2. The survey here treated of is missionary survey, that is to say, it treats of missions and is governed by a missionary purpose. And it is a survey of Christian missions; therefore it is governed by the purpose of spreading the knowledge of Christ. This statement is of great importance and needs to be carefully conned before it is accepted, because by it missionary survey will be distinguished from all other survey. For instance, medical boards survey medical institutions. Their sole concern is whether those institutions are well found and efficient.[1] But when a missionary surveys a missionary hospital (if the principle which we propound is accepted), he surveys it not qua medical establishment but qua missionary utensil. The object is not to find out the medical efficiency of the hospital, but its missionary effectiveness. It may be answered that a medically inefficient hospital cannot be truly effective from a missionary point of view. That may be true; but it is not certainly true. Whether it is true or not, that does not alter the fact that an efficient medical establishment is not necessarily effective from a missionary point of view; it is not necessarily either missionary or Christian at all. Then to survey medical missions simply as medical institutions is to ignore their real significance. Missionary survey must relate the information asked for to the missionary purpose; and unless it is so related the survey is a medical survey, not a missionary survey. The same holds good of educational work, and of pastoral work.
[Footnote 1: We could produce surveys of medical and educational mission work which are essentially of this character, dealing solely with medical and educational efficiency.]
3. The survey here proposed is designed for all societies so far as the societies can be persuaded to supply the information. It would perhaps be more simple to provide statistical returns for one society of which the ecclesiastical organisation is known and the ecclesiastical terms used consequently fixed. But survey of the work of a society, invaluable and necessary as that is for a society, is not sufficient by itself. It is essential to-day that we should be able to place our work in the world in relation to all the missionary work done. We can no longer afford to ignore the work of others and to plan our missions as though other missions did not exist. As we try to point out from time to time no society can act rightly in ignorance of another's work. Therefore we have attempted to design a survey which would show what is the work of any mission in such a form that its work can be related in some sort to the missionary work of all, and not only to the other missions of its own society.
4. Seeing that all survey is scientifically governed by the object for which it is made, it is essential that in a survey such as we propose the end for which it is made should be stated in each case as clearly and definitely as possible. This involves often such a definition of the end as implies a certain missionary policy. Realising this, we have not hesitated to set forth the policy implied in the terms which we use and the questions which we ask.[1] We are well aware that this lays us open to attack from men who may question the policy and dispute the value of the survey. It would be far more easy to set down simply the facts which we think any true survey should contain, leaving them unrelated to one another, so that no one could tell exactly what we were driving at. This is the common plan. Men say they want to know the facts of the missionary situation, any facts, all facts, indiscriminately, and they draw up a list of all the facts that they can think of and issue a questionnaire which leaves the compiler of the answers in complete ignorance concerning the purpose of the questions. Such heaps of information might be used anyhow if they were really complete; but in fact since they have not been designed for any definite use they are generally deficient for any definite use, and remain mere masses of information on which no true judgments can be based. So far from revealing the missionary situation they obscure it. We have, therefore, taken the risk of explaining why we want each piece of information, how we think it might be used, and have drawn our tables in such a form that it is actually seen at work. By so doing we open the door at once, both for intelligent co-operation and intelligent opposition. We frankly make criticism easy; we invite it; for we believe that frank criticism on the basis of agreed facts is extremely fruitful.
[Footnote 1: It does not follow that we approve the policy implied.]
We may well acknowledge that the aim which above all others has appealed to us is the aim of the establishment in the world of a Christian Church, native, indigenous, living, self-supporting, self-governing, self-extending, independent of foreign aid. That has no doubt coloured our work and will perhaps render it less acceptable to some; for the facts which must be included in a survey which accepts that aim are precisely the facts which societies do not now tabulate and are often estimated with some difficulty.
But though this thought has inevitably governed our conception of survey and we have made no attempt to conceal it, we have nevertheless tried to avoid the danger of selecting for survey only those facts which might serve to support a theory of the method by which that aim is to be attained; and we have kept in our minds constantly the needs of men whose idea of the aim of foreign missions differs from our own.
5. Missionary survey must justify itself by assisting definitely and clearly those who make it and those who have to direct and support missionary work in all parts of the world. The first question which we ought to answer in every case where our help is asked is this: "What do we want to do? What is our purpose in doing anything at all here?" The second question is: "What must we know to enable us to act discreetly and wisely in this case? What facts are properly to be taken into account in this matter?" The first question is the question of aim, the second is the question of relation. Suppose we say that we want to send our missionaries where they are most needed, what information must we have to direct us? First we must know what we mean by need, what kind of need we are to put first in our thoughts; that is the question of definition of aim. Then, how shall we decide where that need is greatest at the present time, for us, that is, within our possibility of active assistance; that is the question of relation. The facts of need as we define it must be related and compared. The survey of which we speak as necessary for an intelligent understanding of foreign missions must provide these facts in a form easily grasped and understood and compared for different countries and districts, so that those who direct action and those who support the action may be able to do so with reason, not being guided merely by the most influential voice or the loudest shout.
6. To serve this purpose survey must have twofold aspect. It must be a review of the present state of the work, it must also be a review of the present position of the work. It is a review of the state of the work, the stations, the converts, the Church; it is a review of the position, the progress made compared with the work to be done. But the state varies, the position changes, and action must be taken continually.
The survey, therefore, should be not simply a single act but a continual process. Mission work is not a task which can be undertaken and finished on a predetermined plan, like the construction of a railway. It is a task the conditions of which vary from time to time, and consequently plans and policies and methods must vary, and this variation can only be rational if it is determined by recognition of the changing circumstances, and the change of circumstances can only be understood and appreciated if the survey of missions is a continuous process kept constantly up to date. It is a form of mission history in which the omission of a few years may break the connection of the whole narrative.