English mission

“ No difficulty appears to have been thrown in the way of the mission, even in these distant stations; in fact, the people believing that all Europeans are under the protection of England would never think of injuring them. ”

“ Where innumerable forces are at work such as are implied in the impact of western civilisation upon the peoples of the East, or of Africa, it would be extremely difficult to state the exact impression made by the mission, even if we could survey the whole state of the people at regular and definite periods. ”

“ Like the Bishop of Durham, I believe 'that the unequal heritage which we enjoy, containing as it does, the common enjoyment of the highest forces for inspiring and disciplining a generous character, not only prepares us to face the problem of the organization of industry as a fellowship of service, but lays on us the obligation of doing so. The life of nations is a mission no less than the life of men, and unless the teaching of history misleads us, this is part of the mission of England. ”

“ Most Europeans take no interest in missions, look on missionaries as good men engaged in a Quixotic enterprise, and know almost nothing about their work, but still they treat them with courtesy. There are, however, some of our own countrymen who take a deep interest in our work, visit our schools, occasionally attend our native services, and contribute liberally to our mission schemes. ”

“ Cannot a person come home without being suspected of deep and ulterior motives? I may tell you at once, I am not on a mission to promote a better understanding between England and America. No person, however keen about it, can do much in that line. Things which are worth while are made by something better than missions or treaties. They are made only by great ideals in the hearts of the common people. ”

“ First, as an organisation, as the amazing product of English patriotic intelligence devoted to one sole end—the defence of civilisation against the immoral attack of the strongest military machine in the world. And then, so to speak, as a moral entity, for my mind was full of the sights and sounds of the preceding days, and the Army appeared to me, not only as the mighty instrument for war which it already is, but as a training school for the Empire, likely to have incalculable effect upon the future. ”

“ Oh, remember how God fulfilled that promise to England seventy years ago, when the French swept in fire and slaughter, and horrors worse than either, over almost every nation in Europe, while England remained safe in peace and plenty, and an enemy never set foot on God’s chosen English soil. Remember the French war, and our salvation in it, and then believe and take comfort. Trust in the Lord and be doing good; dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. ”

“ And some of us who have never been abroad will begin to talk of the great work we have performed. How we apples swim, don't we? To tell what we have done, when perhaps hundreds and thousands of brethren who have never been abroad on a mission in their lifetime would consider it a great calamity to be called to go on a foreign mission. ”

“ I have often propounded the view that the British Empire is an organization, due partly to accident, partly to opportunity, but partly also to the qualities and virtues of our race, which has been charged, as we believe, by a Higher Power, with a mission to mankind, and that mission, I have contended, has been carried out, on the whole, with no small measure of justice, righteousness, and success. But apparently I was all wrong. For I take up these German books and I learn that England is the arch-enemy of humanity. ”

“ If the honour, glory, and well-being of the child be dear to the parents, Great Britain should surely be more proud of the United States than of any of her colonies. We Britishers have a noble mission. The word I know is unpopular, for it has been foully misused; but it is in itself a good word, and none other will supply its place. We have a noble mission, but we are never content with it. It is not enough for us to beget nations, civilize countries, and instruct in truth and knowledge the dominant races of the coming ages. ”

“ Now, without doubt the sending of the missionaries has vastly improved conditions of human life in the foreign-mission lands. The missionaries have been the forerunners of great improvements. They have been the pioneers blazing out the paths along which both trade and diplomacy have gone with the newer and better civilization of the West. Civilization has developed marvellously in the western half of the world. ”

“ Each mission has behind it a history, and, before it, more or less of an aim and policy. It should be the ambition of every member of that mission to study and honour the one, and to be faithful and loyal to the other. The history of most missions in India is precious and full of instruction. ”

“ At any rate I may plead that during my own month in France I have been in contact with many leading men in many camps, English, French, and American, and both military and diplomatic, especially with the British Army and its chiefs; and so far from perceiving in the frankest and most critical talk of our own people—and how critical we are of our own doings those know who know us best—any sense of lost prestige or weakened power, my personal impression is overwhelmingly the other way. ”

“ And it is the undoubted duty of us English, who absorb people and territories in the high name of civilisation, to be true to our principles and our aim, and aid the great destroyer by any and every safe and justifiable means. ”

“ We have a multitude of people chastened by losses, ennobled by a common effort, needing support in that effort, perplexed by the reality of evil and cruelty, questioning and seeking after God. What does the National Mission offer? ”

“ As the field of their activities, ranging over entire continents, grows in scope and in importance, the aims and purposes associated with the first stage of their glorious mission must, in no wise, be either neglected or forgotten. ”

“ Would not the rigid definition of the aim of our foreign missions, by excluding a great many legitimate aims and methods, weaken and beggar our missions, which are strong in proportion as they admit all sorts of different aims and methods? There are men who speak and act as if they thought so, and in consequence welcome as a proper part of the missionary programme all Christian, social, and political activities. ”

“ Just before beginning a great battle on the sea, you remember that Admiral Nelson hung out a flag with these words for all to see: "England expects every man to do his duty." And so our great General, the Captain of our salvation, expects that every boy trained up in a Christian church will do his duty. ”

“ Our location is for a purpose. For if you and I believe in the mission of individuals who accomplish the purposes of Providence, we must believe in the mission of nations for the elevation of mankind to a better future. ”

“ Viewing the peculiar nature of this enterprise it is impossible to resist the conviction how entirely the work of missions is the work of the Lord. He must appoint the men for it; He must endue them with the needed qualifications ”

“ In the best interest of humanity, I venture to say that it is the duty of England to apply this power without further delay—its duty to itself, to its starving operatives, to France, to Europe, and to humanity. ”

“ Through all these arrangements a single aim is visible, that every man in England should have his definite place and definite duty assigned to him, and that no human being should be at liberty to lead at his own pleasure an unaccountable existence. The discipline of an army was transferred to the details of social life, and it issued in a chivalrous perception of the meaning of the word duty, and in the old characteristic spirit of English loyalty. ”

“ You who know something of the vastness of the English effort—you urge upon me that English writers whose work and names are familiar to the American public are bound to speak for their country, bound to try and make Americans feel what we here feel through every nerve—that cumulative force of a great nation, which has been slow to rouse, and is now immovably—irrevocably—set upon its purpose. ”

“ Any man who goes on a mission in these times, to the European nations, to the United States, or to the islands of the sea, and returns home with his scalp on, I think he should certainly acknowledge the hand of the Lord in it. ”

“ Missions are however a far greater thing after all than simple proselytism. It would require many a volume to tell of what they have done for civilization, freedom, the exploration of unknown regions, the bringing to light of ancient literatures, the founding of the science of comparative religion, the broadening of the horizon of Christian thought in the homelands, and the bringing of distant peoples into the brotherhood of nations. ”

“ I am charged to open—and keep open, if possible—all such districts and countries as I may explore for the commercial world. The mission is supported by a philanthropic society which numbers noble-minded men of several nations. ”

“ As we look around among our leading men, our statesmen, our legislators, the judges on our bench, the commanders of our armies, the men to whom this English nation commits the conduct of its best interests, profane and sacred, what do we see to be the principles which guide our selection? ”

“ God’s glory, we do not hesitate to affirm, has been more or less advanced by the conduct and policy of England in and during the warfare which has been recently accomplished in the East. All that we have done in it worthy of praise or remembrance, we have done, so we believe and confess, through Him, through his strength, through his teaching, through his Gospel, through the very circumstances under which He has placed us, and through the very constitutional dispositions which He has given us. ”

“ In searching the history of our own country, when it stood together as a united nation, waging just war, we find England, our mother country, whose language we speak, arrayed against us. But, on account of this bond of birth and language, should we cease to tell about the deeds of those men who freed us from her grasp and oppressions, and made us what we are? ”

“ One reason of the success of the mission work is the common-sense that prevailed at the outset in dividing the field among the different denominations, so that the minds of the natives should not be confused as to the character of the teachings they were receiving. ”

“ There one reaches the bed-rock of it all—the conviction of a just cause. What would it avail us—this pride of victory, of organisation, of science, to which these great despatches of our great Commander-in-Chief bear witness, without that spiritual certainty behind it all—the firm faith that England was fighting for the right, and, God helping her, "could do no other." ”

“ If we take the widest expression of such mission activity we find that to estimate the true value of such work we should be compelled to survey not only the mission and its activities but the social, moral, material, and spiritual state of the people among whom the mission was planted, and seek for signs of a change which we could trace with some certainty to the influence of the mission. ”

“ In the thoroughness of organization, the elements of permanency, the great variety of means used such as hospitals, schools, literature, and industrial helps, the present probably exceeds by far the early movement. The statesmanlike study by church leaders of the whole world-field, the steadiness of movement year after year, in spite of difficulties and discouragements, the careful systematic effort to inform and arouse the home church—these are marked features of the present foreign-mission campaign. They are such as to awaken the deepest admiration of any thoughtful onlooker. ”

“ In Western Europe, on the other hand, people have arrived by hard experience at the conviction that intelligence, capacity, culture, and energy, bring men to the front, and give them peace at home and power abroad. It is the knowledge of how to make the best possible use of their energy and abilities that has enabled the English to derive success from our victories and sacrifices. ”

“ Of all the fantastic tricks played by the bursting shells it was the most curious.
Chapter VII The Spirit Of The English When I left England for home I had just returned from France and had motored many miles in both countries. Everywhere in this greatest crisis of the century I found the people of England showing the most undaunted and splendid spirit. To their common enemy they are presenting an unbroken front. The civilian is playing his part just as loyally as the soldier, the women as bravely as the men. ”

“ Perhaps this is the secret of our finding so distinguished a soldier, Government envoy, Foreign Office commissioner, author, linguist, benefactor to science, explorer, discoverer, and organizer of benefits to his country and mankind at large, standing before the world on a pedestal as a plain unadorned hero, sitting by his distant fireside in a strange land, bearing England's neglect, and seeing men who have not done a tithe of his service reaping the credit and reward of his deeds—nay, of the very ideas and words that he has spoken and written. ”

“ How many American soldiers in Europe, I wonder, have looked about them, have used their sensible independent American brains (our very best characteristic) , have left school histories and hearsay behind them and judged the English for themselves? A good many, it is to be hoped. What that judgment finally becomes must depend not alone upon the personal experience of each man. ”

“ We English want an army and a navy; we don't like it when those fellows on the Continent swagger in our faces, and yet we won't pay either for the ships or the men. However, now that they've done away with purchase--Gad! I could fight them in the streets for the way in which they've done it!--now that they've turned the army into an examination-shop, tempered with jobbery, whatever we do, we shall go to the deuce. ”