And it weareth the Christian down.
“And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased;
And the epitaph drear, a fool lies here
Who tried to hustle the East.”
The ordinary Hindu will endure the white man's impatience, [pg 213] and he and the native Christian will submit to the same weakness on the part of the missionary. But they fail to understand it; and the missionary's power with them is very largely impaired by the manifestation of this evil spirit. Even if impatience were ever, anywhere, a virtue, in India it is always an unmixed evil and should be guarded against. The warning is the more needed because the tropical climate itself is a very bad irritant to the nervous system. Among the Hindus patience is regarded the supreme virtue of God and of man; and it should adorn every missionary who seeks to be their leader.
Humility also is a grace which needs much cultivation by the missionary. He has constant temptation to pride. The sin of masterfulness is naturally his besetting sin; for his influence over his people and his control in the direction of his work gradually grow sweet to him and develop, if he is not very careful, into an imperiousness of will which is neither pleasant to those who come in contact with him, nor consistent with the golden grace of humility, nor in any sense pleasing to God.
Love—that essence of divine character—needs preëminent guarding, encouragement and development on the part of the missionary. There is so much that is unlovely and unlovable all about him, so little to attract and draw out his tender emotions that he needs to drink freely from the fountain of love above; or he will degenerate very easily into a hard, cold, unsympathetic, cynical missionary—a frame of mind which will utterly disqualify him for any joy or power in his work. One of the best missionaries I have known used to pray very frequently—“O Lord, save [pg 214] me from the sin of despising this people.” It is a prayer which every missionary may find it necessary to offer frequently. True Christian love is none the less necessary, yea the more necessary on the mission field, because the missionary lives among people who are not kindred in blood to himself.
Then he needs also a large gift of faith and of hope. The smallness of the Christian Church in the midst of a dense mass of heathenism; the apparent inadequacy of earthly means to convert that great people to Christ; the slowness of progress and the fewness of results—all these tend to depress and discourage the worker. And he needs to offer for himself, as for his people, the prayer which Elisha offered in behalf of the young man,—“O Lord, I pray thee open his eyes that he may see. And the Lord opened the eyes of the young man and he saw and behold the mountain was full of chariots of fire round about Elisha.”
Spiritual power, in all its forms, is not only greatly needed by the missionary, it is also highly appreciated by the people who are always ready to be led by it. I believe that the people in the East are much more amenable to this influence and much more ready to follow spiritual guidance than are the people of our own land. And this, in itself, is an added reason for deep spirituality in the missionary.