Note 15 — Chapter XVI · CONCLUSION.

The longer one labours in Africa the more does he feel what a call there is in that land for Missionary effort. Christian agency could effect a great deal more if better directed. Here we have a land teeming with population. Each Missionary has a field for himself alone, perhaps as extensive as Great Britain which has its thousands of Clergy. In a quiet rural parish of Scotland we may have the United Presbyterian, the Free Church, and the Church of Scotland (all three Presbyterian.) This gives us three clergymen doing a work which one clergyman could easily accomplish. In the interests of Christ’s Kingdom this is surely a pernicious arrangement which is all the worse if the various Christian bodies instead of fighting with Home Heathenism fight with each other. What a great deal might be done “to make disciples of all nations” by employing existing agents! But it is said “Clergymen are unwilling to go to heathen lands”. This raises the question, ‘What encouragement have they to become Missionaries?’ The Church of England, for instance, has no difficulty in finding Clergymen who will become Bishops. A great deal depends upon the inducements that are held out, and we may say so without implying that the English Bishop is more mercenary or less self-denying than a city Missionary.