1 8 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. [chap. n. 



CHAPTER II. 



MISSIONARY PREPARATION. 



a.d. 1836-1840. 



His desire to be a missionary to China — Medical missions — He studies at Glasgow 

 — Classmates and teachers — He applies to London Missionary Society — His 

 ideas of mission work — He is accepted provisionally — He goes to London — to 

 Ongar — Reminiscences by Rev. Joseph Moore — by Mrs. Gilbert — by Rev. 

 Isaac Taylor — Nearly rejected by the Directors — Returns to Ongar — to 

 London — Letter to his sister — Reminiscences by Dr. Risdon Bennett — Pro- 

 mise to Professor Owen — Impression of his character on his friends and fellow- 

 students — Rev. R. Moffat in England — Livingstone interested — Could not be 

 sent to China — Is appointed to Africa — Providential links in his history — 

 Illness — Last visits to his home — Receives Medical diploma — Parts from his 

 family. 



It was the appeal of Gutzlaff for China, as we have 

 seen, that inspired Livingstone with the desire to be a 

 missionary ; and China was the country to which his 

 heart turned. The noble faith and dauntless enterprise 

 of Gutzlaff, pressing into China over obstacles apparently 

 insurmountable, aided by his medical skill and other 

 unusual qualifications, must have served to shape Living- 

 stone's ideal of a missionary, as well as to attract him to 

 the country where Gutzlaff laboured. It was so ordered, 

 however, that in consequence of the opium war shutting 

 China, as it seemed, to the English, his lot was not cast 

 there ; but throughout his whole life he had a peculiarly 

 lively interest in the country that had been the object of 

 his first love. Afterwards, when his brother Charles, 

 then in America, wrote to him that he too felt called to 

 the missionary office, China was the sphere which David 

 pointed out to him, in the hope that the door which had 



