prepared themselves, but somehow John's manner
seemed to throw a blanket over everything,--he seemed so
cold and preoccupied, and had so strange an air of restraint
that the Methodist brother could not warm up to his theme
and elicited not a single "Amen"; the Presbyterian prayer
was but feebly responded to, and even the Baptist preacher,
though he wakened faint enthusiasm, got so mixed up in his
favorite sentence that he had to close it by stopping fully
fifteen minutes sooner than he meant. The people moved
uneasily in their seats as John rose to reply. He spoke slowly
and methodically. The age, he said, demanded new ideas; we
were far different from those men of the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries,--with broader ideas of human brother-
hood and destiny. Then he spoke of the rise of charity and
popular education, and particularly of the spread of wealth
and work. The question was, then, he added reflectively,
looking at the low discolored ceiling, what part the Negroes of
this land would take in the striving of the new century. He
sketched in vague outline the new Industrial School that
might rise among these pines, he spoke in detail of the
charitable and philanthropic work that might be organized, of
money that might be saved for banks and business.
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