THE MISSIONARY LIFE. 313 



recollection of their sins when God had opened their hearts to 

 Christianity and repentance. It is true that missionaries have 

 difficulties to encounter ; but what great enterprise was ever ac- 

 complished without difficulty ? It is deplorable to think that 

 one of the noblest of our missionary societies, the Church Mis- 

 sionary Society, is compelled to send to Germany for missionaries, 

 whilst other societies are amply supplied. Let this stain be 

 wiped off. — The sort of men who are wanted for missionaries 

 are such as I see before me ; — men of education, standing, en- 

 terprise, zeal, and piety. It is a mistake to suppose that any 

 one, as long as he is pious, will do for this office. Pioneers in 

 everything should be the ablest and best qualified men, not those 

 of small ability and education. This remark especially applies 

 to the first teachers of Christian truth in regions which may 

 never have before been blest with the name and gospel of Jesus 

 Christ. In the early ages the monasteries were the schools of 

 Europe, and the monks were not ashamed to hold the plough. 

 The missionaries now take the place of those noble men, and we 

 should not hesitate to give up the small luxuries of life in order 

 to carry knowledge and truth to them that are in darkness. I 

 hope that many of those whom I now address will embrace that 

 honorable career. Education has been given us from above for 

 the purpose of bringing to the benighted the knowledge of a 

 Saviour. If you knew the satisfaction of performing such a 

 duty, as well as the gratitude to God which the missionary must 

 always feel, in being chosen for so noble, so sacred a calling, you 

 would have no hesitation in embracing it. 



For my own part, I have never ceased to rejoice that God 

 has appointed me to such an office. People talk of the sacrifice 

 I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa. Can 

 that be called a sacrifice which is simply paid back as a small 

 part of a great debt owing to our God, which we can never re- 

 pay ? — Is that a sacrifice which brings its own blest reward in 

 healthful activity, the consciousness of doing good, peace of 

 mind, and a bright hope of a glorious destiny hereafter ? — Away 

 with the word in such a view, and with such a thought! It is 

 emphatically no sacrifice. Say rather it is a privilege. Anxiety, 

 sickness, suffering, or danger, now and then, with a foregoing 

 of the common conveniences and charities of this life, may make 



