Captain Crowell, instead of resenting my defiance
of his ruling, helped to reconcile the divided factions
in the church; and though, as I have said, twice
afterward I submitted my resignation, in each case
the fight I was making was for a cause which I
firmly believed in and eventually won. My second
resignation was brought about by the unwillingness
of the church to have me exchange pulpits with the
one minister on Cape Cod broad-minded enough to
invite me to preach in his pulpit. I had done so,
and had then sent him a return invitation. He was
a gentleman and a scholar, but he was also a Uni-
tarian; and though my people were willing to let
me preach in his church, they were loath to let him
preach in mine. After a surprising amount of dis-
cussion my resignation put a different aspect on the
matter; it also led to the satisfactory ruling that
I could exchange pulpits not only with this minister,
but with any other in good standing in his own
church.
My third resignation went before the trustees in
consequence of my protest from the pulpit against
a small drinking and gambling saloon in East Dennis;
which was rapidly demoralizing our boys. Theo-
retically, only ``soft drinks'' were sold, but the
gambling was open, and the resort was constantly
filled with boys of all ages. There were influences
back of this place which tried to protect it, and its
owner was very popular in the town.
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