The spirit of this organization is peculiar. It really does not ask anything of its adherents or attendants, or whatever they might be called, except that they come in. No dues are collected, no services exacted. There is even a free lunchroom and an employment bureau run in connection with it, where the hungry can get a cup of coffee and a roll at midnight and the jobless can sometimes hear of something to their advantage during the day. The whole spirit of the place is one of helpfulness, though the task is of necessity dispiriting and in some of its aspects gruesome. For these individuals who frequent this place of worship are surely, of all the flotsam of the city, the most helpless and woebegone. There is something about the type of soul which turns to religion _in extremis_ which is not pleasing. It appears to turn to religion about as a drowning man turns to a raft. There is the taint of personal advantage about it and not a little of the cant and whine of one who would curry favor with life or the Lord. Granting this, yet here they are, and here they come, out of the Bowery and the side streets of the Bowery, that wonderful ganglia of lodging houses; and in this place, and I presume others of its stripe, listen to presumably inspiring sermons. In all fairness, the speakers seem to realize that they have a difficult task to perform in awakening these men to a consciousness of their condition. They know that there is, if not cant, at least mental and physical lethargy to overcome. These bodies are poisoned by their own inactivity and sense of defeat. When one looks at them collectively the idea instinctively forces itself forward: “What is there to save?” And yet, shabby and depressing as are these facts, there is a collective, coherent charm and color about the effort itself which to one who views it entirely disinterestedly is not to be scoffed at. The hall itself, a long deep store turned to a semblance of Gothic beauty by a series of colored windows set in the store-front facing the Bowery, and by a gallery of high-backed benches of Gothic design at the back, and by mottoes and traceries in dark blue and gold which harmonize fittingly with the walnut stain of the woodwork, is inviting. Even the shabby greenish-brown and dusty gray coats of the audience blend well with the woodwork, and even the pale colorless faces of gray or ivory hue somehow add to what is unquestionably an artistic and ornamental effect.