Chapter IV

Besides these changes already mentioned, there needs to be a great change in the national sentiment on the subject.

All these wrongs of a child are the result of the low estimate which prevails as to the rights of a child. There seems to be little or no interest in a child as a subject of the Queen and an object of the law. I must except Her Majesty's judges, and the best legal magistrates. To hear cases for children, I would always rather have a lawyer on the bench than a Sunday-school teacher. The religion of pious J.P.'s seems to be to let people off--adults I mean. It is not always so when it is a child who is charged. What is wanted in the interests of every form of unhappy English child life in this country to-day is righteousness, the robust righteousness of God; and His indignations at neglect of the hunger, or the sickness of a child. The shameful sufferings of English children to-day are jointly the work of the English bench and the English brute: of mawkishness on the bench, of cruelty in the brute.

On this subject of children hurt and killed the Church too has acted in grievously strange ways. It has taught what happened in the worship of the Syrian Moloch: it has not even known what is done in the worship of the English Bacchus. Much horror has it felt at the destruction of baby life on the Ganges; and little, if any at all, at the destruction of it on the flabby bosoms of English women whom men have made mothers, and to whom they have given no bread. As an argument for Christianity, it has pointed to the children abandoned in Pagan Rome, oblivious of the 20,000 a year abandoned in our own cities and villages, to death, or the parish. Of the five-and-twenty or thirty little boys once massacred at Bethlehem, it holds annual mournful commemorations. Of the hundred times that number of little boys and girls annually smothered within sound of its church bells it says nothing. When I think of the Church and of child-suffering and slaughter in England, I cannot help remembering the Biblical saying, as to whose eyes it is that "are in the ends of the earth." For the "soul" of children, whatever that may mean, the professional religionist eyes are at home; but for their suffering and slaughtered bodies, they are away in far times and far lands. And its purse, and its heart has gone there too.

A grand opportunity is now afforded to stamp cruelty to children out of the land. The law has come to be grandly right. Will the men who wear the name of that greatest friend of children the world ever contained meet the opportunity, find the money to discover the crimes and to enforce the law against them?

I hear you murmur, "The police! It is the work of the police to do that." That is not true. It is not the work of the police to discover anything, nor to initiate proceedings for anybody. They are a brave good body of men; but they have their set work to do, and their strict rules for doing it. But, were it so, when you stand before the judgment throne of Him whose will, Jesus says, is that not one little one should either suffer from hunger, or nakedness, or be sick and perish, will you dare to tell Him that you knew that that was His will, but that you left it to the police?

The new law has been created by Christian labour. It is the expression of Christian sentiment. It must be enforced by Christian money.

To enforce the splendid new law, the Society is seeking to raise its income to L15,000 a year. In the enforcement of the Factory Acts L30,000 a year is spent. In the enforcement of the Act for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals L29,000 is annually spent. Is it too much to ask for half these sums for the enforcement of the law for Children, when, without it, their sufferings must continue? Contributions may be sent to JOHN FAULKNER (_Secretary_), 7 Harpur Street, Bloomsbury, London, W.C.

SUBSCRIPTIONS AND DONATIONS.

The Society consists of Annual Members, subscribing L1 and upwards yearly; of Associates, subscribing less than L1, but 5_s._ and upwards yearly; of Life Members, subscribing not less than L10 in one payment; and of Patrons, subscribing not less than L50 in one payment.

National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

FOUNDED 1884.

_Royal Patroness_--H.R.H. PRINCESS CHRISTIAN.

_Patron_--The Right Hon. the Lord Mayor of London.

_Trustees_--The Baroness Burdett-Coutts; Cardinal Manning; Colonel Sir Francis Burdett, Bart.; R. Ruthven Pym, Esq.

_President_--His Grace the Duke of Abercorn.

CENTRAL COMMITTEE.

_Chairman_--R. Ruthven Pym, Esq.

_Vice-Chairman_--W. H. Collingridge, Esq.

Countess of Aberdeen.
H. C. Barker, Esq.
Rev. Prebendary Barnes.
Bishop of Bedford.
Mrs. Benson.
Baroness Burdett-Coutts.
F. A. Channing, Esq., M.P.
J. Colam, Esq.
Lady Ellis.
Dudley C. Falcke, Esq.
Sir Thomas Farrer.
Lady Farrer.
Hon. Lady Fitzgerald.
Lady George Hamilton.
Lady Henderson.
Miss Henderson.
Rev. J. W. Horsley.
Countess of Iddesleigh, C.I.
Countess of Iddesleigh.
Countess of Mar.
Mrs. F. W. Maude.
A. Meysey-Thompson, Esq.
Mrs. Meysey-Thompson.
Viscountess Midleton.
J. Louis Mitchell, Esq.
J. Montefiore, Esq.
Lady Nottage.
C. C. Osborne, Esq.
C. Kegan Paul, Esq.
Hon. Mrs. Pereira.
E. de M. Rudolf, Esq.
Lady Margaret Shelley.
Rev. B. Stephenson, LL.D.
Miss Hesba Stretton.
Miss H. L. Synnot.
Lady Tryon.
Rev. T. Turner.
Lady Catherine Vane.
Ashton Warner, Esq.
Rev. Benjamin Waugh.
Lady Willoughby de Eresby.

_Treasurer_--R. Ruthven Pym, Esq.

_Honorary Director_--Rev. BENJAMIN WAUGH.

_Counsel_--Robert Frederick Colam, Esq.

_Solicitor_--Henry C. Barker, Esq.

_Hon. Surgeon_--Howard Marsh, Esq., F.R.C.S.

_Visiting Surgeon_--J. Rees Gabe, Esq., M.D.

_Bankers_--Messrs. Coutts and Co., Strand, W.C.

_Secretary_--Mr. JOHN FAULKNER.

_Head Office and Shelter_--

7 Harpur Street, Bloomsbury, W.C.

_Telegraphic Address_--"CHILDHOOD, LONDON."