[Footnote 105: The Lebanon, vol ii. p.79.]
We have no desire to hold up to the ridicule they deserve the absurd canting sentences and so-called scriptural ejaculations with which the of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society is interlarded. All who have perused similar documents must be well acquainted with the way in which [{349}] verses from Holy Writ are made to serve £. s. d. by the writer. Nor do we wish to make our readers laugh I reproduce some of the "pious" anecdotes which are to be met with in these pages. Thus it may, or may not, be true that at Nicomedia "a few years ago all was darkness and bigotry;" but it can hardly be taken what the French would call "au sérieux" that two Armenian priests in this locality were "awakened" by reading an Armeno-Turkish translation of The Dairyman's Daughter, and that, since the conversion of these gentlemen, a flourishing church, with a large congregation, has been gathered together, and a home mission formed to carry the Gospel to the towns and villages around. [Footnote 106] Also, from a personal knowledge of the facts, we permit ourselves to doubt whether the so-called "missionary" work in Constantinople has been, to say the least of it, judiciously carried on; and whether, about two years ago, the zeal without knowledge on the part of the missionaries did not very nearly cause a rising of the whole Mahometan population, and a general massacre of all the Christian population in that city. Nor—on the testimony of Anglicans, Presbyterians, and other Protestants—can we subscribe to the eulogium sung in praise of "the excellent Bishop Gobat." We have far more serious matters to deal with as regards the American missions in Syria and the East, and of which, if they are in the least degree consistent, Protestants more than Catholics whom it really does does not concern, would do well to take heed.
[Footnote 106: See Tenth Annual Report of the Turkish Missions-Aid Society. p. 10.]
In the appendix to his "Tour," Mgr. Patterson has, with a fairness and impartiality of judgment which cannot the too highly praised, investigated the question as to what it is that the native Protestants in the East really believe with the process of their so-called "conversion" is complete. And it may not be out of place here to that mention that the present writer, who has lately returned from a residence of nearly ten years in those countries, entirely and to the letter agrees with what this author has stated. Were it allowable to mention names, he could also adduce the authority of many Englishmen who have resided in Smyrna, Constantinople, Beyrout, Damascus, the Lebanon, and other parts of the East, all of them Protestants, most of them attending every Sunday the English ministrations of the American missionaries, and some of them even communicants in their churches. The evidence of these is varied in different points, but, as a whole, certain pages of Dr. Patterson's appendix might serve as a precis of the various opinions which these gentlemen have spoken, and which the writer himself has formed during his prolonged residence in the East. Be it, however, noted, that the objections here raised are not against the American missionaries themselves, but against the result of their labors, as well as against those of other Protestant missionaries— wherever throughout these lands their labors have produced any fruit whatever in the shape of "converts."
"Most true it is," says Mgr. Patterson, "that though large sums are expended yearly by Protestants for their missions, the result is nevertheless small indeed; but yet a great work is being done (I sincerely think unintentionally) by those establishments. The faith of hundreds and thousands in their own religion is being shaken, without any other faith being substituted for it. [Footnote 107] The missionaries' reports are full of expressions to the effect that many persons come to them, declaring their readiness to hear what they had to say, and their disbelief of their own national or common faith; and yet the 'converts' registered by themselves may be told in units, or at most by tens. Accordingly, I never came in contact with 'liberals' in politics or religion, whether Jew, Christian, or Gentile, who did not commence the conversation (on the supposition that I was a Protestant) by declaring their disbelief of this or that current dogma of their faith; and in all such cases I found I was expected, at a Protestant to applaud [{350}] and admire their lamentable condition of mind. I repeat, most emphatically, that I never saw a single person of this description who had one doctrine to affirm. The work of the Protestant missions is simply descriptive. In Turkey it is detaching Mohammedan subjects from their allegiance to their spiritual and temporal head; in Greece it is introducing the mind of youth to the conceit of private judgment; in Egypt it does the same for the Copts; and in Mesopotamia for the Nestorians. The missionaries report that, among the Jews, they prefer to have to do with the rationalists rather than with the Talmudists; and acting on that principle everywhere, they first make a tabula rasa of minds, on which they never afterward succeed in inscribing the laws of sincere faith or consistent practice." (P. 456.)
[Footnote 107: The italics an our own, and we give them to mark the pith of the whole question, with which nearly all Protestants, as well as every Catholic we have met, that have inhabited Syria, Palestine, or the Holy Land for any time, most fully concur.]
Here, then, we have, in a few words, an account of what the teachings of the Protestant missionaries in the East result in. They take away the faith that is in these people, and give them nothing in return. [Footnote 108] In other and plainer words, the end of all this teaching, and preaching, and denouncing of "popish" doctrines, is simple unbelief or infidelity, embellished with Scriptural verses and the current cant of the evangelical school. Do the subscribers to the Turkish Missions-Aid Society contemplate this as one of the results of their liberal donations? Is this what the society put forth so boldly as the "Gospel in Turkey?" Is it for such a change that the traditions mounting to within less than four hundred years of our Lord's sojourn on earth, preserved as they are by a people living in the land which he inhabited, are to be cast off? Surely, even from the most enthusiastic of the evangelical school, these questions can have but one answer. [Footnote 109]
[Footnote 108: An English official who had resided upward of twenty-five years in Syria, and who is a very earnest Protestant, told the present writer exactly the same. "The American missionaries," he said, "destroy the faith these native Christians had, but give them no other in return. The consequence is, that they invariably become more rationalists.">[
[Footnote 109: About four years ago, a party of English travelers were journeying over Mount Lebanon. While halting at a roadside "khan," they were accosted by a native who spoke English very well. They asked him who he was, and where he had learnt their language. He said he was, or had been, servant to one of the American missionaries, naming the gentleman, and that he was "a good Protestant." One of the ladies present put a few questions to him, and among others, asked him what he now believed of the Virgin Mary? "That for the Virgin Mary," said the miscreant, spitting at the same time, and using an Arabic gesture indicating the utmost contempt. The lady—an Anglican, not a Catholic—of course dropped the conversation, feeling too disgusted to continue it. Some days afterward she related that anecdote to the wife of an American missionary; but the latter was not at all shocked, merely making the remark. "I guess the the man had got rid of his old superstitions." Is this what they call evangelizing the native Christians?]
And let not the subject be either misunderstood or blinked. Take any dozen Englishmen really conversant with the ways of the country and the ideas of the inhabitants; let them all the Protestants, and even be of those who, finding no other Protestant ministration, attend the chapels of the American missionaries. Of the twelve, certainly nine will tell you that, although well-meaning and honest made in their way, the preaching of the Protestant missionaries in the East holes down but never builds up belief, and that in sober truth the native Protestant "converts" are but so many free-thinkers—theoretical Christians, but practical infidels. There is, with respect to this part of our subject, one more extract from Mgr. Patterson's book, [Footnote 110] which, although somewhat lengthy, we find so much to the purpose, with respect to some of the questions of the day, that we copy it entire:—
[Footnote 110: No one interested in the present spiritual state of the East should be without this volume, and every traveller to Palestine—Catholic or Protestant—should take it with him.]