His heart was beating rapidly as he went forth into the London streets. He had only uttered a part of his convictions, but he was thankful to have had the opportunity to do that. He crossed over, and stood for a few minutes among the graves of Bunhill Fields, and saw the names of the brave men who had done the work which God gave them to do; and he vowed that he would lose no chance of using his voice, whenever and wherever he could, for he longed to see the Church united in the work which was so evidently waiting to be done. But he had much to engross him in his own and his father’s affairs. He spent some hours of every day in the office, endeavouring to grasp the real state of things there, and finding much to make him sad. His father was very disinclined to give way to the men; and one of those much-to-be-regretted labour disputes seemed inevitable. The men appeared to have very little power, really, to secure that which they wanted. Crowds of unemployed were always ready to step into vacant places. For one situation there would be fifty applicants, and this made it possible for masters to be to some extent independent of the men, notwithstanding the trades unions. And there had arisen an antiunionist association composed of men who helped each other and fought for each other, and who were now numerically strong enough to resist the trades union men who in a strike tried to keep them out of wharves, docks, and factories. Mr. Knight, finding that women and boys could do his work as well as men, and for less wages, had in his employ many thousands of these, and this was a grievance of which the men bitterly complained. It happened in an enormous number of cases that men were idling about, and drinking, while their wives were employed at factories, in consequence of which the homes were wretched, and the children sorely neglected. There were, indeed, a hundred wrongs that called for reform, and a crying need of some one with a clear head and a kindly Christian heart to put matters straight. Arthur Knight knew from the first day that he spent in his father’s office that under existing conditions it was no place for him. He would not, he simply could not, for the sake of all the wealth of the world, so do violence to his conscience, and slay all that was best in him, as to continue to sell goods that were next to worthless, and keep thousands of families on the verge of starvation, while he was getting richer every year. So much he settled with himself once for all, although he equally resolved to have no rupture with his father.