Mr. Bulstrode’s power was not due simply to his being a country banker, who knew the financial secrets of most traders in the town and could touch the springs of their credit; it was fortified by a beneficence that was at once ready and severe—­ready to confer obligations, and severe in watching the result.  He had gathered, as an industrious man always at his post, a chief share in administering the town charities, and his private charities were both minute and abundant.  He would take a great deal of pains about apprenticing Tegg the shoemaker’s son, and he would watch over Tegg’s church-going; he would defend Mrs. Strype the washerwoman against Stubbs’s unjust exaction on the score of her drying-ground, and he would himself-scrutinize a calumny against Mrs. Strype.  His private minor loans were numerous, but he would inquire strictly into the circumstances both before and after.  In this way a man gathers a domain in his neighbors’ hope and fear as well as gratitude; and power, when once it has got into that subtle region, propagates itself, spreading out of all proportion to its external means.  It was a principle with Mr. Bulstrode to gain as much power as possible, that he might use it for the glory of God.  He went through a great deal of spiritual conflict and inward argument in order to adjust his motives, and make clear to himself what God’s glory required.  But, as we have seen, his motives were not always rightly appreciated.  There were many crass minds in Middlemarch whose reflective scales could only weigh things in the lump; and they had a strong suspicion that since Mr. Bulstrode could not enjoy life in their fashion, eating and drinking so little as he did, and worreting himself about everything, he must have a sort of vampire’s feast in the sense of mastery.

The subject of the chaplaincy came up at Mr. Vincy’s table when Lydgate was dining there, and the family connection with Mr. Bulstrode did not, he observed, prevent some freedom of remark even on the part of the host himself, though his reasons against the proposed arrangement turned entirely on his objection to Mr. Tyke’s sermons, which were all doctrine, and his preference for Mr. Farebrother, whose sermons were free from that taint.  Mr. Vincy liked well enough the notion of the chaplain’s having a salary, supposing it were given to Farebrother, who was as good a little fellow as ever breathed, and the best preacher anywhere, and companionable too.

“What line shall you take, then?” said Mr. Chichely, the coroner, a great coursing comrade of Mr. Vincy’s.

“Oh, I’m precious glad I’m not one of the Directors now.  I shall vote for referring the matter to the Directors and the Medical Board together.  I shall roll some of my responsibility on your shoulders, Doctor,” said Mr. Vincy, glancing first at Dr. Sprague, the senior physician of the town, and then at Lydgate who sat opposite.  “You medical gentlemen must consult which sort of black draught you will prescribe, eh, Mr. Lydgate?”