One shook his head, and declared that no good could come of such preaching, since there was no true religion in it.

Another snapped his fingers, saying the man was not only a fool, but a mischief-maker.

A third said all the trouble in the world had been made by just such meddlesome men.

The church of great moral ideas might be a good enough church for some people; but such a preacher as this made more infidels than honest men.
The whole town soon got into a dispute as to whether the Reverend Warren Holbrook was a wise and good man, or simply a mischief-making egotist.
The women took the side of Holbrook, and stuck to it, like true women.
He preached the right sort of religion, they said, and was a wise and good man, or he could not preach as he did.

The men did not believe a word of it, but seeing that their wives were inclined to have it all their own way, and would not hear a word against the new preacher, quietly submitted, as men generally do.