ARGUMENT FOR MEDICAL MISSIONS

"I am in earnest; I will not equivocate, I will not excuse. I will not retreat a single inch and I will be heard."

-William Lloyd Garrison.

"My country is the world. My countrymen are all mankind.”

-William Lloyd Garrison.

"The world's a room of sickness, where each heart
Knows its own anguish and unrest;

The truest wisdom there and noblest art
Is his who skills of comfort best."

-Keble.

"I have long since ceased to pray Lord Jesus, have compassion on a lost world.' I remember the day and the hour when I seemed to hear the Lord rebuking me for making such a prayer. He seemed to say to me,

'I have had compassion upon a lost world and now it is time for you to have compassion. I have left you to fill up that which is wanting in Mine afflictions in the flesh for the body's sake, which is the Church. I have given My heart; now give your hearts.'"'

-A. J. Gordon.

"The student of social philosophy in determining the stage of civilization at which any nation has arrived regards as an almost infallible criterion the degree of esteem in which its women are held."

-Edward Balfour.

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THE HEALING OF THE NATIONS

I

ARGUMENT FOR MEDICAL MISSIONS

An old church in Damascus which was built in

Foreword. the early days of Christianity, had the words "To the Glory of God," inscribed over the portal. The Muhammedans captured it and plastered it over. Now the plaster has fallen and revealed the old inscription. In the spring days of the Christian Era deeds of mercy to the sick were counted part of the life of love which the Lover of Men had infused into His followers.

These kindly offices to those stricken in body have ever been a glory of Christianity. Though sometimes in the clash and clangor of doctrinal strife the Church has well nigh forgotten its ministry to the sick, yet its neglect has been but for a little season, to be renewed by at least some select and holy souls, with greater fervency and devotion.

The association of Religion and Medicine is perfectly natural. The Christian religion claims to complete and consummate, as well as to comprehend, the ends of Medicine. A God is only thinkable in terms of everlasting life. We are the ministers of life. He is the Prince of Life. We fight against death and are all defeated. Death assailed Him and He vanquished death." In this fight for length of life He is not ashamed to call us brethThe justification of the marriage between healing and preaching is the life of Christ. It was reserved for these closing days of the second thousand years of Christianity to revive on a comparatively large scale the work of treating the sick, in demonstration of the love of God toward their bodies as well as souls. In no sphere is this demonstration more needed than among those who have never yet heard the story of the Healer of Men. To

ren.

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the heathen abroad, as well as to the godless at home, the most convincing proof of the love of God is that it begets love to man.

Definition.

By a Medical Missionary we mean one who takes the fruits of the Christian Era as exemplified in modern Medicine and thus seeks to plant the roots of Christianity in nations and among peoples who are ignorant of its doctrines. The Medical Mission is, as Dr. Willard Parker used to say, Clinical Christianity. The late professor of medicine in Oxford University said recently in speaking on Medical Missions, "that any religion to be true must be such as would appeal to all men of every race, and in any period of its evolution," and that the religion of Jesus exemplified in the work of the Medical Missionary did this pre-eminently.

Purpose.

The purpose of Medical Missions is not simply philanthropic, though it finds its glory in self-sacrificing philanthropy. It is not merely an enterprise to secure the inestimable benefits of Western Medicine and Surgery for those in these terribly needy lands. Its purpose is not educative alone, though its educational influences are far-reaching; nor is it to provide a temporal benefit as a bribe for spiritual blessing.

The purpose of Medical Missions is to win men to Jesus Christ by the use of methods precisely comparable to those used by Christ when on earth, as the Great Succorer of Bodies, as well as Divine Saviour of Souls.

It is passing strange that attention should Necessity for need to be drawn to the sweet influences of Consideration. this love-work. It would have seemed so natural a deduction from the religion of which love is the essence, even if we had not the records of Christ's example.

"As every lovely hue is light,

So every grace is love,

and this sphere of service is surely one in which real abiding love to fellow-men can be more impressively shown than in almost any other.

Yet to-day its privilege and duty is by no means unquestioned. The very fact that North America and Brit

ain have two hundred and thirty times as many physicians as there are Medical Missionaries among the whole of heathendom, is ample proof that the Church has not yet begun to realize the claims of those other lands for loving medical attention. The united population of these two countries is but one-ninth of the heathen world.

Can it be that such a population requires 156,000 physicians and can spare less than 700 for the neglected one thousand millions in mission lands?

Love is the distinguishing characteristic of the Christian religion. Other teachers had set high standards of faith, others had preached the sternest self-sacrifice; some had even attempted to shadow forth a high hope in the future; but Christ alone among the great masters has placed this quality as the test of discipleship, and as the manifestation of the Godhead. "By this," we hear Him say," By this shall all men know that ye are MY disciples, if ye have love one to another." Not only has this been recognized by students of comparative religions; it is recognized by the world. The world cares little about the exercise of faith by professing Christians. It frankly confesses its inability to comprehend faith. As to hope, it allows the Church to please itself about its glorious hope of a hereafter, but when it comes to love, it is keen to observe and mark every breach.

If we are to follow in the steps of Jesus, it is not optional, but essential, that we walk even as He walked, in the path of love. As the justification for Medical Missions is the career of Christ, so the prime motive for their prosecution is love toward Christ and through Him toward men.

The Argument for
Medical Missions.

The argument for Medical Missions is manifold. Ne see it expressed by the appalling need for such work in the lands under consideration. This need is seen

in the ignorance displayed by those professing to be the physicians of these people.

The native doctors are absolutely ignorant of Ignorance. the rudiments of scientific medicine. The first thing an embryonic medical student in China does is to commit to memory the three hundred places in