naries shall ray S SOOD S they of laber ork, ant phases d le for hout m jects da Il also p e WOL Doks of 8. and J e acc On reaching the nearest railroad station (about 12 miles from the town) they were met by a finely dressed man who had been delegated to meet them and act as escort and guide. About half way on their journey they were met by a dozen others, who were leading men of the town, and who had also come to wel come them and to constitute an additional escort of honor. Forming into a procession they reached the town where a reception was tendered to them which was a complete ovation, and such as was customary to give to princes in other days. The whole community seemed to have joined in the welcome and to esteem it a great favor to have teachers to come to them. Full preparation had been made for the services, and an audience of 1,300 assembled to hear the speakers, while some three hundred more were unable to gain admittance. There was the closest attention, and instead of doubt as to the truth and reality of the Christian religion there was evidently a sincere desire to be taught at once the way of peace and salvation. The confidence manifested towards their teachers seemed unbounded, and all the leading men in the community were united in the desire to learn about the religion of Christ. Aside from the public services there were a large number of intelligent inquirers who came for light on points which they did not fully understand. The meeting and the whole visit was a gratifying success. When Dr. Verbeck and his assistant left it was arranged that some one should go there every month and conduct religious services. The unanimous voice of the people seemed to be that they regarded Christianity as a great blessing, and so all were ready to receive its doctrines and follow its precepts. There is a growing conviction throughout Japan that the religion of Christ is the source of all true civilization, and the people The church at Mistrina has about 130 to 140 members. For some time past there has not been as much interest as usual, and it was decided to have a large religious mass-meeting. Rev. Dr. Verbeck, Rev. Mr. Key, and Rev. Mr. Ballagh, were invited to come and preach. The Christians rented the theatre and began to prepare for the services by advertising, and in conformity to the law applied at the police station for permission to hold the service, giving at the same time the names of the speakers and the subjects of the discourses. The officials replied that no foreigners would be allowed to speak, as the passports given by the government are for health and scientific observation only, and to lecture as proposed was a violation of the law. Then the Christians were much troubled and sent a telegram to Tokio that the meeting could not be held. But two or three days later they were informed that there were no objections and the services were again advertised. has p covers people mumi idol's down mone wood. sight these while ture g look u witho the pe in an and steadi find h name The lions provi the Agair vast s pueril The first meeting was at the church and about 60 people assembled. On the second day a theatre was rented and an audience of 350 people gathered. This was followed by another gathering where there was still more present. On the same night there was to have been a theatrical performance in the town, but so few came that it was abandoned. On cast the morning of the day on which the nace. speakers left, 30 more held a friendship those meeting. The same evening 400 persons worsh gathered at Armudzee to hear the Gospel. sough any stron confe these that▾ idols me." I an on c It is but a few months since Rev. Mr. Ito was pelted with mud and stones in the streets of Mistrina, and his life was I are v in danger. Now there is no trouble at such services, and the former excitement and persecution has only worked to the harm of those who were engaged in it. During this visit Rev. Mr. Ballagh received 22 members into the church and the Christians were in strengthened and encouraged. A list of the Buddhist temples and monasteries in Japan has recently been published and a comparative table is theat given to show the great falling off in the an ic number since the year 1714. At that had time there were 393,087 temples and| dres: every way deny life, wax futu I v man tells the truth only when to tell a lie would be to his disadvantage. Whether he is to resort to truthfulness or lying. self-interest, and never principle, is to determine. He looks upon these conditions as he looks upon one of two boats, and takes the one that will best help him over the stream. It is a proverb commonly repeated among the people "The char acter for an official has two mouths," showing the word of a ruler cannot be trusted. What must be the ethical value of a system which after nearly twenty centuries leaves the officers so corrupt that the Government has to look to Christian countries for the managers of its customs service! When the Gospel penetrates there, the noblest examples of truthfulness, purity, and holiness prevail. And when Buddhism can show a solitary village among these thousands clean enough to permit an examination, where men and women abhor a lie, they will have some claim to our respect. I have walked through hundreds of villages and never found that kind of people. Chinese Punishments in the Next World. Rev. C. Spurgeon Medhurst, of the English Baptist Mission in China, writes from the city of Tsing Chu Fu: The other day, in company with my teacher, I visited the temple of Yen Wang, the Ruler of the Spirit World, which contains representations of the punishments inflicted in the 16 hells according to the Taouist and Buddhist Scriptures. "The first courtyard was filled with tablets containing the names of donors to the temple. Here we did not linger long, but passed on to the inner yard, where the sufferings of the lost were depicted. On either side of this yard was a corrider filled with dusty, dirty, lifesize figures (all Chinese temples are dirty and more or less dilapidated) personating devils, with most hideous shapes and frightful faces, torturing their unfortunate victims, while the same penalties were painted with still more revolting fidelity on the wall behind. At one end of the first corridor was a large drawing of the wheel of life. Streams of men and women were entering on the one side and making their exit on the other, as reptiles, animals, or 11 in donds had hoon or woe. TI man The so g open Он orite for k "At the opposite end of the corridor was a representation of the city of Yen Wang himself, from the closed gates of which some restless spirits who were clamouring for admittance, were being driven by fire and shot. But here, as also in the picture in the opposite corri- anity dor, showing the faithful crossing of the to de bridge leading to the land of blessedness (while some less fortunate beings were being swept away by the flood beneath, bitten and tormented the while by the dragons and monsters inhabiting the evil waters), no attempt is made to describe the rewards of heaven, while man's utmost ingenuity is strained to delineate the pains of hell. For, indeed, Buddhism byter conducts its votaries to annihilation as the summum bonum, or at the best to a mere negative bliss. “The various kinds of punishment exhibited were, my teacher informed me, not so numerous as he saw in a larger temple in Pekin, but those I saw were quite enough for me. "There was Yen Wang, of gigantic stature and forbidding countenance, sitting in state, trying the newly arrived spirits, who were kneeling before him to receive their sentence. Here were the various sentences passed, being remorsely executed. Re medi Jews the H Unit Re an, tl youn each schoo The unde Four Syria in Ge Jerus The the m ing n fancy I have ing fo Mrs Peng of ou adver and, i "Those who during life reviled their parents (a very serious crime in China) were being broken and crushed in a sort of mortar. Dealers in short weights' and measures were swinging in the air by hooks fastened in their backs. Adulterers were clinging to iron tubes filled One with fire, devils with pitchforks were killed pressing them closer to the fiery pillar. Liars were having the tips of their Missi tongues cut off. Murderers were thrown gatio on the mountain of knives,' while other read criminals were wandering shivering, half naked, among the 'ping shan' or 'mountains of ice.' "There were other tortures even more ghastly than these-such as men being sawn asunder, disembowelled, boiled in oil, pounded in mortars, etc., but these will be sufficient to show what means are relied upon by the natural instructors of the people to hinder men from vice.” NOTES. There have been rezuonk Rev then thing the e Man. Th Missi the 2 Gossi his o comr to Di On es from i all the C one en Ost unter ediately told us rs." f the Le ed to a first t the crest... made a rd and out, He Seminary at Nagasaki, Japan. In Tinnevelly, India, a Protestant catechist, who is a convert from heathenism was sent to evangelize a district in which there were as yet no Christians. He has been enabled to turn five of the devil temples into Christian Churches, and now three catechists are employed to teach the people who are under Christian instruction. The Rev. M. L. Irving writes of the Bordeis tribe in East Central Africa: "They have different charms for different things; and each village has its peculiar dawa or charm. At the entrance of a village one sees a sort of rabbit-trap, called Fingo, which is supposed to protect them from harm. It is no easy task to convince them of their ignorance." Ghazeepore, India, for the manufacture of rose-water and the costly attar of roses. It is said that it takes 20,000 full a Christian in the land; now there is caste. not a heathen. Then two lone men with getting their brave wives, commenced what out of seemed to many like the leadership of a Kayasth forlorn hope. Now, in the 1,200 villages tain oth and towns of Fiji we have a teacher and difficult a church or preaching place. Then we income had no schools; now we have 1,845, cov- ters mar ering the educational needs of the com- the cha munity. Then we had not a native con- groom's The vert, now we have 30,000; then not a native preacher, now we have 3,000 who whole to preach Christ to their fellows; then the leaders of the movement lifted up their voice in the wilderness of heathenism and foul wrong, to those who were impatient of their witness, now over a hundred thousand gather to the sanctuaries of Fiji, eager to hear the messenger of life." on the c adopted a Missio helper, ited by England came so count of Dr. Scudder, of Chicago, says: "Mis- China, t to disco preache faithful to the death fo The ter gods; I them t could h Because and joi stay the faith, in plague sions pay financially, as the old wheelwright found who gave one dollar to missions in the Sandwich Islands, feeling as if he had dropped it into the sea, but was amazed to receive not long after an order for twenty carts at ninety dollars each. They pay scientifically, as the sixty languages reduced by missionaries to grammatical form attest. They pay restoratively, as the Moors of the day bear witness; and Vora, a Sandwich Islander, who, born a heathen, on his death-bed said to friends about him that his canoe was ready, its sail was spread, and the pilot on board; and a certain Brahmin who, when converted, besides being invincible in argument, possessed such eloquence as to bring tears to Brahmin eyes-a feat as difficult as to wring moisture from the pebbles of a brook. That they have restored society and whole nations let the disappearance of suttee, of Juggernaut, and of drowning in the Ganges declare: and Madagascar and Polynesia-that submerged continent-and Fiji, with her eight hundred churches, swell the testimony." blown roses to make about one-half an ounce of the attar. It is obtained by exposing the rose-water to the open air during the night, and then skimming off the oil which gathers on the surface. The Pearl of Great Price is worth much more. A native pastor of one of the Presbyterian churches in Japan writes that there are five important things which he says the Christian religion has accomplished for the Empire of Japan. First, the adoption by their government of our calendar; next, the enactment of a law compelling the inhabitants to keep one day in the week as a day of rest, which is our Sabbath; then the adoption of our common school system; fourth, freedom to bury their dead as they like (formerly the body at death had to be given to some Buddha priest); finally, the separation of Church and State, which gives them entire freedom of worship, and opens Japan as never before to Christian missionaries. The Christian Ladder says: "The The Indian Messenger says: reason why so many parents in the North West Provinces of India kill their infant daughters is that they feel considerable difficulty in procuring suitable matches for them, owing to caste and other difficulties. A proud Rajpoot cannot consent to get his daughter married to one lower than himself in point of caste or in social rank; consequently, the easiest way of solving the difficulty is to "Out of a dispose of the unwelcome burden,—the then he they res and wo Althoug the maj contribu chapel. Mrs. went to goddess young ness, dr orname those a before ings we came ar their gi only Sa pelled t as she p athi bu for her several time th FOR THE IEAR 1000. Missionary Song. BY REV. A. BRIGHAM. O, Thou Desire of all the world, But list, I hear the great command, Awake my people, hear the call, Let prince and peasant heed; Yea, dearest ones must many give, Lay down your gold at Jesus' feet. Thy holy church let zeal inspire, Go, compass earth and ocean brave, Council Bluffs District, Des Moines Con- ing. Our Missionary Collections. Ill.: was $ Rev Ather gram from from coura Rev man, siona Sunda Sund: have ercise Rev Plain had a and & used for E colled maki The collections so far this year indicate The the increased interest our people are taking in missions. The receiptsof the Missionary Treasury at New York and Cincinnati, for the first six months of the fiscal year which commences with November 1st, as compared for the same month of last year show the following: November... February Total to May 1.. Th No. been valua The gain on May 1, 1886, for the six months is $83,617.05. In order that the million shall be raised there must be an active co-operation of the pastors. Surely we shall not ask for this in vain. Rev. J. W. Rue, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church at McVeytown, April... Pa., writes that he has purchased two hundred Missionary boxes, and has placed them in the hands of two hundred members with the promise that they will put in at least one penny a week, and as much more as they can. Every one who does not take a box is pledged for a definite amount. In this way he is certain of doubling his collection over last year. Rev. J. B. Holloway, pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Denton, Texas, writes: "Last Sunday was our Missionary day. We called for a subscription from the Church, and to our satisfactory bewilderment, the amount subscribed in good subscriptions reached twelve per cent. over the Million line,' and not a cent yet from our SundaySchool. Last year little Austin Conference, that good Bishop Foster was wont to feel was without a mission in the world, overleaped the 'Million line' $160; and Denton will, this year, do her part 6 toword nutting $200 oron the (line! God Easter Sunday Collections. Rev. H. W. Watts writes from Asotin Rev. H. H. Barton writes from Dow the a In at ha is da alter has e circu Th the Edu tive be ha men infor peop Th Miss to th Dela All shoul The Holy Land and Its Protestant By the Holy Land we mean the country bordering on At the present time all of this country is embraced in cus has a population The Rev. J. B. There are said to be 25,000 Jews in the land, about one-half of whom are in Je the eleventh century, fr parted from it as not The Druses seem indeed ward Christianity than t regard the English as th wrought upon by Turkis have taken arms again SAMARITANS ON MOUNT GERIZIM IN PALESTINE. rusalem. There are from fifty to sixty thousand Arme- The Moslems constitute the mass of the population. The Druses are often counted as a Moslem sect. mandments, one of whi among themselves only. this respect are sadly lik not believe in prayer. I secret assemblies they a practices; but the charg is among them a specia are initiated into the dee |