PROTESTANT PROSELYTISM IN EASTERN LANDS [Footnote 103]

[Footnote 103: 1. The Gospel in Turkey, being "the Tenth and Eleventh Annual Reports of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society." Published at the Society's Office, 7 Adam Street, W.C.; at Nisbet's; and Hatchard's, London. 1864-5
2. The Lebanon: a History and a Diary. By David Urquhart. London; Newby. 1860.
3. Journal of a Tour in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Greece. By James Laird Patterson. M.A. London: Dolman. 1852.
4. Prospectus of "the Syrian Protestant College." Issued by "The Turkish Missions-Aid Society." London. 1865.]

There are few impartial and well-informed Protestants who will not confess that their missions throughout the world have invariably proved to be utter failures. No matter to what sect or denomination they belong, or from what country or association their funds are derived, Protestant missionaries, as preachers of that gospel about which they speak so much, never have converted, and we believe never will, convert the heathen save by units and driblets, hardly worthy of mention. In India, in Turkey, in Africa, among the South-Sea Islanders, and the Red Indians of America, the result of Protestant missionary labor is the same wherever it has been tried. The people to whom their missionaries are sent may, and often do, become more or less civilized from intercourse with educated men, and often learn from those who wish to teach them higher matters, some of the arts and appliances of European life. Some few certainly embrace what their preachers deem to be Christianity; and occasionally, but very seldom, small communities of nominal Christians are formed by them. But to bring whole regions of the inhabitants to the foot of the cross—to convert whole nations to Christianity—to prove that their converts have embraced a system in which a man must do what is right as well as believe what is true—are triumphs which have hitherto been reserved for the Catholic Church, and for her alone.

But, even humanly speaking—and quite apart from all considerations of the truth as existing only in the ark which our Lord himself built—can we wonder at these results? Are there any who have sojourned in, or even past through the lands where missionaries of both religions work, and have not compared the Catholic priest with the Protestant minister who has come out to preach the gospel in those countries? Take, for instance, and up-country station in British India. Is there a Protestant missionary in the place? If so, he is a man with considerably more than the mere script and staff of apostolic days in his possession. As wealth goes among Englishmen in the East, he is perhaps not rich; but he is nevertheless quite at his ease, and certainly wanting for nothing. He has his comfortable bungalow; his wife and children are with him; the modest one-horse carriage is not wanting for the evening drive of himself and family; nor is the furniture of his house such as any man of moderate means need despise. He has a regular income from the society he represents; and his allowances are generally such as, with a little care, will allow of his living in great comfort. And, finally, if he falls sick, too sick to remain in the country, the means of taking him home again to England or America are forthcoming at a moment's notice. He is generally a good linguist; for having nothing else to do daring six days of the week, he devotes much of his time to the study of the vernacular. [{343}] He is respected by the European officers of the station; for he is often the only person they ever see in the shape of a clergyman. He is almost always an honest, upright man, with little or no knowledge of the world, and, if possible, less of the natives to whom he is sent to preach. This, however, does not matter; for, except among his own personal servants, he makes no converts, and has but few hearers. There is no positive harm in him, but as little active good. He is a fair sample of a pious-minded Calvinist, but is certainly no missionary, as Catholics understand the word. So far from having given up anything to come out to India, both he, his wife, and his—generally very numerous—offspring are much better off than if he had remained in his native Lanarkshire or Pennsylvania. If he belongs to the Church of England, he is very often a German by birth, and appears to have "taken orders" in the establishment without having for a moment abandoned his own peculiar theological views. Some few Englishmen—literates, hardly ever University men—are to be found here and there, as English Church missionaries; but these are and far between, nor do their labors often show greater results than those of their Presbyterian fellow-laborers. Even Dr. Littledale [Footnote 104] speaks of "the pitiful history of Anglican missions to the heathen;" and he might with great truth have extended his verdict to the missions of every other denomination of Protestantism.

[Footnote 104: See The Missionary Aspect of Ritualism, in the Church and the World. (London: Longmans.)]

In contrast to the Protestant, take the European Catholic missionary in the East, as apart from the native-born priest. He is invariably a volunteer for the work, either a monk or a secular priest, who aspiring to more severe labor in his Master's vineyard, has chosen the hard and rugged path of a preacher of the gospel in pagan lands. As a general rule, you will probably find him living in an humble room in the native bazaar, and depending for his daily bread upon the charity of his flock, or the contributions of any English Catholic officer or civilian who may happen to be in the neighborhood. He is Catholic in his nation as in his creed; for you may find him French, Belgian, Italian, Spanish, Irish, or English. The present writer has met a French nobleman and the son of a wealthy Yorkshire squire laboring and preaching as Jesuit Missionaries to the natives of India and the poor Irish soldiers who form so large a portion of every garrison in that country. Is it, then, to be wondered at if, notwithstanding their superior means and far greater worldly "respectability," the Protestant missionaries do not succeed as ours do; or rather, that whereas our missions are never without fruit, theirs seldom show forth even a few sickly leaves? But the simple fact is, the missionary spirit—or rather the spirit which leads a man, if he believes that duty to God calls him to abandon family, wealth, comfort, health, nay, life itself—never has, and never can be, understood by Protestants, whether climbing the heights of ritualism, or sunk in the depths of Socinianism. Catholics are often angry with Protestants, because the latter are uncharitable respecting monks, priests, and nuns. Catholics are wrong in being angry. Hardly any person who is not a Catholic can understand the spirit which moves men and women to make such sacrifices for the love of God, and counts the loss as so much gain. The very idea of these acts is to him as color to one who has been blind from his birth: he not only cannot understand it, but you cannot explain it to him. This is a truth to which every convert will bear testimony, after his eyes have been opened to the truths of God's one and only Church, and which even few of those who have been Catholic from their youth upward can realize.

But notwithstanding "the pitiful history" of Protestant missions to the heathen, the work of these gentlemen in that direction is not deserving of [{344}] other sentiment than that of pity. If men will labor in fields where they can bring forth no harvest, and if others will pay them for doing no good, the affair is theirs, not ours. They never can do harm to the Church in those regions, for they achieve neither good nor evil to any one, further than by giving the natives in places where there are no Catholic missionaries a very erroneous idea as to what the duties of a Christian teacher ought to be. Not so, however, in those countries where Protestantism has sent its emissaries to undermine the faith which flourished among the inhabitants centuries before the very name of Protestant was known or heard of. To help such undertakings, "The Turkish Missions-Aid Society" was established and is kept up, and it is to the two reports of that society at the head of the list of works under notice, that we would call the especial attention of Protestants, even more than Catholics, throughout England.

The "Laws and Regulations" of "The Turkish Missions-Aid Society" are divided into nine clauses, and in the second of these we are told that—

"The object of this society is not to originate a new mission, but to aid existing evangelical missions in the Turkish empire, especially the American."

What these "evangelicals" missions are, and to whom the "American" missionaries are sent, we shall see presently. As a matter of course, the society is supported by the very cream of "evangelical" Protestantism, having Lord Shaftesbury for its President, Lord Ebury as Vice-President, and Mr. Kinnaird as Treasurer. The subscriptions are very large indeed, and from the "statement" furnished by the report for 1864-65, we find that no less a sum than £24,672 5s, has been sent out to the East for "native agencies" alone, since the commencement of the society, now about eleven years ago; this, of course, being all in addition to the very heavy sums and comfortable salaries furnished by the American society, called the Board of Foreign Missions, by which these missions and missionaries are maintained.

It would appear that the "fields" occupied by these American missions are five in number, and the present condition of them is thus summarized in the eleventh, the latest, annual report, now before us:

[Transcriber's note: The column titles are
abbreviated as follows:
MS.—Missionaries
NA.—Native assistance
SAOS.—Stations and Outstations
CH.—Churches
CM.—Church Members
SCH.—Schools
ASA.—Average Sabbath Attendance
SMF.—Scholars male and female]

Fields MS. NA. SAOS CH. CM. SCH. ASA. SMF.
Western Turkey 45 73 45 19 512 37 1569 1615
Central Turkey 19 54 27 14 998 26 3125 1717
Eastern Turkey 21 74 50 14 403 51 2201 1889
Syrian 24 37 22 8 200 25 650 548
Nestorian 16 81 36 0 529 0 3000 0
Total 125 320 120 55 2642 139 10545 5100

These "missions" have been at work, some more, some less time; but a fair average for the whole would be about twenty-five years. It will be observed that in the five "fields" there are but 2,642 "church members," or what, among Catholics, would be termed communicants. The individuals who come under the head of "Average Sabbath Attendance," can no more be termed Protestant then his grace the duke of Sutherland can be called a Catholic because he was present at the funeral of Cardinal Wiseman. But we will grant, for the sake of argument, that the 2,642 "church members" are earnest, consistent Protestants. If so, and taking into calculation only the funds furnished by the Turkish Missions-Aid Society, as quoted above, these converts I'm not very valuable, for they have only cost something less than ten pounds each. But if to the £24,672 5s., we add all that the American Board of Missions has paid in the same period as salaries for missionaries, for "native assistants," for schoolmasters, rents, building of churches, printing, books, and the passage-money of missionaries and their families to and from the East, we shall find that there is not one of these individuals whose conversion has not one way and another cost around three thousand pounds. At this price [{345}] they ought to be staunch anti-papists, for their religion has been a very high-priced article.

Let us turn for a moment to the second book on the list at the head of this article. No one who has read a line of the well-known Mr. Urquhart's many writings on political questions, will ever accuse him of Catholic tendency on any subject. He is not a bigot, indeed; nor, again, does he ever defendant the past history of Protestantism, for he is too well read to uphold what every honest man, with the knowledge of an ordinary school-boy, must condemn. In oriental matters, moreover, Mr. Urquhart has his peculiar views; but as these have nothing whatever to do with the questions of Protestant and Catholic, missionary or non-missionary, we may fairly accept what he says on the subject as the testimony of an impartial witness. Here, then, is what he writes respecting the Catholic clergy and the sectarian missionaries in Syria and Mount Lebanon:

"The Roman Catholic regular and secular clergy are established here as in any other Roman Catholic country; that is to say, they are pastors of flocks, and not missionaries, The Protestants have no flocks, and they are sent with a view to creating them. TWENTY-FIVE THOUSAND POUNDS are yearly subscribed in the United States for that object, and the missionaries come here having to justify the salaries they receive."—The Lebanon, vol. ii. p. 78.

The italics in the above quotation are our own, and we have thus marked the words in order to draw attention to what every traveller in the East, not that with the "pure gospel" media, has borne testimony. But let us return once more to the "statement" of the five missionary "fields" occupied by the Americans in the East. Mr. Urquhart would never make an assertion like the above without chapter and verse for what he says; and when the writes that TWENTY-FIVE THOUSANDS POUNDS are yearly subscribed in the United States to support their missionaries in the East, we may very safely consider the statement to be true. We cannot, however, suppose that for this enormous sum the missions in Syria only are meant, for then each one of the two hundred "church members" with which that land is blessed would cost a small fortune in himself. But at the same time it is impossible not to allow that he must mean the American missionary establishments in the East generally—the five "fields," of which a "statement" has been copied above, and the total of whose "church members" amounts to 2,642. And even with this calculation it will be seen that every Protestant communicant costs the pretty little annual sum of about £9 10s. for his conversion, and subsequent religious instruction. We are given to finding fault, and not unnaturally so, with the cost of the Established Church in Ireland; but what is this when compared with the price of the "Gospel in Turkey"? It is doubtful whether—apart, perhaps, from some other Protestant missionary "field" of which we are yet ignorant—the religious instruction of any people in the known world costs as much. It is as if each ten individuals had a curate entirely to themselves, and each hundred "church members" a very well-paid private Anglican rector of their own. No wonder that we are told the Syrian Protestant converts think highly of their new creed, "the Gospel of Christ," as it is modestly called. In a country where everything is more or less measured by a monetary standard, a convert for whose spiritual well-being £9 10s. per annum is paid must believe himself to be in a state of exaltation, considering that had he remained in his own church, his Maronite, Greek, Greek Catholic, or Armenian priest—having to say mass every day, to attend to some one or two thousand parishioners probably scattered over a large district—would consider himself very fortunate indeed if he had a stipend of two thousand piastres a year, or about £20, of which more than half would be paid in corn, oil, or fruits. [{346}] The fathers of the Jesuit mission in Syria are allowed a thousand francs, £40, for the travelling expenses, clothing, table, etc., of each priest when engaged on missionary work away from the house of his community; how, then, is it that the American missionaries cost so very much more? We will take up our quotation from Mr. Urquhart again, at the point where we left off:

"They (the American missionaries) have town-house and country-house, horses to ride and an establishment and a table which speaks well for the taste of the citizens of the United States. These are results obtained by exertion and combination, and which, affording enjoyment in their possession, prompt to efforts for their retention. The persons thus raised to affluence and consideration in a fine and luxurious climate would have to sink back to hard conditions of life, if not to want and destitution. This relapse presents itself as the consequence of failing in the creating of congregations, or at least of supplying to those who subscribe the funds plausible grounds for expecting that the consummation was near. Looking at the country, nothing can be more painful and more hopeless than the contest: nowhere is an ear open. As to converting the Turks, they might just as well try to convert the Archbishop of Canterbury.
* * * * * *
"As to converting the Jews, it would be much better for the United States to send missionaries to Monmouth-street. There remain, then, but the Maronite, the Greek, the Greek Catholic, Armenian, and Nestorian churches, that is to say Christians, to convert. From the pre-existing animosities among the Christians, the missionaries could not so much as open their mouths to any of the members of these communities on the subject of religion, and therefore it is a totally different course that they have adopted. They have offered themselves as schoolmasters; not as persons depending for remuneration on their claims to the confidence of parents, and on their proficiency; but supplying instruction gratuitously, and adding thereto remuneration to the scholars in various shapes. Their admission in this form has been forced upon the people by the Turkish government. The condition, however, has been appended to it, that they should not attempt to interfere with the religious belief of the pupils. This has been going on for years; the money continuing to be supplied on the grounds that Protestant congregations are being created, and the proceeds enjoyed by the missionaries on their undertaking that they shall not create them.
"The statistical under-current is, however, veiled or disguised from the men (the missionaries) themselves. The one generation has, so to say, succeeded the other. The new men come out occupied with their zeal, not caring critically to examine the position in which they stand, in entering at once on a contest already engaged. They are filled with contempt for everything around them; and to religious zeal, itself a sufficiently active impulse, is superadded the necessity of furnishing reports for public meetings and periodicals in America—reports which, failing to contain statements proselytes secured, have at last to supply narratives of contests undertaken and martyrdom endured."—The Lebanon, vol. ii. pp. 79, 80.

Our author has, in the foregoing paragraph, certainly touch most of the weak points of Protestant missionary working. Even a cursory analysis of the reports before thus confirm every word of this quotation from his book. Like every Protestant account of missionary work, the Turkish Missions-Aid Society's Reports are interlarded with scriptural quotations, having always the same significance—that the time for seeing the results of the labor has not yet come, but soon will be; or, as Mr. Urquhart puts it, they supply to those who subscribe the funds, plausible grounds for expecting that the consummation is near.

Some years ago, a grand case of quasi martyrdom was reported that Exeter Hall, and must have been worth much money to the societies who furnish missionary funds for the East, both in England and America. It was the cause of many questions being asked, and much correspondence being furnished, in both Houses of Parliament. Dispatches were written, the Turkish Government threatened, and the life of Lord Stratford de Redcliffe, who was then our representative at the Porte, made a burden to him for a time with extra work. The story was that some American Protestant missionaries, when "preaching the Gospel" on Mount Lebanon, were stoned and otherwise ill-treated, being finally turned out of the village in which they resided; some of them being badly wounded. The tale was well told, but, like other histories of the kind, was allowed to the forgotten [{347}] as soon as it had served its purpose. Here is Mr. Urquhart's version of the affair, gathered as it was in the country itself, is not unlikely to prove the true version of the story:

"The missionaries arriving at Eden (a village not far from the celebrated cedars of Lebanon, the inhabitants consisting entirely of Maronite Catholics) entered a house, and disposed themselves to occupy it. The master of the house told them that he would not and could not receive them. They persisted, threatening him in the name of the Turkish authorities. A great commotion ensued, and the people, with the fear of the Turkish authorities before their eyes, devised a plan for dislodging the missionaries by unroofing the house. A roof in the Lebanon is not composed of tiles and rafters; to touch a roof is a very serious affair, not to be undertaken in wantonness. The people had the satisfaction of seeing the missionaries mount and depart without any act on their part which would expose them to after-retribution."—The Lebanon, vol ii. p. 82.

I said before, Mr. Urquhart is one of the very last men who could be accused of any leaning toward Catholicism, still less of any affection toward the native Christian population of Syria and Lebanon. Of this his volumes bear witness in every chapter. But in a dozen instances he proves what we have so often heard asserted by travellers returned from these regions, that the people do not want, and do not wish for, the American missionaries, and would far rather be without them. Also that wherever these Protestant apostles are located, their presence is a continual source of trouble and annoyance, by causing quarrels among the people, and that their sojourn in the land is most certainly not conducive either to the glory of God on high, or of peace on earth to men of good will. That their so-called mission has been a most complete religious fiasco, is pretty well proved by the returns which at page 308 we copy from these reports. If the reader will but turn back to it, he will find that with twenty-four missionaries and thirty-seven native assistants, the number of "church members" in the Syrian "field" amounts to no more than two hundred, and this after the Americans have worked as missionaries in this "field" for the last quarter of a century or more. Surely no clearer proof than this is wanting for endorsing what Mr. Urquhart has said above respecting the way and the reason why these religious undertakings are puffed up, and "plausible grounds" given for expecting that the consummation of "gospel" triumph is at hand.

There is, perhaps, no Christian population in the world more united as a body, more attached to their clergy, more faithful in their holding to the See of Peter, or more orthodox in every particle of their faith, than the Maronites of Mount Lebanon. To illustrate, even in the most superficial manner, the history and ritual of this singular people would extend this paper far beyond our limits. Suffice it to say that upward of ONE THOUSAND years before the discovery of America, the holy sacrifice of the mass was offered up in their churches, and matins, lauds, vespers, and complins sung every morning and evening in their sanctuaries, just as at the present day. Their name is derived from that of St. Maroun, a holy hermit, who, in the fourth century, when the heresies of Eutyches and the errors of Monothelism were so common throughout the East, preserved the inhabitants of Lebanon and the adjacent parts from those influences. "The Maronites," says Mgr. Patterson, in his work, which is the third on our list at the head of this paper,—

"The Maronites maintain that they have never swerved from the Catholic faith, and love to assert that their Patriarch is the only one whose spiritual lineage from St. Peter, in the see of Antioch, has been unbroken by the taint of heresy or schism." (P. 389.)

Their secular clergy number about 1,200, and the regulars, inhabiting sixty-seven monasteries, comprise some 1,400 monks, priests, and lay brothers. They have besides fifteen convents, in which there are about 300 nuns.

[{348}]

"The blessings of education (continues the same author) are widely diffused among the Maronites. Almost all are able to read and write; and though few even of the clergy can be called learned, they are all sufficiently instructed in the most necessary things, and especially in the practical knowledge of their faith. Offences are rare among them, crimes almost unknown. The number of the Maronites of Lebanon appears to be about 250,000. In 1180, William of Tyre estimated them at more than 40,000; in 1784 Volney placed them at 115,000; and Perrier, in 1840, at 220,000. Elsewhere they are hardly to be found; the largest number I know of is at Cyprus, where there are about 1,500. A few also are found at Aleppo and Damascus, and some at Cyprus.
* * * * *
"There are (among the Maronites of Lebanon) four principal colleges for the education of the clergy. The most ancient is that of Ain Warka, in which between thirty and forty pupils are educated. They are taught Arabic (their vernacular), Syriac, which is the liturgical language of this rite; logic, moral theology, Italian, and Latin. Six exhibitions for the maintenance of as many scholars at the College of Propaganda were attached to this college. At the time of the first French occupation of Rome, the funds which provided for them were seized, and have never been restored; but the pupils still go to Rome, and many of them are to be met with in the higher ranks of the Maronite clergy." (P. 388.)

It is then to turn this people, and these priests, from the faith which they have so long and so honestly held, and from the spiritual paths in which they have walked for at least fifteen hundred years, that respectable black-coated American gentlemen, whose experience of life has been confined to Boston or New York, are sent over and maintained by the funds furnished by the zealous evangelicals of England and the United States. No wonder if those to whom they come would rather be without them. With the people whom they are sent to "convert" they have not a single idea in common. The very vernacular of the country has to be studied and learnt by them (an undertaking of at least two or three years, as Arabic is perhaps the most difficult language in the world for an adult to acquire a proficiency in), before they can preach or even converse with those whom they wish to teach what they themselves deem, the truths of eternal life. Without the most remote approach to a thing like a ritual, and without even the barest liturgy to recommend them, they come among a people who from very very infancy are perhaps more familiar with the meaning and teaching of earnest ritualism than any nation on earth. Mr. Urquhart, in the quotation we have given elsewhere, says of the American missionaries, that "as to converting the Turks, they might just as well try to convert the Archbishop of Canterbury;" might he not have said the same as to the converting of the Maronites? From the 200 "church members," which the returns of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society state as the result of the "missionary" labor on the Syrian "field" during the quarter of a century and more which the work has been going on, if we deduct the personal servants of the twenty-four missionaries, and of thirty-seven native assistants, how many will then be left as real, true, and earnest converts from their own faith to that which the American missionaries would teach them? "It has to be observed," says Mr. Urquhart, "that the proselytism carried on is not, as is supposed in Europe, against unbelievers, but between Christians;" [Footnote 105] and surely here is proselytism of the kind forced upon a people against their will, by the inhabitants of another far-off country, who would do very much better if they spent their yearly £25,000 among themselves, in "converting" the thousands of worse than pagans to be seen daily in the streets of every great town of England and America, and whose "faith" is from time to time shown in their "works."

[Footnote 105: The Lebanon, vol ii. p.79.]

We have no desire to hold up to the ridicule they deserve the absurd canting sentences and so-called scriptural ejaculations with which the of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society is interlarded. All who have perused similar documents must be well acquainted with the way in which [{349}] verses from Holy Writ are made to serve £. s. d. by the writer. Nor do we wish to make our readers laugh I reproduce some of the "pious" anecdotes which are to be met with in these pages. Thus it may, or may not, be true that at Nicomedia "a few years ago all was darkness and bigotry;" but it can hardly be taken what the French would call "au sérieux" that two Armenian priests in this locality were "awakened" by reading an Armeno-Turkish translation of The Dairyman's Daughter, and that, since the conversion of these gentlemen, a flourishing church, with a large congregation, has been gathered together, and a home mission formed to carry the Gospel to the towns and villages around. [Footnote 106] Also, from a personal knowledge of the facts, we permit ourselves to doubt whether the so-called "missionary" work in Constantinople has been, to say the least of it, judiciously carried on; and whether, about two years ago, the zeal without knowledge on the part of the missionaries did not very nearly cause a rising of the whole Mahometan population, and a general massacre of all the Christian population in that city. Nor—on the testimony of Anglicans, Presbyterians, and other Protestants—can we subscribe to the eulogium sung in praise of "the excellent Bishop Gobat." We have far more serious matters to deal with as regards the American missions in Syria and the East, and of which, if they are in the least degree consistent, Protestants more than Catholics whom it really does does not concern, would do well to take heed.

[Footnote 106: See Tenth Annual Report of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society. p. 10.]

In the appendix to his "Tour," Mgr. Patterson has, with a fairness and impartiality of judgment which cannot the too highly praised, investigated the question as to what it is that the native Protestants in the East really believe with the process of their so-called "conversion" is complete. And it may not be out of place here to that mention that the present writer, who has lately returned from a residence of nearly ten years in those countries, entirely and to the letter agrees with what this author has stated. Were it allowable to mention names, he could also adduce the authority of many Englishmen who have resided in Smyrna, Constantinople, Beyrout, Damascus, the Lebanon, and other parts of the East, all of them Protestants, most of them attending every Sunday the English ministrations of the American missionaries, and some of them even communicants in their churches. The evidence of these is varied in different points, but, as a whole, certain pages of Dr. Patterson's appendix might serve as a precis of the various opinions which these gentlemen have spoken, and which the writer himself has formed during his prolonged residence in the East. Be it, however, noted, that the objections here raised are not against the American missionaries themselves, but against the result of their labors, as well as against those of other Protestant missionaries— wherever throughout these lands their labors have produced any fruit whatever in the shape of "converts."

"Most true it is," says Mgr. Patterson, "that though large sums are expended yearly by Protestants for their missions, the result is nevertheless small indeed; but yet a great work is being done (I sincerely think unintentionally) by those establishments. The faith of hundreds and thousands in their own religion is being shaken, without any other faith being substituted for it. [Footnote 107] The missionaries' reports are full of expressions to the effect that many persons come to them, declaring their readiness to hear what they had to say, and their disbelief of their own national or common faith; and yet the 'converts' registered by themselves may be told in units, or at most by tens. Accordingly, I never came in contact with 'liberals' in politics or religion, whether Jew, Christian, or Gentile, who did not commence the conversation (on the supposition that I was a Protestant) by declaring their disbelief of this or that current dogma of their faith; and in all such cases I found I was expected, at a Protestant to applaud [{350}] and admire their lamentable condition of mind. I repeat, most emphatically, that I never saw a single person of this description who had one doctrine to affirm. The work of the Protestant missions is simply descriptive. In Turkey it is detaching Mohammedan subjects from their allegiance to their spiritual and temporal head; in Greece it is introducing the mind of youth to the conceit of private judgment; in Egypt it does the same for the Copts; and in Mesopotamia for the Nestorians. The missionaries report that, among the Jews, they prefer to have to do with the rationalists rather than with the Talmudists; and acting on that principle everywhere, they first make a tabula rasa of minds, on which they never afterward succeed in inscribing the laws of sincere faith or consistent practice." (P. 456.)

[Footnote 107: The italics an our own, and we give them to mark the pith of the whole question, with which nearly all Protestants, as well as every Catholic we have met, that have inhabited Syria, Palestine, or the Holy Land for any time, most fully concur.]

Here, then, we have, in a few words, an account of what the teachings of the Protestant missionaries in the East result in. They take away the faith that is in these people, and give them nothing in return. [Footnote 108] In other and plainer words, the end of all this teaching, and preaching, and denouncing of "popish" doctrines, is simple unbelief or infidelity, embellished with Scriptural verses and the current cant of the evangelical school. Do the subscribers to the Turkish Missions-Aid Society contemplate this as one of the results of their liberal donations? Is this what the society put forth so boldly as the "Gospel in Turkey?" Is it for such a change that the traditions mounting to within less than four hundred years of our Lord's sojourn on earth, preserved as they are by a people living in the land which he inhabited, are to be cast off? Surely, even from the most enthusiastic of the evangelical school, these questions can have but one answer. [Footnote 109]

[Footnote 108: An English official who had resided upward of twenty-five years in Syria, and who is a very earnest Protestant, told the present writer exactly the same. "The American missionaries," he said, "destroy the faith these native Christians had, but give them no other in return. The consequence is, that they invariably become more rationalists.">[
[Footnote 109: About four years ago, a party of English travelers were journeying over Mount Lebanon. While halting at a roadside "khan," they were accosted by a native who spoke English very well. They asked him who he was, and where he had learnt their language. He said he was, or had been, servant to one of the American missionaries, naming the gentleman, and that he was "a good Protestant." One of the ladies present put a few questions to him, and among others, asked him what he now believed of the Virgin Mary? "That for the Virgin Mary," said the miscreant, spitting at the same time, and using an Arabic gesture indicating the utmost contempt. The lady—an Anglican, not a Catholic—of course dropped the conversation, feeling too disgusted to continue it. Some days afterward she related that anecdote to the wife of an American missionary; but the latter was not at all shocked, merely making the remark. "I guess the the man had got rid of his old superstitions." Is this what they call evangelizing the native Christians?]

And let not the subject be either misunderstood or blinked. Take any dozen Englishmen really conversant with the ways of the country and the ideas of the inhabitants; let them all the Protestants, and even be of those who, finding no other Protestant ministration, attend the chapels of the American missionaries. Of the twelve, certainly nine will tell you that, although well-meaning and honest made in their way, the preaching of the Protestant missionaries in the East holes down but never builds up belief, and that in sober truth the native Protestant "converts" are but so many free-thinkers—theoretical Christians, but practical infidels. There is, with respect to this part of our subject, one more extract from Mgr. Patterson's book, [Footnote 110] which, although somewhat lengthy, we find so much to the purpose, with respect to some of the questions of the day, that we copy it entire:—

[Footnote 110: No one interested in the present spiritual state of the East should be without this volume, and every traveller to Palestine—Catholic or Protestant—should take it with him.]

"The Protestant sects of the West (says our author) are represented in the East by missions of several denominations; but since they all represent but one principle, namely the denegation of spiritual authority as the basis of belief, it is unnecessary to to distinguish them here. At first sight it might appear that the Episcopalians, or representatives of the Anglican establishment, should command a distinct notice, since they have one point (that of episcopal superintendence) in common with the Eastern sects; but when is considered, not merely that the fact of their having real bishops is denied by all sects of the East, [Footnote 111] as well as by the Catholic Church, [{351}] but that they themselves entirely repudiate any claims which might be founded on their supposed possession of an apostolic commission and authority through the episcopate; and when, moreover, it is remembered that a few persons who think differently on these points are wholly unrepresented in the East, it seems evident that the distinction would be unreal. Further, the Protestant missions in the East are mainly supplied by ministers in the communion of the Establishment in England, but often not episcopally appointed or ordained, and in all cases a perfect the equality is admitted between such as are so appointed and those who are not. Hence the Anglo-Lutheran 'Episcopalians,' the independents, the American Congregationalists, etc., act in unison, and on one principle. They teach that the belief they advocate in certain doctrines is to be acquired by each individual through a perusal of certain writings, and must be held by him as the result of convictions proceeding from his own investigation of those writings, which they assert to be the inspired word of God. This procedure they call 'the right of private judgment.'

[Footnote 111: This, be it remembered, was written in 1852, ten years before the recent attempt at union on the part of certain Anglicans with the Greek Church. What Mgr. Patterson says is the simple truth, and is confirmed by numerous conversations which the present writer had, during a ten years' residence with several patriarchs and numerous bishops, priests, and deacons of the Greek, Armenian, Nestorian, Copt, and Jacobite sects. All these clergy hate the very name of Rome, but they acknowledge she has real bishops and a real priesthood; while one and all deny that the Anglican Church as neither. The English Book of Common Prayer, translated into Arabic, is very often met with throughout the East, but it does not appear to have impressed the Oriental Churches, whether in communion with the See of Peter or not, very favorably respecting the Established Church of this country. The Thirty-nine Articles they regard with especial horror, as showing the church to be heretical at core. Nor have the members of the Anglican Church and Anglican Bishop of Jerusalem done much to remove this impression, but rather the contrary.]

"But the very terms of the Protestant principle, thus represented, involve, not merely a disregard of existing authorities, but also of that which presents that system for the acceptance of Eastern Christians. Those, however, who advocate its claims are not usually to be bound by the laws of consistency in logic. Though they will have every man to read the Sacred Scriptures (that is, their version of them) and to judge for himself, they have also a few doctrines, built on them, as they suppose, to which they attach an importance equal to that ascribed by Catholics to the dogmas of faith. Of these, the chief is what they term 'justification by faith only' the doctrine which teaches that man is accounted (but not made) fit for eternal life in the divine presence, by a subjective act or sentiment of the mind, called by them 'faith.' This 'faith' is not the 'faith' of theological writers, but a persuasion, or enthusiastic feeling, on the part of the individual, that he is saved from eternal death by sacrifice of the cross. Laying such stress as this view does on a persuasion, or feeling of the mind, it might be expected that other acts of the mind would be regarded by those teachers as of cognate importance. With singular inconsistency, however, they regard all such acts, whether of love, hope, or fear, or the like, as not only unimportant or indifferent, but even sinful in fact or tendency. The one operation of the soul to which they attach salvation is that of persuasion that itself is saved. To account for so arbitrary a distinction, they allege that this persuasion is not a natural gift, but a divine grace—or, rather, the divine grace; for in it are contained, and from it flow, all those good results which Catholic writers call 'graces;' such as humility, charity, hope, etc. This extraordinary and almost inexplicable doctrine, they consider not only conveyed in Holy Scripture, but the whole sum and substance of its teachings; and they allege portions of the epistles of St. Paul, in which he declares that man is not justified by works, done irrespectively of the divine sacrifice of the cross, to prove that all works or acts of the mind (saving always the one act of persuasion, which they call 'faith') are valueless and ineffectual to work out salvation. The teachers of this view among us are often pious persons, who act morally from natural good feelings; but the Eastern mind is too consistent and too voluptuous to imitate them. If it is possible, they say, to attain salvation by means of a sentiment so pleasant, we regard it as quite unnecessary to add to it supererogatory performances disagreeable to our inclinations." (P. 453.)

Here, in sober fact, and if we will only give things their right names, is one of the chief reasons of such "conversions" as take place in the East to Protestantism. An oriental mind is difficult to fathom at once; but take any of the professed Protestants in Syria or other parts of Turkey, clear away all the rubbish they have learnt to talk in imitation of their new teachers—separate if you can (and it is merely a matter of time and patience) all the prating about "the Lord Jesus," and "the blessed Scriptures," the "teaching of the Spirit," and suchlike spiritual mouthings, from what are the actual thoughts of the individual and the real reasons for his change, and you will invariably find at the bottom of his mind the all-prevailing idea, that of what use are confession, penance, private prayer, fasting, giving alms, and other good works, when salvation can be accomplished by the far more easy and pleasant process of a mere sentiment of the mind, which any man can train his understanding into believing when he wishes to do so. And these, be it understood, are the best of the converts. As Mgr. Patterson says of them:—

[{352}]

"Such persons as I am alluding to have really embraced the principle on which Protestantism rests. They have thrown off the authority of their own belief, not to accept the formula of another, but to reject all authority. They are like the German 'philosophic' Protestants, or the French universitaries of the West—their conduct is often irreproachable, but their belief is a blank, and their principles distinctly Antinomian, even when they themselves do not put them in practice. I maintain that to one class or other of these all the proselytes made to Protestanism in the East belong. They are either worthless persons, who are happy to substitute an easy-simulated sentiment for whatever amount of discipline their communion imposed, or they are 'philosophers,' sceptics, and infidels. The reports of these allegations, and the existing state of religious and political parties in the East, give scope for these results." (P. 453.)

There are, however, two other reasons, which also act powerfully upon such natives of the East as come under the influence of Protestant missionary teaching, and of which when they have abandoned their own creed, they take especial pride in the possession. The one is the notion which they imbibe from certain misquotations of Holy Writ, as well as from ill-judged (even looking at it from a Protestant point of view) teaching on the part of their new pastors; namely, that every man is "a priest unto God," and that once a Protestant and a "church-member," they are as high in spiritual rank, and far superior in "saving faith" to those whom they formerly regarded and respected as their clergy. The idea is, of course, utterly false, and childish in the extreme, to our views. But the native mind can only be judged by its own standards of worth, and the fact remains as we have said. That the Protestant missionaries would knowingly foster such notions it would be uncharitable to believe; but that such is another result of their teaching there can be no doubt whatever. The missionaries themselves, however, see very little indeed of their congregations, small as they are, save at prayer-meetings and preachings once or twice in that week. It is a curious fact, but one which has struck many even of those who have not yet found courage to knock and ask for admittance into the Catholic Church, that in proportion has a sect, or people, or nation, stray far from unity of the one true fold, so to their pastors and teachers neglect and despise that visiting and looking after their flocks, which forms with us such a prominent part of every parish priest's or missionary's duty. The High-Church Anglican Protestant clergymen—although still very far short of what is done by our clergy—come next to the Catholic priest in this work; and as we descend the scale of Protestantism, we find the practice more and more rare, until I the Socinians such acts of supererogation on the part of their preachers are never heard of. With Protestant missionaries in the East the practice is exceedingly rare: perhaps it is regarded as an infringement upon true religious liberty?

The third reason which has often—very generally, if not always—influence in making the native of Syria, Palestine, or other Eastern lands embrace Protestantism, is that when he has done so, the fact of his being a proselyte puts him indirectly under the "protection" of the English or American consul, if such an official there is—and there generally is one—within even a couple of days' journey from the convert's place of abode. Not that the individual is at once put on the rolls of the English or American subjects. Such was some years ago the practice; but now for very shame's sake this has been altered. But, as the English consuls-general, consuls, and vice-consuls have a sort of standing order to "protect" all Protestants against the tyranny or ill-usage of the local authorities; and as every native Protestant has nearly always some grievance which he makes out to be an injustice committed on him because he is a Protestant, so his complaint invariably finds its way to the English consulate, and either the chief of the office or one of his native dragomen deems it imperative upon him to interfere, if not officially, at any rate officiously, with the pasha or other authority of the place. [{353}] As a matter of course the complaint is listened to, and—justice or not justice—the "protected" of the consul gets what he calls justice, but which his opponent often deems the very reverse. For, be it remarked, that, as a general rule in the East, "justice" means obtaining what you want, not what is yours by law or equity. Your complaint, and what in Europe we call justice, may be on the same side. If so, all the better; but if not, you will term your view of the affair "justice" all the same; and, if you don't get what you want, you are unjustly treated. This sort of administration is but too often ruled by the consuls, and the "converts" know full well how to make use of it. No one who has not lived in the Turkish dominions can imagine the power which an European consul or vice-consul has in those countries. Mr. Urquhart has done good service in exposing this evil, which is, in point of fact, one of the chief reasons why the Ottoman Empire has been gradually but surely verging toward ruin since the foreign consular power became virtually far greater than that of the local authority. Of this interference of one country in the affairs of another, Mr. Urquhart says, it presents "a terrible prospect for the human race; for it involves the extinction of each people, and the absorption ultimately of the whole in some one government more dexterous than the rest." All the chief governments of Europe have been more or less guilty of this meddling with the executive of Turkey, but notably England, France, and Russia, in whose hands every local pasha is a plaything, to be tossed here and there at will. England says—or, rather, each English consul says for her—that he most interfere, else French influence would be too powerful in the province or district. France returns the compliment, and declares that England—that is, the English consul—is such a deep diplomat that, unless she uses her influence, England would be paramount in the place. Russia, on the other hand, declares that she must maintain her prestige, else the Turks would say of their old enemy that she had fallen in the scale of nations. This interference in the administration of the Ottoman empire is thus described by Mr. Urquhart:

"In other countries it has been known as diplomatic representations made in regard to principles; here (that is, in Turkey) it is administrative. It bears upon the taxes, the customs, the limitation of districts, the administrative functions, the parish business, the selection and displacement of functionaries, the operations of the courts of law—whatever is included under the word 'government' belongs here to 'interference.' This operation is exercised with authority, without control, without responsibility. The discussions in reference thereto are carried on between the functionaries of a foreign government; and as that foreign government can enter upon the field only by an act of usurpation, its position is that of an enemy. Every act is directed to subvert and to disturb; the object of each individual is of necessity to supersede the legitimate authority of the native functionary with whom he is in contact.
"Thus it is that the administrative interference, which has in Syria replaced the diplomatic, is carried on through consuls." (Vol ii. pp. 349, 360.)

Hitherto this work of "interference" has been carried on by our English consuls in Syria in very much the same way as it has by their Russian and French colleagues, no better, but no worse. At any rate, in all matters of influencing religious affairs, directly or indirectly, they have held perfectly aloof. But if we are to judge from a document lately put forth by the Turkish Missions-Aid Society, the title of which stands at the end of the list of books and pamphlets that heads this paper, either an entire change has in this respect come over our policy, or else several of our Anglo-Syrian official must be acting in direct disobedience [{354}] of the wishes of the Foreign office. We allude to an appeal for the building of "A SYRIAN PROTESTANT COLLEGE," together with a prospectus of the same, and a list of the "Local Board of Managers," among which, to their shame be it said, appear the names of Mr. Geo. J. Eldridge, her majesty's consul-general in Syria; Mr. W. H. Wrench, her majesty's vice-consul at Beyrout; Mr. Noel Temple Moore, her majesty's consul at Jerusalem; and Mr. E. T. Rogers, her majesty's consul at Damascus. That there can be no real desire or want for such an institution in the country, and that the very appeal for help to found it is about the most outrageous piece of pious impudence that has ever been published, even in the name of sectarian so-called religion, will appear upon a further examination of this document. We will do the American missionaries the justice of saying that no Englishman would, or could, ever have had the toupé to ask for money for such a purpose; the whole document bears the unmistakable impress of "smart" New-England. As we have shown before, from the "summary" of American Missions Statement given elsewhere, copied from the report of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society, the number of Protestant "church members" on the Syrian field is two hundred; this, too, after nearly thirty years of missionary "labor" in the country. And now these same missionaries come forward and modestly tell us that "more than £20,000 have already been secured and invested in the United States" for the building of this proposed "institution," and that "it is proposed to raise an equal amount in England, the income annually going to the support of the College." The president of the proposed college, and ex-officio president of the board of managers, is an American missionary, the Reverend Dr. Bliss, and among the members of the board are the names of some thirteen or fourteen other missionaries of all sorts. The trustees, who "are to have the general supervision of the institution," reside in New York, where we should imagine they will be able, from their proximity to the college in Syria, to supervise the whole affairs exceedingly well. With these, or with such persons as have parted with their money for such a pious folly, we have nothing to do. But as regards the English officials, it is another matter and Protestants, as well as Catholics must agree that men holding the positions they do in a country where religious discord is the bane and curse of the land, have no business to mix themselves up with an undertaking which is purely and wholly got up for the purpose of proselytism. Had the subscription been to build a Protestant chapel or church, or to endow any such establishment for the use of the English residents in Syria, it would have been a very different matter. To lend their names to any such undertaking these gentlemen would you a perfect right; but to give their official sanction to a scheme which is but a renewed campaign on the religion of the country, and as English government officers to say that they—and consequently the government they represent—approved as consul-general and consuls of a wholesale sectarian converting shop, is nothing less than a prostitution of the name of this country in Syria. The "dodge" is a good one; the American missionaries, notwithstanding their "tall" pious talk in missionary newspapers, have actually done nothing toward perverting the native Christians of Syria. Two hundred "church members" in nearly thirty years is at the rate of seven converts a year less than the third of a convert every twelve months for each the twenty-four missionaries. This pay. Even American subscribing "Christians" will, after a time, cease to contribute for what brings forth so little fruit. Something must be done; and therefore they have started the idea of this "Syrian Protestant college," having got the promises of these [{355}] consular gentlemen to countenance it as they have done.

Did these proselytizing consuls, before they allowed their names to be made use of in this prospectus, read the third paragraph of the document, in which we are coolly told that "THE ENEMIES OF CHRISTIANITY, PROFESSED INFIDELS AS WELL AS PAPISTS, FULLY ALIVE TO THE ADVANTAGES TO BE GAINED FROM THE PRESENT STATE OF THE COUNTRY, ARE ADOPTING BOLD AND ENERGETIC MEASURES TO FORESTALL PROTESTANTISM IN BECOMING THE EDUCATORS OF THIS VAST POPULATION"?

Or, if they did read it, did it not strike them that there was an insolence, as well as an amount of sickening cant and implied falsehood, throughout these words which ought to have prevented them, as English gentlemen, to say nothing of their official character, from countenancing such a concern? Have English consuls in Eastern lands so far lost whatever teaching they may have had as to forget that, taking all her majesty's subjects throughout the world, the "Papists" are very nearly as numerous as the Protestants; and that to class them "infidels," and call them "the enemies of Christianity," is an insult—to say nothing of the loud vulgarity and the utter untruth of the assertion, which there can be no excuse for any English gentleman, far less any English official, to lend his name to? In this, every person with the slightest pretension to the name of gentleman or an educated man, no matter what may be his religious persuasion, must agree with us. And to talk of "Syrian Protestantism," with its two hundred "church members" amidst a population of half a million native Christians, and three times that number of Moslems, being "forestalled" in "becoming the educators of this vast population," is much as if the Mormons in London were to complain that the English Church was "forestalling" them in being the educators of the capital of England. The Latter-day Saints of the metropolis bear a much larger and not at all less respectable proportion to the rest of the population of London, than the Protestant "converts" of Syria do to the rest of their fellow-countrymen.

Three excuses may be put forth in defence of these consular gentlemen who have thus disgraced the country they serve. It may be asserted—1st, That if French, Russian, and Austrian consuls give official protection to Catholic and Greek religious establishments, it is quite lawful for English authorities to do the same to Protestant undertakings. 2dly, That "the Syrian Protestant college" is to be got up for literature, the sciences, jurisprudence, and medicine, and not for religious purposes. And, 3dly, That they have allowed their names to be made use of without reading over the prospectus. Of these the third and last excuse is the only one that will hold water for an instant; and for their sakes we hope it may be true, poor and lame as such a plea would be for official men. As regards the first of these pleas, which we have put into the mouths of the defendants, it is quite true that the French, Russian, and Austrian consuls have and do afford official protection to Catholic and Greek religious establishments, but the cases are by no means parallel.

To quote again the words of Mr. Urquhart:—"The Roman Catholic regular and secular clergy are established here (in Syria) as in any other Roman Catholic countries; [Footnote 112] that is to say, they are pastors of flocks, and not missionaries. The Protestants have no flocks, and they are sent with a view of creating them."

[Footnote 112: The same may be said of the Greek clergy, who have many and very large congregations—in the country—in some parts much more numerous than the Maronites or other Catholic churches.]

We wonder what this writer would have said could he have seen a "Syrian Protestant college" proposed as a means toward this much-desired end, or could he have foreseen that four [{356}] English consuls could ever have went their names—officially, too—to such a combination of Little Bethel and "smart" American doings. Nor will it suffice to say that this institution is not being got on foot for the express purpose of proselytism, more or less direct. In paragraph number eight we are told that—

"The college will be conducted on strictly protestant and evangelical principles."

What that means, we all know; also—

"It will be open for students from any of the Oriental sects or nationalities who will conform to its laws and regulations."

That is to say, any student belonging to the Latin, [Footnote 113] Maronite, Greek Schismatical, Greek Catholic, Armenian Catholic, Armenian Schismatical, or other Eastern church, will be admitted to this college, provided he attends "Protestant" and "evangelical" preachings and prayers, and is humble-minded enough to hear the faith of his fathers denounced every day as one line of "the enemies Christianity," and "Papists" lovingly asked with "professed infidels." And in the very next sentence we are further informed that—

[Footnote 113: In the East, European Catholics, and all others who use the European or Roman Ritual, are called "Latins;" while the other Oriental churches in communion with the See of Peter are distinguished by their respective names—Maronites, Greek Catholics, Armenian Catholics, Syrian Catholics, Chaldeans, and others. The whole are termed "Catholics," and there is nothing of which they are so proud as their intercourse with Rome and the centre of unity. Of the various schismatical and heretical sects, there is not one that assumes the name of "Catholic" except certain of the "advanced" school English Established Church.]

"It is hoped that a strong Christian influence will always centre in and go forth from this institution; and that it will be instrumental in raising up a body of men who will fill the ranks of a well-trained and vigorous 'native ministry;' become the authors of a native Christian literature; supply the educational wants of the land; encourage its industrial interests; develop its resources; occupy stations of authority, and in a large degree aid in carrying the Gospel and its attendant blessings wherever the Arabic language is spoken."

With the help of one English consul-general, two English consuls, and one English vice-consul, this may be in a certain measure be done: yes, and will be done; for consular influence in those lands is all powerful. But without it, no: without this English state-help the "Syrian Protestant college" will wither, and only bear fruit in such proportion as have done the "Protectant churches" in Syria, with their twenty-four missionaries, their thirty-seven native assistants, and their two hundred communicants, after nearly thirty years labor in the Syrian "field."

After the extracts we have given from the prospectus, can there be any doubt as to the proselytizing intentions of this American-Syrian-Protestant-evangelical institution? or can there be two opinions as to the propriety of English gentlemen and English officials degrading themselves and their office by becoming connected with such an undertaking? We observe, by the way, as a curious coincidence in the prospectus, that the name of the New-York Treasurer to the board of trustees of this proposed college is William E. Dodge; and that the Rev. D. Stuart Dodge, of New York, has been appointed one of the professors. Would it not have been better and more appropriate if her majesty's consuls at Beyrout, Damascus, and Jerusalem had left all this evangelical speculation to men of like name and calling? It is true that when the prospectus was drawn out, and these English officials allowed their name to be made use of, Lord Palmerston was prime minister, and Lord Russell ruled over the foreign office. That the Shaftesbury power with the first, and the well-known tendencies of the author of the Durham letter, may have had some influence with these individuals in their official character is possible, nay, probable; but should gentlemen, English gentlemen, ever have allowed their names to go forth as patrons and directors of this unholy humbug? A private individual may lend his influence to whatever scheme he likes to patronize; but a public servant and above all an English public servant in Turkey—has no right whatever to be so liberal with his patronage.

[{357}]

One word more ere we have done with the "Syrian Protestant college."

At the head of the list of subscribers to this proposed institution is £1,000 from "The late Syrian asylums' committee." If we are rightly informed, that money was subscribed from the residue of a fund which was instituted in 1860 to afford assistance to the sufferers from the Syrian massacres. To this fund Catholics, Protestants, Greeks, and Jews subscribed, with the express stipulation and understanding that no part or portion of it was to be used for any religious purpose whatever. The fact was, that the chief managers of the fund in Syria were American missionaries, and subscribers to it were afraid that the money would be used for proselytizing purposes. After a time the great misery of the Syrian Christians came to an end, and no further relief was required: but there still remained an unused balance of about £1,200 of this fund in the banker's hands. If what is reported in London be correct—and we have very good reason for believing it to be so—who was it that gave authority for this £1,000 to be given as a donation to the Syrian Protestant college? To question regards not only the Catholics, Greeks, and Jews of London, Manchester, Liverpool, and other towns in England that subscribed to this fund, but also those belonging to a large—and we are thankful to say a very large—class of our Protestant fellow-countrymen, who, however much they may differ from us in matters of faith, are enemies to religion being made a cloak for fraud, and are honest and honorable in their dealings between man and man. If this £1,000 which heads the list of subscriptions in the Syrian Protestant college was really given from the money which in 1860-61 was gathered together as "the Syrian relief fund," a gross and most infamous breach of trust has been committed, and all men should beware how they in future contribute to anything in which the American Oriental missionaries have any influence.

But where have the projectors of this college learned geography? They tell us that the establishment will be "LOCATED IN BEYROUT, the seaport of Syria, a city rapidly growing in size and importance, and OCCUPYING A CENTRAL POSITION IN RESPECT TO ALL THE ARABIC-SPEAKING RACES."

The capitals are our own, for we would note these words as bringing a new light in geographical discovery. That Beyrout is by far the most pleasant, nay the only pleasant, town in Syria to reside in—that there is more society, and particularly what the promoters of this undertaking would call more "Christian" society, we fully admit. That, on account of its proximity to the sea, it is far more healthy than most towns in Syria, and that from the number of its European and native Christian inhabitants it is far safer to reside in, and much more exempt from the chance of any Moslem outbreak taking place, cannot be denied. But that it occupies "a central position in respect to all the Arabic-speaking races," is simply, and very grossly untrue, as a glance at any school-boy's atlas would show. It would be about as correct to assert that Plymouth or Falmouth held "a central position in respect to" the rest of England. If the promoters of "The Syrian Protestant college" are so very anxious to diffuse the great blessings of their faith and literature "wherever the Arabic language is spoken," would not Damascus, Mosul, Aleppo, Antioch, or even Bagdad, be more central than Beyrout? To reside in any of these places would not be so pleasant, but it would be more missionary-like, and would certainly save the money of the subscribers, Beyrout being by far the most expensive town in all Syria to live in.

But men of American sectarian preacher stamp never knew and never will know what a missionary spirit is. It is foreign to their habits as well as to their creed. When we hear of [{358}] American Protestant missionaries going forth with barely a change of clothes; when we learn that they abandon father, mother, family, house and home to preach the Gospel; when we read of half a score of them undergoing martyrdom, as did two Catholic bishops and eight priests in Corea, an account of which was published in the Times of the 27th August last—when, in fine, we hear of their taking lessons in their work from the Jesuits, the Lazarists, the Capuchins, the Dominicans, or any other of those religious orders which have shed such lustre upon the church in all ages—it may then become a matter of discussion whether, notwithstanding their gross errors in faith, they have not something of the missionary spirit among them. At present we can only look upon them as do all the Moslems, the native Christians, the Jews, and nineteen-twentieths of the European population in the East, namely, that they drive a very flourishing trade, and enjoy very comfortable incomes: but that the work they are paid for doing has neither the self-denial of man nor the blessing of God to make it prosper. Protestant missions throughout the world have ever been, are, and ever will be, most miserable failures. Dr. Littledale was, at any rate, candid when he spoke of "the pitiful history of Anglican missions to the heathen;" but he might with equal truth make mention of the wretched results of Protestant missions throughout the world. That unison of mawkish sentiment and Biblical phrases selected at random, which commonly goes by the name of "cant," may certainly influence weak-minded persons to subscribe to visionary schemes of a Protestant conversion of Oriental Christians. But exposure must come sooner or later, and with it the beginning of the end of subscriptions. Some years ago the American missionaries gave up the "field" they occupied at Jerusalem; would it not be as well if they conferred a similar boon on the Syrian and Lebanon districts? The churches against which they are chiefly engaged in preaching have their own bishops, their own clergy, and their own missionary preachers from Europe. These latter are not engaged in perverting men from another quarter, but—at the request, and with the full concurrence of the native bishops and clergy—they build up and repair the breaches in the sheep-fold, and help in driving away the wolves that would enter. There may be—there are—sheep that go astray from time to time, but considering all things—and particularly now that the sectarian influence of English consuls in Syria has been brought to bear on the "work"—these are few indeed. The Maronites and other sects in communion with St. Peter's successor, form part and parcel of God's one only true and holy Catholic Church, against which, we have His word, the gates of hell shall never prevail. [Footnote 114]

[Footnote 114: The fact of four English consuls allowing their names to go forth as patrons of a Protestant College, which is to be got up for the perversion of native Christians, is so utterly at variance with the general practice of our government, that we must express our surprise it has been overlooked at the Foreign Office. We cannot imagine Lord Stanley lending even a tacit sanction to such an outrage of the feelings of the native Syrian Christians.]

In his work upon "Mount Lebanon," from which we have already quoted, Mr. Urquhart relates a conversation which he had with a certain Maronite bishop, which seems so apropos that we give it entire:—

"I wish you to know [said the bishop] that we are not attached to France. France is to us on oppression from which we would be most happy to escape; we have proved this by acts, but no account is taken of them. How France came to be considered our protector is an old story, into which it is needless to enter. The connection awakened against us the hatred of the Turks and of the Greeks, and to it may be attributed the past suffering of our people from both. Here and in the other parts of Syria, in Egypt and in Cyprus, from the middle of the last century to the close of the campaign of Napoleon, we reckon that the blood of 40,000 Maronites has been shed by the Turks or the Greeks. This is the debt we owe to French protection. When, in 1840, the French government sent to us to require us to support Ibrahim Pasha and Emir Beshir, we gave a flat refusal. [{359}] M. —— came to Saida, and sent a message to the Patriarch (of the house of Habesh), who sent his own secretary to give him the answer, which had been decided on by the bishops and chiefs, which was, 'The Maronites have heard much of, but have never seen, the fruit of the protection of France, and could not, in the hope of it, expose themselves to the risks they were now required to run.' Then the English government sent to us an agent (Mr. Wood), accompanied by M. Stendel, on the part of the Austrian government, proposing to us to accept the protection of Austria in lieu of that of France. We declined to make any application for such protection; and we complained to Mr. Wood of the interference in our religion of the Protestant missionaries which made us look with suspicion on the intentions toward us of the English government. He assured us that the English government was opposed to all missionary schemes, and suggested that we should draw up a petition to the Turkish government, requesting the missionaries to be prohibited from entering the country, promising that the English ambassador would obtain from the Porte an order to that effect. Satisfied with these assurances, we aided in the expulsion of Mehemet Ali, although he had every way favored the Maronites.
"The promised order respecting the missionaries never came, England set up a Protestant bishop (in Jerusalem), and obtained from the Porte the formal recognition of the Protestants as a body."(Vol. ii pp. 261, 262.)

The italics in this quotation are our own. They show pretty plainly whether or not the missionaries are welcome to the natives of Syria. But what will these same natives say now, when they see our consuls-general and consuls coming forth as the official patrons and promoters of Protestant missionary proselytism? If it be true—and we have certainly always looked upon it as one of the rules of our government—that the English government "is opposed to all missionary schemes," how is it that the consul-general in Syria, the consul at Jerusalem, and the consul at Damascus, are allowed to take upon themselves the office of "managers" or "local directors" of the Protestant Syrian college?