take God at his word and do as did the apostles and the
primitive Christians?

CHAPTER VI.

That sermon was preached almost thirty-three years ago. It was an
extemporaneous discourse, and no notes were preserved. Nevertheless,
there were circumstances attending its delivery, that have indelibly
impressed its leading points on the memory of the writer.

S. J. H. Snyder was a Lutheran from Pennsylvania, and at that time was a
resident of Atchison county. He had traveled to see the world, and was a
writer of books. He heard the sermon, and was greatly taken with it. He
wrote out a report of it, and handed his report to me for criticism and
correction. He intended to send it for publication to a paper in
Pennsylvania. I said to him that his report left out the most essential
and vital part of the sermon, and proposed myself to write out an
abstract of it for his use. This I did, but my friend Mr. Snyder
concluded: "This is a hard saying, who can hear it?" He was not willing
to be counted unsound in the faith by his brethren in Pennsylvania, and
forwarded the original manuscript.

There were also in the audience two young gentlemen, recently come from
the New England States to seek their fortune. They were just of that age
to think that what they did not know, or at least what the people of New
England did not know, was not worth knowing. Such a meeting in the open
air; such an audience, in which the dress of every man and woman was got
up according to their own notions, and that, too, without consulting
Mrs. Grundy; _such a preacher! and such a sermon_! Certainly these all
were new to them, and did not command their highest admiration. These
young gentlemen kept up a sort of running commentary between themselves,
on what they saw going on, until, becoming tired of their misbehavior, I
turned and said to them in effect: "Young gentlemen, you profess to be
men of good breeding, and it is understood that well-bred people will
behave themselves in meeting." They were very angry, and one of them
wrote me a saucy letter about it. But finding little sympathy in the
settlement, they went to Atchison, and there they found abundant
sympathy and open ears to hear. A man who was a preacher, and a
pronounced free State man, had come from Illinois and had settled on the
Stranger Creek; and who could tell the mischief he might do to his
brethren who were squatters from Missouri? When these same New England
gentlemen were in their