loo Kenneth S. Latourctte, 



wisdom and strength to our efforts and better security to our 

 friends abroad. It will not interfere with individual and private 

 conduct; while it will give counsel and support to all, and have 

 general supervision of the several objects of Christian benevo- 

 lence which may come within its reach. It has commenced a 

 depository and library. ... It has or will soon open a corre- 

 spondence with the several missionary stations between the 

 capes. "^^ It published "Chinese Scripture Lessons for Schools"^^ 

 and guaranteed the expenses of the Chinese Repository for the 

 first year.®^ After the Repository was guaranteed by Olyphant 

 the Christian Union seems to have ended its specific usefulness, 

 and to have lost itself in the societies formed later for more 

 specialized activities. 



A second organization was that for the "Diffusion of Useful 

 Knowledge in China," formed in December, 1834. Its purpose 

 was "to prepare and publish, in a cheap form, plain and easy 

 treatises in the Chinese language on such branches of useful 

 knowledge as are suited to the existing state and condition of 

 the Chinese Empire."^* In four years it had issued almanacs, 

 and a "collection of elementary and useful information used by 

 the young and by men of imperfect education," which included 

 some modified Aesop's Fables, a universal history, and. a history 

 of England. A description of the United States and a history 

 of the Jews were about to come out, and other works were in 

 preparation.^^ It was a larger organization than the Christian 

 Union, but as in time its work came to be done by other agencies 

 it was allowed to lapse. 



°' Corres. of the A. B. C. F. M., China, 1831-7, No. 37, Bridgman to 

 Evarts, Jan. 27, 1831. See also, Tracy, History of the Am. Bd., p. 201. 



'' Corres. of A. B. C. F. U., China, 1831-7. 



*^ See Bridgman to Anderson, April 5, 1833, Corres. of A. B. C. F. M., 

 China, 1831-7, No. 73. Tracy says that if the work had been unsuccess- 

 ful, but a fourth part of the expense would have fallen on the American 

 Board, which implies that the Christian Union guaranteed only three- 

 fourths of the expenses (Hist, of Am. Bd., p. 224), but he does not quote 

 his authority. I am inclined to think that Tracy may be right, and that 

 Bridgman's statement was merely a general one. 



~* Williams, Mid. King., 2 : 340. 



^° Fourth Annual Report of the Society, Nov. 21, 1838, Ch. Rep., 

 7 : 399-410. 



