War and the Weird. Forbes Phillips
dull German Protestantism with its gross materialism raised the plentiful crop of sects in England, our country was known through Europe as "Merrie England." Our people loved the festival of S. Michael. S. Michael's Mass was a red letter day. The Communion and Inter-Communion of earth with heaven was emphasized. Families met that day to pray and feast, lovers plighted their troth, gatherings of relatives and friends was the rule, joy was the key-note. Then dissent raised its ugly head, dissent that had its birth in Germany. These kill-joys got the upper hand. The recognition of the Christ-Mass, Christmas and the Michael-Mass, Michaelmas, was put down by law. Dissent has never hesitated to use compulsion when it lay ready to hand to enforce materialism. So belief in angels well nigh ceased to exist. To-day the revival comes from actual experience rather than from church teaching. The antagonism to such belief amounts to unreasonable heights of folly. Luther has so long occupied the place of Christ that dissent has forgotten what Christ taught us in regard to angels. We ignore the fact that He claimed to have seen angels, and to have had their help and ministration. When politics mix with religion, spirituality dies, there is no vision, for there is little belief and less sincerity. No wonder the soldier's vision of angels strikes them as something altogether beyond the pale of belief.
It is time that our "spiritual fathers" and other stepfathers began to give us a lead in spiritual things. We are burdened with bishops who play to the gallery and the cheaper press, who would rather take a confirmation service in a coal-pit than in a consecrated shrine of prayer, for the simple reason that "Confirmation in a Coal-pit" gets a flaming advertisement in every paper. Their vision is set on notoriety: the spiritual vision recedes. How can they have sympathy with those who pierce the boundary line that separates this world from a higher plane?
Men who have spent their lives on office seeking can never be seers or priests. Parsons who beat the political drum may rise to power political, never to the power spiritual. The vision glorious is to those who face duty, self-sacrifice, and see in them the Divine Call, who believe in the sacrifice of the Gospel rather than its comfort. The charlatan must not dominate the Christian in our spiritual pastors, if it do, then such are not qualified to minister in spiritual things.
VII
THE WHITE COMRADE
The story that angels fought on the side of the Allies in the battle of Mons must rest upon evidence, coupled with experience. If we begin by assuming that there can be no intelligences in the universe unless they are clothed in the regulated fashion, then no amount of evidence will suffice. It is a worm's-eye view that regards man as the last word in mind.
Meanwhile France is pursuing the evidence for another story exclusively of French origin and vouched for by men to whom the belief in spiritual beings is repugnant, viz., the apparition of "Le Camarade Blanc," of whom at Nancy, in the Argonne, at Soissons and Ypres men talked with hushed voices but with the quiet assurance of men who had seen. It must be something arresting which changes an atheist into a mystic. Again and again the French wounded speak of a man in white bending over them as they lay on the field helpless, and ministering relief. The mysterious one whom our allies call the "Comrade in White" appears simultaneously on different parts of the battlefield. His mission ever is one of mercy.
The Living Church reprints from Work and Life an article giving a full account of "The White Comrade," furnished by a wounded soldier. All accounts agree in the main facts. He is generally observed after "severe fighting," he appears where "death is busiest," he "ignores shot and shell," he is ever "calm, collected," and brings with him an atmosphere of peace. Men of the 87th and 128th French Infantry who have been fighting in the Argonne, have seen him, and on several occasions he has been seen in the trenches.
The soldier's account which appeared in The Living Church is worth reading. It is not conclusive evidence, but the number of such experiences has value on the great subject of Spiritual Intervention. Religion pledges itself to such a belief. This is the soldier's story, one of many similar stories:
"It was the next day. At noon we got word to take the trenches in front of us. They were two hundred yards away, and we weren't well started till we knew that the big guns had failed in their work of preparation. We had advanced 150 yards when we found it was no good. Our captain called to us to take cover, and just then I was shot through both legs.
"I fell into a hole of some sort. I suppose I fainted, for when I opened my eyes I was all alone. The pain was horrible, but I didn't dare to move lest the Germans should see me, for they were only fifty yards away, and I did not expect mercy. I was glad when the twilight came. There were men in my own company who would run any risk in the darkness if they thought a comrade was still alive.
"The night fell, and soon I heard a step, not stealthy, as I expected, but quiet and firm, as if neither darkness nor death could check those untroubled feet. So little did I guess what was coming that, even when I saw the gleam of white in the darkness I thought it was a peasant in a white smock, or perhaps a woman deranged. Suddenly I guessed that it was 'The Comrade in White.'
"At that very moment the German rifles began to shoot. The bullets could scarcely miss such a target, for he flung out his arms as though in entreaty, and then drew them back till he stood like one of those wayside crosses that we saw so often as we marched through France. And he spoke. The words sounded familiar, but all I remember was the beginning, 'If thou hadst known,' and the ending, 'but now they are hid from thine eyes.' And then he stooped and gathered me into his arms—me, the biggest man in the regiment—and carried me as if I had been a child.
"I must have fainted again, for I awoke to consciousness in a little cave by a stream, and 'The Comrade in White' was washing my wounds and binding them up. I wanted to know what I could do for my friend to help him or to serve him. He was looking toward the stream and his hands were clasped in prayer; and then I saw that he, too, had been wounded. I could see, as it were, a shot-wound in his hand, and as he prayed a drop of blood gathered and fell to the ground. I cried out. I could not help it, for that wound of his seemed to be a more awful thing than any that bitter war had shown me. 'You are wounded, too,' I said. Perhaps he heard me, perhaps it was the look on my face, but he answered gently: 'This is an old wound, but it has troubled me of late.' And then I noticed sorrowfully that the same cruel mark was on his feet. You will wonder that I did not know sooner. I wonder myself. But it was only when I saw his feet that I knew him."
An incident which left a great impression upon me occurred at a hospital in North West France in September 1914 quite early in the war. I was visiting some wounded English and French soldiers. One poor fellow, a Parisian, called me to his side. "Come close, monsieur, for I would talk in a whisper. You are English—yes: and you English are common sense, practical—tell me—do you believe in God and angels, such things as priests teach children and women?"
"My measure of experience in life has compelled my belief in angels or spiritual beings, and common sense demands my belief in a Supreme Mind which I call God, the one Basic Fact," I replied.
"Monsieur I would talk with you. Do you believe that this God has priests to reveal such things to us?"
"The Great Supreme Mind has priests, leaders, prophets, in all departments of knowledge, music, mathematics, chemistry, navigation or engineering—why should He not have chosen instruments to reveal theological truth?"
He lay some time quiet, then he said, "It is good; now I feel I can tell you, for you will not smile. For years, ever since I could think, I have been an atheist. I went into this war an atheist. A few days ago a shell burst near me and I was wounded in twenty-nine places." (This statement was subsequently substantiated by the doctor and a nursing sister of mercy.) "Monsieur, I was in great pain: then suddenly a kind face was looking into mine, something touched my brow, the awful pain ceased. 'You called me,' a soft voice said. Then I remembered that when I was wounded I had cried, 'Oh, my God!'