There was a little band of district-visitors who stood by him the
more resolutely for the coldness with which worldly women regarded
him; and these persons, with their opportunities of making interest
in poor households, constituted a party agency not to be despised.
They worked among high and low with an unscrupulous energy to which
it is not easy to do justice. Wheedling or menacing--doing
everything indeed but argue--they blended the cause of Mr.
Welwyn-Baker and that of the Christian religion so inextricably that
the wives of humble electors came to regard the Tory candidate as
Christ's vicegerent upon earth, and were convinced that their
husbands' salvation depended upon a Tory vote.
One Sunday, Mr. Vialls took for his text, "But rather seek ye the
kingdom of God, and all these things shall be added unto you." He
began by pointing out how very improper it would be for a clergyman
to make the pulpit an ally of the hustings; far indeed be it from
him to discourse in that place of party questions--to speak one
word which should have for its motive the advancements of any
electioneering cause. But in these times of social discontent and
upheaval it must not be forgotten that eternal verities were at
stake. There were men--there were multitudes, alas! who made it
the object of their life-long endeavour to oust Christianity from
the world; if not avowedly, at all events in fact.
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