Four years in Upper Burma

by W. R. Winston

I shall naturally be asked, “What then about those larger missionary organisations, in different parts of the world, that put asceticism (not economy) avowedly in the forefront, as one of their leading principles?” Well, I will only say of them, in brief, that where it is asceticism as defined above, and not mere economy, facts and experiences have proved that, in the tropics, it has resulted in a far heavier death-rate, in far more total or partial failures of health, and, as human nature has its limits of endurance, in a considerable addition to the numbers in the column headed “retired from the work.” A proper deduction made from the working strength of such missions, on account of these non-effectives, would show, perhaps, that the cheapness supposed to be attained, is more apparent than real.

On one occasion it was pointed out to the great Napoleon that he was losing a great many men in a battle; he is credited with the cynical reply, “You cannot have omelettes without breaking eggs.” In like manner one at least of these organisations has said boldly, “You cannot have a war without losing soldiers.”

True; but if the greater part of this loss is clearly needless and preventible, and if it is the result of want of proper provision being made, and through the neglect of proper precautions of the most ordinary kind—then even the sacredness of the purpose does not justify the recklessness of the methods.

“Alas, that bread should be so dear!

And flesh and blood so cheap!”

There remains only one more point which I need to mention, and that is the utter futility of the ascetic method, if it is used with any intention of impressing the Oriental mind. The utmost degree of asceticism which any European could ever think it right to adopt, in the discharge of his duties as a missionary, would, to an Oriental, fall far short of his ideal of self-denial, and would not be worth the name. A writer, with wide experience of India, has put this so well, that I may as well quote his words.

“The Hindus understand real asceticism perfectly well, and revere it as a subjugation of the flesh; and if the missionary and his wife carried out the ascetic life as Hindus understand it, lived in a hut, half or wholly naked, sought no food but what was given them, and suffered daily some visible physical pain, they might stir up the reverence which Hindus pay to those who are palpably superior to human needs. But in their eyes there is no asceticism in the life of the mean white, the Eurasian writer, or the Portuguese clerk, but only a squalor unbecoming a teacher, and one who professes, and must profess, scholarly cultivation.”

I have ventured, not without due reflection, to point out in this chapter what seems to be a very false ideal of missions and missionaries. The setting up of the missionary as a spectacle, an object lesson in self-denial, may be a time-honoured institution, but it ought certainly to give way now to some more rational method of recommending this important enterprise. I do not mean to say that this mistake has been universal, or even general. Many people of knowledge and common sense have risen above it. But the evidences of this idea to be found still in prominent places at home, and the instances of it abroad, which are here cited, prove that there has been in popular thought too much leaning in that direction, and show that there is need to point out the fallacy, and the evil of it.

When the simple recital of missionary facts includes the actual experience of unusual trials and perils—as, alas! must still be the case sometimes—it will always command sympathy and attention; but to represent these things as at all comparable in importance to mission work, or to suppose that they essentially belong to it, is neither true nor judicious. And I have shown that, when this tendency is yielded to in the mission field, it leads to an asceticism which produces no increase of usefulness, but a speedy termination of the missionary’s labours.