Once upon a time a coach was held up by a road-agent. The driver explained to the robber that his only passenger was a man, who was asleep inside. The highwayman insisted that the traveler be awakened. “I want to go through his pockets!” he declared fiercely, with an oath.
The bishop, when aroused, made gentle protests.
“You surely would not rob a poor bishop!” he exclaimed. “I have no money worth your attention, and I am engaged on my duties as a bishop.”
The robber hesitated.
“A bishop, eh?” he said thoughtfully. “Of what church?”
“The Episcopal.”
“The hell you are! That’s the church I belong to! So long!… Driver, larrup them mules!”
* * *
A Scotch Presbyterian clergyman tells the story of a parishioner who formed a secession with a few others unable to accept the doctrines of the church. But when the clergyman asked this man if he and the others worshiped together, the answer was:
“No. The fact is, I found that they accepted certain points to which I could not agree, so I withdrew from communion with them.”
“So, then,” the clergyman continued, “I suppose you and your wife carry on your devotions together at home.”
“No, not exactly,” the man admitted. “I found that our views on certain doctrines are not in harmony. So, there has been a division between us. Now, she worships in the northeast corner of the room and I in the southwest.”