There is a story, told by an American poet, of an explorer who was rowed down the River Amazon one night from sunset to sunrise, the dark river gliding with a serpent’s stillness between forests of giant trees wound round with snake-like creepers. Suddenly at midnight a cry, a long despairing moan of solitude arises, a cry so full of agony and fear, that the heart of the traveller stands still as he listens. The oarsman starts, drops his oar, crosses himself and whispers, “The cry of a lost soul.”“Nay, a bird perhaps,” the traveller says. “No, señor, not a bird; we know it well. It is the tortured soul of an infidel, an accursed heretic, that cries from hell. Poor fool! he shrieks for ever in the darkness for human pity and for prayer. May the saints strike him dumb! Our Holy Mother has no prayer for him; for having sinned to the end, he burns always in the furnace of God’s wrath.” The traveller made no answer to the baptised pagan’s cruel lie, which lends new horror to the deepening shadows as the boat’s lamp burns dim, and the black water slides along without a sound or a ripple. But lifting his eyes to the strip of the starry heavens visible between the dark walls of forest, he sees the cross of pardon (the beautiful constellation, the Southern Cross) lighting up the tropical sky, and he urges aloud his strong plea: “Father of all, Thou lovest all; Thy erring child may be lost to himself, but never lost to Thee. All souls are Thine. Through all guilt and shame, perverseness of will and sins of sense Thou forsakest not. Wilt Thou not, eternal source of good, change to a song of praise the cry of the lost soul?” And a sense of peace and assurance fell upon the soul of the traveller as the first streak of dawn summoned all nature to her morning song of praise.
You and I have been together among the Alps, in the early hours of the dawn, when all nature was freshly baptised with the dew of the morning, and such an exquisite purity was in the silent air, that we seemed to be breathing the heavenly ether of a new-born earth. And we have together looked upon those pure, snow-covered peaks, those fair sentinels of heaven, in the evening glow, bathed in the rose and gold of the setting sun; appearing at the last moment of farewell to the day, as if lighted by some light from within themselves. At such times we have felt that it was hardly possible to imagine anything more beautiful, more awful in grandeur and purity than this. May it be that we shall see these same familiar features renewed in the times of the new heavens and the new earth?—all that tends to decay and death, all storms, violence and destructive forces done with for ever, and this beautiful earth again such as we have seen it and loved it at its best, but infinitely better and more beautiful than its present earthly best. Its present unrest, the violent and terrifying forces working within its bosom are, it may be, the travail pangs which will usher in the new earth.
To the Editor of the Shield.
January 1st, 1905.
I feel impelled, in spite of much physical weakness, to send a message of New Year’s greeting, through your organ, to such of my old friends and associates in our Crusade who are still living, as well as to the younger generation of workers, many of whom I have never seen.
I believe we all realise that we are living in troubled times, both as to our own land and to the world in general. I do myself realise it deeply. Yet no note of discouragement is allowed by “the God of Hope” to sound in my soul. I say this emphatically—and my friends may believe that this hope has not its source in any natural buoyancy, for I am suffering much. I should like just to reiterate the old everlasting truth that “Jehovah reigns.” It is my belief that His presence among us will be felt in proportion as evil and perplexity increase on all sides. He hears the bitter cry which is arising from earth. The “distress of nations” spoken of in Scripture is His distress who bore the sins and the griefs of the whole world. Do not, dear friends, think of Him as far off, and of His earth as a “God-forsaken planet.” It is still always His earth, and at a time when faith seems to decay, He will arise in His majesty and love. “He saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no Intercessor; therefore His own arm brought salvation.”
I am with you, my dear old and young companions in arms—with you in spirit and in sympathy at this season and always.
This year she was able to welcome a great moralvictory for the Abolitionist cause. For the Extra-Parliamentary Commission, appointed by the French Government in 1902, though originally not counting more than three Abolitionists among its seventy members, formally condemned the system of the Police des mœurs. It remains however to be seen what the French Chambers will do with the matter.
The following letter is a specimen of the touching manner, in which she mourned the loss of her friends, as one by one they passed away.
This year she was able to welcome a great moralvictory for the Abolitionist cause. For the Extra-Parliamentary Commission, appointed by the French Government in 1902, though originally not counting more than three Abolitionists among its seventy members, formally condemned the system of the Police des mœurs. It remains however to be seen what the French Chambers will do with the matter.
The following letter is a specimen of the touching manner, in which she mourned the loss of her friends, as one by one they passed away.
To a friend.
March, 1905.
It would be difficult for me in my present circumstances of weakness to write, as it has been suggested, the story of the life and work of my dear late colleague, Margaret Tanner. Others, I trust, will give the facts of her long and faithful career. But I cannot refrain from writing to you a few words from my heart, about her who has so lately been called to her rest, and to the higher service which, I believe, is granted in that rest to those who have faithfully served God on earth.
She and I have been allied in work since the autumn of 1869. It is a long retrospect, and many memories crowd upon me as I look back on our special work of the Ladies’ National Association. We have always worked in perfect harmony, although differing markedly in natural character. To speak honestly, as one conscious of faults, which were however overruled (for we were educated in the work itself to which we were called), I was too impetuous, impulsive and sometimes rash. The keen sense of injustice which possessed both her and me, was apt at times to fill me with bitterness of soul. She, on the contrary, was always calm, steady, equal, gentle—a true representative of the Society of Friends. I think I never heard her say an unkind word of anyone, or pass a harsh judgment on persons who were unjust and cruel, although abhorring the injustice and the cruelty. She was very humble, and wonderfully self-effacing. With all her gentleness, she had the utmost firmness, never wavering in the least in principle; and her grasp of principle and her sense of justice were allied to a lifelong, tenacious perseverance in duty, and in devotion to our cause to the very end. She would say that she owed much to me. Few people guess how much I owed to her, to that firm, quiet individuality. She was full of pity for the outcast and oppressed, and in this we were wholly one. Her memory is very sweet and fragrant to me; and I am full of a grateful remembrance of the influence which her character has had on me.
I recall many visits I made to Durdham Park, where she lived much, and worked with her sisters. The drawing-room meetings we held there, and the traditional beautiful hospitality of Friends, are a bright and peaceful memory to me. There was inspiration in those meetings, and they were fruitful in practical results. Lastly, may I say that I noted with reverent love the spiritual ripening of the character of that dear friend, towards the close of her long life of faithful labours. Her love for me was deep and tender, and mine for her. The last time I saw her, the light of Heaven was on her aged face, which bore the marks of the patience which had had its perfect work.
What follows is part of the message sent by Josephine Butler on the occasion of the thirtieth anniversary of the Federation, meeting at Neuchâtel in September, 1905.
What follows is part of the message sent by Josephine Butler on the occasion of the thirtieth anniversary of the Federation, meeting at Neuchâtel in September, 1905.
The inception of our work, which has grown so wonderfully, began very much earlier than anyone knows. You will be surprised perhaps, when you know all. What I have to tell you illustrates two truths, which are, to my mind, confirmed by the inner history of all vital evolutions of which we know anything in the past history of the human race. The first of these two truths or principles is, that in order to produce a movement of a vital, spiritual nature someone must suffer, someone must go through sore travail of soul before a living movement, outwardly visible, can be born. This was so in the greatest movement of eternity—the evolution of the Christian faith. To that end Christ suffered, as we know (in a measure) to what a degree; but the depth and infinitude of His suffering we cannot know. It is what the Greeks called “The unknown and unknowable agony.” Scripture speaks of the “travail of His soul.” In an infinitely smaller measure I believe that the evolution of any vitally good principle, or truth, must be and always is preceded by suffering, by travail of soul.[17] It is not all who join in the vital movement who need to suffer; by no means. Their sufferings are less probably, as time goes on. The truth visibly born into the world carries with it the conviction and intellectual adhesion of a multitude of good and just persons. There is still labour and strain, and weariness and disappointment, and inward conflict to be borne by those who join the good cause; but not often, I think, the long, silent period of conception and child-bearing which precedes the actual appearance of the living child in the world. This has a close connection with much that Christ said about the hidden life of the seed sown in the Kingdom of God. The smallest of seeds, He said, falls into the ground, remains long concealed there, apparently dead, unseen by any. But in time it appears an infant plant, and, as He said, becomes the greatest of all trees, so that the birds of the air rest in its branches.