THE GOSPEL IN ALL LANDS.

FEBRUARY, 1893.

APPEAL OF THE GENERAL COMMITTEE OF THE METHO. DIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH FOR HOME MISSIONS.

HILE we are in duty bound to extend the missionary agencies of our Church

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to the remotest parts of the earth, the opportunities of the field at home create an imperative demand which we dare not refuse to consider, a demand more urgent to-day than ever before.

In America the "foreign" field is at "home." We ponder the Master's commission, "Go into all the world," and we lift our eyes to find "all the world" pouring its populations into our open gates. We plan to go to them, and, lo, they meet us more than half way. Our own coasts are crowded with the foreign subjects we cross the sea to seek and to save.

The rush of foreign immigrants, in the future to be augmented rather than diminished, suggests new reasons for increasing our missionary efforts in the old lands, that we may prepare them before they leave home for the new life on this side of the sea; but it emphasizes every argument hitherto employed for receiving them when they do come with the amplest provisions for indoctrination, in the Christian way, in those vital truths which are the very life and hope of the Republic.

These foreigners come with prejudices to be removed; with false or partial views as to what freedom is to be corrected; with no sense of the responsibility under which they are placed as citizens of a free nation, and with unworthy views as to the relation of Christian faith, experience, and character to political obligation.

At our very doors immigrants are met by tricksters of the market, the State, and the "Church." Every effort is made to keep them under a foreign dominion, social and ecclesiastical. In many cases they settle in communities of their own; teach their children the language, manners, and customs of fatherland; foster all the old prejudices against the new order of things; retain as far as possible the civilization of their native lands, the very civilization which made their immigration to this country a necessity.

The Gospel, which we as a Church have proclaimed for more than a century, is the salvation of these misguided people. We need resort to no political devices, nor ally ourselves with any political party, in order to win our fellow-citizens to an enthusiastic acceptance of American ideas. The Gospel of universal brotherhood which we preach, and the blessed experience of the inner life which we promote, will guarantee loyalty to the large doctrines of the Republic, and save the newcomers from the evil teachings of Anarchy and an unchristian Socialism. A Methodist church in every foreign community on our shores will develop American liberty by making free, as the truth of Christ makes free, those who accept his Gospel and walk in the light and joy of his Spirit.

Immigrants of every nationality are peculiarly susceptible to the spirit of kindness by which the true Church of Christ is animated. They are the "strangers within our

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gates" to whom in Christ's name we give welcome. They find in a Methodist church not an "ecclesiastical establishment," but rather a home, with hearty songs, fervent prayers, earnest sermons, fraternal greetings, and the realities of Christian experience and good neighborship.

The missionary work in our own borders among foreigners is still further commended by the fact that so many of this class are but temporarily resident here. They come for a time and return to their native lands. Every word of Gospel truth which such casual hearers receive is good seed, from which one day good fruit may come. The work among the Chinese in America is of this character. The lessons given in special Sunday school classes in so many parts of the country to these waifs from the Celestial empire are "as bread cast upon the waters."

Thus in missions at home, among Germans, Scandinavians, Italians, Portuguese, Bohemians, Hungarians, Mexicans, French Canadians, Chinese, and Japanese, and among the Indians, who have a preeminent claim upon us, we are, through the domestic department of our great Missionary Society, spreading the Gospel and building up the Church of our Lord Jesus Christ.

This branch of our work comes home to us still more closely, for it reaches our own people, our old neighbors, our sons and daughters, who, led by the enterprise of the age, have themselves gone to find homes on the frontier. By every contribution toward the Christianization of the extreme limits and the newly opened interiors of our own country, we are laying hold upon and helping our kith and kin, reminding them of the old doctrines to which they listened in the earlier years, and thus are we doing much toward bringing them "back to the old faith they learned beside their mother's knee."

Dearly beloved, we need your sympathy and help in this important work. We need more money to project, establish, and sustain missions of our Church in this land. We need more accurate missionary information on the part of our people, more conscientiousness and consecration, and more systematic giving.

We need especially more men and women for mission work abroad and at home, more ardent love, and more of the self-sacrifice that love inspires.

JOHN H. VINCENT.

(By order of the General Committee.)

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MISSIONARY EDUCATIONAL WORK IN CHINA.

BY PRESIDENT J. C. FERGUSON, OF PEKING UNIVERSITY.

HE justification of educational work as carried on by missionary societies which are organized for the spread of the Gospel lies in the fact that these societies take as their model the life of Christ, which was filled, not simply with the work of preaching, but with the broad work of "doing good." If any single apostle were chosen as a model he could not truly represent the aim and work of Christianity, for never has a follower of Christ been able to combine in himself all the varieties of Christ's work. Luke was a physician, but accompanied Paul, the preacher, and Timothy was a teacher, but their common master Christ was all; hence if we chose Luke or Paul or Timothy as our sole model, or elevated the example of one of them above all the others, we should be at fault. The Christian Church has the same right to carry on the work of healing and teaching as the work of preaching, though, in the category of "gifts," the work of prophecy or preaching is placed first. Christ himself made the work of preaching foremost, but followed and supple

Missionary Educational Work in China.

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mented it by the broad work of helping the poor, relieving the distressed, and elevating all those about him.

Educational work is peculiarly needed in China, because China has, from its earliest history, been a literary country. The present system of civil service examinations through which officials are promoted to their positions is based upon a literary standard. By thus compelling all her officials to prepare themselves by a thorough literary culture for the duties which they hope to perform, she has placed a premium upon literary pursuits and acquirements which has had a very great influence upon her national history. These examinations have been in vogue since about one thousand years before the birth of Christ, and are very thorough and searching. The student passes his examination first in the township, then in the county, and again before the literary chancellor of the province, and in this process the unworthy and incompetent are sifted out. The young man who is successful in his examination before the provincial chancellor is promoted to his first degree, and this entitles him to compete at the triennial examinations held in the metropolitan capitol. In these examinations only about one in every one hundred and fifty candidates can be successful, and out of these successful candidates, who are compelled to pass a still higher examination before a board of regents in the imperial capitol, are selected the candidates for official promotion. As young men pass through these various examinations they are severely tested, and only those who have done meritorious work can hope to be successful. This custom makes it necessary for young men who hope to rise to high positions in their native land to prepare themselves thoroughly by literary pursuits. This preeminence which China accords to literary work makes it important that the Church, when taking up missionary work in that land, should not disregard this characteristic of the people.

Another fact which needs attention is, that in Chinese literature ethical teaching is always a part of literary composition. The great model of the literary mind-their ancient sage Confucius-was not simply a man of letters, but was an ethical teacher, with what he considered a mission to his generation, to restore the teaching of earlier sages and to establish the right principles of government; hence in the Confucian Analects we constantly find ethical maxims and broad moral teaching which were meant to inspire and uplift those who had charge of the government of the country. The students who now study the writings of Confucius and of Mencius regard themselves not simply as men who desire to acquire literary excellence, but also as students of correct ethical principles. They study both the writings of Confucius and his life, and attempt to acquire both the literary style of their master and also to model their lives after his life. They try to sit as Confucius is reputed to have sat, walk as he is reputed to have walked, and deport themselves as he is said to have deported himself. These young men regard themselves as Confucius regarded himself, a teacher of all those about him, and the custom is now universal among the people of regarding these young men as their teachers. Parents point to these young men who take the sages as their models, and urge their sons to pattern their lives after their models. This opens a broad door for Christianity, in the fact that those who are taught in Christian schools expect to have ethical teaching, and if we can give them not only a broad and thorough culture, but also the better ethical teaching of Christ, which will lead them to repentance and salvation, and then send out into communities all over the empire young men of culture and thorough refinement who will, for this very reason, have a prominence among their people and who will also have the Lord Jesus Christ as the model of their lives, we shall have beacon lights in every community. Then shall the parents who point their sons to these models be pointing them also to him who is the Saviour of the world.

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Educational work must, in the future, play a very important part in uprooting superstitions which now have a stronghold among the people. Side by side with the prominence which China has placed upon literary pursuits have grown the dreadful superstitions which now retard so much the progress of the empire. This is explained by the fact that history shows that the nations that forget God always plunge into dark superstition. Atheism and superstition are closely allied, and he who says in his heart there is no God is usually the one who most readily accepts the grossest superstition. The baneful superstitions of China are closely allied with misconceptions of the forces of nature. Fungshui lays its deadly hold upon matters of state, and this superstition is only a misconception of the power of the elements. Their whole system of astrology is also based upon misconceptions of nature, and only as science is taught and the truths of nature which God's word has helped to reveal are taught among the people, can Christianity gain a stronghold.

Thus educational work will also be a very important factor in helping China to overcome the greatest evil which has ever beset a nation-the traffic of opium. This deadly vice has gained such a hold upon the people that in our part of China about seven out of every ten adult men are addicted to its use. We can hardly hope for the reform of these adult victims, but can with certainty expect that the young men who are trained in our schools, and are taught the direful effects of the opium drug upon the human system and upon their nation, will never become addicted to its use. This has been the history of the graduates of Christian schools in China up to the present time, as is shown by the fact that not one graduate of the Christian schools in China has ever become addicted to the use of opium.

The greatest value, however, of Christian education in China is that we may present Christ to the leading minds of that empire. While we should not neglect the poor nor the outcast nor the great middle classes, yet it is important that we do something also to reach those young men who are to be the leaders of thought and action in their country. If we can be instrumental in bringing one student to Christ who shall afterward become a masterful leader among his own people, we shall have done more for the evangelization of that empire than if we had been instrumental in leading hundreds of ordinary minds to a knowledge of the truth. The great work of Ananias was not that of faithfully witnessing among the ordinary minds, but it was in leading the master mind of Paul to an appreciation of his need of Christ. All the other converts of Ananias are unrecorded, but the conversion of this one man, whom he did something to bring into the light, forms a conspicuous part of the Book of Acts. This was because Paul was able not simply himself to appreciate and believe on Christ, but was able also to become a leader in the Church. If through our schools we shall be able to bring leading minds in China into contact with the Lord Jesus and be instrumental in the conversion of some of them, the future evangelization of China is an assured fact. The great need of our evangelistic work in that land to-day is men who shall be able to lead the hosts of God to victory, and only as we place ourselves in a position to reach this class shall we be able to do our whole duty.

MENCIUS, who lived in China about one hundred years after Confucius, said: "There is an ordination for everything; and a man should receive submissively what may be correctly ascribed thereto. Death sustained in the discharge of one's duties may be correctly ascribed to heaven. Death under handcuffs and fetters cannot be correctly so ascribed. The great man is he who does not lose his child-heart. To nourish the heart there is nothing better than to keep the desires few."

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SIGNS OF PROMISE IN CHINA.

BY REV. W. T. HOBART.

HE Shan-tung District of the North China Mission is farthest from Peking, but in some respects the most interesting of our Methodist Episcopal fields. Though seven hundred miles away, we were providentially led there many years ago.

Within its limits lie the tombs of Confucius and Mencius, teachers Kung and Meng they should be called, for their names were Kung and Meng, and they were called Fu-tzu, meaning teacher. This is a title, like doctor with us, and not a part of the The early Catholic missionaries probably thought it all the name of the sage,

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and so called him Confucius. But this is merely a parenthesis.

Not only these tombs, but T'ai-shan, one of the sacred mountains of China, covered with temples from top to base, to which thousands of pilgrims flock annually from all parts, is here situated. Yet here at the Mecca of China, near these triple holy shrines, the humble Methodist itinerant preaches the glorious Gospel of the blessed God.

Rev. Frederick Brown, the wide-awake presiding elder of the district, with his corps of native assistants, proposes to rout the devil and take the whole region for Christ. He has invented or adapted a Gospel wheelbarrow to be used in the sale of Scriptures and tracts. It is decorated with various Scripture texts, and thus preaches to the eye of every passer-by. This barrow the peripatetic bookseller can trundle all over the district, and he has only to stop and open the lids, when he is ready to supply