After Prison--What?

by Maud Ballington Booth

[IV
THE POWER BEHIND THE WORK]

In the bright fragrance of a spring morning our long, heavy train of cars wound its way slowly up the Divide. The track curved and doubled back and forth amid the forest like some great brown silver-streaked serpent; here gliding into the earth to be lost in the blackness of a tunnel, there, flinging itself over a dizzy chasm spanned only at fabulous cost by a feat of engineering. Higher, ever higher we rose until a glorious view of valley swept below us from the forest fringe to Ashland. At the summit came a pause for breath and then the long, dark, suffocating tunnel, and after it the sight that one would gladly cross a continent to see, as we beheld it in all the glory of brilliant sunshine and bluest ether. Below us stretched a great plain, a veritable green ocean of prairie. To one side the ridge of rugged forest-clad mountains that form the great Divide. Away ahead like high rocky islands in the emerald sea rose the dark steep Buttes backed by the spires and turreted peaks of the Castle Rocks.

But all this was only a setting for the jewel, the less beautiful, above which towered in queenly majesty the glory of the Sierras, Shasta. As we first saw her, it seemed impossible to believe that the gleaming majestic mass of whiteness belonged to earth. She seemed to be a great white cloud on the horizon, shimmering against the pale-blue ether, resting but for a moment on the rock-bounded forest that swept from the plain to form her base. As we slowly wound our way down to the valley, as we glided in and out and round about over the plain, we gazed for hours at this most wonderful of mountains, our eyes fascinated, our lips silent, our hearts stirred by the wonder of her quiet, queenly grandeur. At first she dazzled us in the full glory of the sunlight as her snows shone against a vivid blue sky, then as the sun sank to the ridge opposite, the background changed to palest green and her whiteness was stained with crimson and touched with gold, growing richer and deeper every moment. Darkness began to gather in the valley; the woods grew mysterious with gloom; purple shadows crept up to the timber-line and even dared to steal over her snowy base, but the head of Shasta still glowed and blushed with the glory of the setting sun. At last he was lost to us over the ridge and the swift twilight claimed the whole land, but watching still the mountain heights above us, we saw yet another change. Shasta was transfigured! The pale primrose of the after-glow shone over all her pure whiteness and from a queen of glory she seemed changed to the sweet loyalty of a loving heart that held the sacred memory of the beloved long after he was lost to other eyes.

Night found us creeping downwards in the solemn darkness of the chasm on the further side. Great fir trees, giant sentinels of the forest closed in about us and that strange, silent mystery of mountain solitudes reigned supreme. Looking backwards, we could still catch glimpses of the centre peak behind us, shining serenely white now beneath the silvery moonbeams, which had not strength to penetrate the dense forest that clothed the gorge. Leaning over the edge of the observation car, I had become so absorbed in communion with nature that it was startling to be aroused by a voice at my side. A fellow-passenger was calling my attention to something away down beneath us in the abyss which seemed to me to hold nothing but impenetrable blackness. As my eyes became used to the obscurity, however, I could distinguish a little silver line amid the rocks and though at first I could hear only the creaking of the trestle bridge beneath us and the labored breathing of our great locomotive, I distinguished at last the far-away silvery music of a tiny mountain stream. It struck me as strange that I should have my attention called to this little brook when I had seen so many glorious streams and rivers in my overland journeys. The explanation however gave reason enough as my friend announced, "That is the Sacramento at its source. During the night we shall cross it twenty-seven or twenty-eight times and to-morrow you will see it very differently when we cross it for the last time."

All through that night I watched the growth of the little stream. At first it was narrow and shallow and its voice but a silvery song as it threaded its way amid the rocks or sent a spray of mist and foam over the moss when some obstruction barred its way. But by and by it grew to be a rushing torrent, the double note of power and purpose dominated its song, and as the train thundered over bridge after bridge, I saw it dashing and crashing over its rugged bed, here leaping a precipice, there rushing with wave-white fury against some mighty rock, tossing great logs from side to side as if they were straws. Ever onward, forward, downward, drawing with it every lesser stream, engulfing every waterfall and spring, it kept us company through the long, moonlit night and then in the broad daylight, we crossed it for the last time and saw it in the might of its accomplished strength. As the great ferry-boat bore our heavy train over the river, I looked out upon a deep broad placid expanse of blue water. Sunbeams played with the myriad ripples powdering the turquoise with gold. Fertile foothills rolled away on either side and looking far off to the horizon the mighty river joined the bay, and yet further lost itself through the Golden Gate in the mighty Western ocean. Broad enough, deep enough, strong enough to carry a nation's fleet upon its breast, that is what the streamlet of the wilderness had become. What mighty lessons Nature teaches us!

I have carried my readers far away to California and surely might be accused of wandering from my point, but I wanted to tell them of a voice that has been a blessed cheer and inspiration to my heart, reminding me in hours of difficulty and discouragement of the great Source of all strength and power. Had a critic paused in faithless speculation by the side of the little Sacramento in its rocky cradle days up there in the wilderness, he might have interrupted its silvery song with a jarring note of discouragement. "Foolish little stream," the critic might have said, "what are you singing about so joyously? Do you tell of the thirsty you are going to cool, of the wilderness that shall blossom at your touch, of the great valleys you are going to fertilize? Are you dreaming of ships you would carry, of the long miles you would travel, of the great ocean upon whose breast you would cast yourself? How absurd and unlikely are these day dreams! Look at yourself! See how tiny and insignificant you are, so narrow that a child could leap over you, so shallow that I can see the very pebbles in your bed. It is a foolish fancy, impossible of realization. You had better stop singing, you will only dry up and be absorbed by the ferns and moss of the forest; that will be the easiest, happiest end for you." If the stream had thought it worth while to respond, I know the answer that would have rung out clear and sweet, for this is the message it sang to my heart, "Yes, of myself I may be small and insignificant. The distance and obstacles may be far and formidable. I may of myself be too weak to face them, but look behind me, at the snows of Shasta; think of the springs and water courses that gush from her eternal rocks and remember that my help comes from the hills and when thus helped, I too can become mighty."

In the early days of the work, it seemed an overwhelming undertaking to meet the great sad problem that faced us within the walls of State Prison. There was indeed a great desert representing thirst and need, wreck and ruin. Many tried to discourage us by painting in vivid colors, the difficulties of the undertaking, and I grant they cannot be very easily exaggerated, for where vice and sin, human weakness and life's misfortunes have swept over mankind, the problem is one of the most overwhelming that can be faced. The work was spoken of as an experiment and a very doubtful one at that, and if it had been some new plan for the reforming of criminals, some mere exertion of human influence or the hobby and scheme of an organization that was to be tried, one might well have been faint-hearted. We, however, have felt from the first and now feel more intensely than ever that this undertaking has not been our work, but God's work. We can truly say we are not attempting it in our own strength but we "lift up our eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh our help," and to every doubter and critic we answer, "God does not experiment." His work succeeds; His building stands; His touch transforms. Were it not for this, what heart should we have in dealing with those who have made trial of other help and strength and found it to fail them?

Many of the men to whom we go are defiled with the leprosy of sin. They have tried self-purification, and effort after effort has failed them. What could we say to them unless we believed that the Voice that said of old, "Be thou clean," could say it as truly to-day? We deal with some who are truly blind as to things spiritual, and no human hands could open these sightless eyes, no human voice could unstop the ears of the spiritually deaf. There we must deal with souls and consciences dead to right, unconscious of the responsibilities and possibilities of life, and we know that only the Divine Hand that raised the dead can quicken them again. We have realized and acknowledged this from the first, so our work is not to be a moral education or a recommendation tending to the turning over of a new leaf, but we have sought ever to point the souls in darkness to the true light and those wrestling with their own sin and weakness to the wondrous power of God.

Too often are we met when pleading with men to rise up and make a brave effort to do right, with the discouraging answer, "I have tried and failed," and each effort that proved fruitless has robbed them of the courage to try again. While we do not for a moment discount the vital importance of personal effort, of good resolves, of will exerted in the right direction, we try most clearly to show the need of seeking God's help, showing that when the man would start out on the road, it is of the utmost importance to start right. Feeling as we do, we have naturally been filled with hope and courage for our work. We do not have to look for difficulties, we need not be overwhelmed by our own weakness or inefficiency; nothing is too hard for God. No obstacle can stand before Him. So from the first we have been full of faith and joy in battle and have not been disappointed for victory after victory has come to add inspiration to our efforts.

We believe that the great Father-heart feels intense pity and divine compassion for the one who has strayed and fallen. Surely no child of God can doubt this. It has seemed to us that the time has come when that passage of Scripture is being fulfilled, "For He hath looked down from the height of His sanctuary; from heaven did the Lord behold the earth, to hear the groaning of the prisoner, to loose those that are appointed to death." One can but be a believer in the miracles of old when faced with the miracles of to-day, where the fetters that have bound some souls have been snapped, and men have been delivered from the power of opium, of strong drink and other vices after they had been given up as utterly beyond redemption. During these years of work in prison, onlookers have acknowledged to me over and over again, that they have been forced to recognize some superhuman power when they have seen lives transformed. From watching at first with indifference or skeptical criticism, they have come at last to look upon the work with absolute faith, even though personally they have had no knowledge of the wonderful power at work.