Upon the closure of mass the Reverend Buhr would provide a final anecdote on the topic of faith and duty. "Sweet iced crystals rained from the heavens in a graceful dance upon the bent roofs of hay packed cottages. Inside characters of individual stories spoke, touched, and broke that to whichever laid with them. Through the soft snow packed ground stamped hooves and boots, men brought reclusive and shaken by the first fingers of winter. Children, cheeks reddened by the thinly frozen air used the powdered snow to formulate such playful acts to which would make their elders, watching from their small windows, reminisce over their once innocent and romantic acts of youth. All too well does life come with the happenings of nature, comes to the acts of man. Eyes drawn to the the ice slushed avenue came a youthful man, blue eyes stilled swelled with every intention of greatness. Wrapped in dark thick garbs, the man went to door to door, entering the lives of each cottages drawn narrative. The Children would cease their playfulness and stare to the young man at their parents doors, faces made downhearted at his appearance, not knowing his purpose yet knowing it burdensome on their lives. Then young man kept his smile, for he was fortunate and held no intention of bringing terror into the lives of his neighbors, yet knew all to well the root of their fears. Upon slowly opening, each door would come a different face: beautiful, worn, young, and old. Though to the young man he did not see a face, he saw a story, a life, the feelings built by a soul brought forward to a constant existence of individual destiny. Upon entering the hosts would either smile, remain poker face, express anger, or simply cry. The young man never judged, for to him he had seen the tests and acts of faith one often overlooks. The guest would take note of the scene, looking to the jars, shelves, beds, the old woman who peered at him from the corner, having no need to longer speak, for she would have learned to communicate through the means of an idle glance. Buckle. Clank. Jingle. Swoop. All when collected, or rather sometimes some of all, the young man would smile, nod, and step out from the scene back into the white void of the world. The Children would sometimes throw snowballs at him in revenge to what they couldn’t understand, though the young man, if hit, would continue on to the next cottage. The elders would watch through their windows as he would leave their lawns, eyes not fueled by anger but of experienced wisdom and testament. For why did he march door to door? For collection of tax? Yes and no. The young man did his assorted duties to collect payment to the local landlord, though same to had his occupation have a separate obligation. That being to witness the lives of many, experiencing their struggle, their folksy dances, their weeping of laborious dread. For none but one enjoyed the young man, the other being himself. Regardless, the young man did not feel unloved, removed, or different from the rest, for he knew that the Soul of Empire watched not over just him, but all of those in the known world. The world might be cold and full of suffering, but is that not the lesson itself? Why we plead, why is it that we must struggle instead of be spared the horrors of reality? The answer lies within the question. For what are we without the snow, the cottage, the elder, the children, the known, and the unknowing? That shall be up to the individual to decide, for it is only they and or the Emperor that may answer that question for them. For the young man recognized this early, life is not made to have rationale, it is meant to be lived. In his cycle of collection from those whom he has approached, he takes life as it is, yet never falters to pessimism for he knows that his last laugh is on him. Existence is not an illustrated story, it is a development to which nothing is certain yet is made such by the material forces of life, similar to that of a snowflake being in flight and then part of the packed snow on the earth to which we step."
