Even if General Booth prove himself equal to the occasion, the despotic nature of the management makes the success of the scheme precarious. Everything hangs upon the single thread of his life, which may be snapped at any moment. Even if we admit his consummate and comprehensive genius, what guarantee is there that his successor will inherit it? General Booth bids us remember that the Salvation Army _has_ succeeded, and its past achievements are a pledge of its future triumphs. But let us look into this, and see how much it is to the point. That the Salvation Army is a striking success is not to be disputed. But what is the _character_ of its success? This is an all-important question: for a man, or an organisation, may be very successful in one direction, and hopelessly impotent in another. Undoubtedly the Salvation Army caters for hysterical persons who are sick and tired of the “respectable” forms of religion. But is it true that the Army reforms the thief, the drunkard, and the profligate? Now in answering this question it is well to bear in mind that solitary cases prove absolutely nothing. There is no principle, no system, no organisation, which has not absorbed some persons who previously led lives of selfish indulgence, aroused in them an interest in impersonal objects, and surrounded them with a restraining public opinion. The real question is this —How is the Salvation Army in the main recruited? Again and again it has been asserted by outsiders, and admitted by candid members, that the Army is principally recruited from other sects. Some years ago this assertion was publicly made in the _Times_ by the Rev. Llewellyn Davies, who was prepared to prove it in his own parish of Marylebone. Mr. Davies was answered by “Commissioner” Railton, who indulged in vague generalities, which were cut short by the simple request to produce the notorious sinners converted in that parish. Of course they were not produced: for the most part these “converts” exist on paper. The Army’s pretensions are disproved by statistics. It boasts of nearly ten thousand officers and a million of adherents. Now if these, or a considerable proportion of them, had been drawn from the moral residuum of England, a very serious impression would have been made on the ranks of vice and crime. But what are the facts? While the Education Act has made a difference in the number of young criminals, there is no perceptible diminution in the number of hardened offenders. Prostitutes, also, are as numerous as ever, and the national drink-bill actually increases.