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THE NEXT MISSIONARY CONFERENCE.

REV. C. W. MATEER, D.D.

OME two months ago I wrote to the Editor of the Recorder suggesting that he bring forward the subject of another general Missionary Conference. If I had been impressed with the need of a Conference so early as 1887, I would have moved sooner. The fact that no one anticipated me, goes far to show that there is no general desire for a conference so early as 1887. As a member of the committee of arrangements for the former conference, I know something of the work to be done and the time required. I am decidedly in favor of postponing the conference two years at least, if not three-making it in 1890. A lady who favors 1889 suggests to me, that we always say 10 or 12, not 10 or 13, which more than makes up for the round number 1890.

I suggest the following reasons for postponement:-The time is now too short to make the necessary arrangements for 1887 and yet give the time that should be given for the preparation of papers. If the papers are to be really valuable, time is needed to collect facts and data, and to send for authorities and helps.

It will take time to settle the present question of the time, and then it will take time to get a committee of arrangements satisfactorily appointed and organized for their work. Dr. Williamson has already nominated them it is true, but it is hardly likely that the brethren named, or the missionary body at large, will consider the dictum of a single man as a satisfactory appointment. Each province or section of China will doubtless claim the privilege of appointing its own member of the committee of arrangements, as they did in the former case. This committee will require time to ascertain the wishes of their constituents in regard to subjects, etc., and to arrange a convenient time and place for their meeting. The northern ports are now closed for the winter, which greatly impedes communication with that section of China. By no possibility could a committee be properly appointed, and arrangements made for their meeting befere next May or June. After the programme of subjects is made out and circulated, numerous modifications will be required, which will necessitate correspondence and entail delay, before the programme is finally settled and writers ready to address themselves to their work.

China is large, and travelling expensive. A postponement of two or three years will give more time and opportunity to make provision for the necessary expense; also to mature plans whereby

attendance at the conference may be made to fall in with other ends relating to business or health.

The present is a time of general stringency in money matters. Nearly all American Missionary Societies, at least, are embarrassed, and are likely to be for a year or two to come. In many cases missionaries are in consequence crippled in private resources, while the Boards are not likely to entertain favourably applications for aid. This, be assured, is with many a very important matter.

Dr. Williamson's paper in the last Recorder is enthusiastic, but not convincing. It assumes more I fear than the facts will warrant. I look in vain for evidences of religious movement in China, or of the speedy decay of either Taoism or Buddhism. Whatever there is of movement in China now concerns mines, railroads, and waroutfit. The Missionary work, however, is moral and spiritual, and a Missionary Conference should be held with these ends chiefly in view. If we were to meet as a conference of engineers, I should consider the present time highly opportune.

It is true a desire was expressed by the last conference for another in ten years. This was the natural expression of the enthusiasm of the occasion. It is questionable however whether a cooler consideration of the whole question would justify another general conference quite so soon. A really interesting and profitable conference, with new and suggestive papers, will not be so readily achieved as it was before, when the whole field was new. Each added year will make the achievement easier, and its attainment more probable.

I like the editor's suggestion. The Shanghai local conference is entitled to take the lead. Let them first call formally for a vote from every mission station in China and by this vote decide the question of time. If they will then map out China and call for the appointment of a delegate from each section to represent it in forming a programme, and perfecting plans for the meeting of the conference, the business will go on satisfactorily. Even if the conference is postponed two or three years it is not too soon to initiate the preparatory steps.

Tungchow, December 9th 1885.

THE MISSIONARY CONFERENCE-A PROTEST.

BY REV. M. T. YATES D.D.

THE call for the expression of an opinion, on the part of the various district conferences, in regard to the time for the next general Conference of Missionaries, was, if we are to avoid serious confusion, timely. For, while we know that several have suggested 1890, Dr. Williamson, who has just come to dwell amongst us, has, in a letter in the Recorder for December, settled the question of time, so far as he is able to do it, in favor of 1887; and has assumed the authority to appoint a committee "to make preliminary preparation in regard to papers and procedure;" and to name Dr. Y. J. Allen as convener; and calls upon the district conferences to hurry up this matter and report to Dr. Y. J. Allen.

When I read Dr. Williamson's letter, and considered his reasons (?) for 1887, and his presumption in making these appointments, without consulting this local conference, I was, to say the least, surprised. But another glance at the letter showed that he must have consulted Dr. Allen, his Convener. I am sorry that the counsel did not produce better results;-but when we remember what Dr. Allen wrote to the Advocate of Missions, which was republished in the Recorder for October, there is not much ground for surprise. He says to his home friends;-"We must not cast about to see what others have done, or are doing here, for I tell you conscientiously, that there is nothing in this field to challenge our admiration, but much to be shunned and deprecated as wasteful and childish." If the faithful and persistent preaching of the Gospel of Christ to the multitudes, is a thing "to be shunned and deprecated as wasteful and childish," then so much the worse for him who wastes his means and forces in something else.

But I must notice Dr. Williamson's reasons for urging the earlier date of 1887. Considered in a religious point of view, they are apocryphal. To one who knows the truth about the Chinese. they seem to be the product of a man who is living in an ideal world-a veritable will-with-a-wisp. He says that "China has marvellously changed during these last ten years. There is a perfect ferment among all classes, especially among the reading, and educated men." China has been somewhat disturbed by the late war; but she has not seen her boasted power laid low at a blow;" on the contrary she is, in her own estimation and in fact, stronger, in everything that contributes to the stability of an empire, stronger than she was before the French war. She is moving slowly in the direction of defensive measures-telegraphs,

armaments, and some talk about rail-roads, and the development of her resources; but we hear not one genuine whisper, from any class of the people, about a revolution in religious matters-the 'change," in which missionaries are mainly, if not solely, interested.

Your space will not allow me to enter more than my protest against his other arguments:-1st, "That these wars, and the consequent action of foreign nations, have thrown China into the hands of Christendom as a ward," to be taught. 2nd, "That they have a knowledge of the living and true God almost universal thoughout the whole of China, under the name of T'ien Lau-yeh, or Lau T'ien-yeh, which requires only to be vivified, amplified and enforced." 3rd, "We have a code of moral ethics," (Confucianism), of the five constant virtues, which only needs "to be supplemented by the relationship between God and man, and another, the all-embracing virtue of love to God, to make the code almost perfect." 4th, Their system of ancestral worship. "Their ancestral feasts are observed, in reality, as family reunions where the spirits of the dead mingle with the living. Our duty here also is obvious." "There is thus wonderfully little to overturn in China. Our great duty is supplementing. Tauism and Buddhism are only excrescences in the body politic. They are perishing of themselves and are not worth refutation."All this is wonderfully like Jule Verne's explorations of unknown worlds. This concise summary of part only of Dr. Williamson's arguments, opens a new and wide field, through which I would delight to roam; one that affords themes on which I could furnish copy for The Recorder for many months; but I must forbear. Suffice it to say, I enter against these arguments, one and all, my most unqualified protest. I regard them as a mirage, and am surprised that any Christian teacher of the pure Gospel of Christ, could endorse them. They reveal the approach of a Three-headed Hydra, with which the faithful allies of Christ may as will prepare themselves to contend; for he is coming, yea is even at the door. "Hercules killed this monster by applying firebrands to the wounds as he cut off the heads;" and I doubt not the Lion of the tribe of Judah will be able, in his own way and time, to destroy this monstrosity. I am opposed, toto calo, to our attempting to graft the pure religion of Christ on to Confucianism; and I hope that most Christian teachers in China, and at home too, are of the same mind.

Under the circumstances, it seems to me that the best thing to do, is to wait for responses to the call for the expression of an opinion as to the time for the next general Conference. If the call is not responded to, it may be taken as evidence that the early date of 1887 is not desired.

DEAR SIR,

Correspondence.

MORE NOMINATIONS BY DR. WILLIAMSON.

Most inadvertently I omitted the name of the Rt. Rev. Bishop Moule, Hangchow, in the list of names of proposed committee for the preliminary steps as to general conference. Would you kindly permit me to supply the deficiency. And now, since the Rev. W. Muirhead has retured from furlough, I beg also to add his name. Cordially Yours,

A. WILLIAMSON.

DEAR SIR.

A CORRECTION.

In the Recorder for November, p. 434 there is an error that seems to call for correction. My brother, archdeacon Moule, is made to say, that; "At Santu and the neighbourhood there are nearly thirty Christians who.........have engaged to pay about two dollars each towards the Church Fund this year."

The Christians of Santu and the neighbourhood have shewn a very hopeful spirit by maintaining divine service among themselves with very little help indeed from paid agents, lending rooms for the purpose in three out of four hamlets, enduring persecution on the whole with exemplary patience, and meantime spreading a knowledge of the gospel among their heathen neighbours; and they have promised a small sum towards general Church expenses, but certainly not a quarter of the amount implied above. They are most of them exceedingly poor, living from hand to mouth; only about two householders among them being in more comfortable circumstances, of whom one is the least liberal of the whole number.

One other phrase needs modification;-"all can read intelligently" should be,-"a larger proportion than usual in our Chehkiang missions can read intelligently."

My dear brother's sketch of his visit, after six years absence, to a district in which he was the first to 'sow the seed of the Kingdom' is full of interest and truth; and I am sure he would be as anxious as I that there should be no heightening whatever of the colours of sober truth.

Yours faithfully,

Hangchow, November 18th, 1885.

GLEANINGS.

G. S. MOUle.

The British Bible Society Monthly Reporter for September acknowledges a donation of £1000 from the Rev. T. R. Fisher, a retired Wesleyan minister, which is to be used to promote the Society's work in China, and the Reporter for October acknowledges another donation of £1500 also for Bible work in China. Fortunately there are many who still believe the Bible Work, even in China, to be a most hopeful branch of missionary effort, and in many respects the foundation for all other work.

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