In 1899, we held a preaching service in a theater. Mr. Omoto happened to be drinking in the saloon opposite. Hearing of our gathering, with some rowdy comrades, he thought he would break it up, with the result that we experienced persistent opposition throughout the meeting. But the sermons on Pessimism and the New Life, and my statement of the reasons that had brought me to Japan attracted his attention, and the next day I received an anonymous letter asking for tracts. These seem to have produced a profound impression, particularly the tract entitled "Two Young Men." It told of two hardened prisoners who had been transformed by the gospel and became highly useful and well-known members of society. Mr. Omoto thereupon set himself definitely to learn about Christianity, but privately, unwilling to make public his new hope. He bought and read through, quite by himself, the entire New Testament. Though he gained some idea of the gospel, he soon found he had lost none of his passion for drink. After a while he went to Kobe and joined a temperance society; but soon finding that the society had members who broke their pledges, he began to break his. In despair he went to Okayama and tried to join himself to Mr. Ishii, head of the well-known Christian orphanage, asking to be made a Christian, but he was told to return to Matsuyama and join the church there in his old home; only so could he be saved. Greatly disappointed, he returned and called on me early in June, 1901, but without telling fully about himself. He also called on Mr. Nishimura, an earnest Christian worker, who prayed with him, telling him that to be saved he must receive the Holy Spirit.
That summer, quite exceptionally, I returned in the middle of the vacation. Mr. Omoto appeared at the prayer-meeting for the first time and was evidently in a state of great excitement, so much so that only with difficulty could we understand his remarks and his prayer. The gist was that he had that day received the Holy Spirit, that he was now saved, and that his joy was too great for utterance. Tears rolled down his cheeks as he talked and prayed. After the meeting I had a few words with him, and urged him to ally himself with our experienced workers. He was so excited that I feared for him, and wondered whether this might not be a tornado of emotion due to drink and to the nervous condition incident to his riotous life, an emotion which he mistook for the gift of the Holy Spirit. I urged him to begin at once to live the Christian life, cutting loose from all bad companions and bad habits.
To gain an honest living he entered the Matsuyama Cotton Thread Spinning Factory. This required twelve hours of work daily, sometimes by day and sometimes by night, a hard pull for one who had done no steady work for years. He attended Christian services faithfully, so far as his hours of work allowed, and became quite intimate with two or three of our best Christians. Before long he began to talk about the wretched conditions and immoral life of the factory girls, telling us of the situation already described in Chapter IX.[9] His first thought was to give these tired children wholesome recreation. He secured the use of our preaching place in the vicinity of the factory and invited the girls to attend what he called the Dojokwai (Sympathy Society). He soon persuaded the girls to add a little reading and writing to their play, and later also, sewing. These meetings had of course to be held after the twelve or more hours of work in the factory had been completed. Care had also to be taken that the studies and the fun should not absorb time needed for sleep. Membership in the Sympathy Society rose rapidly and soon numbered seventy girls.
At first meetings were held only in the evening three times a week, and lasted but an hour. But as the educational element of the society developed, others were induced to help and every evening save Sunday was occupied. In order that girls on the night shift might continue their studies similar classes were also held from seven to nine o'clock in the morning. Before six months had passed the play aspect of the society was largely superseded by the educational.
But opposition of Buddhists now began to show itself. A few parents refused to let their girls attend. The most determined opposition however came from the manager in the factory who had charge of one of the shifts. Members of that shift were so treated that gradually they dropped out of the Dojokwai, and new members from that shift could not be secured. The hostile manager was however himself dropped some months later, and all opposition to the work from within the factory ceased.
In a previous chapter we have noted the facts discovered by Mr. Omoto as he went the rounds of the boarding-houses in which the girls were required to live.[10] As these conditions became clearer and more appallingly impressive, he began to say with increasing frequency and insistence that the Sympathy Society, however successful, could not do what was needed. Only a Christian home would answer. Not only do the girls need to learn to read and write and sew, but even more than these do they need a home free from temptation, clean and pure and helpful, and elevating morally and religiously. The difficulties however in the way of such an enterprise seemed insuperable. To say nothing of the financial problem, a still greater obstacle, it was felt, was the securing of "recognition" from the factory, for Buddhist influence in the factory was at that time still dominant. During these months the Sympathy Society was winning its way among the girls and their parents, and Mr. Omoto himself was learning valuable lessons.
One was that the girls were not all eager to be in a Christian home. We of course forbade all drinking, irregular hours, and more irregular "friendships." Attendance on prayers, night and morning, and at the school, was required. It looked for a time as if we should fail, for lack of girls to meet the expenses.
But in spite of discouragements we kept on. The earnings of the girls who lived in the home, for the first year, were 1,361 yen. Of this sum they paid for board 905 yen, and sent to their parents 456, whereas girls in the other boarding-houses were able to save nothing, although the amount paid for board was the same in all the houses, being fixed by the factory at 3.60 yen per month, or twelve sen (six cents) per day.