Up from the Soil
If you want to drive the devil out of the world, hit him with a cradle
instead of a crutch.--BILLY SUNDAY.
Sunday must be accepted as a man of the American type before he can
be understood. He is of the average, every-day American sort. He is
one of the "folks." He has more points of resemblance to the common
people than he has of difference from them. His mind is their mind. The
keenness of the average American is his in an increased degree. He has
the saving sense of humor which has marked this western people. The
extravagances and recklessnesses of his speech would be incredible to a
Britisher; but we Americans understand them. They are of a piece with
our minds.
Like the type, Sunday is not over-fastidious. He is not made of a
special porcelain clay, but of the same red soil as the rest of us. He
knows the barn-yards of the farm better than the drawing-rooms of the
rich. The normal, every-day Americanism of this son of the Middle West,
whom the nation knows as "Billy Sunday," is to be insisted upon if he
is to be understood.
Early apprenticed to hardship and labor, he has a sympathy with the
life of the toiling people which mere imagination cannot give. His
knowledge of the American crowd is sure and complete because he is
one of them. He understands the life of every-day folk because that
has always been his life. While he has obvious natural ability,
sharpened on the grindstone of varied experience, his perceptions and
his viewpoints are altogether those of the normal American. As he has
seen something of life on many levels, and knows city ways as well
as country usages, he has never lost his bearings as to what sort of
people make up the bulk of this country. To them his sermons are
addressed. Because he strikes this medium level of common conduct and
thought, it is easy for those in all the ranges of American life to
comprehend him.
"Horse-sense," that fundamental American virtue, is Sunday's to an
eminent degree. A modern American philosopher defines this quality
of mind as "an instinctive something that tells us when the clock
strikes twelve." Because he is "rich in saving common sense," Sunday
understands the people and trusts them to understand him. His most
earnest defenders from the beginning of his public life have been the
rank and file of the common people. His critics have come from the
extreme edges of society--the scholar, or the man whose business is
hurt by righteousness.
The life of William A. Sunday covers the period of American history
since the Civil War. He never saw his father, for he was born the
third son of pioneer parents on November 19, 1862, four months after
his father had enlisted as a private in Company E, Twenty-third Iowa
Infantry Volunteers.
There is nothing remarkable to record as to the family. They were one
with the type of the middle-western Americans who wrested that empire
from the wilderness, and counted poverty honorable. In those mutually
helpful, splendidly independent days, Democracy came to its flower, and
the American type was born.
Real patriotism is always purchased at a high price; none pay more
dearly for war-time loyalty than the women who send their husbands
and sons to the front. Mrs. Sunday bade her husband answer the call
of his country as only a brave woman could do, and sent him forth to
the service and sacrifices which soon ended in an unmarked grave. Four
months after she had bidden farewell to her husband, she bade welcome
to his son. To this third child she gave the name of her absent soldier
husband.
The mother's dreams of the returning soldier's delight in his namesake
child were soon shattered by the tidings that Private William Sunday
had died of disease contracted in service, at Patterson, Missouri, on
December 22, 1862, a little more than a month after the birth of the
boy who was to lift his name out of the obscurity of the hosts of those
who gave "the last full measure of devotion" to their nation.
Then the mother was called upon to take up that heaviest of all burdens
of patriotism--the rearing of an orphan family in a home of dire
poverty. The three children in the Sunday home out at Ames, Iowa--Roy,
Edward and William--were unwitting participants in another aspect of
war, the lot of soldiers' orphans. For years, Mrs. Sunday, who at this
writing is still living and rejoicing in the successes of her son,
was able to keep her little family together under the roof of the
two-roomed log cabin which they called home. In those early days their
grandfather, Squire Corey, was of unmeasured help in providing for and
training the three orphan boys.
Experience is a school teacher who carries a rod, as Sunday could
well testify. He learned life's fundamental lessons in the school of
poverty and toil. To the part which his mother played in shaping his
life and ideals he has borne eloquent tribute on many platforms. When
the youngest son was twelve years old, he and his older brother were
sent off to the Soldiers' Orphanage at Glenwood, Iowa. Later they
were transferred to the Davenport Orphanage, which they left in June
of 1876, making two years spent in the orphanages. Concerning this
experience Sunday himself speaks:
"I was bred and born (not in old Kentucky, although my grandfather
was a Kentuckian), but in old Iowa. I am a rube of the rubes. I am a
hayseed of the hayseeds, and the malodors of the barnyard are on me
yet, and it beats Pinaud and Colgate, too. I have greased my hair with
goose grease and blacked my boots with stove blacking. I have wiped my
old proboscis with a gunny-sack towel; I have drunk coffee out of my
saucer, and I have eaten with my knife; I have said 'done it,' when I
should have said 'did it,' and I 'have saw' when I should 'have seen,'
and I expect to go to heaven just the same. I have crept and crawled
out from the university of poverty and hard knocks, and have taken
postgraduate courses.
"My father went to the war four months before I was born, in Company E,
Twenty-third Iowa. I have butted and fought and struggled since I was
six years old. That's one reason why I wear that little red, white and
blue button. I know all about the dark and seamy side of life, and if
ever a man fought hard, I have fought hard for everything I have ever
gained.
"The wolf scratched at the cabin door and finally mother said: 'Boys, I
am going to send you to the Soldiers' Orphans' Home.' At Ames, Iowa, we
had to wait for the train, and we went to a little hotel, and they came
about one o'clock and said: 'Get ready for the train.'
"I looked into mother's face. Her eyes were red, her hair was
disheveled. I said: 'What's the matter, mother?' All the time Ed and I
slept mother had been praying. We went to the train; she put one arm
about me and the other about Ed and sobbed as if her heart would break.
People walked by and looked at us, but they didn't say a word.
"Why? They didn't know, and if they had they wouldn't have cared.
Mother knew; she knew that for years she wouldn't see her boys. We
got into the train and said, 'Good-bye, mother,' as the train pulled
out. We reached Council Bluffs. It was cold and we turned up our coats
and shivered. We saw the hotel and went up and asked the woman for
something to eat. She said: 'What's your name?'
"'My name is William Sunday, and this is my brother Ed.'
"'Where are you going?'
"'Going to the Soldiers' Orphans' Home at Glenwood.'
"She wiped her tears and said: 'My husband was a soldier and he never
came back. He wouldn't turn any one away and I wouldn't turn you boys
away.' She drew her arms about us and said: 'Come on in.' She gave us
our breakfast and our dinner, too. There wasn't any train going out on
the 'Q' until afternoon. We saw a freight train standing there, so we
climbed into the caboose.
[Illustration: "WHERE'S YOUR MONEY OR TICKET?"]
"The conductor came along and said: 'Where's your money or ticket?'
"'Ain't got any.'
"'I'll have to put you off.'
"We commenced to cry. My brother handed him a letter of introduction
to the superintendent of the orphans' home. The conductor read it, and
handed it back as the tears rolled down his cheeks. Then he said: 'Just
sit still, boys. It won't cost a cent to ride on my train.'
"It's only twenty miles from Council Bluffs to Glenwood, and as we
rounded the curve the conductor said: 'There it is on the hill.'
"I want to say to you that one of the brightest pictures that hangs
upon the walls of my memory is the recollection of the days when as a
little boy, out in the log cabin on the frontier of Iowa, I knelt by
mother's side.
"I went back to the old farm some years ago. The scenes had changed
about the place. Faces I had known and loved had long since turned to
dust. Fingers that used to turn the pages of the Bible were obliterated
and the old trees beneath which we boys used to play and swing had
been felled by the woodman's axe. I stood and thought. The man became a
child again and the long weary nights of sin and of hardships became as
though they never had been.
"Once more with my gun on my shoulder and my favorite dog trailing at
my heels I walked through the pathless wood and sat on the old familiar
logs and stumps, and as I sat and listened to the wild, weird harmonies
of nature, a vision of the past opened. The squirrel from the limb of
the tree barked defiantly and I threw myself into an interrogation
point, and when the gun cracked, the squirrel fell at my feet. I
grabbed him and ran home to throw him down and receive compliments for
my skill as a marksman. And I saw the tapestry of the evening fall.
I heard the lowing herds and saw them wind slowly o'er the lea and I
listened to the tinkling bells that lulled the distant fowl. Once more
I heard the shouts of childish glee. Once more I climbed the haystack
for the hen's eggs. Once more we crossed the threshold and sat at our
frugal meal. Once more mother drew the trundle bed out from under the
larger one, and we boys, kneeling down, shut our eyes and clasping our
little hands, said: 'Now I lay me down to sleep; I pray the Lord, my
soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray thee, Lord, my soul
to take. And this I ask for Jesus' sake, Amen.'
"'Backward, turn backward, O time in thy flight,
Make me a child again, just for tonight,
Mother, come back from that echoless shore,
Take me again to your heart as of yore.
Into the old cradle I'm longing to creep,
Rock me to sleep, mother, rock me to sleep.'
"I stood beneath the old oak tree and it seemed to carry on a
conversation with me. It seemed to say:
"'Hello Bill. Is that you?'
"'Yes, it's I, old tree.'
"'Well, you've got a bald spot on the top of your head.
"'Yes, I know, old tree.'
"'Won't you climb up and sit on my limbs as you used to?'
"'No, I haven't got time now. I'd like to, though, awfully well.'
"'Don't go, Bill. Don't you remember the old swing you made?'
"'Yes, I remember; but I've got to go.'
"'Say Bill, don't you remember when you tried to play George Washington
and the cherry tree and almost cut me down? That's the scar you made,
but it's almost covered over now.'
"'Yes, I remember all, but I haven't time to stay.'
"'Are you comin' back, Bill?'
"'I don't know, but I'll never forget you.'
"Then the old apple tree seemed to call me and I said: 'I haven't time
to wait, old apple tree.'
"'I want to go back to the orchard,
The orchard that used to be mine,
The apples are reddening and filling
The air with their wine.
I want to run on through the pasture
And let down the dusty old bars,
I want to find you there still waiting,
Your eyes like the twin stars.
Oh, nights, you are weary and dreary,
And days, there is something you lack;
To the farm in the valley,
I want to go back.'
"I tell it to you with shame, I stretched the elastic bands of my
mother's love until I thought they would break. I went far into the
dark and the wrong until I ceased to hear her prayers or her pleadings.
I forgot her face, and I went so far that it seemed to me that one
more step and the elastic bands of her love would break and I would
be lost. But, thank God, friends, I never took that last step. Little
by little I yielded to the tender memories and recollections of my
mother; little by little I was drawn away from the yawning abyss, and
twenty-seven years ago, one dark and stormy night in Chicago, I groped
my way out of darkness into the arms of Jesus Christ and I fell on my
knees and cried 'God be merciful to me a sinner!'"
[Illustration: BILLY SUNDAY AND "POP" ANSON, FORMER CAPTAIN OF THE
FAMOUS CHICAGO "WHITE SOX" BASEBALL TEAM, ON THE GOLF LINKS.]
Of formal education the boy Sunday had but little. He went to school
intermittently, like most of his playmates, but he did get into the
high school, although he was never graduated. Early in life he began
to work for his living, even before he went off to the Soldiers'
Orphanage. Concerning these periods of early toil he himself has spoken
as follows:
"When I was about fourteen years old, I made application for the
position of janitor in a school.
"I used to get up at two o'clock, and there were fourteen stoves and
coal had to be carried for all them. I had to keep the fire up and keep
up my studies and sweep the floors. I got twenty-five dollars a month
salary. Well, one day I got a check for my salary and I went right down
to the bank to get it cashed. Right in front of me was another fellow
with a check to be cashed, and he shoved his in, and I came along and
shoved my check in, and he handed me out forty dollars. My check called
for twenty-five dollars. I called on a friend of mine who was a lawyer
in Kansas City and told him. I said: 'Frank, what do you think, Jay
King handed me forty dollars and my check only called for twenty-five
dollars.' He said, 'Bill, if I had your luck, I would buy a lottery
ticket.' But I said, 'The fifteen dollars is not mine.' He said, 'Don't
be a chump. If you were shy ten dollars and you went back you would not
get it, and if they hand out fifteen dollars, don't be a fool, keep it.'
"Well, he had some drag with me and influenced me. I was fool enough
to keep it, and I took it and bought a suit of clothes. I can see
that suit now; it was a kind of brown, with a little green in it and
I thought I was the goods, I want to tell you, when I got those store
clothes on. That was the first suit of store clothes I had ever had,
and I bought that suit and I had twenty-five dollars left after I did
it.
"Years afterwards I said, 'I ought to be a Christian,' and I got on my
knees to pray, and the Lord seemed to touch me on the back and say,
'Bill, you owe that Farmers' Bank fifteen dollars with interest,' and
I said, 'Lord, the bank don't know that I got that fifteen dollars,'
and the Lord said 'I know it'; so I struggled along for years, probably
like some of you, trying to be decent and honest and right some wrong
that was in my life, and every time I got down to pray the Lord would
say, 'Fifteen dollars with interest, Nevada County, Iowa; fifteen
dollars, Bill.' So years afterwards I sent that money back, enclosed
a check, wrote a letter and acknowledged it, and I have the peace of
God from that day to this, and I have never swindled anyone out of a
dollar."
There are other kinds of education besides those which award students a
sheepskin at the end of a stated term. Sunday has no sheepskin--neither
has he the sheep quality which marks the machine-made product of any
form of training. His school has been a diversity of work, where he
came face to face with the actualities of life. He early had to shift
for himself. He learned the priceless lesson of how to work, regardless
of what the particular task might be, whether it was scrubbing floors
(and he was an expert scrubber of floors!), or preaching a sermon
to twenty thousand persons. He had a long hard drill in working
under authority: that is why he is able to exercise authority like
a major-general. Because personally he has experienced, with all of
the sensitiveness of an American small boy, the bitter injustice of
over-work and under-pay under an oppressive task-master, he is a voice
for the toilers of the world. In this same diversified school of
industry he learned the lesson of thoroughness which is now echoed by
every spike in his tabernacle and every gesture in his sermons. Such a
one as he could not have come from a conventional educational course.
It needed this hard school to make such a hardy man.
It was while a youth in Marshalltown, Iowa, playing baseball on the
lots, that Sunday came to his own. Captain A. C. Anson, the famous
leader of the Chicago "White Sox," chanced to see the youth of twenty,
whose phenomenal base-running had made him a local celebrity. It is no
new experience for Sunday to be a center of public interest. He has
known this since boyhood. The local baseball "hero" is as big a figure
in the eyes of his own particular circle as ever a great evangelist
gets to be in the view of the world. Because his ears early became
accustomed to the huzzahs of the crowd, Sunday's head has not been
turned by much of the foolish adulation which has been his since he
became an evangelist.
A level head, a quick eye, and a body which is such a finely trained
instrument that it can meet all drafts upon it, is part of Sunday's
inheritance from his life on the baseball diamond.
Most successful baseball players enter the major leagues by a
succession of steps. With Sunday it was quite otherwise. Because he
fell under the personal eye of "Pop" Anson he was borne directly from
the fields of Marshalltown, Iowa, to the great park of the Chicago
team. That was in 1883, when Sunday was not yet twenty-one years
of age. His mind was still formative--a quality it retains to this
day--and his entrance into the larger field of baseball trained him to
think in broad terms. It widened his horizon and made him reasonably
indifferent to the comments of the crowds.
A better equipment for the work he is doing could not have been found;
for above all else Sunday "plays ball." While others discuss methods
and bewail conditions he keeps the game going. Such a volume of
criticism as no other evangelist, within the memory of living men, has
ever received, has fallen harmless from his head, because he has not
turned aside to argue with the umpire, but has "played ball."
There is no call for tears or heroics over the early experiences
of Sunday. His life was normal; no different from that of tens
of thousands of other American boys. He himself was in no wise a
phenomenon. He was possessed of no special abilities or inclinations.
He came to his preaching gift only after years of experience in
Christian work. It is clear that a Divine Providence utilized the very
ordinariness of his life and training to make him an ambassador to the
common people.