THE UNITY OF THE SPIRIT 200 



its influences, seem to be dying out or 

 largely returning to barbarism. Of the 

 400,000,000 in India an insignificant pro- 

 portion of natives acknowledge the sway 

 of the Christ. There is a bright side in 

 the heroism of the missionaries, who are 

 persistent, brave, confident of victory ; but 

 the cause has not progressed far enough to 

 justify the slightest division among the 

 workers. And yet in every non-Christian 

 land there is multiplicity of sects. A 

 Wesleyan bishop from Canada is reported 

 to have found in one small town in Japan 

 four different branches of the Methodist 

 Church, requiring the presence at stated in- 

 intervals of three or four different bishops 

 from America and Great Britain. The report 

 is credible. I have seen in one place after 

 another in that country Presbyterians, Bap- 

 tists, Anglicans, American Episcopalians, 

 Methodists North and South, Wesleyans 

 from Canada, confusing natives by different 

 names, insisting on insignificant details of 

 their own organizations, when an impres- 

 sion had hardly been made on surrounding 

 heathenism. What do Japanese or Chinese 

 care about the Historic Episcopate ? What 

 must be the effect on a converted Buddhist 

 14 



