The Man with the Book; or, The Bible Among the People

"You see, master, as how sandwiches never can get on, cos we're a broke-down lot. Why you should see us afore we starts with our boards, all a-rubbin' our rheumatisms or a-coughin', so as it is wonderful how we gets on. But lots of us are respectable though we ain't always honest, as we get into a public instead of crawling, and there we enjoys our pipes and talks. Why one on us is a queer old man what had a good business in the muffin line, and it udd make you stare if you heard the poetry he makes up, and then you would laugh, and then your eyes would water like. Well, to-day he brings in a new song all by hisself, and it all ends with what is called—

"'The man what walks the gutters.'

"And it's a correct account of how we are looked down on, and shows that none of our old pals will shake our paws, as it's awkward like when your harms pop out of your side like serampores at the railway; and then it shows that it's no good to police the men what gets drunk, and fine 'em five shillings, the correct thing being to make 'em sandwiches for a week with 'vertisements about them teetotal meetings. And then nobs would mayhaps have to do the boards, which would helewate the perfession, as all what they does helewates. Howsomever a chap what's a wagabon offered me his fist, and I kicked his shins; and affor that I never killed a fly, as my 'art is tender-like. That wagabon ruined us. My wife was a 'ousemaid, and I was a cabby; and she had twenty-three sovereigns, and I had ten on 'em. So we made a match, and I took a stable and borrowed a 'orse, and bought an old cab and did it up, and we was a-doing first-rate. So that man comes one morning, and says he to me, 'You're good natured, and if you'll oblige me, I will oblige you; and I wants to buy a 'orse, and if you'll write across a paper what's a bill, I'll have the money and will stand treat.' Well, that made me feel as I was a gent to get money with writing, and I does it; and the treat I had wasn't no good. Well, three months arter that, a chap comes to my stable with a paper nearly all print, which said I was to pay that fifteen pounds I signed on the paper; and I couldn't and I wouldn't, and I got drunk lots of times, and they hexecuted in the stable, and then I hadn't a cab; and then I frets, and was werry ill in the hospital; and then I thought a lot, and says I to myself, says I, 'I ortent to have writ on that paper, and I ortent to have took to the drink, and I ortent to have been 'ard with the wife, as I made the trouble. And now I'm a sandwich I brings her the little bit of money I gets."

"You did wrong," said the Missionary, "in signing that paper without consulting your wife and your Bible. She might have seen the danger and prevented it; if not the good Book would have said to you, 'Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts. If thou hast nothing to pay, why should he take away thy bed from under thee?' I have called in because I find that you are making another mistake, a very serious one, as regards your children, by allowing them to go to the convent school. The Sisters have been kind to your wife, and have persuaded her that there is no difference between their religion and that which is true; they have however caused your children to kneel before images, though God in the commandment has said, 'Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or bow down thyself to them.' Besides this, they will be taught other things which are not true, and must therefore injure them. Poor as you are, you are responsible to God for your children, and you sin by allowing them to be brought up in a false religion. Bear bravely with your troubles, and brighter days may come, but do right to your children by allowing me to take them to a proper school." After a feeble resistance from the mother this was agreed to, and the visit ended in a reading from the Bible; after which the family knelt together at the throne of grace. Next morning the Missionary called for the children and took them to the National School. During the day the Sisters called upon the mother, and after a short visit left the Court with a quick tread. The week after, several of the Romanists, including the family with the miniature altar, left; eleven of the catechisms they had circulated were exchanged for good books, and so the effort to Romanize in Paradise Court was stayed.

The opposite house, the door of which was closed upon the Missionary at his first visit, was known to leading members of the cadging fraternity as an "easy padding ken," which means "a quiet lodging-house for begging impostors." As these rogues only stayed a short time, to conceal themselves from the police or to prepare new deceits for their country friends, a rapid succession of them was met with, from the "shallow cove" (i.e., a pretended sailor in distress), to the "highflier" (i.e., a begging-letter impostor). The gipsy man and his wife who kept the den professed to be very fond of the tracts, but a man who did the "religious dodge" told the giver that they were saved up and sold to such as himself at twopence a dozen, for village and roadside begging. The landlord got into trouble with the police, and to put them off the scent he for several months let the upper rooms in the regular way. This accounts for the circumstance that the visitor did not know that the top back had been occupied by a family for five or six weeks. Thinking that lodgers were there, he, one dark November afternoon, made his way to that part of the house. In reply to his knock, the door was opened by a woman who was partly intoxicated, and, whose appearance denoted that she sifted upon the dust-heaps. She refused the tract which was offered upon the ground that "it was no good to eat;" but when told of the "true Bread," she opened the door wider, and looking toward a bundle of rags, said, "You can talk to my girl as is very bad, as I'm going out," and then she staggered downstairs.

The visitor approached the rags, upon which lay a little girl of eleven years. She partly raised herself, as if to look at the stranger, and then sunk back as though exhausted with the effort. "I have come to talk to you about Jesus, and to pray with you," said the Missionary, taking hold of her emaciated hand, and then he paused to give the little sufferer time to recover from the excitement of his presence, and to glance round the room. It was a wretched dwelling; filthy in the extreme; with scarcely a vestige of furniture, unless the two boxes which served for seats, and the planks placed across pieces of wood, which served for a table, could be dignified by that name. In one corner was a pile of old kettles without spouts, and saucepans without handles and lids. In the fireplace, which was without a fender and filled with ashes, was a tinker's hand-fire—a saucepan with round holes at the side and wire handle. In different parts of the room were little heaps of dirty rags, bottles, and greasepots. All this showed that the occupant was a travelling tinker, who had been stopped on his travels by the illness of the child, and that his wife had obtained work upon a dust-heap, from which she brought worn-out tinware for her husband to "doctor up" and re-sell to the poor. Turning toward the child, the visitor inquired how long she had lived there, and if she could say the Lord's Prayer. In reply, the child, panting at intervals for breath, in a low, hollow tone, said, "For four or five Sundays, sir, I was ill, and we had to sleep under a hedge, which made me worse; and then we tramped on here, and the doctor has been to see me, and says he can't do much for me, as I am getting thin and can't eat;" and then raising herself upon her arm, she continued, her eyes lighting up with a supernatural brightness, "I can't say all that prayer, but I can the pretty hymn which is in the book under my head. I can't read, but I know it's there." And then the peach colour of her cheek deepened as she opened the "penny hymn-book," and repeated the first two verses of the hymn:

"'Come, let us join our cheerful songsWith angels round the throne.'"

Then she threw herself back as though exhausted, but her face assumed an expression of intense happiness. After a few minutes the question was asked, "And how did you learn that hymn?" "A little girl at the tramps' lodging, at Ipswich," she replied, "went to Sunday-school, and took me with her for three Sundays: the lady saw I was ill, and kissed me, and told me how to say that hymn, and it makes me so happy. And I am going to Him soon," she whispered, gazing up with evident delight. "You must not talk any more, dear," said the visitor, "but I will now pray to Jesus, to whom the angels in heaven are singing, and ask Him to make you very good now, and then to take you to be with Him in glory." "Ask Him," whispered the child, "to make father and mother good: they get drunk and frighten me so, and say such wicked words." The request was complied with, and He who has told His disciples to "ask that they may receive," was petitioned, in simple language but in earnest prayer, to bless the child and to save the parents.

A few necessaries were that evening sent for the child; and two days after the Missionary again ascended that dark staircase: he did so with pleasure, because he felt that in that dismal room there was a little one who loved the Saviour, and who would soon be called to His presence and personally blessed by Him. The door was opened by the mother, who burst into tears and turned away; upon glancing toward the bed of rags, the visitor was startled at seeing a small elm coffin in its place, and inquired when the child died. "Late in the night when you were here," the mother replied, sobbing. "She was in great pain, and sat up in the bed and took out her little book, and said the hymn she was so fond of—

'Come, let us join our cheerful songsWith angels round the throne;'

and then her cough came on, and she fell back in the bed and died like a lamb." While they were speaking, the father, a low-looking tramp, came in; and the Missionary told them of the child's request that he would pray for them that they might be made good. Both of them cried with intense feeling, and then they knelt beside that little coffin, while prayer, deep earnest prayer, was offered for their salvation. That evening, and for several months after, they attended the meeting in the Widow's room, and before they left the place for a settled life, not a tramp's, the man gave proof of his reformation, and the woman that she had believed to the saving of her soul.

In that day when the Lord shall give to each of His servants according as their work shall be, the lady who taught that beggar child a hymn about His love and glory, and won her heart to Him with a kiss of Christian charity, will in no wise lose her reward.

The Book in the Court.

ITS TRUTH.

"'Well, lad!' he said, 'I've flung my life away,And now must give the reckoning in, they say.'I said, 'I hope, Sir, that you stand preparedTo meet the Judge, and 'bide by His award!''Prepared!' he said, 'Roger, my open eyesNow look upon the past without disguise;And I remember all the years gone by,And all I've done, as 'twere but yesterday.It is no use to urge me to repent;I've lost my chance, and now must be contentTo fare as others do,—so let that be:But 'tis a dreadful word—Eternity!''Dear Sir,' I said, 'it is a dreadful word:Lift up your heart and call upon the Lord.Perhaps'—He started up impatiently,—'I cannot call: so let that matter be!I have no hope that I shall be forgiven;I know a drunkard cannot go to heaven;And as I stand upon destruction's brink,I see I've sacrificed my soul for "drink."Oh, what a fool I've been! but say no more;My crazy bark will soon push off the shore.'"

Mrs. Sewell.

CHAPTER V

ROLEY-POLEY'S OPINIONS—THE BUS-WASHER—COMMUNISM—AN INFIDEL CLUB ROOM—PHILOSOPHERS—CONFLICT WITH INFIDELITY—THE 'STROLOGY WOMAN—BIBLE ANSWERS—IMP WOMAN—THE CONVERTED INFIDEL.

The Book in the Court:ITS TRUTH

"Thy word is true from the beginning." Ps. cxix. 160.

ALL who knew "Roley-poley," as the children delighted to call him, were convinced that something was wrong with him or his affairs. He was regarded as one of the respectables of the Court; and as he left home, with his huge narrow-edged basket, covered with a white cloth, upon which were displayed slices of rolled currant-pudding and plum-cake, he looked the pink of cleanliness. His rosy, contented face, white calico cook's cap, of which he was very proud, and his clean apron, were as charms to his supporters,—the roughs and gutter children. The partner of his life was also a partner in the provision business, as she sold sheep's-trotters outside the doors of the public-houses. Though both were turned sixty they were healthy, and their room had an appearance of comfort. It was plain that they prospered, as in the afternoon they left with well-filled baskets, and at night returned with them empty. Business difficulties were not therefore the cause, and yet the good-natured little man became ill-tempered, sharp with his customers, and "cranky" with every one; and then his meek little wife began to look wretched and speak of her "troubles." Liquor was not the cause, as "Roley-poley" was a sober man: so the conclusion arrived at was, that his "opinions," which of late had become very peculiar, were at the root of the evil. This was confirmed by his venturing an attack upon the Missionary, with whom he had been generally on good terms: and this is how the event occurred. The reader of the good Book was standing in a door-way with a group of boys, whose tossing for pence he had stopped by an offer to read them the story of a young man who was thrown into a den of lions. As "Roley-poley" passed with his basket there was a diversion of attention and a fingering of pence, with such a look at the tempting spread that the retailer approached to do business. The youths paused in their purchase to hear the end of the narrative, which may have irritated the poor man, as he looked spitefully toward the Book, and exclaimed, "That all contradicts itself, and it's made up of lies by the parsons, what doesn't produce nuffin, to keep us down and to get our money, and it says, it does, that God come from Teman, and nobody knows about that and Him; and it's bad, cos it says we are to be like a man what told people to steal a donkey. My opinion is, 'No religion and our rights.'" He then toddled away, as one who had let off the long condensed steam of "his opinions."

Next morning the Missionary entered his room to seek an explanation, and was told that "such as him wasn't wanted."

"Yes you be, master," exclaimed that meek little woman, with positive anger. "He's a-turning infidel, cos them shoemakers has lent him Tom Paine's book, which he was reading all two Sundays; and now he's miserable, and talks wicked, and goes to them infidel meetings, and doesn't stop out with the basket, cos he ain't content-like, and wants other people's things."

"She's a wixen," retorted the husband; "and a wixen what hasn't got reason, which is the worser sort of wixens: and she is always a-reading her mother's book, 'The Whole Duty of Man,' which is a parson's book, and agin our rights."

The domestic jangle was stopped by the visitor observing, "It is quite right in religion to use our reason; as the Bible tells us to 'prove all things, and to hold fast that which is good.'" And he then, in a soothing tone of voice, and with simple illustrations, proved to the poor man that God is, and that He is the Rewarder of them who diligently seek Him; and then assured him of his interest in the loving heart of the Saviour.

The old man listened, and it was evident by the manner he pursued his work of pudding-making that he was the subject of an inward conflict. After washing his apron, he poured the flour into the dirty old tub with such vengeance as to create a cloud of dust, and then he mixed with such energy that his arms were soon covered with whitey-brown flakes. By the time the dough was deposited upon the table he was calmer, and toward the end of the operation the rolling-pin was gently used. Rising from his seat the Missionary said kindly, "I am sorry for you, as you have been injured. The men have done you more harm by lending you that book than if they had broken your arm. You have struggled on together for a great many years, and ought now to be trying to make your last days your best days. That bad book will prevent this, and will rob you of the hope of meeting together in heaven. Do, my good friend, read your Bible, and ask God to take the wicked thoughts out of your mind."

The wife, who was preparing her trotters in another tub, burst out crying; and the tears started into the poor man's eyes as he said, "I'll give 'em up, sir, and I'll take to your Bible; and the name of the book I had is 'The Age of Reason,' and the 'bus-washer has it, and we was told not to let you see it."

A bad book, among a people so ignorant as the dwellers in Paradise Court, is worse than a beast of prey at large: so thought the visitor, as he hastened to the room of the family who had received the book, in hope of its capture. The man, an omnibus-washer, had just returned from his work, at which he had been employed since three in the morning. He was dirty and haggard, but this was his usual condition; but the dark frown upon his brow and the surly way in which he received the visitor were new to him. He was one of those to whom positive good had been done, and who had evinced his gratitude. He had a sickly wife and six children, and his hard earnings were only seventeen shillings weekly. As in bad weather he worked a greater part of the night, he had, no doubt from a feeling of exhaustion, contracted the habit of having a quartern of rum as soon as the public-house opened, which habit greatly reduced his wages and led to after-drinking. No wonder then that his family were at times in a starving condition. His boy of seven was deaf and dumb, and a great object of pity. One day a neighbour, to quiet his moaning as he sat upon the stairs, gave him a penny. The child hastened to the baker's and bought a loaf of bread with it. As he entered the room gnawing it, the other children, in savage hunger, sprang upon him and tore it out of his hands. This came to the knowledge of the Missionary, who called upon the man to reason with him about the spending of his wages. The Widow had already been there, and had convinced the wife that more could be made of the money if both were agreed. As the results of the conference the man was induced to sign the pledge; and to help him in forming habits of sobriety, arrangements were made for him to receive a breakfast of bread, butter, and coffee, at a house which opened at five o'clock in the morning, and that free of cost. By the time a fortnight was over the man had improved in health, and was firm in his resolve to keep the pledge and to continue his early breakfast. Good results followed, for the wife became cheerful, the children happy, and the room assumed an appearance of comfort. A cloud had however now gathered over the family, the man absented himself from home, and the wife's Sunday shawl and wedding ring had again disappeared. Their visitor was therefore concerned about them, and this accounts for his hurrying to their room. At first the man was sullen; but in reply to the remark, "I fear that you have neglected your promise to read a chapter daily?" he replied, "I'm the best scholar down here or in the yard either, and I've found out how we are kept down by the 'haristocrats;' and now I understands what are our rights, I'll have my share of the wealth which is the people's which produces it." And then, clenching his fist, he exclaimed, "And if fighting for it is to be done I'll do my share."

The visitor tried to secure his attention to the reason and religion of the matter, but was stopped by the wife, who to his astonishment, chimed in with the declaration, that "the people were becoming enlightened, and were not to be kept down by religion, though some who believed in it were good and some were bad." After listening to them for a sufficient time to acquaint himself with the full extent of the damage they had received, he said sharply, "You have not had time to think over the opinions you have accepted: when you have done so you will discover your mistake, and I trust find to your joy that the words of the Lord are pure, making wise the simple." And then he left, with a sad heart at the discouragement received.

Upon his next visit to the owner of "The Age of Reason," the Missionary tried to convince him that he was doing positive harm by circulating his book of "advanced opinions," and instanced the parties to whom we have referred. "I admit," he replied, "that the immediate result of unsettling the mind is productive of apparent evil; but we free thinkers, like good surgeons, wound to heal and amputate to save. We do not expect to annihilate the theological system of ages without damage to individuals and to society. Our principles will revolutionize and destroy until we are able to build up a new moral system." He then told the visitor that a Branch Secular Society of thirty members had been formed at a neighbouring coffee-house, and added, "After business on Saturday evenings we intend to hold a discussion for the purpose of making new members; and as I have the privilege of inviting a friend, I shall be glad to see you there."

As several residents in the Court had joined the Society, the Missionary felt that it was his duty for their sakes to accept the invitation, and he therefore entered the room at the appointed time. Its arrangements were certainly comfortable and attractive, the walls were neatly papered, and round the room were twenty ornamental brackets, and upon each of these the bust of an infidel writer, such as Byron, Chubb, Paine, Shelley, Shaftesbury, Voltaire, and others. Under each bracket was a small shelf, upon which were the works of the man represented by the bust, and the effect was very pretty. There was also a shelf with such books as "A Short and Easy Method with the Saints." Upon the table were the various infidel publications, and three Bibles—the Authorized Version, the Douay, and Priestley. There was also a Dictionary, and an auctioneer's hammer for the use of the Chairman. This personage, an ironmonger's foreman, was voted to the chair, and congratulated the members upon the success of the new movement. He then announced the subject for discussion: "Does man require a revelation?" and called upon the Secretary, a secular bookseller, to open upon the negative side. He did so in a really clever speech, clearing his way by stating truisms about the force of the human intellect, man's capacity for knowledge, and his power over the material world. He then made an onslaught upon Christianity, charging it with all the evil done in its name, and much more, and proceeded to establish the proposition: "Science the providence of life; spiritual dependency leading to material destruction." He then took pains to show "that morality is independent of Scriptural religion," and besought his hearers to reject the Book, which reason and modern discovery proved to be false, and to rely upon philosophy and science for the attainment of social and political equality with their upraising and happy influences.

Upon taking his seat he was applauded, and then the Missionary rose, with his pocket Bible in his hand, and said, "I trust that you, Mr. Chairman, and the members of this Society, will extend to me the courtesy usually shown to strangers, by allowing me to speak to the affirmative of this question; and as this is my first attempt to take part in a debate, I am sure that you will grant me your forbearance should I inadvertently trespass upon your rules of discussion. Now, as your Secretary has placed philosophy and science in antagonism to this Book, and stated that these are the weapons of your warfare with which Christianity and our social state are to be destroyed and supplanted, let me reply by taking the position, 'That philosophy is only groping in the dark for the Bible, and that science is only hobbling after it.' (Laughter.) This is a great subject, and we ought to approach it with modesty, because many of the best, the noblest, and the most learned of our race have believed in the Bible. Sir Isaac Newton from his observatory scanned the starry canopy, and then confirmed the statement of the Hebrew poet, that 'the heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth forth His handy work.' And let me here remind you that true philosophy—skill in the science of nature—is after all a spiritual product from the exercise of man's intellect upon the works of creation: as, for instance, the atomic theory is the fruit of reason in chemistry. You have therefore to accept the arguments of philosophers whose reasoning contradicts your senses, as when they tell us that the earth goes round the sun. If then in natural phenomena we have to use our reason in accepting or rejecting the theories of men, does it not lead to the conviction that reason itself requires to be enlightened and directed in matters beyond its power of action? It is in necessary truths which man by searching cannot discover, that communications from the Creator becomes needful; and this Book contains such revelations: true philosophy therefore leads up to it. And now let me, on the authority of the historian Neander, remind you that before Christianity gave the idea no one thought of forming a system of enlightenment which could extend to the people. The Stoic, Epicurean, and Platonic forms of philosophy recognize two classes of mankind—the noble-minded who formed their disciples, and the gross multitudes whom they avoided as sunk hopelessly in degradation. The Founder of the Christian religion, however, rose above the human philosophers, by proclaiming His mission to the common people, and in this way raising humanity to the standard of an universal brotherhood." The speaker was here stopped by shouts of contradiction; but he produced silence by holding out the Bible, and exclaiming in an impassioned manner, "Philosophy and science can lead man to the intellectual enjoyment of nature and to maxims of wisdom: they can also trouble him with grave perplexities. They teach him that matter is indestructible, and that there is a constant restoring of the face of nature; and in this way they raise in his mind the important questions, 'Are my intellectual powers to be destroyed while matter only undergoes a change?' and 'If a man die shall he live again?' You who reject this Book look down into the grave and discover a darkness which can be felt but not penetrated. We, however, who accept this revelation, look into its darkness and discover flashes of celestial glory which make a passage-way to an immortality of blessedness. The song of victory over death belongs to the Christian philosopher, who, looking into the grave, exclaims with joy, 'The Lord has risen indeed, and because He lives I shall live also.'"