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hours I had sat thru a drearily monotonous bible-class
Sunday School class under our hosts leadership he
had never by word or smile lent a relaxed gleam
of cheer or hope to the simplicities of the New Testament
as he unfolded them via Barnes' Notes -- weighing
down my youthful spirit every Sunday with this picture of
me as a rebellious sinner in the hands of an avenging
God with possible death before another dawn -- I suppose
I got used to it -- I suppose I grew used to it but ^{for [but?]} I
did not express my own religious life with the sacredest
of old churches until some years after -- What a loss
of days of gentle adoring love of God the Father
whose very Spirit was within me, and whose world
was my splendor -- ! There were queer good men in
those days and as some one says "they believed like
fury" --