Matthew 2:18

THE CRY OF THE CHILDREN

‘In Rama was there a voice heard.’

Matthew 2:18

These little victims were but the first sacrificed by the powers of evil to retard the progress of the kingdom of light. Cruelty and hatred compassed the death of the King Himself, and since then saints have suffered, blood has been shed, tears have flowed, and martyrs have witnessed by their deaths.

I. The tragedy of child-suffering.—It reminds us, too, of the ever-present tragedy of child-suffering—the suffering which results from the misdoing, cruelty, or neglect of adult people. How sad it all is, and we realise that, like the tragedy of old, it is all the fruit of sin! How many victims are sacrificed, year by year, by the neglect or positive ill-treatment of vicious and cruel parents! Parents so sodden by drink and other demoralising indulgence that natural affection has died within them, or only shines fitfully, making the periods of neglect, violence, and cruelty all the more horrible by contrast.

II. What can be done.—Thank God, much is now being done to alleviate the suffering of little children. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children does much to prevent the grosser forms of cruelty and ill-treatment. Our Waifs and Strays Society rescues children from the streets and their demoralising influences; and all over the land orphanages, founded by God-fearing Christian people, have been erected that little ones left unprovided for may not be without homes. We may do much to alleviate this suffering, to stop this continual moral and actual slaying of little innocents, by supporting by every means in our power the carrying of the Gospel, the work of our Church, in the dark places in our cities.

III. The true remedy.—This is the true remedy: to lift up Jesus, the Friend for little children; to reach parents by our Temperance Societies and other reforming parish agencies; and so sweeten and make wholesome the home influences. And this is work which we can do much to aid, both by personal service and by giving of our means. There is, too, the work of the Sunday schools, and other parish agencies for directly influencing the little child-lives, and preventing the soul-slaying which is even more terrible than cruelty and death to the body. Very much is done in this way for the young mind by filling it with the beautiful story of the Gospel, to prevent its poisoning by the vitiated atmosphere of a vicious home-life.

—The Rev. H. G. Wheeler.