Among these was Squire Woodhouse. He had several times ruined the regularity of the proceedings of other meetings, but still he was unsatisfied. He had not expressed his own views in full, partly because he had not been asked to do so, but principally because he had had no settled views to express. Now, however, the case was different. He had leisurely pondered over everything that he had heard in the class, he had admired each original idea with the true American heartiness toward new notions, he had endeavored to reconcile them with his unformulated but still very positive preconceived religious opinions, and his honesty had finally triumphed over his theology and his sophistry. When he came to church, therefore, he neglected his own pew and took the front seat and the extreme right end thereof, so when Deacon Bates opened the exercises of the class immediately after service, it was impossible not to call upon Squire Woodhouse first of all. The Squire cleared his throat, waved his head about in a dissatisfied manner, and finally said: "This thing of being meek grows pretty big when you think about it for a little while, and the worst of it is that everything else in the chapter is only a chip out of the same block. All of it--being meek and everything else--seems to come in the end to just this: you mustn't be like folks in general, particularly like business men. I confess that I don't know exactly how to do it all, but it seems to me it must be done by any one who believes that Jesus Christ had the right to say all that he did. I _don't_ know how to be meek about the way I was swindled--treated, I mean--by the insurance companies when my barn burned down----" "Personal!" whispered Mr. Prymm. "I don't care if it _is_ personal," said Squire Woodhouse. "I'm trying to point a moral, and it isn't my fault if other folks get in the way and get hurt. I don't know how to be meek when I'm abused, but----" "It isn't required of you," said Mr. Jodderel. "You're expected to take care of what has been intrusted to you in your capacity as a steward of the Lord." Many were the affirmative shakes of head which followed this remark. "I suppose I am," said the Squire, "and so long as I am a human being I won't be likely to forget it; but whether when I get mad over being swindled the anger all comes from my feeling of being deprived of the Lord's property, I'm not so sure: I've a suspicion that more of it comes from the heart of Squire Woodhouse than from the kingdom of heaven." "Not a bit of it," said Mr. Hopper, finding at last a subject upon which he could speak from the abundance of his heart. "Aren't you working for the good of your family, and don't St. Paul say that the man who don't look out for his family is worse than an infidel?"