“But what do you mean by asceticism? Where do you draw the line?”
By asceticism I mean the deliberate—sometimes even ostentatious—cutting down of provision as to food, clothing, dwelling, and general comfort, to a point obviously below the standard of health and efficiency; this standard being naturally fixed at an approximation to that of the mode of life to which the missionary has previously been accustomed. My own experience of missionary life, extending over nineteen years, is that I have always had to work much harder than if I had been in England, and, whilst the mode of living must needs be very plain and temperate to be healthy, the food must be nourishing, and the surroundings in a fair degree of comfort, or it will soon lead to a collapse.
I do not condemn economy; God forbid! No one believes in that more than I do. I entertain strong views as to the importance of a humble, simple, unostentatious manner of life, and have always practised it. Nor do I wish to state that the missionary has no need of self-denial. A man cannot be even a disciple without self-denial. Without it, as a missionary he would be useless; and I may testify, in all simplicity, that I have known what it was to practise it, and have reaped the sweet and precious fruits of it. But if that hymn of Keble’s is true anywhere it is true in the missionary’s life—
“The trivial round, the common task,
Will furnish all we ought to ask;
Room to deny ourselves; a road
To bring us, daily, nearer God.”
“All we ought to ask”; missionary life with its labours, cares and anxieties, often in an exhausting climate; its frequent and sore disappointments, its loneliness, the separation from friends and children, and the special call sometimes to new and untried spheres of duty; its sense of heavy responsibility in having to stand practically alone, at the head of a band of native helpers, and to be expected to supply enthusiasm for everybody about him—these, the necessary and unavoidable trials, are the legitimate means of denying himself; and they afford infinite scope for useful, holy service, and they are quite enough, without going further afield, like Don Quixote, in search of more.
I trust my readers will bear with me whilst I give the details of some cases I have known, where honoured brethren and sisters have felt moved to attempt the ascetic method, in order that we may observe how it works.
I knew a pious devoted missionary of another Society. He was a man of decidedly ascetic life. One of the ordinary diseases of the country, not generally fatal, assailed him. His constitution, in the opinion of those best able to judge, was so weakened by his ascetic life that he could not rally, but died in the prime of life. Humanly speaking, he died before his time, and one fails to see that his death constitutes any adequate object lesson, to compensate for the loss of his active usefulness. A missionary’s continued and useful life ought to be a much greater benefit to a country than the deposit of his remains in the soil, and the example of a living worker is surely more influential than the memory of one departed.