The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1868-12-02
The American Board of Commi ssioners
for Foreign Missions.


The American Board of Commi ssioners
for Foreign Missions.
This Board recently held its annual meeting
at Norwich, Connecticut Nearly seven hum
dred members were present,-all entertained
with generous hospitality in that beautiful
city.
Thirty new missionaries had been sent into
the foreign field The Board is out of debt.
The sum of $500, 900 is asked from their church
es for the current missionary year.
Respecting the missions in China, the Re
port shows the door wide open, but only four
missionaries in the Foochow mission, and eight
in Northern China. All the missionaries of
all the societies com bined do not make more
than one missionary to three million Of the
Chinese people
Meanwhile China approaches us. Soon she
will be but thirty days travel from our Allan
tic coat by means of the Pacific Railroad and
steamers from California And meanwhile too,
China, through her chief ambassador in this
country recently, says to us: PLANT your
shining cross on every hill and in every valley.
China invites your missionaries.
We add extracts from the General Survey
submitted to the Board.
"The anticipations of the earl triumph of
the gospel in India, on the part of the anti
missionary society of Madras, and of the eight
thousand persons convened at one time to de-
wise measures to prevent its spread, have not
been realised but the foundations of heather
ism have been undermined. Few educated
Hindoos-and they are now reckoned by tens
of thousands in all parts of the country-at
tempt to defend the old idolatrous usages. In
the natural opposition of the renewed heart,
they accept the thesm of Francis Newman
and Theodore Parker, while complimenting
the missionaries upon the immense services
they have rendered to. the social and moral
elevation of India Social ties retain many
truly enlightened minds from the confession Of
Christ. But the time Of great changes cannot
be far off. English laws, English schools.
English railways and telegraphs, five hundred
and fifty Christian missionaries from many
religious societies; fifty thousand adult COM
municants in Christian churches-these are
the forces at work for the moral renovation of
British India, (both sides the Ganges) on which
we may well invoke the divine blessing, with
confidence that the night is far spent and the
day is at hand. y
Summing up some Of the results of this
review, we find the 30 churches of our missions
in Asia and Africa twenty years ago, with a
membership of 765. now increased to 1855
churches and 5,706 members in the same fields {;
the 10 native preachers OF that time, including
the Hawaiian, now represented by l0l settled
IL tI,n
preachers few hundred dollars contributed
to the support of their own institutions changed
to nearly so 600 the past year, while 50 indie
finished work. These results, it is believed,
must be gratifying to every friend of Christian
missions. They show the preparation that
has been made for the yet more rapid advance
Of the gospel. The 332 devoted Christian men
and women from our churches, with corps
of 965 native laborers, 220 churches, set up as
light centres, with membership of $4,000
living witnesses to the excellence of the gospel
in thousands of villages and cities round the
globe.-this is the power for Christ, com
mended to our faith, our hopes and prayers. "
We have introduced to our readers this
view of the operations of the American Board
as a specimen of what is being done in the
world by various Protestant bodies, and with
the view of encouraging our own Church to
be jealous in this good cause. 1t is too late
in the day for doubts about the success of
Foreign Missions. 1t is also too late to plead
poverty and weakness, or the need of all our
men and means for our home work. Our
Church, we feel sure, understands that ques-
ton. The American Board speak of the edu-
cational value of Foreign Missions to the
churches at home in the matter of benevolence
as g far above rubies' They are right. And
moreover the value to ourselves of the argu
ment for the truth of Christianity from its
power amongst all men of all nations is also
Unreasonable. We shall get our reward in
these and many other ways, if We earnestly
and vigorously prosecute this great work, of
the foreign propagation of the faith.
And how great is the encouragement the
survey above given furnishes. Mark what
power there is in the idea of self support as it
works among the little missionary churches,
and what power in the idea of its being their
duty to pass forward the truth to those beyond
them. But nothing more delightful meets
our eye in all this survey than the influence
Of Christian Missions in elevating woman
throughout the Eastern world. The time has
indeed come las the Board says) for enlarged
efforts in this line for the prejudices against
them begin to give way everywhere.
What do we see in our own Church as invi-
ting us to enter fully on this work? Seven
young men already selt-devoted to it, and per
haps not less than two hundred candidates for
the ministry at the same time rising up all
around us to supply the home wants and to
overflow and pass onward to the heather.
These two hundred candidates in various
states of preparation are more, very many
more, than the Southern Church ever had at
any one time before. There is brighter day
dawning. Let us thank God and take cour-