"Has it never struck you that you might possibly help it quite as much by remaining here as by going out again?"
Oh, Jean! Jean!
"Never," he said, with a slight flush. "My work lies there, and I hope to give my life to it, and to give it up for it if need be, as my dear old friend gave his."
"But there are others who could do the work just as well, are there not?"
"Many, I hope. I hope many will."
"And, if I understand aright, Missionary Societies are always short of funds, and the work is hindered, or at all events progresses more slowly, in consequence."
"I have my own views as to that," he said quietly.
"Won't you tell me what they are? I am greatly interested."
"They are not shared by many of my friends, and I do not obtrude them. I believe that the work is God's work, and when He sees fit to provide larger ways and means, larger ways and means will be forthcoming. If we had all the money we wanted, we might lose our heads, and go ahead too fast—scamp the work perhaps, and prove but jerry-builders in the end. One cannot forget that it has taken Christianity eighteen hundred years to arrive at its present position, and that for long periods it lay almost dormant; whereas, if the Founder had deemed it best to accomplish the work at one stroke, He could have done it."
"Yes," she said thoughtfully. "I don't think I ever looked at it in that light before. And you are quite determined to go back?"