“There's been a campaign on this winter, over in the States,” said Doane, speaking slowly and thoughtfully. “Part of that fund is to be sent here to help extend my work in the province. They're using all the old emotional devices. All the claptrap. Chaplain Cabell is touring the churches with his little cottage organ and his songs.”
“But the need is real out here, Grigg. And the people at home must be stirred into recognizing it. They can't he reached except through their emotions. I've been through all that. I see now, clearly enough, that it's an imperfect world. We must do the best we can with it. Because it is imperfect we must keep at our work.”
“You know as well as I what they're doing, Henry. Cabell, all that crowd, haven't once mentioned Hansi. They're talking the Congo.”
“But you forget, Grigg, that the emotional interest of our home people in China has run out. They thought about us during the Boxer trouble, and later, during the famine in Shensi. Now, because of the talk of slavery and atrocities in Central Africa, public interest has shifted to that part of the world.”
“And so they're playing on the public sympathy for Africa to raise money, some of which is later to be diverted to Central China.”
“What else can they do?”
“I don't know.”
“You find yourself inclined to question the whole process?”
“Yes.”
“Aren't you misplacing your emphasis, Grigg? We all do that, of course. Now and then.... Isn't the important thing for you, the emphatic thing, to spread the word of God in Hansi Province?” He leaned forward, speaking simply, with sincerity.