Later in his life, Jack was to recollect those open-air sermons with the skepticism of a world-weary adult. The sermonizers were religious maniacs who’d liefer rove the countryside in the company of pestilential Vagabonds than submit to the authority of Anglicans; and so how could such be expected to give a fair and impartial account of what went on in the Church of England? Of the slanders and calumnies that they flung against that Church’s shiny red door, most were probably hallucinations; the remainder might have a germ of truth, but must still consist mostly of perfervid phant’sies. It was not that Jack had any affinity for the Church, any need to hold up their end of the argument. It was rather that he got sick of preachers early on. If he were to give credit to their ravings about the Anglican Church, he must give equal credit to their assertions, so tediously repeated, that he was bound for Hell. He preferred to take a dim view of everything they said, rather than picking and choosing.