TWO PRESIDENTS.
It was our good fortune while in Rio to be received by the President of
the Republic, Dr. Nilo Pecanha. Missionaries Shepard, Langston and
Ginsburg and Dr. Nogueira Paranagua escorted me. When we started I
suggested that we take a street car. Not so those Brazilians! We must
go in an automobile. We were very careful to wear our Prince Albert
coats, too; for, above all things, the Brazilian is a master in
punctilious ceremonies. We were ushered into the waiting room by a
doorkeeper, a finely-liveried mulatto with a large chain around his
shoulders to indicate his authority. The waiting room was full of
people, but we were not kept waiting long. We sent in our cards and
soon we heard our names announced and we were led into the presence of
the private secretary. After a few words of explanation by Dr.
Paranagua, the secretary retired to ask the President if he would see
us. He returned presently and showed us into the audience chamber,
which was a large and tastefully decorated room. Around the walls were
several groups of chairs, placed in true Brazilian style somewhat as
follows: A cane-bottomed divan was set with its back to the wall, then
several cane-bottomed chairs were placed at right angles to it in two
rows facing each other, usually four in a row. The President guided me
between these chairs and took a seat on the divan and motioned me to a
seat by his side. He is a man of slight build, with a mild expression
which wins confidence. He was most informal in his speech and spoke in
a candid and unreserved manner which quickly put us at ease.
I told him, through an interpreter, that we had come from a visit to
the Minister of the Interior, with whom we had been in conference about
the status of Brazilian schools. The President expressed his great
pleasure over our coming to see him and said that he had personal
knowledge of what our denomination is doing and of some of the workers.
He was satisfied that our object was altruistic and for the good of the
country and people; that so far as depended upon him, he was ready to
give us the full benefit of his official position. As proof of his wish
to see absolute religious freedom, he cited an instance of how he had
protected some monks in the Amazon Valley recently. These men were in
straits and he had sent soldiers to liberate them, and then turning
with a smile to Ginsburg, he said that he also never abandoned his
friend Solomon when he was attacked. He refreshed our minds upon the
fact that lately, when certain priests in the city of Rio had attempted
to resist the government over a disputed piece of property which had
been granted them under the old regime, he gave them to understand that
if they did not behave themselves, the door was open and they could
leave the country. They soon came to terms. As to his successor, the
President said that the incoming President was of the same party and
would carry out the same policies, ideas and ideals. These policies
meant absolute liberty of thought, conscience and speech, which is
guaranteed by the constitution. Before the interview closed, he again
expressed his pleasure at receiving a representative of an American
institution, convinced as he was that the propaganda of our schools,
morals and ideals would draw the two nations closer together, and that
he was ready to encourage us to that end. "We are following the ideals
of the United States," he said, "which we recognize as our elder
sister." He expressed peculiar pleasure over the prospect of our
establishing a college and he assured us that the Brazilian government
would put no obstacle in the way of our purpose, but that it would do
all in its power, on the other hand, to encourage us.
While we are meeting Presidents, I would like to introduce you to
another one upon whom the salvation of Brazil depends more largely than
it does upon any occupant of the chair of chief magistrate. It is
possible for the man who has been elevated by the ballots of his people
to serve in a large way the moral good of his people and we thank God
for all rulers who rule with justice and liberality in the interest of
liberty and the common good. But far greater and far more serviceable
than these are those choice spirits who, by embracing the gospel of
Christ, give themselves devoutly to bringing in His reign in the hearts
of men. Such spirits, by the sheer force of their characters, wield a
far more abiding influence for the help of their fellows. The man I
wish to introduce is Dr. Nogueira Paranagua, the President of the
Brazilian Baptist Convention.
He belongs to one of the oldest and most aristocratic families of the
State of Piauhy. He was Governor of his state at the time of the
institution of the Republic. After the establishment of the Republic,
he was elected to the National Congress for a term of four years. Then
he was elected to the Senate and served nine years. He is a skilled
physician and is married to a Swiss lady of fine family. His family
connections occupy one quarter of the State of Piauhy. He is, at the
present time, Treasurer of the National Printing Concern, which does
not occupy all of his time. The remainder of his time he devotes to the
practice of his profession and to the preaching of the gospel. He is a
deacon in the First church in Rio. He is not an ordained minister--he
is simply an humble man of God. He is an ardent patriot who believes
that the salvation of Brazil can be realized only through the gospel of
Christ, to which he gives his life and all.
Now I, for one, believe that the theory of Dr. Nogueira is the one that
will finally lead Brazil into the fullness of life and power it is
capable of attaining. It is well to have written in the constitution
the guarantee of religious and political liberty. It is well to have
Presidents who courageously carry into effect the provisions of this
constitution, but the highest good is not attained until behind all
documentary guarantees is a personal righteousness in the people. Dr.
Nogueira's insistent advocacy of Christ for Brazil is the one thing
that gives assurance of a genuine righteousness that will exalt the
nation.
He is the President of a remarkable body. It was our privilege to
attend the Brazilian Baptist Convention which met in Sao Paulo, June,
1910. It was composed of sixty delegates, about one third of whom were
missionaries. The remainder were natives. They came from all parts of
Brazil. One man from the Madeira Valley traveled three weeks on his
journey to Sao Paulo. They represented 109 churches, which had a total
membership of 7,000. These churches increased by baptism twenty-five
per cent, last year. They maintain a boys' school and a theological
school at Pernambuco, a school for boys and girls at Bahia, a boys'
school at Nova Friburgo, a girls' school at Sao Paulo and the crown of
the school system, the Rio Baptist College and Seminary in the capital.
They have a Publication Board to produce Sunday School and other
literature, a Home Mission Board to develop the missionary work in the
bounds of Brazil, and a Foreign Mission Board, which conducts foreign
mission operations in Chill and Portugal. While their country is so
needy, they believe in the principle of foreign missions so thoroughly
that they gave last year for foreign missions as much per capita as did
the churches in the bounds of the Southern Baptist Convention. One
night during the Convention, I addressed them upon the subject of
foreign missions, and after I had finished speaking one of the
missionaries came forward and said he had thought that in as much as he
had given his life to foreign mission work, he was not under any
special obligation to contribute money to this cause, but now he saw
his error and proposed to give as a means of grace and in order to
discharge his duty to the larger cause.
What a privilege it was to attend this Convention! All of us took our
meals at the Girls' College and by this arrangement we had a most
delightful time socially. It is a fine body full of good cheer, hope,
faith, courage, consecration. To come to know them--missionaries and
native Christians alike--is to enter into fellowship with some of the
choicest and most indomitable spirits that have ever adorned the
Kingdom of our Lord.