’"I resolved that no disadvantage as to birth, or education, or social condition should debar any one from entering the list of combatants so long as he was one with me in love for God, in faith for the salvation of men, and in willingness to obey the orders he should receive from me and from those I authorized to direct him.  I have, of course, had many disappointments—­not a few of them very hard to bear at the time—­but from the early days of 1868, when I engaged my first recognized helper, to 1878, when the number had increased by slow degrees to about 100, and on to the present day, when their number is rapidly approaching 20,000, there has not been a single year without its increase, not only in quantity, but in quality.

’"I am sometimes asked, What about those who have left me?  Well, I am thankful to say that we remain in sympathetic and friendly relations with the great bulk of them.  It was to be expected that in work such as ours, demanding, as it does, not only arduous toil and constant self-denial and often real hardships of one kind or another, some should prove unworthy, some should grow weary, and others should faint by the way, whilst others again, though very excellent souls, should prove unsuitable.  It could not be otherwise, for we are engaged in real warfare, and whoever heard of war without wounds and losses?  But even of those who do thus step aside from the position of Officers, a large proportion—­in this country nine out of ten—­remain with us, engaged in some voluntary effort in our ranks."’

‘But,’ continued Mr. Bramwell Booth, ’I would be the last person to minimize our losses.  They may be accounted for in the most natural way, and yet we cannot but feel them and suffer from them.  And yet it is all just a repetition of the Bible stories of all ages; nay, of all stories of genuine fighting in any great cause.  The great feature of our present experience in this matter is that the number who go out from us grows every year smaller in proportion to the whole, and that, as the General says in the above extract, a very large proportion of those continue in friendly relations with us.

’The triumph of these splendid men and women, in the face of every kind of difficulty in every part of the world is, however, really a triumph of their faith.  It is not the Army, it is not their leaders, it is not even the wonderful devotion which many of them manifest, which is the secret of their continued life and continued success, nor is it any confidence in their own abilities.  No!  The true representative of the Army is relying at every turn upon the presence, guidance, and help of God in trying to carry out the Father’s purpose with respect to every lost and suffering child of man.  By that test, alike in the present and future, we must ever stand or fall.  The Army is either a work of faith or it is nothing at all.

’Everything throughout all our ranks can really be brought to that test, and I regard with composure every loss and attack, every puzzle and danger, chiefly because I rely upon my comrades’ trust in God being responded to by Him according to their need.’