““The service seemed weak to Willy, especially because the preacher that day was Thomas Chater, a rank beginner. But after hours of prayer Chater’s words built as a summer storm. Finally Chater shouted Scripture from the Book of Hebrews, “Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach!” Willy was thrilled. His heart was on fire. Go outside the camp, bearing the disgrace Christ bore? Why, at that moment, it could mean only one thing. He must join the persecuted, despised Christians: the Dissenters. But could he do something so rash? Dissenters couldn’t stand in Parliament. They couldn’t send their sons to schools. They could not enter all professions. Locally they were being persecuted by Lady Elizabeth Mercer. This great owner of property evicted Dissenters from her cottages right and left. “Yet,” Willy argued with himself, “look at what these Dissenters have done for me.””
