Mission Resources. Wide-awake pastors and wide-awake church members cannot do all they wish for lack of time and strength. It thus becomes true that comparatively few charges are doing all they might do for missions. Would it not be an excellent plan to adopt such methods in the interest of missions? God is so richly pouring out his blessings upon our missions in all lands that our very successes become the source of our greatest anxieties. Ascribing all praise to God for these successes our hallelujahs are suppressed by a sense of the weight of burdens which none among us dare assume but for the consciousness they are divinely imposed. How can we train our converts? How feed the lambs daily added to our flocks? How train up a ministry and a generation of people that shall truly honor God? These are burning questions in India with every missionary of all denominations. The utmost zeal now put forth on present lines fails to cause the home churches to keep pace financially with the rapid advance in the foreign field. Must this agonizing struggle that attends the birth of every new enterprise continue to shadow it constantly for lack of funds and men? Must we continue to face, powerless to act, these great open doors of unprecedented opportunity? Let the home Church answer. The Are all the best methods of raising recruits and money adopted? Or can these in some way be rendered more efficient? Few wholesale mercantile houses in America could stand to-day were their methods for increasing sales not more perfect than are ours for collecting funds. Their methods reach every man who has need of their goods. churches in great nerve centers, the cities, at home more or less throb with new life in regard to this supreme question of the evangelization of the world; but we have failed as yet to make the whole body throb and glow with a sense of union with God in this work. "We are workers together with God" in this, or we are nothing. What is wanted for the Methodist Episcopal missions of the world is a thorough canvass of every Methodist Episcopal church in America by those who will be to the Missionary Society what Brother Cox is to individual churches and Sunday schools. Such evangelists need not necessarily be men of great eloquence in the pulpit, though that would be a powerful factor, but they must be men of God, hav ing tact and business talent. Not worn-out or superannuated workers, but men full of fire and endurance. I would have such a one going from charge to charge in every Conference, cooperating fully with every pastor, encouraging and strengthening them; not only speaking publicly as often as may be fitting, but going from house to house, seeking to place our excellent periodical literature in every home, and also such books on missions as may help to give permanent depth and strength to the 357 cause. They could give tender and prayerful counsels and advice concerning legacies and gifts of property, enthusing churches and Sunday schools with lofty ambitions concerning sacrifices and systematic giving. They should plan for plenty of time to thoroughly work each charge, keeping their plans elastic so as to return, if need be, to clinch nails previously driven, and make their work effective. Their plans should include all possible aid to the pastor in organizing for work and enthusing his workers. All who will consider the matter of large gifts to the Missionary Society, and are yet not ready to give at once, should be put in communication with the missionary secretaries. There must be somewhere in our Church many laymen well fitted for this work. Some of our pastors could well afford to devote certain periods to this work. All honor to pastors and presiding elders who do all that they possibly can in all these ways, and these are many; but if, as the results of Mr. Cox's work indicates, many can profit by special help in those departments of work that all consider their first and most important duty, building up the Sunday school and congregation, would they not also profit much by this special help for missions. Students, and especially those studying for the foreign field, might profitably devote vacations to this hand-to-hand planting and watering of the prolific seeds of truth concerning missions. By no means of secondary importance should be the work of seeking earnestly for the men and women whom God has everywhere in training for the mission field; counseling such and strengthening them, and encouraging them to make full proof of their call. The sacrifices such will need to make are often overestimated by themselves or their friends, and the special grace given of God with each day of sacrifice underestimated. For the severance of dearest home ties, for the hearts' throbbing, as the ocean's expanse shuts out of sight the country we love, for every expected and unexpected trial in the field there is for us a special and sweet and sufficient cup of grace. "As thy days so shall thy strength be" needs to be emphasized in every ear, that hearing the call, "Who will go?" desires to answer, "Here am I, send me." Such evangelists should live among the people, and so plan that traveling expenses would be light. I see not but that their support could be largely met by the profits our publishers would be glad to give for the spread of our books and periodicals. Cultivating self-supporting ideas and agencies in each mission field, with all possible diligence, and exercising all care in the use of funds, it will be still necessary to adopt measures that will vitally interest in this work all who look for the coming of the kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Kolar, India. 358 Meeting of the International Missionary Union. Meeting of the International Missionary Union. BY REV. ALBERT B. NORTON, B.D. THE tenth annual meeting of the above named organization began on Wednesday evening, June 14, in the Sanitarium Tabernacle, at Clifton Springs, N. Y. Of the one hundred and forty missionaries who had written of their intention to attend the meeting of the Missionary Union, over seventy were present at this first session. Dr. J. T. Gracey, the President of the Union, opened the meeting. Scripture was read by Rev. Mr. Bodwell. Chaplain of the Sanitarium, and prayer offered by Rev. Mr. Cope, Pastor of the Baptist Church in Clifton. Dr. Henry Foster, the much beloved friend of the missionaries, made the address of welcome to the missionaries on behalf of the pastors and people of Clifton Springs and the physicians and officers of the Sanitarium. Rev. J. A. Davis, of Hempstead, L. I., but formerly of the American Reformed Church Mission in China, responded. Rev. C. Nichols, of the American Baptist Mission in Burma, took charge of the 'Recognition Meeting," in which the missionaries spoke briefly of their experience. The object was that the workers from their distant fields might thus be introduced to one another. Nearly all the missionaries have never attended a meeting of the Union before. Tears flowed as some told of the trials and difficulties through which the Lord had brought them. All feel that there is here a beautiful manifestation of Christian love, overleaping all denominational fences. A Canadian Methodist brother, who had been in Japan, said the trials and hardships of the work, driving him to throw himself on the sovereign grace and power of God, had made him a good deal of a Calvinist. A Presbyterian brother, who rejoiced in having been prepared for the work of the Presbyterian Board in China "by that good man, Professor Charles A. Briggs, of Union Theological Seminary," said that his work in China had driven him into "the doctrine of the common grace of the Methodists." Miss M. P. Eddy, M.D., of the Presbyterian Board, was about to sail for Syria, the land of her birth. She said that she was the ninth person of her family consecrating themselves to missionary work in Syria, and that the aggregate service of four of them was over one hundred years, and that she was the first lady medical graduate to go as a missionary to that country. Miss L. S. Cathcart and Miss T. Crosby spoke of their work in the distant Pacific Isles of Micronesia, where they received their mail only once a year. On Thursday papers were read and discussions given on missionary work in papal lands, among the American aborigines, also in Turkey, Persia, and Bulgaria. Cyrus Hamlin, D.D., the founder of Robert College, at Constantinople, always has something worth hearing about the mighty works of God in the Turkish Empire. At the request of many friends Dr. Hamlin is about to publish his autobiog raphy-Life and Times of Cyrus Hamlin. Those who have read his former book, Among the Turks, will not need any advice to read his new book. Dr. Hamlin's service in Turkey was for forty years, from 1837 to 1877, and he is now in his eighty-third year. During the last year he has been constantly traveling, employed by the American Board to address churches on missions. Rev. George W. Wood, D.D., labored in connection with the American Board principally in Turkey, from 1837 to 1887. These veterans were listened to with interest. Miss C. E. Bush spoke of her work in eastern Asiatic Turkey, where she and Miss Seymour had labored together for twenty-three years. Their principal work was among the women, their touring being done in the saddle, and the monotony of their missionary life was spiced with dangers from robber bands, and from fording the Euphrates, Tigris, and other rivers. Friday morning Dr. Hamlin read a paper on "The Attitude of the Moslem Mind toward Christianity." A paper was also read on "Movements toward Reform in the old Gregorian Church," prepared by Dr. J. L. Barton, of Harpoot, Turkey. Then there was a discussion on "Movement toward Reform in the Russian Orthodox Church." Friday afternoon was devoted to "Woman's Work in Mission Lands," and all the speakers were ladies. Mrs. Dr. C. C. Thayer presided. There were so many to speak that each lady was limited to ten minutes. It was one of the most interesting sessions of the Union. Mrs. Mudge told us of her experience among the Hindus, showing in what chains of bondage Hindu women are bound. Miss Crosby spoke on work in Micronesia, where she had spent six years. The missionaries there receive but one mail a year. One year the mail of Mr. Bingham, on the Gilbert Islands, was seized by the native savages before he could get it, and they ate the letters and papers, thinking them to be some foreign delicacy, he only finding a few scraps of his letters to indicate what had become of them. A native from one of the unevangelized islands said to Miss Crosby, "Send us a teacher with your spirit food." And when she said to him that the missionaries could not come that year, he said: "Why are you missionaries here? You say you love us. You say the people in America love us. You say your God loves us. Then why cannot my people have anyone to bring spirit food to them?" Mrs. C. R. Mills spoke of her work teaching deaf and dumb boys in Shantung, China. Miss May Carleton, M.D., of the Methodist Episcopal Mission in FooChow, spoke of training Chinese midwives and other Chinese women to become practitioners of medicine among the millions of Chinese women. While there is an open door for medical missionaries in every Meeting of the International Missionary Union. heathen land, the door is specially wide open in the Flowery Kingdom. Mrs. Wellington White, who with her husband had spent ten years in China, spoke with much pathos and power. Two years ago, when she and her husband were nearly ready to start back for China, they met with a railroad accident at Elmira, N. Y., in which Mr. White and three of their four children were killed; Mrs. White was also badly injured. Eminent oculists had told her that as one result of her injury she would probably become blind. But in answer to prayer, through her treatment at Clifton Springs, her eyesight has been spared. She pleaded very tenderly and earnestly for the thousands of blind girls in China, whose fate is worse than that of slavery. Mrs. Gulick told of work in Japan since 1871. Miss Houston, of the Southern Presbyterian Church, spoke of the character of the Romanists in Mexico, and of mission work among them in Matamoras. In coming to the International Missionary Union, Miss Houston traveled her first one hundred and sixty-five miles in stagecoaches. Mrs. Craver, wife of S. P. Craver, Presiding Elder of the Puebla District of the Methodist Episcopal Conference in Mexico, told with much feeling and power the story of the persecutions which she and her husband had endured for Christ's cause in Mexico. All of Mrs. Craver's addresses and testimonies during the meetings of the Union were given in the power of the Spirit, and could not help but draw out prayer and sympathy for God's tried people in Mexico. Friday evening was devoted to India. Dr. James Mudge gave a brief but comprehensive account of the marvelous work of conversion in the Methodist Episcopal Missions in India. It was hoped that Dr. Thomas Craven or Rev. C. P. Hard could have been there to have told the story of that work, but in their absence Dr. Mudge well represented it. Rev. W. Powell told us several incidents from his own mission station, showing the depth and character of the work of the American Baptist Mission among the Telugus. Rev. E. S. Hume, of Bombay, spoke of some of the great modern reform movements in India. Rev. E. G. Phillips represented the work among the Garos in Assam. The story of Mrs. Case, of Burma, was very interesting, telling of work in Upper Burma among the Dacoits. C. A. Nichols, President of the Karen College at Bassein, Burma, represented the work of the Christian Karens of the Bassein District, a work that has been conspicuous and unique, because of the heroism shown by these Karens in carrying out their principles of self-support and aggressive work in the "regions beyond." One of the most helpful features of the week's meetings of the Union was the devotional meeting 359 each day from 9 to 10 A. M. The prayers, the testimonies, and the praises at those meetings show where the hearts of missionaries are. Dr. Cushing, in leading the devotional meeting one morning, spoke of a visit to the venerable Dr. F. G. Hibbard, whose home is in Clifton Springs. His wife recently said to him, "I have a letter for you from the Society for the Higher Exegesis of the Bible." Dr. Hibbard, who has largely lost the use of his superb mental faculties, replied: "I cannot remember about it, my dear; all things behind me are dark, but it is all glory before; there is a thick blanket behind me, but a very thin veil before me." On Saturday Rev. P. Z. Easton read a paper on "Dervish Pantheism." Brother Easton had seen much of the working of Mohammedan ideas in Persia. A paper was read on "Mass Movement in India," prepared by Rev. G. W. Jackson. Also a paper was read by Rev. A. Dowsley on " Education in Missions." Saturday afternoon was given up for a children's meeting, in which the vernacular songs of China, India, Japan, and other countries were sung, and in which curios, costumes, etc., were exhibited. Saturday evening was devoted to a stereopticon exhibition, in which views of the principal mission countries were exhibited. On Sunday, at 9 A. M., was held the missionary love feast in the Sanitarium chapel, led by Dr. Mudge. It was indeed a royal feast of the King's bounties. At 10 A. M. was the sermon of the whole meeting, by Rev. George Douglass, D.D., President of Wesleyan Theological College at Montreal, Dr. Douglass, now in his sixty-eighth year, has done the work of his life as an invalid and a subject of disease. Fortythree years ago he went as a missionary among the blacks in the Bermudas. He there contracted disease, which poisoned his whole system and has never left him. He has to be led as he walks about. When he arose to preach two brethren lifted him from his chair. Fifteen years ago the disease attacked his eyes, and for twelve years he has been blind. When Dr. Gracey introduced him, he said: "God, who has touched his body, has also touched his soul. He is the Chrysostom of America." He took as his text: "But we glory in tribulations also," Rom. 5. 3. For about an hour the audience was held spellbound, the eyes of very many being bathed in tears. It was a wonderful sermon, delivered in the power of the Holy Spirit. Sunday afternoon was devoted to Japan, and Sunday evening to China. I cannot take time now to report the admirable addresses which were given by Rev. Geo. B. Smyth, of Foo-Chow, and others. . On Monday evening, Rev. R. H. Nassau, D.D., who has spent about thirty years as a missionary on the west coast of Africa, read an able paper on "Bantu Superstition in Africa." This paper was prepared after much research and study, and was of a high character. 360 Our Methodist College in India. There was a discussion of the Geary (or Chinese Exclusion) Bill, and the following resolutions were adopted by the Union: Whereas, The United States for over fifty years has maintained treaty relations with China, guaranteeing protection to American citizens in China, establishing full toleration from the Chinese government for the Christian religion, and regulating American commercial relations with people of that country; and, Whereas, Both the Scott Bill of 1888 and the Geary Bill of 1892 have glaringly violated the different treaties of 1842, 1860, 1868, and 1880, first by forbidding Chinese laborers visiting their native land to return to this, contrary to the express stipulations of the treaty of 1880, and secondly by enacting a variety of restrictions and penalties for the Chinese already residing within the territory of the United States, contrary to the treaty of 1880, which expressly states that all Chinese in the United States shall be subject to the same favors, privileges, exemptions, and immunities accorded to the most favored nation; therefore, Resolved, 1. That this Union desires to place on record its strong protestation to the policy of breaking a national contract, and also to the unjust and unfriendly features in the laws now in force regarding Chinese immigration, and especially concerning those Chinese who are already residents in the United States. 2. That this Union would most respectfully petition the executive and legislature of the nation to repeal the present law, and enact such a new law as will either harmonize with the treaties made in the past with China, or, if desirable, with a new treaty agreed upon and duly ratified by both governments; and, 3. That a Standing Committee of two be appointed to represent this Union in endeavoring to secure in every possible way such legislative action as will be alike creditable to the Christian character of our nation, respectful to China, and beneficial to all American interests in that land. There were also adopted the following Resolutions on Sabbath Desecration by the Columbian Exposition: Resolved, 1. That in the judgment of this Conference the Congress and executive government of the United States deserve the commendation of all Christian people for their action in favor of closing the gates of the Columbian Exhibition on the first day of the week. 2. That we deplore the example of bad faith exhibited by the local directors in first accepting the money grant from the treasury of the United States, and complying with the condition of closing the gates on Sunday, and subsequently violating that condition, thereby outraging Christian public sentiment in abolishing all distinctions of days in the week in regard to requirement of labor and allowing of amusements. This action we condemn as at war with the timehonored institution of the American Sabbath, and as exemplifying a decadence of moral sentiment sadly in contrast with that expressed in the conducting of the National Exposition of 1876 at Philadelphia, when the gates were kept closed on the Lord's Day. The following officers were chosen for the ensuing year: President, J. T. Gracey, D.D. Vice Presidents, Cyrus Hamlin, D.D.; S. L. Baldwin, D.D.; M. H. Bixby, D.D.; George Douglass, D.D.; Rev. J. K. Wright. Secretary, Rev. W. H. Belden, of Clifton Springs, N. Y. Associate Secretary, Mrs. Dr. C. C. Thayer, Clifton Springs, N. Y. Treasurer, James Mudge, D.D. Librarian, Dr. C. C. Thayer. The next meeting of the Union is to be on June 13-20, 1894, at Clifton Springs, N. Y., and at the same place on following years, always beginning on the second Wednesday evening of June (D. V.). All returned missionaries of every evangelical body and nation are cordially invited to attend these meetings, and take part in them. Through the generosity of Henry Foster, M.D., the founder of the Sanitarium and Missionary Tabernacle at Clifton Springs, and other Christian friends at Clifton Springs, free entertainment is given for the week to all missionaries who attend these meetings. Our Methodist College in India. BY REV. W. A. MANSELL, PRINCIPAL. THE Lucknow Christian College dates from the year 1866 when at the second session of the India Annual Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, resolutions were passed recognizing the 66 urgent want of a college of high grade in connection with our work," and looking toward the immediate establishment of such a school as soon as the necessary funds would justify it. Before this time there had been in existence a school of high order of excellence in connection with our mission in Luck. now under the superintendence of Rev. J. H. Messmore, but that school was in the heart of the native city, and was attended mostly by non-Christians, and it was the design of the new school that it should be more especially for our own children, and should be in reality a college as soon as the work would justify it. A board of trustees was appointed at the Conference of 1867, and in 1868 the trustees reported that about ten thousand rupees had been subscribed toward the endowment. The board prepared a circular to the Church at home, containing a full statement of the enterprise; this statement appeared in most of the Church papers and was the means of awakening much interest in the home Church. The trustees reiterated their profound conviction that the proposed college was a necessity, and expressed their opinion that a sum of at least one hundred thousand rupees should be secured as an endowment to place the college on a firm and prosperous basis. The school was finally opened on the 1st of February, 1877, in a small house on the mission premises, as no funds were available for purchasing buildings. Rev. H. Mansell was the first principal, and with several teachers began the work of organiz ing the classes, and commenced teaching. The ac commodations for both school and boarders were unsatisfactory, and the attendance during the first year was small, the total enrollment being forty. During the five years, 1878-82, the school was under the superintendence of Rev. B. H. Badley, and was advanced to the grade of a high school, matriculating its first class of five students in December, 1882. Rev. J. W. Waugh, D.D., served as principal during the years 1883, 1884, since which time it has been under |
