the child. As there are no suitable schools here, children must be
sent home to school at an early age. They cannot stay in the parental
home and attend school from there, as American children do, but must be
from childhood put into a boarding-school, and this takes money. Now
no missionaries' salaries are sufficiently large to enable them to lay
up much money, and unless there is a child's allowance there will be no
money for his education, in which event the missionary must sacrifice
his self-respect by asking some school or friends to educate his child.
He feels that if any one in the world deserves a salary sufficient to
meet all necessary expenses without begging, he does; and it hurts him
to give his life in hard service to {215} the church in a foreign land,
and then have his children educated on charity.
All mission boards should give their men an allowance for each child,
unless the salary paid is sufficiently large to enable them to lay
aside a sufficient sum for this very purpose.
The health allowance is also a wise provision because the climate is
such as often to necessitate calling in a physician, and doctors' bills
are enormously high. If the missionary is not well he cannot work; but
if he is left to pay for medical attendance himself out of a very
meager salary, all of which is needed by his wife and children, he will
frequently deny himself the services of a physician when they are
really needed.
The work of the missionary is most trying, and the demands on his
health and strength are very exhausting. The petty worries and trials
that constantly meet him, the rivalries and quarrels which his converts
bring to him for settlement, the care of the churches, anxiety about
his family, etc., are a constant strain on his vital force, in order to
withstand which it is necessary that he should have regular periods of
rest and recreation. Nature demands relaxation, and she must have it,
or the health of the worker fails.
It is customary in Japan for the missionaries to leave their fields of
work during the summer season and spend six weeks or two months in
{216} sanatoria among the mountains or by the seashore. Here their
work, with its cares and anxieties, is all laid aside. The best-known
sanatoria in Japan are Karuizawa, Arima, Hakone, Sapporo, and Mount
Hiezan. In most of these places good accommodations are provided, and
the hot weeks can be spent very pleasantly. Large numbers of
missionaries gather there, and for a short time the tired, isolated
worker can enjoy the society of his own kind; his wife can meet and
chat with other housewives; and his children can enjoy the rare
pleasure of playing with other children white like themselves. These
resorts are cool, the air is pure and invigorating, and the missionary
returns from them in September feeling fresh and strong, ready to take
up with renewed vigor his arduous labors.
It is objected to these vacations that they take the missionary away
from his field of work, and that so long an absence on his part is very
injurious to the cause. This is partially true; but a wise economy
considers the health of the worker and his future efficiency more than
the temporary needs of the work. The absence of the foreign worker for
a short period is not as hurtful as one would at first glance suppose.
A relatively larger part of the work is left in the hands of the native
helpers in Japan than in most mission fields, and these evangelists
stay at their posts {217} all through the summer, and care for its
interests while the foreigner is away. The same need of a vacation
does not exist in their case, because they are accustomed to the
climate, and they work through their native tongue and among their own
people.
The need of this missionary vacation is so evident that we need only
give it in outline. In the first place, the unfavorable climate makes
a change and rest desirable. As I have already stated, the climate of
Japan is not only very warm, but also contains an excessive amount of
moisture and a very small per cent. of ozone, and is lacking in
atmospheric magnetism and electricity; hence its effect upon people
from the West is depressing. Besides the climate, the missionary's
work is so exhaustive and trying, and its demands upon him are so
great, that a few weeks' rest are absolutely necessary. The same
reasons which at home justify the city pastor in taking a vacation are
intensified in the missionary's case.
Not least of these reasons is that the missionary may for a while enjoy
congenial society. Many of us spend ten months of the year isolated
almost entirely from all people of our own kind. The Japanese are so
different that we can have but little social life with them; and it is
but natural and right that, for a short period, we should have the
opportunity to meet and {218} associate with our fellow-missionaries.
The work which we do the remainder of the year is done much better
because of this rest and fellowship.
Dr. J. C. Berry, in a paper read before the missionary conference at
Osaka in 1883, discusses very fully this question of missionary
vacations and furloughs. After elaborating the reasons for them, which
reasons I have given in brief above, he says: "It therefore follows
that, because of the numerous and complex influences operating to-day
to produce nerve-tire in the missionary in Japan, regard for the
permanent interests of his work requires that a vacation be taken in
summer by those residing in central and southern Japan, the same to be
accompanied by as much of recreation and change as circumstances will
permit."
With all the care and precaution that can be taken, with systematic
rests and vacations, there soon comes a time when it is necessary for
the missionary to return to his home land, to breathe again the air of
his youth, and to replenish his physical, mental, and moral being. All
the mission boards recognize this and permit their men in this and in
other fields to return home on furlough after a certain number of
years. The definite time required by the different missions before a
furlough is granted varies from three to ten years, the latter period
being the most general. {219} But this has been found to be too long,
and failing health usually compels an earlier return. Some boards have
no set time, but a tacit understanding exists that the missionary may
go home at the end of six or eight years.
At the end of the prescribed period the missionary family is taken home
at the expense of the board, and is given a rest of a year or eighteen
months. During this time, if the missionary is engaged in preaching or
lecturing for the board, as is generally the case, he is paid his full
salary. If he does no work he is sometimes paid only half his salary.
This is very hard, as the salary is just large enough to support him
and his family, and their expenses while at home are almost as great as
while in the field. If the salary is cut down the pleasure and benefit
of the furlough are curtailed. If the missionary in the service of the
board exhausts his health and strength in an unfavorable climate it
seems but fair that he should be properly supported while endeavoring
to recuperate. When a church at home votes its pastor a vacation,
instead of cutting down his salary during his absence, it is customary
to give him an extra sum to enable him to enjoy it. Why should not the
same be done for the missionary? He should at least be permitted to
draw the full amount of his small salary.
Against these vacations is urged their great {220} expense to the
boards, the greater loss to the mission because of the absence of the
worker, and the moral effect of frequent returns upon the church at
home. All of these objections have weight, but they are far outweighed
by the reasons that necessitate the furlough. The accumulated
experience of the different boards makes the judgment unanimous that
these are necessary. The judgment of competent medical men also
confirms the statement. Dr. Taylor said in the Osaka conference: "I am
convinced that a missionary's highest interest requires, and the
greatest efficiency in his work will be secured by, a return home at
stated intervals." Dr. Berry said in the same conference: "The new and
strange social conditions under which the missionary is obliged to
work; the effects of climate, intensified in many cases by comparative
youth; the absence of many of those home comforts and social,
intellectual, and religious privileges with which the Christian
civilization of to-day so plentifully surrounds life; the home ties,
strengthened by youthful affections,--all these combine with present
facilities of travel to render it advisable that the young missionary
be at liberty to take a comparatively early vacation in his native
land."
From an economic standpoint it is wise to grant these furloughs. It is
poor economy to keep the workers in the field until they are completely
{221} broken down, and then have to replace them by inexperienced men,
who will not be able to do the work of the old ones for years. Far
wiser is it to let them stop and recuperate in the home lands before
this breakdown comes. It costs less money to keep a missionary well
than to care for him during a long, unprofitable period of sickness. I
quote again on this point Wallace Taylor, M.D., who, in the paper
referred to above, said: "The present haphazard, unsystematic methods
of most missions and boards is attended with the greatest expense and
the poorest returns. Some of the boards working in Japan have lost
more time and expended more money in caring for their broken-down
missionaries than it would cost to carry out the recommendations herein
made. Again, I observe that many who do not break down begin to fail
in health after the fourth or fifth year from entering on their work.
They remain on the field, and are reluctantly obliged to spend more or
less time in partial work, while experiencing physical discomfort and
dissatisfaction of mind. Very many of these cases would have
accomplished more for the means expended by a furlough home at the
close of the fifth or sixth year.... Over $90,000 have been expended
in Japan by one mission alone in distracted efforts to regain the
health of its missionaries."
These furloughs are also needed to keep the {222} missionary in touch
with the life of the home churches. The West is rapidly progressing in
civilization, in arts and sciences, and in theology as well. The
missionary who spends ten or more years on the field before returning
home finds himself in an entirely new atmosphere, with which he is
unfamiliar. He looks at things from the standpoint of ten or more
years ago; his methods of work, his language, all are belated. In
order that he may give to the nascent churches of Japan the very best
theology, the very best methods, and the very best life of the Western
churches, it is necessary for him to return frequently to breathe in
their spirit and life and keep up with their forward march.
For the missionary's personal benefit he should be permitted to come
into frequent contact with the home churches. A too long uninterrupted
breathing of the poisonous atmosphere of heathenism has a wonderfully
cooling effect upon his ardor and zeal, and is trying to his faith. He
needs to come into contact with the broader faith and deeper life of
the home churches, and receive from them new consecration and devotion
to his work.
The church at home needs also to come frequently into contact with its
missionaries. Nothing will so stir up interest and zeal in the mission
cause as to see and hear its needs from living, {223} active workers,
fresh from the field. If missionaries were more frequently employed to
represent the cause to the churches at home perhaps our mission
treasuries would not be so depleted. Mission addresses from home
pastors are abstract and theoretical; those from missionaries are
concrete and practical. The former speak from reading, the latter from
personal experience. The address of the missionary comes with power
because he speaks of what he has seen and felt, and his personality is
thrown into it.
For the sake, then, of the work abroad, of the missionary himself, and
of the home churches, missionaries should be required to take regular
furloughs at stated intervals, and should spend them in the home lands.
How long can the missionary safely work in Japan before taking his
first furlough? That will depend upon the nature of the man himself,
and the kind of mission work in which he is engaged. The average
length of time spent here by the missionaries before the first furlough
is about seven years. There are no men more competent to pass judgment
upon this matter than Drs. Berry and Taylor, who have spent the better
part of their lives here, in the service of the American Board, and who
are thoroughly acquainted with the conditions that surround us. Dr.
Berry says: "I do not hesitate to affirm that the {224}
'ten-year-or-longer rule,' still adhered to by some missionary
societies, and by many missionaries as well, is too long for the first
term.... I indorse what in substance has been suggested by my friend
Dr. McDonald, viz., that the time of service on the field prior to the
first furlough be seven years, and that prior to subsequent furloughs
be ten years; this plan to be modified by health, existing conditions
of work, home finances, and by individual preferences." Dr. Taylor
says: "My observations have led me to the conclusion that the first
furlough ought to be taken at the close of the fifth or sixth year, and
after that once every eight or ten years."
We have yet to look at the trials and sorrows, the encouragements and
joys, of the missionary. We have already looked into the missionary's
home; let us now endeavor to look into his heart. If the former is his
_sanctum_, this is his _sanctum sanctorum_; and I trust my missionary
brethren will pardon me for exposing it to the public view.
We will pass by all physical hardships, such as climate, improper food,
poor houses, etc. Although these are often greater hardships than the
people at home know, they are but "light afflictions" to the
missionary. His real trials lie in an entirely different sphere.
The greatest hardship the missionary has to {225} bear is his
loneliness and isolation. Separated almost entirely from his own race,
he is deprived of all those social joys that are so dear to him. The
thought of his kinsmen and friends is ever in his mind, but alas! they
are so far away. He must go on year after year living among a people
from whom an impassable gulf separates him, leading the same lonely
life. For the first year or two he rather enjoys the quiet and
privacy, but by and by it becomes almost unendurable. Dr. Edward
Lawrence has correctly styled the missionary "an exile." We cannot do
better than quote his words: "Very many of the missionary's heaviest
burdens are summed up in the one word whose height and breadth and
length and depth none knows so well as he--that word 'exile.' It is
not merely a physical exile from home and country and all their
interests; it is not only an intellectual exile from all that would
feed and stimulate the mind; it is yet more--a spiritual exile from the
guidance, the instruction, the correction, from the support, the
fellowship, the communion of the saints and the church at home. It is
an exile as when a man is lowered with a candle into foul places, where
the noxious gases threaten to put out his light, yet he must explore it
all and find some way to drain off the refuse and let in the sweet air
and sun to do their own cleansing work.... The {226} missionary is not
only torn away from those social bonds that sustain, or even almost
compose, our mental, moral, and spiritual life, but he is forced into
closest relations with heathenism, whose evils he abhors, whose power
and fascinations, too, he dreads. And when at last he can save his own
children only by being bereft of them, he feels himself an exile
indeed."
The missionary's life is full of disappointments. Men for whom he has
labored and prayed it may be for years, and in whom he has placed
implicit confidence, will often bitterly disappoint him in their
Christian life. Boys who have been educated on his charity, who are
what they are solely by his help, will frequently be guilty of base
ingratitude, and, worse yet, will repudiate his teachings. The native
church not having generations of Christian ancestry behind it, and not
being in a Christian environment, is often, it may be unwittingly,
guilty of heathen practices that sorely try the heart of the
missionary. The struggle between the new life and the old heathenism
is still seen in the church-members and even in the native ministry.
Each missionary, if he would be well and cheerful in his work, must
learn to cast all burdens of such a character on the Lord, and not be
oppressed by them.
One of the greatest trials some of us have to bear is that we must live
in an environment so {227} unconducive to personal growth and
development There is a great deal of ambition lurking about us still,
and we do not like to see our own development cut short because of an
unfavorable environment, while our friends and classmates at home, who
were no more than our equals in former days, far surpass us in
intellectual development and in influence and power. Perhaps a
missionary should be above such thoughts and should be perfectly
content with a life of obscurity and partial development; but
missionaries are still men, and to many an ambitious one the limits
placed upon his personal development are very irksome.
But why are the conditions unfavorable to high personal development?
Because those stimulants to prolonged, vigorous effort that exist in
the West are lacking. The stimulus of competition, the contact of
thinking minds, so necessary to enlist the full exercise of a man's
powers, are largely wanting. One is shut up to his own thoughts and to
those he gets from books, and his development, in so far as it does
proceed, is very apt to be one-sided. This is the reason why so many
missionaries are narrow, unable to see a subject in all its relations
and to give due importance to each.
The work of the missionary from beginning to end is one of
self-sacrifice and self-effacement. {228} There is no future for him
in the councils of the native church. As the work grows and extends he
must gradually take a back seat. As the native ministry develops, the
foreign minister is less and less needed, and must gradually withdraw.
Again, the home land, father and mother, brothers and sisters, friends
and companions, are just as dear to the missionary as to any one else.
Yet it seems inevitable that he will gradually grow away from them and
be forgotten by them. Prolonged absence brings forgetfulness; diverse
labors and interests put people out of sympathy with one another. When
the new missionary first comes out to his field, communication between
him and friends is frequent. Letters pass regularly, little
remembrances are sent from time to time, and he is still in touch with
his friends at home. But by and by a change comes. After one or two
years exchange of presents and remembrances ceases; gradually the
letters cease also, and none come except those from his immediate
family. Even these become less and less frequent. The arrival of the
mails, which at first was looked forward to with so much joy, is now
scarcely noted. An old American gentleman who has spent some forty
years in the East tells me that he now receives from the home land not
more than two or three letters per year. {229} After a few years of
residence here one feels that he is largely out of touch with the life
of the West, and that he is forgotten, by home and friends.
It seems to me that churches and friends can do much toward preventing
this, and toward brightening the lives of their missionaries, if they
will. Let pastors and friends throughout the church take special pains
to write interesting personal letters to the missionary. It will do
him good just to be remembered in this way. It is natural that the
same kindness, attention, and love that are shown to the home pastor
should not be shown to the missionary, because he is so far away and
the strong personal element is wanting. But if the churches would make
an effort to share their kindness and beneficence between the home
pastor and the foreign one it would be highly appreciated by the latter.
Especially does this seem but fair in a case where a church supports
its own missionary and where most of its members are personally
acquainted with him. Such churches speak of having two pastors; one at
home ministering to them, and one abroad, in their stead, preaching the
gospel to the heathen. Why should not these pastors have equal place
in their hearts and receive equally their kindness and their gifts? If
any preference is shown, it would seem that it should {230} be to the
foreign pastor, for he has much the harder work. But the foreign
pastor is generally forgotten, while the home pastor, with whom living
is much cheaper, is paid a larger salary; he is given a vacation, and a
purse to enable him to spend it pleasantly; at Christmas he is
substantially remembered, and all through the year he is presented with
numerous gifts and shown many favors. The poor lonely missionary is
paid a moderate salary and is given no further thought. Imagine the
feelings of a man in a mission field, supported by one church which
always speaks of him as its foreign pastor, as he takes up a church
paper and reads of the favors shown the home pastor; among them such
items as "a nice purse of fifty dollars," "a three months' leave of
absence, and expenses to ----." He cannot help thinking with a sigh of
that unpaid doctor's bill of fifty dollars incurred by his wife's ill
health last summer, or of the money needed to send his boy home to be
educated.
A church should try to remember its pastor abroad as well as the one at
home. The home pastor himself could see to it that this is done. If
he should simply say, when handed a present for some purpose, "Our
foreign pastor has not been remembered by us, and he needs it more than
I, therefore we will send this to him," the result would probably be
that he and the foreign {231} pastor would both be remembered. If
little expressions of appreciation and kindness, such as this, were
occasionally shown the missionaries, it would do much to brighten and
cheer their hard lives. These are little things, but the little things
have much to do with our happiness.
If the missionary life has its sorrows and disappointments, it has its
pleasures and joys as well. It is with great pleasure that I turn from
the dark to the bright side of our lives.
First I would mention that sweet peace and joy that come from the
consciousness of doing one's duty. The true missionary feels that God
has called him into the work, and that he is fulfilling the divine
will. This knowledge brings with it much pleasure. The joy is all the
sweeter because of the sacrifices that must be undergone in answer to
the divine call. He feels not only that he is in the field by the call
of God, but also that God is with him in his work, leading, guiding,
blessing, helping him. He hears the words of his Master, "Lo, I am
with you alway," and he gladly responds, "In Thy presence is fullness
of joy." The brooding Spirit of God is especially near the Christian
worker in foreign lands, and imparts to him much joy and peace.
Another of the missionary's joys is to see the gospel gradually taking
hold of the hearts of the people and renewing and transforming them.
It {232} is passing pleasant to tell the gospel story, so full of hope
and joy, to these people whose religious ideas and aspirations are only
dark and gloomy. Who could desire sweeter joy than to watch the
transforming power of the gospel in the heart of some poor heathen,
changing him from an idol-worshiping, immoral creature into a pure,
consistent Christian? It is the good fortune of the missionary to see
such changes taking place in the people to whom he ministers. And what
a change it is! For gloom and dejection it gives joy and hope; for
blind, irresistible fate it gives a loving providence. The change is
so great that every feature of the face expresses it.