ligion of Christ! O what a moral charnel-house does our world appear! What a valley of" dry bones!-exceedingly dry!" "Can these dry bones live?" Yes, they shall live! The mouth of the Lord hath spoken it. And even NOW, amidst the darkness and misery which brood over the greater part of the earth, there are appearances, every where, which promise the approach of better days. A short time since, a large part of the inhabited globe was absolutely closed against the missionaries of the cross. But now it may be said, without exaggeration, that the whole world is opened wide to the bearers of the gospel message.-Miller.

THE RIGHT SPIRIT.

Those who best knew the pioneers of modern missions assure us that they had enthusiasm, and in full measure too; else they had never been what they were, nor achieved those things which have endeared their names to us forever. Without this, the shoemaker of Leicester had never been able to give the bible to a score of nations in their own language, and, though uninspired, to speak to the tribes, so that every man should hear in his own tongue. Without this, he had never broken the silence of Pagan darkness and dominion in the jungle, nor made the gods of a hundred cities to quake with fear at the sound of Jehovah's name. Without this, he had never kindled that fire in the East, whose light already shines to the ends of the earth. No; he was as much under the influence of enthusiasm as was ever Alexander or Napoleon. Like them, he exerted all his energies, moral, intellectual and physical, for the promotion of one great, though better object. The most sublime spectacle that the sphere of human existence or human action affords, is a noble soul thus roused to its highest pitch of excitement, every faculty strained to its farthest tension, and all bent on accomplishing a single purpose,-the salvation of the heathen. Every thing within, and every thing without, he made subservient to this. His purpose fixed, his bias received, every pulsation of his heart drove him on, one step nearer to the consummation of his object, and one step nearer to heaven.

The same zeal which fired the hearts of the best missionaries, and the same spirit which has controlled and sustained them in their work, should fill and animate the whole body of the church. There is indeed a zeal kindling, and a better spirit pervading the Christian community. But personal and individual responsibility must be more universally felt. It is absurd, unequal, and unjust, for the mass to lay the heavy burdens of the whole heathen world upon the shoulders of a few missionaries, and executive officers of missionary societies, while they themselves will not touch them with one of their fingers. It is wrong, it is unscriptural, to represent missionaries as a different class and order of men from ordinary Christians. It is a most pernicious doctrine, calculated to persuade the mass that they were born into Christ's kingdom to be drones, while a few only are to collect the honey and fill the hive. The Christian at home and the Christian abroad are not only brethren, but fellow-laborers also; engaged in the same great and holy enterprise of the same Master, and under the same high obligations to live and labor for his cause. When one goes out as a foreign missionary, his name should not be heralded through the length and breadth of the land, as a voluntary martyr of benevolence, who has made great sacrifices, done works of supererogation, and almost deserved to be canonized. He has done well, no doubt; but no more than his duty. The Lord reward him for his work. Let Christians love him for it, esteem him very highly for his work's sake, and nobly sustain him in it. But let others feel, that if they are Christ's, they also are his missionaries, or his agents, to be employed in some way for the conversion of the world.

To hasten the tardy progress of better sentiments, a higher stand must be taken by the friends of missions. A reformation must be effected at home. A generation must be raised up, whose minds, and hearts, and hands, are all trained and disciplined for the cause. Young converts must be taught, that to

all the command is given by the Savior, Go; and to every Christian is addressed the Macedonian cry, Come. A risen, ascending Savior above him, and the perishing millions around him, are commanding and entreating him to do something for the conversion of the world.

God spares the Christian's life after conversion, not merely to fit him for heaven, but to use him in carrying on his designs here below. He can be happy only in doing the Christian's work. If all were more busily employed in their Master's vineyard, there would be less of sorrow, and gloom, and discontent. The Savior's plans for evangelizing the world open greater sources of joy, and supply more abundant means of happiness, than the modern church has yet fully experienced, or even explored. A missionary age must be a happy age. Earth would have new charms for the Christian, if this were more fully realized. Next to being in heaven with Christ, would be the pleasure of laboring to extend his kingdom here on the earth. What a wonderful provision of the gospel economy is this,-to make frail men agents in bringing the nations unto Christ, the messengers of light and life, of spiritual freedom and eternal joy, to the slaves of superstition, the captives of sin and Satan. Surely it is a pleasant thing to live. It is a goodly thing to live. It is a noble, glorious thing to live, if life be not wasted, but spent in carrying out such designs of Heaven, and scattering such blessings among men. That Christian who is unmoved in a time of missionary awakening, has reason for anxiety and alarm. The world will sooner or later be converted; and can he endure the thought of dying without having himself done any thing towards effecting its conversion?

It ought to be proclaimed from the pulpit, and taught in the Sabbath school, it ought to be written on our phylacteries, and engraven on our door-posts, that every Christian is designed to be, in some sense, a missionary. He should first inquire whether he is called personally to enter the field. If this is not expedient or feasible, let him go by his representative, whom he helps to support. Let him go in prayer, in spirit, and in sympathy, with those who can go to labor and die in heathen lands.

Young converts, when glowing in the first warmth of Christian love, are in a proper frame to receive right impressions of duty, if the influences without correspond to the obedient desires within. If the church stand on as high ground as their religious obligations demand, if missionary intelligence is circulated, correct principles of duty taught and enforced, and a missionary atmosphere created, the new convert will always be converted into the spirit of the older Christians, and at once rise to the high standard which they maintain. While the spiritual conflict between the divine influence and the rebellious and stubborn will is carried on in his struggling and agitated bosom, he will feel, that, if he be converted at all, it must be into a missionary church. In the first gush of his holy love, let it be whispered in his ear, that he is a missionary now, to live, not only to perfect his own faith, but also to strive that others may be saved. Such a sentiment will find a ready response. The pliant desires of his ardent soul will clasp around such a truth, with a firm and sweet embrace. Correct impressions, made on his first entrance into the new world in which he finds himself, will be permanent. The right bias received at such a time, can scarcely fail to be retained through life. His first inquiry will be, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" And in that way in which he can do most to promote the world's conversion, and the extension of Christ's kingdom, he will joyfully labor, whether in this sphere or that, whether at home or abroad.

Is this a visionary idea? Is such a state of things in the Christian community impossible, or improbable? No; it has been already, at least partially, realized. It was realized in the first,-the missionary, age of the church. Its record is incorporated into the volume of sacred writ, and stands there for our instruction. By the present generation it should be renewed, and more fully carried out. There must be a revival of the same consecration of self and substance, and the same appreciation of the paramount importance of Christ's kingdom in comparison with all the petty affairs of life, before we shall witness that general spread and triumph of the church over the whole earth, to which prophecy points us, and for which the faithful earnestly pray and anxiously wait. The first attempt of the church to evangelize the world did indeed but partially succeed. But the causes of their failure of entire success are now manifest. We have the light of their example to guide us on our way. We have all the experience derived from the attempts made since that time. It is no experiment we make.

It is not an unknown and unexplored path in which we are required to tread. We behold not only the success, but also the wrecks, of those who have gone before. We see the rocks on which they have split, and, if we are wise, may avoid them. We have the same principles and doctrines on which to build our hopes, the same written command, and the same promise of divine agency and success which they had, and also the experience of those who have gone before, to assist us in making a more successful trial. There has never been a time, when, to human view, the work could be prosecuted with such reasonable expectations of a full and glorious consummation, as at the present day. The fields seem white for the harvest, and nothing waits but our recreant selves.

There is a vague impression resting on the minds of many, that the great enterprise of the world's evangelization will be accomplished in some unknown, unexpected, and perhaps miraculous manner. What are the secret purposes of Jehovah, what miracles he may perform, or what unforeseen revolutions he may bring to pass, we do not, and we cannot, know. But whatever wonders he may work, he has promised no miraculous agency to effect those things which he has commanded the church to perform. And until we receive a new revelation, or a new commission, we should labor in the same manner as did the inspired disciples to whom the charge was immediately given. Now, as then, the application of divine truth will effect the work. The preaching of the cross will still conquer and subdue the world, and transform every vanquished soul into a friend and an ally. The impetration of the Spirit will give efficacy to means, and insure success. Christ is himself the great leader of the enterprise, and it cannot fail. All power is given unto him, and he must, he will, conquer. And the revelation of his final triumph has been made to us, because we have a part to act in accomplishing the work. Human means and agencies are to be employed, and the whole moral power and resources of the church are to be husbanded, and directed in reference to this grand result. Far-reaching plans are to be laid; an immense amount of labor is to be expended; and great revolutions are to be effected, greater than the world has ever yet witnessed.

There must be a revolution of sentiment, a mighty change of opinion. And this must be wrought by voluntary and special effort, made for this specific purpose. The Christian community must be made to believe that the missionary cause is not only more vast, but nobler far, than any other in which men are, or can be, engaged; that all other enterprises and purposes of life, all hopes raised, and ends realized, sink into insignificance when compared with this. This opinion may already prevail to some extent; but it must be made universal in the church. It must be interwoven with all her sentiments, opinions, and doctrines. Christians must learn to prize worldly wealth, only because it may be used for carrying out God's plans of mercy here on the earth. They should covet learning, and discipline, and eloquence, and the power of moving and governing men, only because they are fit offerings to be laid on the missionary altar. Every thing should be rated by its tendency to promote the great enterprise of a world's salvation. Then would they count themselves valuable in the Christian economy, chiefly as means to greater ends. Then would the salvation of every soul be twice joyous; once, because a soul is saved; again, because another laborer is added to the gospel band, and the moral power of the church increased.

True, other enterprises beside the missionary cause are important. Other objects, public and private, demand attention. The multiform interests of life, which concern and occupy mankind, are not to be neglected. But the salvation of the human family should be the chief object of human effort, as it was the great purpose of the Savior's life and death. All other purposes and objects are minor, subsidiary, relative to this.

There must, also, be a revolution in the church as to conduct, habits, and objects of pursuit. Christians must be brought to identify themselves generally with the great work of the world's conversion. From principle and from habit, they should make every thing else subservient to this. No strength should be lost; no energies wasted; no power expended; unless it will in some way promote the great design. The moral and physical resources of the church must be called out, and employed. The reflex influence upon the church itself would be immense. Not only would it purify and elevate the Christian stand

ard, but would develop energies tenfold greater than we have ever known. Neither kings nor empires, philosophers nor schools, have exerted that influence which the church might exert, if the whole Christian community were so interested and directed, so trained and disciplined, that all should harmonize and cooperate for the promotion of this work. It is the unmeasured might of the mass, exerted in the power of the omnipotent Spirit. But the mass must be enlisted, harmonized, and employed. As in the Roman army every soldier carried his bundle of sticks, to cast against the wall or into the trench about the besieged city, and thus open a way of access to themselves for conflict and for victory, so every Christian should be provided with his bundle, for the war which we wage against the kingdom of our foe. There is no trench about the heathen world, none around China, or Persia, or Ethiopia, too deep to be filled, if every man will cast in his bundle. There are no walls so high, but a way may be made over them, if all will do their duty. No defences of timehonored usages, no ramparts of hoary superstitions, are impregnable to the spiritual hosts of the Redeemer.

In the first age of the church, what wonders were wrought by a little band of Christian soldiers, with only the naked cross, the Holy Spirit, and the spirit of sacrifice. With the same spirit of sacrifice now, and with her present resources, what, under God, could she not accomplish? How long before the idols of the East would be broken, and scattered to the four winds of heaven? Budhism and Brahminism, fetish-worship, caste, suttee, and all heathen rites and abominations, would be swept from the face of the earth. Before the light of the gospel they would vanish, like darkness at morning's break. They would flee away, and there would be no place found for them any more.-Prof. J. A. B. Stone.

American Baptist Missionary Union.

DESIGNATION OF MISSIONARIES.

INSTRUCTIONS OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.

By the Foreign Secretary.

In the November Magazine, p. 437 of last vol., some account was given of the public religious services held in Boston in view of the near departure of several missionaries under appointment to eastern missions, Messrs. Jewett, Van Meter, Moore and Benjamin, and their wives. We have concluded, after a little delay from causes which need not be stated, to publish some extracts from the "Instructions" then delivered, together with the addresses by Rev. Messrs. Neale and Church. In publishing the extracts we owe perhaps a word of explanation to our home readers. They are designed mainly for the eye of our missionary brethren abroad, all of whom take the Magazine, and read it; and who all, in remembrance of things which they have seen and felt, will comprehend, in a way in which home readers may not, the pertinency and seasonableness of the sentiments therein expressed. At the same time we hope they will not be wholly devoid of interest to those of our readers who are here at home; and perhaps they will suggest some subjects of profitable reflection.

Delay in sending reinforcements.

There is another class of trials to which you will be exposed; such trials, we mean, as may grow out of the employing of fellow-laborers; or, to state it more accurately, the omission or supposed neglect to employ fellow-laborers in such numbers and of such character as may in your judgment be needed. The severest trials to which missionaries have been subjected, at least some of the severest,-and we fear in certaiu

cases the premature prostration and death of valued missionaries,—are traceable directly or indirectly to this cause: the severity of the trials having been aggravated in the cases alluded to, by influences against which you will do well to guard.

The nature of this class of trials, and the way to meet them, will more fully appear if we state in what circumstances they ordinarily occur.

Our first illustration is in the solitary position of a missionary who, in consequence of the removal of an associate laborer by death or other cause, is left to bear alone the weight of his charge together with the superadded burden devolved upon him from his now absent brother; although before he was barely competent, with the countenance and coöperation of his fellow-laborer, to bear his own burden. Witness the late condition of Hongkong station, of Akyab, of Sandoway, and of Nellore; not to designate others. On your arrival at your respective stations, the other members of our missionary stations remaining as they were at our last advices, it will be our happiness to be able to state that every occupied station of our Missionary Union in Asia, with the exception of Amherst in the vicinity of Maulmain, is in charge of at least two associate missionaries. And this will be in accordance with our approved and settled policy, as being indispensable not only to the health, comfort and highest usefulness of each individual missionary, but to the right measure of security for the continued occupancy of a station, and for the perpetuity of our missionary work in any place; to say nothing of the preservation of what has been already accomplished and of investments of property, labor and character. But this desirable state of things may not long continue. Even while we are here, causes are in operation, which will soon sever in twain some of our little missionary companies, and one and another and another will suddenly find that helper and friend is gone. And such, at no distant day, may be the order of Providence with some of you; and you will look to your native land and to the Missionary Union with irrepressible yearnings and confident expectations of speedy succor. Closely analogous to this class of exigencies, and sometimes affecting the same identical stations, are those in which missionaries have labored long and successfully in their allotted spheres, but their strength begins to wane. Toil and exposure, heats and damps and pestilential exhalations, and fever, and unalleviated, unintermitted cares, and sympathies poured out like water, have done their work. The laborer must retire to rest a while, the weak to recover strength, the dying to live again. But how shall he leave in the wilderness his precious charge? the church he has gathered, his schools, his native assistants, his hopeful inquirers?-Perhaps disease has laid upon him its deathly grasp; and in the near and certain prospect of closing his earthly labors, he calls as from the chambers of the grave for helpers,-successors,-men who shall enter into his labors, who shall reap what he has sown and gather where he has strawed. Such was the cry of the lamented Comstock. So Reed and Slafter and Crocker and Clarke have called. So Goddard and Abbott and Bronson may call, and others whom we forbear now to name.

Another class of exigencies demanding earnest regard, are consequent, but not the less urgently, on the superabounding grace of God bestowed on his missionary servants, opening wide doors of usefulness, giving to his word free course, multiplying believers, -churches,-raising up and presenting for culture and employment a native ministry. The missionary abides in strength; his hands are made strong by the mighty God of Jacob. But who are all these? They come as clouds, and as doves to their windows. The fishers of men have cast their net as the Lord had said unto them, but now they are not able to draw it by reason of the multitude. Thus God has added increase to the Karen Mission. He has not only filled their bosom with sheaves, but he has poured them out a blessing till there has not been room to receive it. And so we trust it may one day be with you; when converts, made willing in the day of God's power,