Truth. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1901-1908, 1906-06-09
is 1T TRUE?


teresting article unoer the head lines
of What the Methodists Have Done
in India" which is reproduced below.
1t reads very nicely and is very TAX
ing, but some knowledge of the liter
ature spread abroad by the Minister
ial association of Salt Lake and the
members of that association individ-
ually engenders doubt as to the YER
acity of the statements OF what the
Methodists have done in India. We,
however, are disposed to be charitable
and will not judge Methodist Bishop
Bashford by the standard applicable to
the Salt Lake Ministerial association.
The article referred to reads as fol
lows:
While his highness the Maharaja,
Gaellwar of Baroda first in rank oil
the hindu princes assures American
reporters that it Is useless to try TO
convert his people, who are eager to
learn of us in the matter OF secular
education, but want to be let alone
in the matter of religion" the Meth
odist Episcopal church celebrates the
semi-centennial of its mission work in
India. Since that church claims to
have been perhaps the greatest sin
gle Christian force in the transAorma-
ton of India" it is presumably not 60
ing to be seriously discouraged by the
views OF the visiting Gaekwar, espe-
cially since the growing spirit OF CO.
operation among the denominations
has so frightened the outlook for for
eign missionary enterprise. Bishop j.
w. Bashford, writing from Shanghai,
30 Chrictian A1unontn
methodist, New York; argues
against the theory that the develop
ment of Japan and the renaissance OF
China are solely due to secular iniiu-
ences and he goes on to say that what
is true of Japan and China is far more
true of India. We read:
"The English government has rem
dered India an incalculable service IN
molding an indefinite number of war
ring states into a magnificent empire
of three hundred million people with
peace and order reigning throughout
her borders; in establishing railways
and fostering material improvements;
in alleviating famines and setting into
play the forces which will eventually
abolish them; in establishing freedom
OF speech and of the press, and in fos-
tering education and laying the foun-
dations of political institutions. But
it must be borne in mind that the CIV
ilization which Great Britain has
achieved for herself and is now devel-
oping in India rests back upon the
Bible, as Queen Victoria pointed out to
the Oriental deputation which sought
the secret of England's greatness.
Again, the most powerful leaven OF
Oriental civilization has been intro
duced into India, not by the English
government, but by the Christian
church, with her hospitals, schools,
colleges, and Christian literature, with
the preaching of the gospel, and with
the consecrated lives of missionaries
and the transformed lives and homes
of the native Christians. DR.. Dutf's
first school for boys in India, the Ba-
reilly Theological Seminary, and the
Santal and Buchanan training schools
for Christian workers; the Arcot, Gen
eral Assembly, the Gordon, Hislop,
Mission, st. Peters, and Trichinopoly
Christian colleges, each with over a
thousand students, and the one hun
dred and forty other Christian col
leges and higher institutions have
trained teachers for, and have largely
nodded, the one hundred and seventy