THEY THAT WOULD ASK WITH A THREAT
There was a meeting of Universalists. This was a society whose
meeting-place was in Soho. It called itself a club, using the word in
a sense of its own, for anyone was admitted to its membership who
chose to join; and, as a rule, all comers, whether members or not,
were free to attend its meetings. It was a focus for discontent. To
it came from all parts of the world the discontented, examples of
that huge concourse which has a grudge against what is called
Society--not of the silent part, which is in the majority, but of
that militant section whose constant endeavour it is to goad the dumb
into speech, in the hope and trust that the distance between speech
and action will not be great.
The place was packed. There were women there as well as
men--young and old--representatives of most of the nations which
describe themselves as civilised; their common bond a common misery.
The talk was old. But in the atmosphere that night was something new.
Bellows had given vitality to the embers which smouldered in their
hearts.
Henry Walters was speaking. They listened to him with a passionate
eagerness which suggested how alluring was the dream which he
proposed to wrest out of the arena of visions.
'I said to a policeman as I was coming in that I believed we were
going to have our turn. He laughed. The police have had all the
laughing. We'll laugh soon. We've been looking for a miracle,
recognising that a miracle was the only thing that could help us. The
arrival of a worker of miracles is a new factor in the situation with
which the police, and all they represent, will have to reckon. It's
just possible that they mayn't find him an easy reckoning. He who can
raise a woman from the dead with a word can just as easily turn
London upside down, and the police with it.
'We've heard of taking the kingdom of heaven by violence. I believe
that it has been recommended by high authorities as a desirable
method of procedure. I propose to try it. I propose we go to-morrow
morning to this worker of miracles, saying: "You see how our wrongs
ascend as a dense smoke unto Heaven. Put an end to them, so that they
may cease to be an offence unto God." He has shown that he has bowels
of compassion. I believe, if we put this plainly to him, with all the
force that is in us, that the greatest of his miracles will be worked
for us. If he will heal the sick, he will heal us; for we are sick
unto more than death, since our pains have dragged us unto the gates
of hell.
'The fashion of the healing we had better leave to him. Let us but
point out that we come into the court of his justice asking for our
rights; if he will give us what is ours we need not trouble about the
manner of the giving. Let us but remind him that in the sight of God
all men are equal; if he restores to us our equality, what does it
matter how he does it? For the substance let the shadow go. But on so
much we must insist; we must have the substance. We must be healed of
our diseases, cured of our sores, relieved of our infirmities. If our
just prayer is quickly heard, good. If not, the kingdom of heaven
must be taken by violence, and shall be, if we are men and women. How
are we profited, though miracles are worked for others, if none are
worked for us? We stand most in need of the miraculous--none could
come into this room, and see us, and deny it!--and we'll have it, or
we'll know the reason why. He can scarcely smite us more heavily than
we are already smitten. I wish to use no threats. I trust no one else
will use them. I'm hopeful, since he has shown that he has sympathy
for suffering, that he'll show sympathy for our sufferings. But--I
say it not as a threat, but as a plain statement of a plain fact--if
he won't do his best for us, we'll do our worst to him. God grant,
however, that at last a Saviour has come to us in very deed!'
When Walters stopped a score of persons sprang to their feet. The
chairman called upon a German, one Hans Kuentz, wild, lean, unkempt,
with something of frenzy in his air. He spoke English with a
volubility which was only mastered by an occasional idiom; in a thin
falsetto voice which was like a continuous shriek.
'I am hungry; that is not new. In the two small rooms where I live I
have a wife and children who are also hungry; that also is not new. I
run the risk of becoming more hungry by coming out to-night, and
leaving work that must be finished by the morning. But when I hear
that there is come to London one who can raise people from the dead,
I say to my wife: "Then He can raise us too." My wife says: "Go and
see." So to see I am come. With Mr. Walters I say, Let us all go and
see--all, all that great London which when it works starves slowly,
and when it does not work starves fast. We need not speak. We need
but show Him our faces, how the skin but covers our bones. If he is
not a devil, he will do to us what he has done to others: he will
heal us and make us free. What I fear is that it is exaggerated what
he has done--I have got beyond the region of hope. But if it is true,
if but the half of it is true--if this morning he healed that crowd
of people with a word, why should he not do the same to us? Why? Why?
Did they deserve more than we? Are our needs not greater? We are the
victims of others' sins. We are the slaves who sow, and reap, and
garner, and yet are only suffered to eat the husks of the great
stores of grain for which we give our lives. Surely this healer of
the sick will give us a chance to live as men should live, and to
die, when our time comes, as men should die! Oh, my brothers, if God
has come among us He'll know! He'll know! And if He is a God of
mercy, a God of love, and not a Siva, a destroyer, who delights in
the groans and cries of bruised and broken hearts and lives, we have
but to make to Him our petition, and He'll wipe the tears out of our
eyes. To-night it is late, but in the morning, early, let us all go
to Him--all! all!--all go!'
Out of the throng who were eager to speak next a woman was chosen--
middle-aged, decently dressed, with fair hair and quiet eyes. Her
voice was low, yet distinct, her manner calm, her language
restrained, her bearing judicial rather than argumentative.
'Brothers Kuentz and Walters seem to take it for granted that the God
of the Christians is a God of love. I thought so when I was a child;
I know better now. The idea seems to be supported in the present case
by the fact that the person of whom we have heard so much has done
works of healing, of mercy. It is not clear that, in all cases, to
heal is to be merciful. Apart from that consideration, I would point
out that the works in question have been spasmodic rather than
continuous, the fruits, apparently, of momentary whims rather than of
a settled policy. This afternoon his assistance was invited in
similar cases. He declined. The crowd continually entreated him to do
unto them as he had done unto others. Their requests were
persistently ignored. It is plain, therefore, that one has not only
to ask to receive. Nor is any attempt made to differentiate between
the justice of contending claims. If this person is Divine, which I,
personally, take leave to more than doubt, he is irresponsible. His
actions are dependent on the mood of the moment.
'I am not saying this with any desire to throw cold water on the
proposition which has been made to us. On the contrary, I think the
suggestion that we should go to him in a body--as large a body as
possible--and request his good offices on our behalf, an excellent
one. At the same time, I cannot lose sight of one fact: that it is
one thing to pray; to receive a satisfactory answer--or, indeed, an
answer of any sort to one's prayer--is quite another. In our childish
days we have prayed, believing, in vain. In the acuter agonies of our
later years prayers have been wrung from us--always, still, in vain.
There seems no adequate reason why, in the present case, we should
pin our faith to the efficacy of prayer alone. The disease has always
existed. Why should we suppose that the remedy has become accessible
to whoever chooses to ask for it? If this person is Divine, he knows
what we suffer; has always known, yet has done nothing. We are told
that God is unchangeable, the same for ever and ever. The history of
the world sustains this theory, inasmuch as it has always been
replete with human suffering. That, therefore, disposes of any notion
that it is at all likely that he has suddenly become sensitive to
mere cries of pain.
'I would lay stress on one word which Brother Walters used more than
once: violence. We are confronted with an opportunity which may never
recur, and may vanish if not used quickly. Here is a person who has
done remarkable things. The presumption is that he can do other
remarkable things for us, if he chooses. He must be made to choose.
That is the position.
'Let us clear our minds of cant. We are going to him with a good
case. The reality of our grievances, the justice of our claims, he
scarcely will be prepared to deny. Still, you will find him unwilling
to do anything for us. Probably, assuming an air of Divine
irresponsibility, he will decline to listen, or to discuss our case
at all. Such is my own conviction. There will be a general rush for
him to-morrow. All sorts and conditions of people will have an axe of
their own to grind. In the confusion, ours will be easily and
conveniently ignored. Therefore, I say, we must go in as large a body
as possible, force him to give us an interview, compel him to accede
to our request--that is, speak for us the same kind of word which he
spoke for those sick people this morning. If he strikes us dead,
he'll do himself no good and us no harm, for many of us would sooner
be dead than as we are. Unless he does strike us dead we ought to
stick to him until we have wrung from him our desire. It is possible
that this is a case in which resolution may succeed. At the worst, in
our plight, with everything to gain, and nothing--nothing--to lose,
the attempt is one which is worth making, on the understanding that
we will not take no for an answer, but will use all possible means to
win a yes. We must make it as plain as it can be made that, if he
will do nothing for us, he shall do nothing for others, at least on
earth. What does it matter to us who enters heaven if the door is
slammed in our faces?'
The next speaker was a man in corduroy trousers and a jacket and
waistcoat which had once been whity-gray. He wore a cloth cap, and
round his throat an old red handkerchief. His eyes moved uneasily
in his head; when they were at rest they threatened. His face was
clean-shaven, his voice husky. While he spoke, he kept his hands in
his trousers pockets and his cap on his head. He plunged at once into
the heart of what he had to say.
'I was one of them as shouted out this afternoon, "Show us a
miracle!" And I was down at Maida Vale this morning, almost
on top of them poor creatures as was more dead than alive. He just
came out of the house, said two or three words, though what they was
I couldn't catch, and there they was as right as if there'd never
been nothing the matter with 'em, running about like you and me. And
yet when I asked him to do something for me, though it'd have only
cost him a word to do it--not he! He just walked on. I'm broke to the
wide. Tuppence I've had since yesterday--not two bob this week. What
I wanted was something to eat--just enough to keep me going till I'd
a chance of a job. But though he done that this morning--and some
queer ones there was among the crowd, I tell you!--he wouldn't pay
attention to me, wouldn't even listen. What I want to know is, Why
not? And that's what I mean to know before I've done.'
The sentiment met with approval. There were sympathetic murmurs. He
was not the only hungry man in that audience.
'I'm in trouble--had the influenza, or whatever they call it, and
lost my job. Never had one since. Jobs ain't easy found by blokes
what seems dotty on their pins. My wife's in gaol--as honest a woman
as ever lived; she'd have wore herself to the bone for me. Landlord
wanted his rent; we hadn't a brown; I was down on my back; she didn't
want me turned out into the street while I was like that, so she went
and pawned some shirts what she'd got to iron. They gave her three
months for it. She'd done two of 'em last Monday. Kid died last week
and was buried by the parish. Gawd knows what she'll say when she
hears of it when she comes out. Altogether I seem fairly off my
level. So I say what the lady afore me says: Let's all go to him in
the morning, and get him to understand how it is with us, and get him
to say a word as'll do us good. And if he won't, why, as she says,
we'll make him! That's all.'
There was no chance of choosing a successor from among the numerous
volunteers. A man who seemed just insane enough to be dangerous chose
himself. He broke into a vehement flood of objurgation, writhing and
gesticulating as if desirous of working himself into a greater frenzy
than he was in already. He had not been on his feet a minute before
he had brought a large portion of his audience into a similar
condition to himself.
'Make him, make him! That's the keynote. Share and share alike,
that's our motto. No favouritism! The world stinks of favouritism;
we'll have no more of it from him. We'll let him know it. What he
does for one he must do for all. If he were to come into this room
this minute, and were to help half of us, it would be the duty of all
of us to go for him because he'd left the other half unhelped. He's
been healing, has he? Who? Somebody. Not us. Why not us as well as
them? He's got to give us what we want just as he gave them what they
want, if we have to take him by the throat to take it out of him!'
'We will that!'
'Only got to say a word, has he, and the trick's done? Then he shall
say that word for us, as he has for others, if we have to drag his
tongue out by the roots to get at it!'
'That's it--that's the way to talk!'
'Work a miracle, can he, every time he opens his mouth? Then he shall
work the miracles we want, or, by the living God, he shall never work
another!'
The words were greeted with a chorus of approving shouts. The fellow
screamed on. As his ravings grew worse, the excitement of his
auditors waxed greater. Buffeted all their lives, as it seemed to
them, by adverse winds, they were incapable of realising that they
were in any way the victims of their own bad seamanship. For that
incapacity, perhaps, they were not entirely to blame. They did not
make themselves. That they should have been fashioned out of such
poor materials was not the least of their misfortunes.
And their pains and griefs, humiliations and defeats, had been so
various and so many that it was not strange that their wit had been
abraded to the snapping-point; the more especially since it had been
of such poor quality at first.