Ray Stannard Baker

“ Surely that gaunt preacher had the true fire in his gray soul. How his voice dwelt and quivered and softened upon the words!
"While the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain--" Thus he brought in the universe to that small church and filled the heart of a boy.
"In the days when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those that look out of the windows be darkened. ”

“ His voice, which he was evidently trying to subdue for Sunday, boomed through the still air. So we walked among the trees to the door of the church. A smiling elder, in an unaccustomed long coat, bowed and greeted us. As we went in there was an odour of cushions and our footsteps on the wooden floor echoed in the warm emptiness of the church. The Scotch preacher was finding his place in the big Bible; he stood solid and shaggy behind the yellow oak pulpit, a peculiar professional look on his face. In the pulpit the Scotch preacher is too much minister, too little man. ”

“ The moment an emotion, especially a religious emotion, becomes an institution, it somehow loses life. True emotion is rare and costly and that which is awakened from without never rises to the height of that which springs spontaneously from within.
Back of the church stands a long low shed where we tied our horse. ”