“Captain Duncan, if I was a preacher to such sailors as your friend here, I should represent hell as an eternal voyage, with every man on board in the agonies of sea-sickness, the crisis always imminent, but never coming.”

This ludicrous and most unprofessional picture amused the old salt exceedingly, and won his entire good-will toward the author of it; so that, after Mr. Beecher left, he said, “That’s a good fellow, Captain Duncan.  I like him, and I’d like to hear him talk more.”

Captain Duncan contended that this free-and-easy way of address was just the thing for such characters.  Mr. Beecher had shown him, to his great surprise, that a man could be a decent and comfortable human being, although he was a minister, and had so gained his confidence and good-will that he could say anything to him at their next interview.  Captain Duncan finished his remarks by a decided expression of his disapproval of the canting regulation phrases so frequently employed by religious people, which are perfectly nauseous to men of the world.

This interesting conversation lasted about three quarters of an hour, and ended, not because the theme seemed exhausted, but because the time was up.  We have only given enough of it to convey some little idea of its spirit.  The company again broke into one of their cheerful hymns, and the meeting was dismissed in the usual manner.

During the whole evening not a canting word nor a false tone had been uttered.  Some words were used, it is true, and some forms practised, which are not congenial to “men of the world,” and some doctrines were assumed to be true which have become incredible to many of us.  These, however, were not conspicuous nor much dwelt upon.  The subject, too, of the conversation was less suitable to our purpose than most of the topics discussed at these meetings, which usually have a more direct bearing upon the conduct of life.  Nevertheless, is it not apparent that such meetings as this, conducted by a man of tact, good sense, and experience, must be an aid to good living?  Here were a number of people,—­parents, business-men, and others,—­most of them heavily burdened with responsibility, having notes and rents to pay, customers to get and keep, children to rear,—­busy people, anxious people, of extremely diverse characters, but united by a common desire to live nobly.  The difficulties of noble living are very great,—­never so great, perhaps, as now and here,—­and these people assemble every week to converse upon them.  What more rational thing could they do?  If they came together to snivel and cant, and to support one another in a miserable conceit of being the elect of the human species, we might object.  But no description can show how far from that, how opposite to that, is the tone, the spirit, the object, of the Friday-evening meeting at Plymouth Church.