Although in the Report of your Committee very brief mention is made
of the work among the Chinese of this country, it is not therefore
to be inferred that that work is being neglected, nor that it is
failing in the ends for which it was undertaken. Rather is there a
deepened conviction of its importance and increased encouragement
in the prosecution of it; but in estimating the importance of the
work we are not to consider alone the Chinese in this country,
though they are a body of men of sufficient number to call for
all, and more than all, that has been done for them. But we look
beyond the 75,000 Chinese in California to the 400,000,000 in their
own land. The Christian world through their missionaries, and by
personal intercourse, are coming to understand this people better
than they once did. Instead of the race of barbarians, stupid
and immovable, which they were once thought to be, those who are
well-informed accept the assertion of the Rev. John Ross, who says,
“They are beyond comparison the most intelligent of non-Christian
peoples; if any race surpasses them in industry, it is only the
Anglo-Saxon.” * * * * *
But how is the Christian church to have a part in remodeling the
institutions and customs of that vast nation? Not by any one method
alone, but one of those which Providence has opened, is doubtless
to be through the agency of Chinamen converted here and returning
to their homes to preach the Gospel to their countrymen. It cannot
be questioned that there will be a place and need for those trained
under the institutions of the Gospel to go to China and plant the
same institutions there; yet the converted Chinamen can do some
things and exert an influence in some directions not open to others.
The career of Yung Wing furnishes a striking illustration of this.
Of humble parentage, converted while at school in this country, he
conceived the plan of bringing Chinese youth of promise to this
country to be educated. He returned to China in 1855, without
money, without influential friends, having almost forgotten his
own language. For sixteen years he studied, taught, served the
government, worked his way upward, and won to his views officers
high in authority. In 1871 his plan was adopted by the government,
$1,500,000 placed at his disposal, and more than 100 selected
Chinese youth were brought to this country. Though his experiment
has now received a check, and perhaps will not be carried on
further, even its success so far is a standing proof of influence
exerted by a Christianized native such as no other could hope to
exert. And not only so, it has by no means been a failure even in
itself considered. The young men who have gone back to China from
our colleges and schools and Christian families have gone back far
other than they came.
It is even a question whether they may not be more to be feared
by the Chinese government as revolutionists than as though they
had returned thoroughly converted Christians. But all will have
received new ideas. Even those who have been chased through the
streets by the hoodlums of San Francisco have learned some new
ideas. They can distinguish between a Christian and a politician
and know who are their friends and what makes them so.
If in a generation we could send back to China a score of Yung
Wings we should do more for the conversion of China than by any
other method open to us.
The Report speaks of a plan for establishing a new mission in
Southern China as being under consideration. To your Committee
it would seem the part of wisdom to move slowly in this matter
so long as the present facilities are offered for labor in this
country, especially as it is uncertain how long these facilities
may continue to be enjoyed.
Thirty different Mission Boards are already occupying points in
China, and though their 1200 laborers are wholly inadequate for
the work of evangelizing China, yet they furnish in their various
stations, points from which laborers may go out, so that the
call would seem to be for men to recruit the missions already
established, rather than for forming new ones. Especially will a
separate movement of this kind be unnecessary if the converted
Chinese of this country are able to carry out their purpose
of establishing a mission of their own in the country back of
Canton. The very fact that they are entertaining such an idea,
and earnestly pressing it, speaks volumes for the work which this
Society has already accomplished, and opens a glorious vista for
its ever expanding career in the future.
Your Committee would propose the following resolution:
_Resolved_, That in view of the small demands made upon the
treasury of the A. M. A. by the work among the Chinese, and the
great returns which that work promises, the constituency of this
Society are under the most solemn obligations to furnish for this
branch of its work all the means that can be employed consistently
with a wise economy and with due regard for the encouragement of
self-help by the converted Chinese themselves.—_Rev. A. E. P.
Perkins, Chairman._
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