NOTES AND COMMENTS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXIV, Issue 10411, 8 April 1897, Page 5

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

L .tatement by Sir William Macgr.egor, Pj. * a published among our cable hLjes yesterday, dealing with the slow rLf« M made by the missions in New Pt j se ) a question of great interest ll' and of vital importance to the rhrirtian Church. Sir William admits that missions contribute powerfully to the - client and moral advance of the airy, but ,ears th b their P ro S resß " 'tardy that the complete evangelisation 5 the island appears so far off as to make 1 question of little real interest to lop)! now living. Tb;s statement is inKing as showing thepoint of view from which a sensible practical man, by no oeans hostile to misiioniry work, regards L matter. There is a natural desire Log men for tangible and striking rewits, and they are inpatient of slow processes extending over centuries. This Lstion has recently bein vigorously disLed in England owinj to Mr. E. W. Beckett, M.P., having referred disparag. My 0 the small result of mission work in India. In reply to ihe oft-used argument as to the want of access of modern missions as compared with those of the wr ly church, the Biship of Newcastle ojotes the great Bishop Lightfoot to the •fleet that in A.D. 250 tin Christian popu,tion of the world was but one in 150, whereas now at the lowst estimate it is one in 5 i^ e&n Farrar mß kes it one in three)! that in A.D. 250 Christiana formed hat a minute fraction )f the population of Neo ■ C'aesarea, one of the largest towns in Asia Minor; tJat there wore but 50,000 Christians at Rone out of a population of a million or a million and a-half, iod that native Gaul vas not much more Christian than native India in 1873. The Bishop of Newcastle also shows that 250 years elapsed between the crushing of early British Christianity by the Saxons and the conversion of Sussex! that the Roman Empire was not evin superficially converted before A.D. 395 ; that the conversion of central and northern Germany occupied two centuries; that toe Christianity of the Scandinavian nations lasted from 800 to 1030, and that of the Slavonic family from the tenth century to the fifteenth or sixteenth, Even in 1230 human sacrifices were being offered up in Prussia, and serpents and lizards were objects of worship. The Bishop asks, have those who criticisu the slow progress of missions mastered these dot*, that they may know what slow progress really means

Canon Gore, of Westminster-wind there it no one, perhaps, whose opinions upon inch a question will be given more weight -takes a somewhat different view to that expressed by the Bishop of Newcastle. Referring to the " slowness of the method gf God," he points out that at the present time it cannot be said that with a great number of races there is a great and immediate hope of widespread conversion. It does not seem to be so with the Japanese or with the Chinese. It does not seem to (a so with the greater part of the races of India. We must not be surprised at it, he •ays, because they are looking to other quarters for help. In some places they are looking to what European civilisation can do for them; in others there is a reaction towards the religion and customs of their forefathers. They have nob by any means worked through the resources of their own Eastern civilisation, nor through the Hurces of the superficial civilisation we ire bringing to them. Canon Gore further points out that "God leaves nations and individuals to work slowly though all the resources of their own nature and their own surroundings, till, at /ait; in very despair of themselves and in lery despair of Him, the race is brought to the point of abject need, or sense of its own incompleteness or desire of something Which opens its heart to the inner leadings of God." This may be true, but in spite of the teachings of history earnest Christian men will be impatient when they see—as in the ease of our own Maoris and of the Australian blacks—races of men in danger of becoming extinct before their evangelilatiou is completed. Sir William Macgregor in his report expresses the feelings of thousands of loyal Christian men and women who are disappointed with the results achieved, although it may be contended, considering the fact that modern missions are hardly a century old, their (access, as Dean Farrar has urged, is "glorious and unprecedented" when viewed in light of past history. At any rate the Christian Church, in spite of disappointment and apparent failure, cannot relax her missionary efforts, for it has been shown that want of faith in Christian missions implies loss of faith in Christianity itself. Or, to use the words of Bishop Westcott, "this work is at once the sign and the measure of our faith in the universal Gospel." It seems that modern missions may cordially welcome the appeal to history, and have rather to fear that splendid impatience of this restless age, which longs for immediate results, and results which (an be represented in sensational figures.

' Lord Cromer's Report on Egypt in 1896 shows that thore has been no pause in the gaud work which has been done on the Nile under British guidance in the last fifteen years. From every point of viaw progress bas been so marked as to make the change which has come over the country a veritable revolution. It would be difficult to say whether the improvement bas been greater materially or morally. Finance flourishes, (0 that whilst indemnities have been paid, conversions effected, and other operations, (mounting in all to some fifteen millions, have been carried out, the Egyptian debt to-day is only some three millions more than it was in 1383. As a matter of fact the debt isnow being paid off at the rate of over threequarters of a million sterling a year. What has been accomplished in the Army and the judiciary are patent to all. It is Sir John Scott's proud boast that corruption has practically disappeared fom the magistracy. Whilst the country benefits so much as a whole, the peasant benefits in particular. He has been emancipated from tho corvee, •nd last year the Government made an Mperiment in State loans which has warned the Greek' usurer that if his demands for interest are unreasonable, the Government will enter into serious competition with him. As with the retrospect so with the prospect. The outlook is eminently satisfactory. It • i" be noted with interest that Lord Cromer anticipates a highly prosperous future for the Egyptian sugar industry.

The crisis in the East is very acute, and the situation is about as grave as it well could be, There is great excitement in jj Greece, and the populace of Athens are | parading the streets clamouring for war. | On the frontier, however, all is quiet,' | although a conflict between the Greek and I Turkish forces may occur any moment. | Farther fighting has occurred at Crete. I the Italian admiral, who is in com- |. tt »ed of the combined fleets, will | not act in a similar position ip the |- operations against Greece. The British |. o»ernment have refused to discuss a I "notion by Sir W. V, Harcourt, for an ad- ■ dress to the Queen against British forces %■ Ming employed against Greece or Crete, p on the ground that it did not raise a direct issue of want of confidence in (he ■ iMJaUirjr, A diicntiipo bu taken place

in the House of Commons on the food supply of Great ' Britain in the event of war. The King of Italy in his speech at the opening of Parliament described the European situation as "everywhere normal." A somewhat sensational torn baa been given to the Transvaal raid enquiry by the production of a private letter written by Sir John Willoughby to the War Office, in which he asserted that Dr. Jameson had told him the Imperial authorities had assented to the raid.