That The General's example of burying his own sorrows in redoubled effort to cheer and help others has been followed everywhere, may count as large compensation for all he has lost. And yet, all who knew him best, have seen that the wound caused by Mrs. Booth's loss was never healed. With the badge of bereavement, which we have substituted for any costly mourning, ever upon his left arm, just as it was twenty years ago, our first General went onward to the great re-union above, "as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing," his sadness ever touching as many hearts as his merry remarks aroused.
Curiously enough, The General, whilst anxious at all times to remind every one of death and judgment, and to prevent their being so intoxicated by pleasure and passing trivialities as to prevent their thinking of their souls and of eternity, abolished, so far as his followers were concerned, the horrible formalities which, in all countries have come to be thought necessary whenever death and the grave come into view.
Nothing could be more opposed to everything taught by Christ than the usual processes of "Christian burial," and the records of "the departed." He who "brought life and immortality to light" through His Gospel could not wish to see His people's graves surrounded exclusively by signs of mourning, and then plastered over with flattering records of earthly glory, making, as a rule, no mention of His Salvation, and the eternal glories it assures. He manifested, indeed, and always shows the deepest sympathy with our sorrows; but He does so most by teaching us to make them steps to higher life and joy.
This great purpose The General aimed at in all his arrangements as to burials, and thus alleviated sadness, and turned death into victory to a very remarkable extent. No widow or orphan under his Flag will add to all the inevitable costs of nursing the dying those of fashionable "mourning," clothing, flowers, or monuments. The cross and crown badge worn on the left arm by himself and his bereaved ones, sometimes for years, whilst providing a most touching token of abiding affection for lost friends, is, at the same time, a special declaration of faith and hope, and yet obviates entirely the need for any peculiar dress "for the occasion."
Every funeral thus becomes a very valuable opportunity for comforting and strengthening the mourners, and for urging the unsaved to ensure an eternal triumph. It would not be easy to compute the total of crowds thus brought under the sound of the Gospel, in connexion with our losses, every year.
Thus all these occasions for sadness have been turned into fountains of joy, not merely to those most immediately concerned, but to the whole community. We have not yet had time or opportunity, thank God! sufficiently to redeem the grave and the cemetery from the scandal of men-praising expenditure, for any sort of tombstone has generally been too costly for our people. But the small, simple edge-stone which marks the resting-place of "Catherine Booth, Mother of The Salvation Army," and which asks every passer-by, "Do you also follow Christ?" has set an example, consistent with all our past and our eternal future.
Surely, the day will come when our General's teaching and practice in this matter will help to lighten the burden of every bereaved family, and make every cemetery the birthplace of crowds of souls. The music and song with which we surround every deathbed and funeral, still too much tinged sometimes with the follies of traditional show, have already been used by God's Spirit to bring life and gladness to many a spiritually dead soul.
Chapter XX
His Social Work
Most erroneously and unfairly it has been widely assumed that the great work of The General was the establishment in the world of some Social Institutions. Happily, we have got a verbatim report of an address to his Social Officers gathered around him a year before his death in which we have a complete statement as to the beginnings and principles of the work, so that we can see exactly how he wished it to be regarded.