_General William Booth Enters into Heaven_--with the accompanying instruments, which blare out from the printed page--is a sublime interpretation of one of the varieties of religious experience. Two works of genius have been written about the Salvation Army--_Major Barbara_ and _General William Booth Enters into Heaven_. But _Major Barbara_, with its almost appalling cleverness--Granville Barker says the second act is the finest thing Shaw ever composed--is written, after all, from the seat of the scornful, like a metropolitan reporter at a Gospel tent; Mr. Lindsay's poem is written from the inside, from the very heart of the mystery. It is interpretation, not description. "Booth was blind," says Mr. Lindsay; "all reformers are blind." One must in turn be blind to many obvious things, blind to ridicule, blind to criticism, blind to the wisdom of this world, if one would understand a phenomenon like General Booth. Booth led boldly with his big bass drum-- (Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?) The Saints smiled gravely and they said: "He's come." (Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?).... Walking lepers followed, rank on rank, Lurching bravoes from the ditches dank, Drabs from the alleyways and drug fiends pale-- Minds still passion-ridden, soul-powers frail:-- Vermin-eaten saints with mouldy breath, Unwashed legions with the ways of Death-- (Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?).... And when Booth halted by the curb for prayer He saw his Master thro' the flag-filled air. Christ came gently with a robe and crown For Booth the soldier, while the throng knelt down. He saw King Jesus. They were face to face, And he knelt a-weeping in that holy place. (Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?) Dante and Milton were more successful in making pictures of hell than of heaven--no one has ever made a common conception of heaven more permanently vivid than in this poem. See how amid the welter of crowds and the deafening crash of drums and banjos the individual faces stand out in the golden light. Big-voiced lassies made their banjos bang, Tranced, fanatical they shrieked and sang.... Bull-necked convicts with that land make free... The lame were straightened, withered limbs uncurled And blind eyes opened on a new, sweet world.... Gone was the weasel-head, the snout, the jowl! Sages and sibyls now, and athletes clean, Rulers of empires, and of forests green! It is a pictorial, musical, and spiritual masterpiece. I am not afraid to call it a spiritual masterpiece; for to any one who reads it as we should read all true poetry, with an unconditional surrender to its magic, General William Booth and his horde will not be the only persons present who will enter into heaven.