is one of the clearest witnesses of the world-wide love of God. The missionary enterprise is one of the finest triumphs of the Christian spirit and in it the very heart of Christianity is revealed. In this missionary enterprise, as in all human things, there are many offshoots that cause the thoughtful Christian some serious misgivings. Some of the missionaries have been men of narrow minds who have regarded all religions outside of Christianity as inventions of the devil; and so they have antagonized the very people they wanted to help. Some workers have been driven on by motives that would not bear the light of day; and so their work has not fully commended the Gospel they preached. Denominational rivalries have hindered the work at home and abroad, and have disgusted the non-Christian peoples. Inspired by a false conception of the kingdom of God men have gone from village to village preaching the Gospel for a witness, as they called it, and taking little interest in the real life of the hearers. But when we have admitted all this the story yet remains half told. For some of the best and noblest souls of the world have been leaders in the missionary movement; and many men and women have wrought for their backward brethren in the most Christly and sympathetic spirit. Missionary workers have been real statesmen and have laid the foundations of great nations that are yet to be. Devoted mission workers have gained the confidence of the people and have earned the name of Jesus Christ's man. The missionary movement is one of the finest triumphs of the Christian spirit, and it stands as something wholly unique in the world. All this is much, but all this is not all. The achieve ments noted are great and notable and are worthy of all honour. And yet they have not solved the problems of the world or brought the redemption of human society. In fact, as we shall see, the problems of to-day are the most perplexing that have ever confronted the Christian worker; and many students of human affairs declare that human society is undergoing a steady and disheartening deterioration. This is certain that Christianity to-day is coming face to face with a great unfinished task which will challenge the faith of the Christian worker and will try the power of the Christian Gospel. It is not possible and it is not necessary here to define this task in detail, for in the chapters that follow some aspects of this task are considered. A brief survey of the world may however aid us in grasping the situation as a whole and in conceiving the task before us. II. THE PRESENT SITUATION It is important that the Christian worker have a clear conception of the essential Christian principle. It is important that he know how Christianity has unfolded and what it has done in the ages past. But it is essential no less that he know his own age and understand the task to which he is directly called. 1. To-day approximately one-third of the race is nominally Christian and there is a section of the world, which includes a dozen leading nations, that may be called Christendom. In this Christendom perhaps onethird of the people are directly affiliated with the churches, while a large proportion confess in some way their allegiance to Christian principles. But in the lands where Christianity originated and the Gospel won its first triumphs there remains only a nominal and inert Church with a most formal and unvital Christianity. In the lands of Europe where Christianity has been longest known we behold the tragic spectacle of a Church that has lost the allegiance of the people and the people turning away from the Church in masses. And in other lands where the Church has a stronger hold upon the people, we yet find many men challenging the Church to show its right to claim the Christian name and doubting in their hearts whether it is worth while to maintain the institution any longer. 2. In the generations past known as the Christian centuries, many evils have been combated and many gains have been made. One evil after another has been attacked in the name of Christianity and its power has been broken. Like a mighty conqueror the Son of Man has marched down the centuries overturning an evil here, ending an abuse there, breaking the shackles of millions of men, lifting the gates of great empires from their hinges and changing the whole drift of history. The child has been brought in from the servant's room and placed in the midst of the disciples; the position of woman has been changed; the curse of human slavery has been abolished; gladiatorial shows have been suppressed; the prisoner has received some consideration at the hands of men, and government has become democratic and humane. The record of these Gesta Christi fills many pages of history and is a most splendid story of victories. But alas! there is another side to the story and this must be told. In the lands where Christianity prevails and its victories have been achieved other great evils no less fatal and pernicious are prevalent and growing. In many so-called Christian nations the consumption of alcoholic liquors is steadily increasing; the proportion of criminals and defectives is growing; in the United States over ten per cent. of the marriages end in the divorce court; and most serious venereal maladies threaten the deterioration of the race. Of one European country it has been said that the people are the most religious and have the greatest preachers; and yet it has more drunkenness and illegitimacy than any country in the world. 3. In this Christendom we find some great cities, numbering from two to three millions and from six to seven millions. In these cities are thousands of Christian men and women and hundreds of Christian churches of one kind and another. And yet in these cities there are plague spots, called slums, that constitute the standing menace of the city and the steady shame of our Christianity. The cities of Christendom are the heaviest handicaps that Christianity has to bear. This is not hearsay and declamation, as any one, alas ! can easily ascertain for himself. The evidence in part at least is presented in such books as "The Life and Labours of the People of London," by Charles Booth; "In Darkest England," by Gen. Wm. Booth; “How the Other Half Lives," by Jacob A. Riis; "The Bitter Cry of the Children," by John Spargo; "If Christ Came to Chicago," by Wm. T. Stead. Professor Huxley tells us that in his earlier life he spent some years in an East End parish, and what struck him was the astonishing dullness and deadness of the existence of the whole people. Some years later he made a journey around the world and saw savage life in all conceivable conditions. "But I can assure you that in this experience of mine I saw nothing worse, nothing more degrading, nothing so hopeless, nothing nearly so intolerably dull and miserable as the life I had left behind me in the East End of London; and had I to choose between the life of these people in the East End and the life of the savage, I would distinctly choose the latter." And he says further that if there is no hope of a large improvement of the condition of the human family, "I should hail the advent of some kindly comet which should sweep the whole affair away as a desirable consummation." A recent traveller in Africa, Bryden, writes thus: "I have visited nearly every native town in Bechuanaland, and I say unhesitatingly that these people are at this moment physically and morally better off than thousands of the population of our great cities of Great Britain, living happier and healthier lives by far than seven-tenths of the poor folks at home." Well then may the Poet Laureate sing so sadly : Is it well that while we range with science, glory. City children soak and blacken soul and sense in There among the glooming alleys progress halts Crime and hunger cast our maidens by the thou- There the master scrimps his haggard sempstress There a single sordid attic holds the living and There the smoldering fire of fever creeps across And the crowded couch of incest in the warrens -Locksley Hall: Sixty Years After. |