This, in large measure, is the cause of our success all over the world.
When you come to think of it, the Salvation Army is a remarkable arrangement. It is remarkable in its construction. It is a great empire. An empire geographically unlike any other. It is an empire without a frontier. It is an empire made up of geographical fragments, parted from each other by vast stretches of railroad and immense sweeps of sea. It is an empire composed of a tangle of races, tongues, and colors, of types of civilization and enlightened barbarism such as never before in all human history gathered together under one flag.
It is an army, with its titles rambling into all languages, a soldiery spreading over all lands, a banner upon which the sun never goes down-with its head in the heart of a cluster of islands set in the grey, wind-blown Northern seas, while its territories are scattered over every sea and under every sky.
The world has wondered what has been the controlling force holding this strange empire together. What is the electro-magnetism governing its furthest atom as though it were at your elbow? What is the magic sceptre that compels this diversity of peoples to act as one man? What is the master passion uniting these multifarious pulsations into one heart-beat?
Has it been a sworn-to signature attached to bond or paper? No; these can all too readily be designated “scraps” and be rent in twain. Has it been self-interest and worldly fame? No, for all selfish gain has had to be sacrificed upon the threshold of the contract. Has it been the bond of kinship, or blood, or speech? No, for under this banner the British master has become the servant of the Hindoo, and the American has gone to lay down his life upon the veldts of Africa. Has it been the bond of that almost supernatural force, glorious patriotism? No, not even this, for while we “know no man after the flesh,” we recognize our brother in all the families of the earth, and our General infused into the breasts of his followers the sacred conviction that the Salvationist’s country is the world.
What was it? What is it? Those ties created by a spiritual ideal. Our love for God demonstrated by our sacrifice for man.
My father, in a private audience with the late King Edward, said: “Your Majesty, some men’s passion is gold; some men’s passion is art; some men’s passion is fame; my passion is man!”
This was in our Founder’s breast the white flame which ignited like sparks in the hearts of all his followers.
Man is our life’s passion.
It is for man we have laid our lives upon the altar. It is for man we have entered into a contract with our God which signs away our claim to any and all selfish ends. It is for man we have sworn to our own hurt, and—my God thou knowest-when the hurt came, hard and hot and fast, it was for man we held tenaciously to the bargain.