sed. The Bishop at this time was making it
his life-work to raise a million dollars for the beginning of a great
Episcopal cathedral; and this of course compelled him to spend much
time among the rich!

The explanation satisfied me; for of course I thought there had to be
cathedrals--despite the fact that both St. Stephen and St. Paul had
declared that "the Lord dwelleth not in temples made with hands." In
the twenty-five years which have passed since that time the good
Bishop has passed to his eternal reward, but the mighty structure
which is a monument to his visitations among the rich towers over the
city from its vantage-point on Morningside Heights. It is called the
Cathedral of St. John the Divine; and knowing what I know about the
men who contributed its funds, and about the general functions of the
churches of the Metropolis of Mammon, it would not seem to me less
holy if it were built, like the monuments of ancient ravagers, out of
the skulls of human beings.

#Spiritual Interpretation#

There remains to say a few words as to the intellectual functions of
the Fifth Avenue clergy. Let us realize at the outset that they do
their preaching in the name of a proletarian rebel, who was crucified
as a common criminal because, as they said, "He stirreth up the
people." An embarrassing "Savior" for the church of Good Society, you
might imagine; but they manage to fix him up and make him respectable.

I remember something analogous in my own boyhood. All day Saturday I
ran about with the little street rowdies, I stole potatoes and roasted
them in vacant lots, I threw mud from the roofs of apartment-houses;
but on Saturday night I went into a tub and was lathered and scrubbed,
and on Sunday I came forth in a newly brushed suit, a clean white
collar and a shining tie and a slick derby hat and a pair of tight
gloves which made me impotent for mischief. Thus I was taken and
paraded up Fifth Avenue, doing my part of the duties of Good Society.
And all church-members go through this same performance; the oldest
and most venerable of them steal potatoes and throw mud all week--and
then take a hot bath of repentance and put on the clean clothing of
piety. In this same way their ministers of religion are occupied to
scrub and clean and dress up their disreputable Founder--to turn him
from a proletarian rebel into a stained-glass-window divinity.

The man who really lived, the carpenter's son, they take out and
crucify all o