"Too strong for my stomach," replied Mr. Braxton. "Something must
have gone wrong with our minister when he sat down to write that
discourse."

"Indigestion, perhaps."

"Or neuralgia," said Mr. Braxton.

"He was in no amiable mood--that much is certain. Why, he set
nine-tenths of us over on the left hand side, among the goats, as
remorselessly as if he were an avenging Nemesis. He actually made me
shudder."

"That kind of literal application of texts to the living men and
women in a congregation is not only in bad taste, but presumptuous
and blasphemous. What right has a clergyman to sit in judgment on
me, for instance? To give forced constructions to parables and vague
generalities in Scripture, about the actual meaning of which divines
in all ages have differed; and, pointing his finger to me or to you,
say--'The case is yours, sir!' I cannot sit patiently under many
more such sermons."

Mr. Braxton evidently spoke from a disturbed state of mind.
Something in the discourse had struck at the foundations of
self-love and self-complacency.

"Into one ear, and out at the other. So it is with me, in cases like
this," answered Mr. Braxton's companion, in a changed and lighter
tone. "If a preacher chooses to be savage; to write from dyspeptic