THE ARTHINGTON MISSION.
Let it not be thought by any of the friends of the Association, because we have not had more to say in the Missionary, that we have given up the hope of yet being able to accept the noble offer of Mr. Robert Arthington, and of establishing and sustaining the Mission proposed by him. We have already fully and formally recognized the importance of the work, the accessibility of the field and its peculiar claims upon our body. Equatorial Africa is our sphere. It is in that that we have labored for over thirty years, and to that that we desire to confine ourselves. This Eastern Mission will be a proper balance and complement to the Mendi Mission on the Western coast. But we have tried to make haste slowly.
The condition precedent made by Mr. Arthington, that the debt of the Association should be extinguished, is now fully and fairly met. That is an obstacle out of the way. The only other condition is one on our part of prudent anticipation. It will take a large amount—though it has been more often over than underestimated—to provide the men and the outfit and to put them on the ground. It will require at least an amount annually equal to that we are expending on the Western Mission to sustain this in the East. And the Executive Committee have thought it wise to assure themselves of $50,000, which they would have in hand to devote to this work as it might be required, before they should take the first step towards beginning it.
There are several things within our horizon to-day which conspire to give us hope of a speedy realization of this plan. Mr. Arthington’s offer still holds good. There is $15,000 for the work to begin with. Dr. O. H. White, the indefatigable Secretary of the Freedmen’s Missions Aid Society in Great Britain, is enthusiastic on the subject of this Mission, and reports to us that the interest of the English and Scotch people in it is deep and deepening. Already he has secured considerable sums to be devoted to this work. Recently he has written us asking for a definite agreement on the part of the Association as to what it will do in the way of providing from this country a portion of the fund deemed necessary to the inception of the Mission, if he shall raise from the mother country a second $15,000. The Committee has answered him that they will agree to provide the $20,000 to make the needed $50,000 for the start, and will then, “with the blessing of God and the assistance of the friends of the African race in Great Britain and America, perpetually maintain the Mission.”
The Committee felt free to make this pledge, in the present financial condition of the Association, and especially as final receipts from the Avery estate have recently come to hand, amounting to a considerable part of this sum, and which are devoted by the donor to the evangelization of the African race in Africa.
It is a great step for us to take; but we have felt that it would be a great mistake, a great failure in duty, for us not to take it. God bless Robert Arthington, of Leeds! God bless Dr. White in his efforts to raise this second fund! God bless every man and woman on either side the sea who shall join hands and put together their resources to carry the light of the gospel of love and liberty into the thick darkness of Eastern Equatorial Africa! Who will help us on this side the water?