He was not so destitute of support as he thought.  There were many mothers’ hearts in Milton that had ached and prayed in agony long years that the Almighty would come with his power and sweep the curse away.  But Philip had not been long enough in Milton to know the entire sentiment of the people.  He had so far touched only the Church, through its representative pulpits, and a few of the leading business men, and the result had been almost to convince him that very little help could be expected from the public generally.  He was appalled to find out what a tremendous hold the whisky men had on the business and politics of the place.  It was a revelation to him of their power.  The whole thing seemed to him like a travesty of free government, and a terrible commentary on the boasted Christianity of the century.

So when he walked into the pulpit the first Sunday of the month he felt his message burning in his heart and on his lips as never before.  It seemed beyond all question that if Christ was pastor of Calvary Church he would speak out in plain denunciation of the whisky power.  And so, after the opening part of the service, Philip rose to speak, facing an immense audience that overflowed the galleries and invaded the choir and even sat upon the pulpit platform.  Such a crowd had never been seen in Calvary Church before.

Philip had not announced his subject, but there was an expectation on the part of many that he was going to denounce the saloon.  In the two months that he had been preaching in Milton he had attracted great attention.  His audience this morning represented a great many different kinds of people.  Some came out of curiosity.  Others came because the crowd was going that way.  So it happened that Philip faced a truly representative audience of Milton people.  As his eye swept over the house he saw four of the six members of his church who were up for office at the coming election in two weeks.

For an hour Philip spoke as he had never spoken in all his life before.  His subject, the cause it represented, the immense audience, the entire occasion caught him up in a genuine burst of eloquent fury, and his sermon swept through the house like a prairie fire driven by a high gale.  At the close, he spoke of the power of the Church compared with the saloon, and showed how easily it could win the victory against any kind of evil if it were only united and determined.

“Men and women of Milton, fathers, mothers and citizens,” he said, “this evil is one which cannot be driven out unless the Christian people of this place unite to condemn it and fight it, regardless of results.  It is too firmly established.  It has its clutch on business, the municipal life, and even the Church itself.  It is a fact that the Church in Milton have been afraid to take the right stand in this matter.  Members of the churches have become involved in the terrible entanglement of the long-established rum-power, until to-day you witness