Article August 12, 1911 Issue

A stranger in New York is apt to find many contrasts

by Rev. A. R. Bickenbach.

New York Observer

A stranger in New York is apt to find many contrasts. This one was the result of an accident. One Wednesday evening I followed a crowd and soon found myself courteously accorded a front sitting in a large and beautifully decorated auditorium. I was in a strange place and in a new atmosphere. Naturally I was all alert. The people sitting about me, and, in fact, all upon whom my glance fell, seemed to be of more than ordinary refinement.

As I was shown my seat the "first reader" was reading something, evidently the lesson for the evening, reading it coolly, devoid of any kind of animal magnetism, reading it as an automaton or a well-modulated talking machine could read it. There was no mumbling, every syllable was carefully enunciated. The audience, which packed the large auditorium, both floor and gallery, were quiet and apparently attentive, but my seat commanded a view of the audience, and the stray glances of many in the audience suggested that the reading was gripping the most of them as little as it did me. But the rest of the hour interested me, for the audience was alive, interested, and intense.

The reading finished, the reader said: "We will now have a few moments of silent prayer and then unite in the Lord's Prayer." A few bowed their heads, many made no change of posture, but I have no doubt that all "prayed," and it was silent. I did not time it, but from some former personal experiences I should judge the silence lasted at least two minutes and a half and it was silence, absolute, prolonged, but painless. It was new to me. Then the reader lifted his chin, shifted his footing, and as he uttered the first words a volume of sound came up from that immense audience such as I had never heard repeat the Lord's Prayer—steady, unchanged, not the faintest diminution when the words were said: "Forgive us our debts, as we forgive." The prayer done, they sang a hymn—again my eye traversed the audience as my ears caught the volume. With few exceptions, all were singing, some with books, some without, five verses they sang, both hymn and tune unknown to me. Then came testimonies. If the audience was awake before, now it was intense. There were a few painful seconds of waiting three several times, but for the most part no hesitancy.

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