The Maréchale (Catherine Booth-Clibborn)Strahan, James
Religion
The Maréchale (Catherine Booth-Clibborn)
Strahan, James
Booth-Clibborn, Catherine, 1860-1955
"You have added a new word to the French language," said M. Sarcey, the
famous critic, to the Maréchale; "I mean the word ’Salutiste.’" In 1881
there was not a single Salvationist in France or Switzerland. After
fifteen years there were 220 stations and outposts, over 400 officers,
headquarters in five cities, and four weekly papers.
But these bare facts only feebly indicate what the Maréchale did for
France. In a moment of depression at the thought of French infidelity,
the Princess Malzoff once remarked to her—
"The French have no soul."
"How dare you," asked the Maréchale, "say such a thing?"
Her friend replied with charming inconsistency, "But you have found the
soul of France!"
That was perhaps the highest tribute ever paid to her.
If one asks some Frenchman who knew the Maréchale in those days how she
won the heart of France, one gets the answer, "But it is natural—she has
the French temperament; and, besides, _elle aime la France_." If one
asks some convert of hers how she found the soul of France, the reply
is, "Ah! she brought us the Christ, who is victorious everywhere." Both
questions were answered together by one who, speaking for many, said,
"She bought us at the price of tears and sacrifice."
When she was at the zenith of her power in France, an admirable
appreciation of her was written[1] by one of the saints of the modern
calendar, Miss Frances E. Willard. We extract a few sentences. "She
inherits, it is said, beyond any other of the endowed and consecrated
eight children of the General and Mrs. Booth, their special gifts,
graces, and grace.... The Maréchale’s career already fulfils her
father’s prophecy that women will, if once left free in their action,
develop administrative powers fully equal and oftentimes superior to
those of men.... ’I love France,’ she said to me, with sparkling eyes:
’it is a great and wonderful country, and I love its people every bit as
much as ever I loved my own. I have become familiar with its peasants in
the provinces; have sat down with the French women who clatter about in
sabots; have shared their chestnuts with them, heard of their sorrows as
well as their joys, and, believe me, the human heart is just the same in
France as it is everywhere; and if you classify the saints whose
histories have come down to us, France would occupy the front rank. The
nation that has produced a Lacodaire, a Pascal, a Fénelon, and a Madame
Guyon, does not lack the germs of spiritual life.’"
[1] _The Review of the Churches_, Feb. 1894.
In 1896, however, her career in France came to an end. She received the
command to go and devote herself to the work of the Army in Holland, and
loyally prepared to obey.
Catholics and Protestants alike were dismayed at the news. One of her
dearest friends, the Catholic scholar M. Lassaire, whose exquisite
translation of the four Gospels had the honour of being put upon the
Index Expurgatorius, came to her and said—
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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