This is an etext version of Mildred Duff, Catherine Booth: A Sketch, with preface by General Bramwell Booth. Originally published by Salvation Army Book Department, circa 1907. This edition was created by Jone Johnson Lewis, 2003.
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Mrs. Booth strove earnestly for doctrine.
'Let us take care,' she said, in The Army's early days, 'what Gospel we preach. Let us mind our doctrine.'
And again: -
'We must stick to the form of sound words, for there is more in it than appears on the surface. "Glory be to the Father, to the Son, and the Holy Ghost," was the theology of our forefathers, and I am suspicious of all attempts to mend it.'
And once more: -
'Let us beware of wrong doctrine, come through whomsoever it may. Holy men make sad mistakes. "Well, but," say some, "is not a person who holds wrong views with a right heart better than a person with right views and a wrong heart?" Yes, so far as his personal state before God is concerned, but not in his influence on man. My charity must extend to those likely to be deceived or ruined by his doctrines as well as to him.'
Mrs. Booth's whole life was a continual fight against sin - sin of all kinds. Whether her Meeting was held for the very lowest and roughest, or whether rows of clergy and lawyers, and lords and ladies sat to listen, it made no difference to her. She attacked sin, and went straight at the very heart-sins of the people in front of her.
'We need great grace,' she says in the midst of her wonderful West-End campaign, where even princes and princesses came to hear her. 'I think the Lord never enabled me to be more plain and faithful. As a lady in high circles said to me, "We never heard this sort of Gospel before." No, poor things, they are sadly deceived.'
