Testimony of Wm. E. Curtiss.
The following testimony of William E. Curtiss, the world-famous correspondent of the Chicago Record Herald, written after an extended visit to the Orient, would seem to be convincing proof that missionaries can give and Turkish children can profit by that which will re-mould and upbuild the remnants of the Turkish Empire.
“The influence of the American schools has been carried to every corner of the Empire. Every student leaving these American schools has carried the germ of progress to his sleeping town. He has become a force for the new order wherever he has gone. This influence has been working for a half century or more, and has been preparing the minds of the people for the great change that has recently come over them. The missionaries do not teach revolution, they do not encourage revolutionary methods; but they have always preached and taught liberty, equality, fraternity, and the rights of man.”[106]
Syrian girls at work in summer.
It is well to remember that the children under missionary influence are being trained not only for what they can be and do in the future, when they are grown up, but are being taught to use now what they have learned, for the benefit of others. Listen to the report of what some Syrian girls did during a summer vacation.
“An hour ago I came home from Sunday-School which we are having this summer. We began it the first summer we came to K. ... and twenty children attend. We are teaching them lessons from the Old Testament, and I think I can say that our school is a real success this year.”
“I am teaching some children Bible stories and have given one of the boys two papers to make a study of some chapters which I have appointed for him.”
“I brought a new Bible with me, and I try to teach our servant to read it.”
These few extracts are from letters which I have received this summer showing how Beirut school-girls are trying to give expression to the pass-it-on spirit. All over the country they are busy according to their opportunities. I know of one little girl who last year was in the lowest class of our Preparatory Department, but this year has a school of seventeen every Sunday afternoon during the vacation. One of her older brothers and a boy cousin taught classes, but she was both organizer and superintendent.
One of the pleasantest gatherings we shall have this fall will be the Report Meeting, when we shall hear from all the pupils about results of their summer efforts for others. Fourteen took certain Bibles home with them, promising to use them in teaching others to read.[107]
Is there anything for children to do in countries where as yet no great awakening or startling political upheaval has taken place, but where missionary influence has been quietly, steadily at work? What about those “unoccupied mission fields” where not even a beginning has been made toward giving the Gospel message? Does Christ need the children of these lands to be at work for Him?
The World’s Tragedies.
“Some one thus summarizes ‘The World’s Tragedies’:—
207,000,000 bound by caste—from Hinduism.