In Darkest England, and the Way Out

by William Booth

SECTION 3.—SOME ADVANTAGES STATED.

This Scheme takes into its embrace all kinds and classes of men who may be in destitute circumstances, irrespective of their character or conduct, and charges itself with supplying at once their temporal needs; and then aims at placing them in a permanent position of comparative comfort, the only stipulation made being a willingness to work and to conform to discipline on the part of those receiving its benefit.

While at the commencement, we must impose some limits with respect to age and sickness, we hope, when fairly at work, to be able to dispense with even these restrictions, and to receive any unfortunate individual who has only his misery to recommend him and an honest desire to get out of it.

It will be seen that, in this respect, the Scheme stands head and shoulders above any plan that has ever been mooted before, seeing that nearly all the other charitable and remedial proposals more or less confess their utter inability to benefit any but what they term the "decent" working man.

This Scheme seeks out by all manner of agencies, marvellously adapted for the task, the classes whose welfare it contemplates, and, by varied measures and motives adapted to their circumstances, compels them to accept its benefits.

Our Plan contemplates nothing short of revolutionising the character of those whose faults are the reason for their destitution. We have seen that with fully fifty per cent. of these their own evil conduct is the cause of their wretchedness. To stop short with them of anything less than a real change of heart will be to invite and ensure failure. But this we are confident of effecting—anyway, in the great majority of cases, by reasonings and persuasions, concerning both earthly and heavenly advantages, by the power of man, and by the power of God.

By this Scheme any man, no matter how deeply he may have fallen in self-respect and the esteem of all about him, may re-enter life afresh, with the prospect of re-establishing his character when lost, or perhaps of establishing a character for the first time, and so obtaining an introduction to decent employment, and a claim for admission into Society as a good citizen. While many of this crowd are absolutely without a decent friend, others will have, on that higher level of respectability they once occupied, some relative, or friend, or employer, who occasionally thinks of them, and who, if only satisfied that a real change has taken place in the prodigal, will not only be willing, but delighted, to help them once more.

By this Scheme, we believe we shall be able to teach habits of economy, household management, thrift, and the like. There are numbers of men who, although suffering the direst pangs of poverty, know little or nothing about the value of money, or the prudent use of it; and there are hundreds of poor women who do not know what a decently-managed home is, and who could not make one if they had the most ample means and tried ever so hard to accomplish it, having never seen anything but dirt, disorder, and misery in their domestic history. They could not cook a dinner or prepare a meal decently if their lives were dependent on it, never having had a chance of learning how to do it. But by this Scheme hope to teach these things.

By this Plan, habits of cleanliness will be created, and some knowledge of sanitary questions in general will be imparted. This Scheme changes the circumstances of those whose poverty is caused by their misfortune. To begin with, it finds work for the unemployed. This is the chief need. The great problem that has for ages been puzzling the brains of the political economist and philanthropist has been "How can we find these people work?" No matter what other helps are discovered, without work there is no real ground for hope. Charity and all the other ten thousand devices are only temporary expedients, altogether insufficient to meet the necessity. Work, apart from the fact that it is God's method of supplying the wants of man's composite nature, is an essential to his well-being in every way— and on this Plan there is work, honourable work—none of your demoralising stone-breaking, or oakum-picking business, which tantalises and insults poverty, Every worker will feel that he is not only occupied for his own benefit, but that any advantage reaped over and above that which he gains himself will serve to lift some other poor wretch out of the gutter.

There would be work within the capacity of all. Every gift could be employed. For instance, take five persons on the Farm—a baker, a tailor, a shoemaker, a cook, and an agriculturist. The baker would make bread for all, the tailor garments for all, the shoemaker shoes for all, the cook would cook for all, and the agriculturist dig for all. Those who know anything which would be useful to the inhabitants of the Colony will be set to do it, and those who are ignorant of any trade or profession will be taught one.

This Scheme removes the vicious and criminal classes out of the sphere of those temptations before which they have invariably fallen in the past. Our experience goes to show that when you have, by Divine grace, or by any consideration of the advantages of a good life, or the disadvantages of a bad one, produced in a man circumstanced as those whom we have been describing, the resolution to turn over a new leaf, the temptations and difficulties he has to encounter will ordinarily master him, and undo all that has been done, if he still continues to be surrounded by old companions and allurements to sin.

Now, look at the force of the temptations this class has to fight against. What is it that leads people to do wrong—people of all classes, rich as well as poor? Not the desire to sin. They do not want to sin; many of them do not know what sin is, but they have certain appetites or natural likings, the indulgence of which is pleasant to them, and when the desire for their unlawful gratification is aroused, regardless of the claims of God, their own highest interests, or the well-being of their fellows, they are carried away by them; and thus all the good resolutions they have made in the past come to grief.

For instance, take the temptation which comes through the natural appetite, hunger. Here is a man who has been at a religious meeting, or received some good advice, or, perhaps, just come out of prison, with the memories of the hardships he has suffered fresh upon him, or the advice of the chaplain ringing in his ears. He has made up his mind to steal no more, but he has no means of earning a livelihood. He becomes hungry. What is he to do? A loaf of bread tempts him, or, more likely, a gold chain which he can turn into bread. An inward struggle commences, he tries to stick to his bargain, but the hunger goes on gnawing within, and it may be there is a wife and children hungry as well as himself; so he yields to the temptation, takes the chain, and in turn the policeman takes him.

Now this man does not want to do wrong, and still less does he want to go to prison. In a sincere, dreamy way he desires to be good, and if the path were easier for him he would probably walk in it.

Again, there is the appetite for drink. That man has no thought of sinning when he takes his first glass. Much less does he want to get drunk. He may have still a vivid recollection of the unpleasant consequences that followed his last spree, but the craving is on him; the public-house is there handy; his companions press him; he yields, and falls, and, perhaps, falls to rise no more.

We might amplify, but our Scheme proposes to take the poor slave right away from the public-houses, the drink, and the companions that allure him to it, and therefore we think the chances of reformation in him are far greater.

Then think of the great boon this Scheme will be to the children, bringing them out of the slums, wretched hovels, and filthy surroundings in which they are being reared for lives of abomination of every description, into the fields, amongst the green trees and cottage homes, where they can grow up with a chance of saving both body and soul.

Think again of the change this Scheme will make for these poor creatures from the depressing, demoralising surroundings, of the unsightly, filthy quarters in which they are huddled together, to the pure air and sights and sounds of the country. There is much talk about the beneficial influence of pictures, music and literature upon the multitudes. Money, like water, is being poured forth to supply such attractions in Museums, People's Palaces, and the like, for the edification and amelioration of the social condition of the masses. But "God made the country, man made the town," and if we take the people to the pictures of divine manufacture, that must be the superior plan.

Again, the Scheme is capable of illimitable application. The plaister can be made as large as the wound. The wound is certainly a very extensive one, and it seems at first sight almost ridiculous for any private enterprise to attempt dealing with it. Three millions of people, living in little short of perpetual misery have to be reached and rescued out of this terrible condition. But it can be done, and this Scheme will do it, if it is allowed a fair chance. Not all at once? True! It will take time, but it will begin to tell on the restering mass straight away. Within a measurable distance we ought to be able to take out of this black sea at least a hundred individuals a week, and there is no reason why this number should not go on increasing.

An appreciable impression on this gulf of misery would be immediately made, not only for those who are rescued from its dark waters, but for those who are left behind, seeing that for every hundred individuals removed, there is just the additional work which they performed for those who remain. It might not be much, but still it would soon count up. Supposing three carpenters are starving on employment which covered one-third of their time, if you take two away, the one left will have full employment. But it will be for the public to fix, by their contributions, the extent of our operations.

The benefits bestowed by this Scheme will be permanent in duration. It will be seen that this is no temporary expedient, such as, alas! nearly every effort hitherto made on behalf of these classes has been. Relief Works, Soup Kitchens, Enquiries into Character, Emigration Schemes, of which none will avail themselves, Charity in its hundred forms, Casual Wards, the Union, and a hundred other Nostrums may serve for the hour, but they are only at the best palliations. But this Scheme, I am bold to say, offers a substantial and permanent remedy.

In relieving one section of the community, our plan involves no interference with the well-being of any other. (See Chapter VII. Section 4, "Objections.")

This Scheme removes the all but insuperable barrier to an industrious and godly life. It means not only the leading of these lost multitudes out of the "City of Destruction" into the Canaan of plenty, but the lifting of them up to the same level of advantage with the more favoured of mankind for securing the salvation of their souls.

Look at the circumstances of hundreds and thousands of the classes of whom we are speaking. From the cradle to the grave, might not their influence in the direction of Religious Belief be summarised in one sentence, "Atheism made easy." Let my readers imagine theirs to have been a similar lot. Is it not possible that, under such circumstances, they might have entertained some serious doubts as to the existence of a benevolent God who would thus allow His creatures to starve, or that they would have been so preoccupied with their temporal miseries as to have no heart for any concern about the next life?

Take a man, hungry and cold, who does not know where his next meal is coming from; nay, who thinks it problematical whether it will come at all. We know his thoughts will be taken up entirely with the bread he needs for his body. What he wants is a dinner. The interests of his soul must wait.

Take a woman with a starving family, who knows that as soon as Monday comes round the rent must be paid, or else she and her children must go into the street, and her little belongings be impounded. At the present moment she is without it. Are not her thoughts likely to wander in that direction if she slips into a Church or Mission Hall, or Salvation Army Barracks?

I have had some experience on this subject, and have been making observations with respect to it ever since the day I made my first attempt to reach these starving, hungry, crowds—just over forty-five years ago—and I am quite satisfied that these multitudes will not be saved in their present circumstances. All the Clergymen. Home Missionaries, Tract Distributors, Sick Visitors, and everyone else who care about the Salvation of the poor, may make up their minds as to that. If these people are to believe in Jesus Christ, become the Servants of God, and escape the miseries of the wrath to come, they must be helped out of their present social miseries. They must be put into a position in which they can work and eat, and have a decent room to live and sleep in, and see something before them besides a long, weary, monotonous, grinding round of toil, and anxious care to keep themselves and those they love barely alive, with nothing at the further end but the Hospital, the Union, or the Madhouse. If Christian Workers and Philanthropists will join hands to effect this change it will be accomplished, and the people will rise up and bless them, and be saved; if they will not, the people will curse them and perish.