Chapter XXX: Moses Miltiades Madison

Everybody knows Moses. He and others like him, "carry the bag" in too many of our churches. But nobody seems to know him so well as Fanny; so we will let her relate his "experience," in her own words:

"Moses Miltiades Madison would fain have the world believe that the stumbling-block the fallen angels tripped over was no besetting sin of _his_.

"The very tails of his coat hung around him in a helpless kind of a way, as if they knew they _ought_ to be suggestive of their owner's _humility_. No sinful zephyrs presumed to dally with the straight locks, plastered with such puritanical precision over his diminutive head; his mouth had a sanctimonious drawing down at the corners, and his voice was a cross between a groan and a wail. At every prayer-meeting and conventicle, Moses was on the ground, (simultaneously with the sexton,) made the most long-winded prayer; elaborated to _seventh_-LIE, the verse he was expounding, and kept one note ahead of the singing-choir in the 'doxology;' knew exactly how long it would be before the natives of the Palm Tree Islands would dress more fashionably than the wild beasts around them, and was entirely posted up about the last speech and confession of the very latest missionary whom the savages had made mince-meat of.

"Now Moses had an invalid wife; and his 'path of duty,' after evening meeting, generally laid in the direction of Widow Gray's house. _She_ was '_afraid_' and _he--wasn't_! So he took the prayer-book, the Bible, and the widow, under his protection, and went the longest way round. His wife, to be sure, before his return, came to the conclusion that it was a '_protracted_ meeting,' but then _Moses_ was 'a burning and a shining light,' (at least so the 'church' said,) and if _Mrs._ Moses was of a different opinion, she kept it to herself. That he did occasionally pervert Scripture words and phrases, and make a very 'carnal' use of the same, when none of the congregation were present, was an indisputable fact; that the crickets, and chairs and tables, sometimes changed places in a hurry, was another; but the last was probably owing to his being a 'medium' for some '_spiritual_ rappings.'

"But if Mrs. Moses 'kept dark,' Jeremiah Jones wouldn't! He was as thorough and straight-forward in his religion as he was in building houses; he detested 'sham foundations,' as he professionally expressed it!

"One night, in an evil hour, Moses popped up, as usual, from his seat in meeting, intending to give an extra touch to his devotional exercises, as he contemplated taking a longer walk than usual with little Widow Gray. So he told 'the brethren,' (through his nose,) that 'if ever there _was_ a sinner that deserved a _very_ uncomfortable place hereafter, it was _him_--(_Moses!_)--that it was a marvel to him that he was permitted to cumber the earth, that his sins were more than the hairs on his head,' (and, by the way, that was a very moderate computation!)

"So Jeremiah Jones seemed to think; for he 'riz' very demurely, and remarked that 'he had been brother Moses Madison's neighbor for many years, and was qualified to endorse that little statement of his, with regard to himself, as _substantially correct in every particular_!' Moses fainted!"