The age-herald., 1900-07-15

pr. J. W. Newman is the Presiding Elder of the Methodist church of North Alabama
 Dr. Newman has written a card in which he takes me severely to task for having furnished to this column several brief ob- servations on the work of missionaries Tn China He severely reprimands me for
 having quoted an interview, printed in one
 the great New York papers. with Consul
 Chow Among other things said by pr.
 Newman in his card is this statement
 Before editors begin to instruct the
 American public concerning the condition
 of missionary life it would be well for them
 to acquire the facts.''
 In handling me pr. Newman has not ex-
 hibited that spirit of Christian charity which I would have expected On the oth-
 CT hand, there pervades his card a spirit of intolerance. He would make it appear that I was an enemy of the great cause of missionary work and to the spread Of Christianity throughout the world. Just to the contrary. I believe in the Bible ut terance that we should go forth and preach the Gospel to all the nations of the earth. Iii China, however, I reassert that we are wasting money and going at our work, in a large measure, wrong end foremost I wrote about missionary work in China in the Age-Herald of June B. likewise quoted Consul Chow's interview in the Age-Herald of June 24. I printed Consul Chow's interview simply for what it was worth. adding, however that there was much truth in his statements, a fact which all men who understand the situation in China will admit.
 did not write ignorantly of the mission ary situation in the Far East I spent sev-
 eral months there and passed much of this
 time in the company of missionaries. In
 face of this knowledge, repeat, as I did on June-3 that much of "the great sums
 of money we spend in sending missionaries
 to that country is. from religious point of view, absolutely wasted There are missionaries in China who have done and are doing a great work. Standing forth as shining example Is pr. Young G. Allen, who has been in missionary work in China for forty years, or more. He went there
 as a young man. He learned the language
 and familiarized himself with the literature
 of China. He established a school and he
 eduacted the Chinese youth, in order that
 he might go forth and preach Christianity
 to his own people of his own country He would teach the Chinese through their own
 people, and he has advocated often the
 sending of Chinese youths to this country
 to be educated that they might return to
 China and teach and preach to their own
 people,.
 say that money is wsated in mission
 work in China because we are contributing great sums annually to send to that coun- try grown men, many of them over thirty
 years of age, to teach Christianity to the
 heathen How can they do it? It takes ten
 years or more for even the brightest intel feet to acquire a full and thorough knowl- edge of the Chinese language-a knowledge
 which will permit him to teach intelligently and to become forceful and effective Tn his arguments Yet we are flooding that coun-
 try with men, and women, too, who can be of no force. I know this I came in con-
 tact with them, and I saw that they could do nothing except live and endeavor to enjoy themselves.
 Dr. Newman, in his card, would endeavor
 to make it appear that I had asserted "that $l0OO gold equals s4O00 Mexican. What did say was that $1,OO0 in China is practi- cally equivalent, for living expenses, tc $4000 in this country This I reassert American money in China is exchanged fo1 Mexican dollars or Hong Kong or Shanghai bank notes, of the same commercial value as Mexican dollars. At the present rate o1
 exchange, and at the rate which has exist ed since 1895, one. gets bit over 5000 Mex -....-.-