Missionary Survey As An Aid To Intelligent Co-Operation In Foreign Missions - Roland Allen; Thomas Cochrane

If then we now add tables to show the help given by the medicals in the schools and the work done by the educationalists in the hospitals we shall be able to gain a fairly complete idea of the co-operation between the three branches.

But it is just at this point, the relation between the medical and educational work, that we shall probably find most difficulty. This relationship has not been carefully thought out in the past, and co-operation between medicals and educationalists is, we fancy, somewhat rare. Few men could tell us exactly what policy is followed, or ought to be followed. This is partly due to that confusion of purpose of which we spoke in the first chapter, a confusion which obscures and confounds our medical and educational missions. If both medical and educational missions had had one common dominant purpose, the relation between them would have been more easily seen; but since they were separated in thought, each having its own particular and separate objects to pursue, they naturally worked along parallel lines and consequently did not meet. If they had had one common dominant object they would have met. But generally speaking there is no clear understanding whether the medical mission has any definite relation to the educational mission, or the educational mission to the medical.

On the medical side, it is not clearly understood whether it is the first duty, or the last duty, of medicals to attend to the children whom we gather together in such large numbers, whether the medicals ought to inspect all the children, whether they ought to be at hand to treat children who are obviously sick, whether these considerations ought to influence the location of the hospital, or of the place of residence of the medical missionaries, or whether this work, if they really gave much time to it, should be considered as withdrawing them from their proper work. Consequently, the health of the children in mission schools has often suffered, and the work of the school been hindered. In one school something approaching to a revolution was produced by the constant care and attention of a doctor. Phthisis, which had been a continual source of trouble and weakness, was reduced considerably, and the whole work and tone of the school improved enormously. If medical missionaries and educational missionaries always realised that they were engaged in a common work, this experience would be almost universal.

In our tables we cannot possibly enter into any details. The work of medicals in schools cannot be exactly stated, it varies greatly in extent and character; but it would, we suppose, always include attention to the health of the children and consultation with the teachers, both about the welfare of the school as a whole and of the care of individual pupils. It might also include lectures in hygiene and kindred topics, sanitation of buildings, and other assistance too varied to specify.

The table can only include visits and inspection of pupils.

The relation of the educational mission to the medical has not been thought out any more carefully. There is in hospitals an opportunity of extraordinary importance, a field of great fruitfulness which is largely neglected. If the hospital is a missionary hospital, founded to heal the souls as well as the bodies of men, ought not the patients in them to be taught as well as medically treated? Have they any claim upon the care of educational missionaries? Have the educational missionaries any duty in hospitals? Very few, we think, have given much attention to these questions: no society, so far as we know, has followed any definite policy in regard to them. A single instance will reveal how important they may be. A doctor who was deeply interested in the teaching of Chinese illiterates took steps to have the illiterate convalescents in his hospital taught to read. The average time which these patients spent in the hospital was three weeks, and in that time they could learn to read the Gospels in simplified script fluently. They thus left the hospital not only healed in body, but with a new interest in life, and a considerable knowledge of Christian truth, and a power to advance in it, and a power also to instruct others. In a hospital for Chinese coolies in France this doctor taught one patient to read the Gospel. The patient was then removed to another hospital where he taught no less than forty of his fellow-patients to read. If such results can be obtained, it would be well to consider whether we are making full use of the opportunities afforded by the gathering of large numbers of patients into hospitals all over the world. Illiterates are not the only people who might profit by Christian teaching, classes for literates might be equally valuable. Large numbers might leave our hospitals with a considerable knowledge of Christian truth, and a new interest in life, with power to advance and to teach others, if they were systematically taught. In one missionary hospital regular courses were given on Christian Evidences, and courses on the education of children might well be given to parents in hospitals.

Here again a table cannot reveal the type and character of the work done: it can only tabulate visits. The work would include the teaching of illiterates to read, and instructing convalescents of higher education either in classes or individually.

We might now sum up this branch of our inquiry thus:—