Upton Sinclair, ed. (1878–1968). rn The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest. 1915.
Children of the Dead EndPatrick MacGill
(A young Irishman, called the Navvy poet; born 1890. From the age of twelve to twenty a farm laborer, ditch-digger and quarryman. As this work goes to press, he is fighting with his regiment in Flanders)N
The merchant was a great friend of the parish priest, who always told the people if they did not pay their debts they would burn for ever and ever in hell. “The fires of eternity will make you sorry for the debts that you did not pay,” said the priest. “What is eternity?” he would ask in a solemn voice from the altar steps. “If a man tried to count the sands on the sea-shore and took a million years to count every single grain, how long would it take him to count them all? A long time, you’ll say. But that time is nothing to eternity. Just think of it! Burning in hell while a man, taking a million years to count a grain of sand, counts all the sand on the sea-shore. And this because you did not pay Farley McKeown his lawful debts, his lawful debts within the letter of the law.” That concluding phrase, “within the letter of the law,” struck terror into all who listened, and no one, maybe not even the priest himself, knew what it meant.