"THE FIELD IS THE WORLD."-MATTHEW XIII. 38. "GO YE INTO ALL THE WORLD, AND PREACH THE GOSPEL TO EVERY CREATURE."-MARK XVI. 15. "BLESSED ARE YE THAT SOW BESIDE ALL WATERS, THAT SEND FORTH THITHER THE FEET OF THE OX AND THE ASS."-ISAIAH XXXII. 20. "FOR YE SEE YOUR CALLING, BRETHREN, HOW THAT NOT MANY WISE MEN AFTER THE FLESH, NOT MANY MIGHTY, NOT MANY NOBLE, ARE CALLED: BUT GOD HATH CHOSEN THE FOOLISH THINGS OF THE WORLD TO CONFOUND THE WISE; AND GOD HATH CHOSEN THE WEAK THINGS OF THE WORLD TO CONFOUND THE THINGS WHICH ARE MIGHTY; AND BASE THINGS OF THE WORLD, AND THINGS WHICH ARE DESPISED, HATH GOD CHOSEN, YEA, AND THINGS WHICH ARE NOT, TO BRING TO NOUGHT THINGS THAT ARE: THAT NO FLESH SHOULD GLORY IN HIS PRESENCE."-1 COR. I. 26-29. "NOT BY MIGHT, NOR BY POWER, BUT BY MY SPIRIT, SAITH THE LORD OF HOSTS."-ZECH. IV. 6. "LO, I AM WITH YOU ALWAY, EVEN UNTO THE END OF THE WORLD." -MATTHEW XXVIII. 20. : DUP.EXCH. 27 MAR. 1901 DREW THEOL. SEM. West Africa (No. 1). Senegal to Sherbro ... Table XXXII... 133 West Africa (No. 2). Liberia to Gaboon..............Table XXXIII.. 135 NOTICE. 1. THE following pages contain the Statistics of Protestant Missions for the year 1872-3; they are similar in their plan and character, though much enlarged, to the "Statistics of Protestant Missions for 1861," printed eleven years ago, for private circulation among the friends of Missions. 2. The difficulties in the way of obtaining exact returns have already been matter of frequent complaint. "So defective are the Reports of some Societies, and so various are the modes of classifying labourers, adopted by different bodies, that it is not possible to gather from published documents even the exact number of Missionary labourers now employed among the unevangelized. Still more entirely defective and perplexing are returns found to be, when an effort is made to ascertain who among the labourers are ordained Missionaries, who male and who female assistants from Christian lands, and who, in various capacities, native helpers." It would be well if some approach to uniformity in the estimating of labours and results were adopted by the various Missionary Societies, and if some general and simultaneous attempt were made by each Missionary Society to obtain the returns of each Mission on a uniform plan, something similar to those presented by the Allahabad Conference of 1872, following substantially the admirable work presented by the previous statistical tables of the Rev. Dr. Mullens. Much do we regret the defective reports of many Missionary Societies, some of them giving no returns of day schools or pupils; most of them ignoring Sunday schools altogether. The Dutch and German Societies labouring in Sumatra, Borneo, Java, and the islands of the Indian Archipelago, do not seem anxious to give information respecting these interesting Missions. Of some important American Societies, that of the Protestant Episcopal Church, for instance, we have only returns up to 1870; the last Reports of the Synod of 1873 not being obtainable. Many more Societies seem not to circulate their Reports, as, after diligent inquiry in America, they have not been procurable. No Missionary Society has preserved a perfect list of the Grammars or Dictionaries compiled by its Missionaries, or the translations in which they have taken a part. This information has to be gathered from incidental mention in Missionary notices and reports, and the record is of course very imperfect. 3. The revenue of the various Missionary and Bible Societies, so far as can be gathered from the returns, is as follows:British Societies, £877,534; Continental, £149,513; American, £599,815. Total, £1,626,862. This amount is about double the estimate made in 1861, and it omits the names of about twenty Missionary Societies in America, and fourteen on the Continent, besides sundry local Societies in India and the Colonies. That this is a large amount in the present low standard of Christian liberality, we freely admit; but what is it, considering the annual accumulation of wealth in Great Britain, America, and the Continental nations? Greater faithfulness in the exercise of our stewardship would no doubt be followed by proportionate spiritual and temporal blessings. God condescends to use us, not because He could not do without our agency, but in order to secure for us the blessedness which accompanies the cheerful giver. "Not because I desire a gift: but I desire fruit that may abound to your account." (Phil. iv. 17.) Who among us can say, "The zeal of Thine house hath eaten me up?" (Psalm lxix. 9.) And of whom will it be said by the Master, "He hath done what he could?" It is worthy of remark that in no instance has the Missionary movement operated injuriously upon the Home interests of any Christian Church. Enterprises abroad have rather stimulated efforts at home. On the other hand, where the obligation to Missionary effort has been neglected, spiritual and numerical declension have followed. "There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth; and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." (Prov. xi. 24.) 4. A word in reference (1st) to the success of the efforts of Christians for the spread of the Gospel among nominal Christians since the commencement of the great revival of the eighteenth century under Wesley and Whitefield; and (2nd) to the results of the labours of Christian Missionaries since the resumption of Mission work in the last decade of the same century. It has been customary to make disparaging comparisons between the triumphs of the apostolic age, and the rapid spread of the Gospel in the following centuries, with |