MISSIONARIES 
parody, as a natural relief), cant still exists, as can be seen by anyone 
who reads most missionary journals and hears many missionaries discourse. 
It exists ordinarily amongst the rawest and newest of missionaries and in 
the youngest of the missionary societies. In such missions as those of 
the Universities, the Church of Scotland and the Livingstonia Free Church, 
cant is extinct to a great extent locally, though it still lingers in the home 
compilations, in the journals which professedly give an account of the work of 
these establishments and which are published for home consumption. Sincere 
friends of mission work, such 
as Robert Needham Cust and 
Canon Isaac Taylor, have at 
times expressed their wonder¬ 
ment that missionaries should 
think it right or necessary to 
attach to descriptions of their 
work given verbally or in writing 
such expressions of mawkish 
piety, and so many statements 
which are an insidious perversion 
of the truth. In the latter case 
I can only imagine it is done on 
the assumption once attributed 
to the Jesuits, that it is right to 
do evil that good may come: 
that the missionaries are as con¬ 
vinced as I am of the ultimate 
good they effect, and that to 
encourage the British public to 
find funds for the carrying on of 
such work they think it excus¬ 
able or even lawful to “gammon” 
them, if I may put it vulgarly, 
to repeat speeches of high-flown 
piety, on the part of savage and 
uncultured converts, which could 
not have been uttered with 
serious consciousness of their 
meaning, and, indeed, could 
never have been formulated 
from such poor arrested brains. 
Then again—especially in the case of newly-formed missionary societies 
who, in the rush of unreasoning enthusiasm have embarked on African 
evangelisation without counting the cost or making the necessary preparations 
—articles too profane to be quoted are written of how God has taken to Himself 
“dear Sister So-and-so” or “Brother Somebody-else,” to “cherish them on 
high” and give them a reward for their labours, as if there had been a 
special intervention of providence, when to the outside observer it is obvious 
that the sister or brother would never have died or even been ill if he or 
she had been properly housed or properly fed. My indictment on this score 
is not half strong enough. I kept by me at one time the journals and records 
of certain missionary societies, intending to quote them in some such 
2 T 
1. BISHOP HORNBY (FORMERLY OF NYASALAND) 
2. THE LATE BISHOP MAPLES, OF LIKOMA 
