Lotus Buds — 'Thy Sweet Original Joy'

"Thy Sweet Original Joy" Beacons of hope, ye appear!

Languor is not in your heart, Weakness is not in your word, Weariness not on your brow.

WITHIN the last few months a friend, a lover of books, sent me _The Trial and Death of Socrates_, translated into English by F. J.

Church.

Opening it for the first time, I came upon this passage:-- _Socrates:_ "Does a man who is in training, and who is in earnest about it, attend to the praise and blame of all men, or of the one man who is doctor or trainer?"

_Crito:_ "He attends only to the opinion of the one man."

_Socrates:_ "Then he ought to fear the blame and welcome the praise of the one man, not the many?"

_Crito:_ "Clearly."

And Socrates sums the argument thus: "To be brief; is it not the same in everything?"

Surely the wise man spoke the truth: it is the same in everything.

The one thing that matters is the opinion of the One.

If He is satisfied, all is well.

If He is dissatisfied, the commendation of the many is as froth.

"Blessed are the single-hearted, for they shall have much peace."

But Nature is full of pictures of bright companionship in service; the very stars shine in constellations.

This book of the skies has been opening up to us of late.

Who, to whom the experience is new, will forget the first evenings spent with even a small telescope, but powerful enough to distinguish double stars and unveil nebulæ?

You look and see a single point of light, and you look again and twin suns float like globes of fire on a midnight sea; and sometimes one flashes golden yellow and the other blue, each the complement of the other, like two perfectly responsive friends.

You look and see a little lonely cloud, a breath of transparent mist; you look and see spaces sprinkled with diamond dust, or something even more awesome, reaches of radiance that seem to lie on the borderland of Eternity.

And the shining glory lingers and lights up the common day, for the story of the sky is the story of life.

Far was the Call, and farther as I followed Grew there a silence round my Lord and me-- is for ever the inner story, as for ever the stars must move alone, however close they are set in constellations or strewn in clusters; but in another sense is it not true that there is the joy of companionship and the pure inspiration of comradeship?

God fits twin souls together like twin suns; and sometimes, with delicate thought for even the sensitive pleasure of colour, it is as if He arranged them so that the gold and the blue coalesce.

And we think of the places which were once blank, mere misty nothings to us.

They sparkle now with friends.

Some of them are familiar friends known through the wear and tear of life; some we shall never see till we meet above the stars.

And there the nebula speaks its word of mystery beyond mystery, but all illuminated by the light from the other side.

In the work of which these chapters have told there has been the wonderful comfort of sympathy and help from fellow-missionaries of our own and sister missions; and, as all who have read, understand, nothing could have been done without the loyal co-operation of our Indian fellow-workers whose tenderness and patience can never be described.

We think of the friends in the mission houses along the route of our long journeyings; we remember how no hour was too inconvenient to receive us and our tired baby travellers; we think of those who in weariness and painfulness have sought for the little children; and we think of those who have made the work possible by being God's good Ravens to us.

We think of them all, and we wish their names could be written on the cover of this book instead of the name least worthy to be there.

And now latest and nearest comfort and blessing, there are the two new "Sitties," whose first day with us made them one of us.

What shall I render unto the Lord for all His benefits towards me?

The future is full of problems.

Even now in these Nursery days questions are asked that are more easily asked than answered.

We should be afraid if we looked too far ahead, so we do not look.

We spend our strength on the day's work, the nearest "next thing" to our hands.

But we would be blind and heedless if we made no provision for the future.

We want to gather and lay up in store against that difficult time (should it ever come) a band of friends for the children, who will stand by them in prayer.

There has been another compelling influence.

We recognise something in the Temple-children question which touches a wider issue than the personal or missionary.

Those who have read _Queen Victoria's Letters_ must have become conscious of a certain enlargement.

Questions become great or dwindle into nothingness according as they affect the honour and the good of the Empire.

We find ourselves instinctively "thinking Imperially," regarding things from the Throne side--from above instead of from below.

We fear exaggerated language.

We would not exaggerate the importance of these little children or their cause.

We have said that we realise, as we did not when first this work began, how very delicate and difficult a matter it would be for Government to take any really effective action, and less than effective action is useless.

We recognise the value of our pledge of neutrality in religious matters, and we know what might happen if Government moved in a line which to India might appear to be contrary to the spirit of that pledge.

It would be far better if India herself led the way and declared, as England declared when she passed the Industrial Schools Amendment Act of 1880, that she will not have her little children demoralised in either Temple houses recognised as such, or in any similar houses, such as those which abound in areas where the Temple child nominally is non-existent.

But must we wait till India leads the way?

Scattered all over the land there are men who are against this iniquity, and would surely be in favour of such legislation as would make for its destruction.

But few would assert that the people as a whole are even nearly ready.

A great wave of the Power of God, a great national turning towards Him, would, we know, sweep the iniquity out of the land as the waters of the Alpheus swept the stable-valley clean, in the old classic story.

Oh for such a sudden flow of the River of God, which is full of water!

But must we wait until it comes?

Did we wait until India herself asked for the abolition of suttee?

Surely what is needed is such legislation as has been found necessary at home, which empowers the magistrate to remove a child from a dangerous house, and deprives parents of all parental rights who are found responsible for its being forced into wrong.

Surely such action would be Imperially right; and can a thing right in itself and carried out with a wise earnestness, ever eventually do harm?

Must it not do good in the end, however agitating the immediate result may appear?

Surely the one calm answer, "_It is Right_," will eventually silence all protest and still all turbulence!

Such a law, it is well to understand at the outset, will always be infinitely more difficult to enforce in India than in England, because of the immensely greater difficulty here in getting true evidence; and because--unless that River of God flow through the land--there will be for many a year the force of public opinion as a whole against us, or if not actively against, then inert and valueless.

Caste feeling will come in and shield and circumvent and get behind the law.

The Indian sensitiveness concerning Custom will be all awake and tingling with a hidden but intense vitality; and this, which is inevitable because natural, will have to be taken into account in every attempt made to enforce the law.

The whole situation bristles with difficulties; but are difficulties an argument for doing nothing?

"Whoever buys hires or otherwise obtains possession of, whoever sells lets to hire or otherwise disposes of any minor under sixteen with the intent that such minor shall be employed or used for .

.

.

any unlawful purpose or knowing it likely that such minor will be employed or used for any such purpose shall be liable to imprisonment up to a term of ten years and is also liable to a fine."

_But_ where it appeared that certain minor girls were being taught singing and dancing and were being made to accompany their grandmother and Temple woman to the Temple with a view to qualify them as Temple women, it was held that this did not amount to a disposal of the minors within the meaning of the section.

Ought this interpretation of the Indian Penal Code to be possible?

The proof the law requires at present, proof of the sale of the child or its definite dedication to the idol, is rarely obtainable.

The fact that it is being taught singing and dancing (although it is well known, as the barrister's letter proves, that among orthodox Hindus such arts are never taught to little children except when the intention is bad) is not considered sufficient evidence upon which to base a conviction.

To us it seems that the presence of the child in such a house, or in any house of known bad character, is sufficient proof that it is in danger of the worst wrong that can be inflicted upon a defenceless child--the demoralisation of its soul, the spoiling of its whole future life, before it has ever had a chance to know and choose the good.

[Illustration: From the Rock, Dohnavur.

] And so we write it finally as our solemn conviction that there is need for a law like our own English law, and we add--and those who know India know how true this sentence is--_such legislation, however carefully framed, will be a delusion, a blind, a dead letter, unless men of no ordinary insight and courage and character are appointed to see that it is carried out_.

God grant that these chapters, written in weakness, may yet do something towards moving the Church to such prayer that the answer will be, as once before, that an angel will be sent to open the doors of the prison-house!

The frontispiece shows the rock to which we go sometimes when we feel the need of a climb and a blow.

It is associated in our minds with a story:--"Between the passages by which Jonathan sought to go over unto the Philistines' garrison there was a sharp rock on the one side and a sharp rock on the other side.

.

.

.

And Jonathan said to the young man that bare his armour: 'Come and let us go over unto the garrison of these uncircumcised: it may be that the Lord will work for us: for there is no restraint to the Lord to save by many or by few.'

And his armour-bearer said unto him: 'Do all that is in thine heart: turn thee, behold I am with thee according to thy heart.'

" We have a rock to climb, and there is nothing the least romantic about it.

We shall have to climb it "upon our hands and upon our feet."

It is all grim earnest.

"We make our way wrapped in glamour to the Supreme Good, the summit," writes Guido Rey, the mountaineer, in the joy of his heart.

But later it is: "One precipice fell away at my feet, and another rose above me.

.

.

.

It was no place for singing."

Friends, we shall come to such places on the Matterhorn of life.

As we follow the Gleam wherever it leads, may we count upon the upholding of those for whom we have written--the lovers of little children?

And now, in conclusion, all I would say has already been so perfectly said, that I cannot do better than copy from the writings of two who fought a good fight and have been crowned--Miss Ellice Hopkins, brave, sensitive, soldier-soul on the hardest of life's battlefields; and George Herbert, courtier, poet, and saint.

"Often in that nameless discouragement," wrote Miss Hopkins, as she lay slowly dying, "before unfinished tasks, unfulfilled aims and broken efforts, I have thought of how the creative Word has fashioned the opal, made it of the same stuff as desert sands, mere silica--not a crystallised stone like the diamond, but rather a stone with a broken heart, traversed by hundreds of small fissures which let in the air, the breath, as the Spirit is called in the Greek of our Testament; and through those two transparent mediums of such different density it is enabled to refract the light, and reflect every lovely hue of heaven, while at its heart burns a mysterious spot of fire.

When we feel, therefore, as I have often done, nothing but cracks and desert dust, we can say: So God maketh His precious opal!"

We would never willingly disguise one fraction of the truth in our desire to win sympathy and true co-operation.

There will be hours of nameless discouragement for all who climb the rock.

For some there will be the "broken heart."

And yet there is a joy that is worth it all a thousand times--well worth it all.

Who that has known it will doubt it?

This reach of water recalls it.

The palms, as we look at them, seem to lift their heads in solemn consciousness of it.

For the water-side--where we stand with those for whom we have travailed in soul, when for the first time they publicly confess their faith in Christ--is a sacred place to us.

[Illustration: THE PLACE OF BAPTISM.

] Has our story wandered sometimes into sorrowful ways?

To be true it has to be sorrowful sometimes.

We look back to the day of its beginning, the day that our first little Temple child came and opened a new door to us.

Since that time many a bitter storm My soul hath felt, e'en able to destroy, Had the malicious and ill-meaning harm His swing and sway;

But still Thy sweet original joy Sprung from Thine eye did work within my soul, And surging griefs when they grew bold control, And got the day.

It is true.

Many a bitter storm has come; there have been the shock and the darkness of new knowledge of evil, and grief beside which all other pain pales, the grief of helplessness in the face of unspeakable wrong.

But still, above and within, and around, like an atmosphere, like a fountain, there has been something bright, even that "sweet original joy" which nothing can darken or quench.

If Thy first glance so powerful be A mirth but opened and sealed up again, What wonders shall we feel when we shall see Thy full-orbed love!

When Thou shalt look us out of pain, And one aspect of Thine spend in delight, More than a thousand worlds' disburse in light In heaven above!

And not alone, oh, not alone, shall we see Him as He is!

There will be the little children too.

_Those who care to know how the Temple Children's work began will find the story in_ "THINGS AS THEY ARE."

_Preface by Eugene Stock; 320 pp. and Thirty-two Illustrations from Photographs taken specially for this work.

Cloth, 2s.

6d.

net (post free 2s.

10d.

) Also,_ "OVERWEIGHTS OF JOY."

_Preface by Rev. T.

Walker, C. M. S.

With Thirty-four Illustrations chiefly from Photographs taken specially for this work.

Cloth, 2s.

6d.

net (post free 2s.

10d.

), Morgan & Scott Ld.

, 12, Paternoster Buildings, London.

_ ONLY A LIMITED NUMBER OF COPIES REMAIN

OF THE

ORIGINAL EDITION OF

LOTUS BUDS

CONTAINING

FIFTY PHOTOGRAVURE ILLUSTRATIONS.

* * * * * Cloth Boards, 14s.

6d.

_net_ (_post free_, 15s.

).

* * * * * "THE MOST STRIKING MISSIONARY BOOK EVER PUBLISHED."

_Her Majesty Queen Alexandra graciously accepted a copy.

_ "The feature of the book is fifty photogravure illustrations from photographs specially taken of the children.

Many of these--indeed, all of them--are very charming.

Some of them are mere babies, others of larger growth, but in each case the photographer has succeeded in presenting pictures which will elicit high admiration.

The laughing faces, curly hair, and fine physical development of the little Indians, make photographs exceedingly attractive.

Indeed, we have never seen a more 'taking' series of children of the Orient.

.

.

.

The book will interest not only supporters of missions but all lovers of children."

--_The Westminster Gazette.

_ "The photogravure illustrations--fifty in number--are perfect as works of art.

Some are pictures of scenery; most are characteristic representations of the children.

All are full-page."

--_British Weekly.

_ ".

.

.

the beautiful little faces depicted in the photogravures which adorn the volume.

There are fifty of these photogravures in the book, the major portion being of children, and we regard it as extremely improbable that more splendid pictures are to be found in any other work."

--_Baby.

_ "The most wonderful photographs."

--_Contemporary Review.

_ "We have seldom seen more attractive illustrations than those of the Indian children which are here reproduced."

--_East and West.

_ "They are the finest photographs of children we have ever seen, and beautifully produced."

--_The Record.

_ "We must, in conclusion, compliment all concerned in the manner in which this appeal for the children has been issued--the author, the artist, and the publishers (Messrs. Morgan & Scott Ld.

), having combined to produce in 'Lotus Buds' a fine piece of work."

--_The Publishers' Circular.

_ * * * * * MORGAN & SCOTT LD.

, 12, Paternoster Buildings, London, E. C. ALSO BY AMY WILSON-CARMICHAEL

* * * * * THINGS AS THEY ARE: MISSION WORK IN SOUTHERN INDIA

With Preface by EUGENE STOCK.

320 pages, and Thirty-two beautiful Illustrations from Photographs taken specially for this work.

Ninth Edition.

Paper, 1s.

6d.

_net_ (_post free_, 1s.

9d.

); Cloth Boards, 2s.

6d.

_net_ (_post free_, 2s.

10d.

).

DR.

A.

RUDISILL, M.

E.

Press, Madras:--"In 'Things as They Are' are pictured by pen and camera some things as they are.

It is all the more needful now when so many are deceived, and are being deceived, as to the true nature of idolatry, that people at home who give and pray should be told plainly that what Paul wrote about idolaters in Rome and Corinth is still true of idolaters in India."

"The account of native life, of the customs of the people, of the few pleasures they enjoy, and the many sorrows that oppress them, is as accurate as it is lucid and entertaining.

It will be well to give this book studious attention; it is so completely sincere and so free from prejudice; and there are many excellent illustrations after photographs."

--_Literary World.

_ OVERWEIGHTS OF JOY: MISSION WORK IN SOUTHERN INDIA

Preface by Rev. T.

WALKER, C.

M. S.

320 pages, and Thirty-four beautiful Illustrations from Photographs taken specially for this work.

Paper 1s.

6d.

_net_ (_post free_, 1s.

9d.

).

; Cloth Boards, 2s.

6d.

_net_ (_post free_, 2s.

10d.

).

(Companion Volume to "Things as They Are."

) "There is a life and enthusiasm and devotion, combined with literary ability and winsomeness of style, which make the book very captivating, as well as very touching.

It is quite wonderfully illustrated with sunsets on the Ghauts and all kinds of wonders, and withal it is a song of spiritual triumph from a soul that feels intensely the cost of the Cross.

A book, indeed, for every Christian home."

--_The Churchman.

_ "One of the most striking and inspiring missionary books of recent years."

--_The Christian World.

_ THE BEGINNING OF A STORY

Being the story of the beginning of the work among Temple children, related for the friends of the Temple children.

Bound in Art Covers, tied with silk cord.

Artistic design embossed in gold, 6d.

_net_ (_post free_, 8d.

).

"This little book tells a touching story.

It is hoped that many who are interested in the work on behalf of Indian children exposed to terrible peril will circulate this booklet to further a cause which has aroused widespread and prayerful interest."

--_Irish Baptist Magazine.

_ "This is a delightful booklet in its attractive blue and gold covers, and with the picture of the smiling Indian maiden looking out upon us."

--_Bible Standard.

_ * * * * * MORGAN & SCOTT LD.

, 12, Paternoster Buildings, London, E. C.

* * * * * Transcriber's note: Obvious punctuation errors were corrected.

The original contained each chapter number and title on a page preceding the actual start of the chapter.

These repeated Chapter Titles were removed to avoid redundancy.

Varied hyphenation, such as "armchair" and "arm-chair", was retained.

The Bear Garden is not hyphenated when used in titles but is hyphenated within the text.

Page 8, "puchies" changed to "pûchies" (kill the poor pûchies) Page 8, "puchie" changed to "pûchie" (each detested "pûchie") Page 22, "subjeect" changed to "subject" (is the subject of) Page 102, "Premalia" changed to "Prémalia" (scene to the Prémalia) Page 237, "form" changed to "from" (from Bunyan's) Page 237, "C. H."

changed to "G. H."

(by G. H.

Morrison) Page 238, "suprintends" changed to "superintends" (superintends the more) Page 256, "opportunties" changed to "opportunities" (watching for opportunities) Page 256, "aviod" changed to "avoid" (To avoid the Penal) Page 298, "own their" changed to "their own" (from their own homes) *** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LOTUS BUDS ***

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