And how the choir themselves like it! They occupy a great curving space
behind the pulpit, and put their hearts into song. And as the
congregation disperse and the choir filter down, sometimes they are
still singing and some of them continue to sing as they go slowly out
toward the doors. They are happy--Conwell himself is happy--all the
congregation are happy. He makes everybody feel happy in coming to
church; he makes the church attractive just as Howells was so long ago
told that he did in Lexington.
And there is something more than happiness; there is a sense of ease, of
comfort, of general joy, that is quite unmistakable. There is nothing of
stiffness or constraint. And with it all there is full reverence. It is
no wonder that he is accustomed to fill every seat of the great
building.
His gestures are usually very simple. Now and then, when he works up to
emphasis, he strikes one fist in the palm of the other hand. When he is
through you do not remember that he has made any gestures at all, but
the sound of his voice remains with you, and the look of his wonderful
eyes. And though he is past the threescore years and ten, he looks out
over his people with eyes that still have the veritable look of youth.
Like all great men, he not only does big things, but keeps in touch with
myriad details. When his assistant, announcing the funeral of an old
member, hesitates about the street and number and says that they can be
found in the telephone directory, Dr. Conwell's deep voice breaks
quietly in with, "Such a number [giving it], Dauphin Street"--quietly,
and in a low tone, yet every one in the church hears distinctly every
syllable of that low voice.
His fund of personal anecdote, or personal reminiscence, is constant and
illustrative in his preaching, just as it is when he lectures, and the
reminiscences sweep through many years, and at times are really
startling in the vivid and homelike pictures they present of the famous
folk of the past that he knew.
One Sunday evening he made an almost casual reference to the time when
he first met Garfield, then a candidate for the Presidency. "I asked
Major McKinley, whom I had met in Washington, and whose home was in
northern Ohio, as was that of Mr. Garfield, to go with me to Mr.
Garfield's home and introduce me. When we got there, a neighbor had to
find him. 'Jim! Jim!' he called. You see, Garfield was just plain Jim to
his old neighbors. It's hard to recognize a hero over your back fence!"
He paused a moment for the appreciative ripple to subside, and went on:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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