THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD'S PRAYER. A FILIAL A MISSIONARY A PENITENT A FORGIVING A CAUTIOUS A TRUSTFUL and GOD-GLORIFYING spirit,-" For Thine is the king dom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever. "HE CARETH FOR YOU." Poor and needy thoug I be, God Almighty cares for me, Gives me clothing, shelter, food, Gives me all I have of good. He will hear me when I pray, He who reigns above the sky, Though I labour here a while, Then to Thee I'll tune my song, Happy as the day is long, This my joy for ever be,- Amen." THE CHINESE MISSIONARY'S HOME. HE Rev. J. S. Burdon, of Shanghai, relates that having gone into the interior on one or two occasions, and experienced the same encouragement of which the other Missionaries speak, he resolved to give himself entirely to visit the towns and villages in the interior, where Christ had not been named. The only question was the best way of setting about it. He and a brother Missionary of another society, who has joined with him in the effort, endeavoured, in the first place, to secure a settlement in some city, or town, or village, say about twenty or thirty miles from Shanghai. This attempt failed. Suspicion of a foreigner exists in the breast of every Chinaman; and though they tried to disarm it by offering to take places which Englishmen generally would not think fit for their cattle, yet the people could not be persuaded. There remained, therefore, no alternative but to go from place to place, from village to village, from town to town, from city to city, IN A BOAT. Mr. Burdon has therefore given up his house, school, and preaching-room in the city of Shanghai. VOL. V. No. VI. JONE 1856, His home is now a Chinese boat, by no means proof against the wind during the cold days of winter. The sphere of work is the district round Shanghai to the distance of about thirty miles on all sides, abounding with towns and villages. This part has been well visited for the purpose of distributing books, but never before systematically visited, as is now being done. Farther from Shanghai the dialect would change, and the Missionary, of course, would have to learn it before he could have intercourse with the people. The plan of operations pursued is this: On reaching any place, the Missionaries anchor in some convenient locality, and there remain until they depart to another town. The mornings and evenings are devoted to the study of Chinese, and the afternoons are given up to missionary work. After commending themselves and their work to the God of Missions, they go off together to some central and public part of the town, generally the court-yard of the principal temple. There they are soon surrounded by a large crowd, and, standing on some stone steps in front of a large vase, they preach Jesus Christ and Him crucified as the only Saviour from sin and ruin. They say: "We have almost always attentive congregations; and sometimes, after the preaching is over, very sensible questions are put to us, which we take great pleasure in answering. Any one who wishes to inquire more particularly is invited to come to the boat. Sometimes we have a good number of visitors at the boat, after returning from preaching, with many of whom we have very interesting conversations." The same plan of missionary operation is pursued-by other Missionaries. The Rev. Mr. Burns, of the English Presbyterian mission, gives some interesting details of his work in a recent letter which begins: "I write these lines on board a river-boat, which has been my principal habitation during the past three months." The great importance of this new mode of prosecuting the missionary work will appear from the following sentences from another part of Mr. Burns' interesting letter: "When on our way to Min-Haing, we passed through a creek or canal, which, as it is a bypath, seems not to have been yet traversed by our missionary brethren, and, meeting with the small market-town of Sin-Keaon (or New Bridge), we spent here one pleasant day preaching to a larger crowd than we could address with effect, brought together, of course, by the novel sight of a foreigner in the garb of his country. When passing slowly down this creek, on the afternoon of Friday, the people came out in unusual numbers to get books, which we threw to them on the banks, or which they waited for on the wooden bridges under which we had every now and then to pass. At one place we had to remain for a full half-hour, until the tide, which was against us, should slacken, and this interval was occupied in addressing a considerable number of people, men and women, who had hastened to the spot. When it was dark, we halted for the night at Chung-Foo-Kean (or Passage-for-all-Bridge), where there are but a few houses, and where we little thought of finding a congregation. However, we had hardly halted, until we were arrested by the sound of a multitude of voices, as of a crowd dispersing, and were informed that there had been a stage-play going on of an unusually immoral kind; and that the people had now dispersed, so that it was too late to reach them. However, we went ashore, and, though the mass of these poor heathens were gone, we still found as many as we could address with effect, lingering about the gambling and eating houses. The people had their lanterns, and we had ours; and, amid the darkness thus broken, we addressed a multitude of precious souls, assisted graciously by our God to speak with more than usual earnestness and liberty of speech; the people, also, as if panic-struck by being overtaken by such a message in such circumstances, listened with a fixed and serious interest. I called on them to join with us in prayer to the true God, in the name of the Saviour of sinners, that He would deliver them from their sins, and save them from the punishment which sin was preparing for them. At the beginning of the address to God's throne, there was some noise of voices, but towards the close all was breathless stillness. My companion and I were encouraged by this meeting, as if by God's special guidance, with opportunities of declaring His truth, and calling fellowsinners to repentance. The following day (Saturday), at Min-Haing, we met with another unexpected opportunity of addressing the truth to many. When, in the afternoon, going from our boat to preach a second time in the town, we came upon a spot retired a little from the street, where a crowd were witnessing jugglers' tricks, and to which the people were still flocking. We took our stand on the raised pathway at one side of the street leading to the spot, and not only succeeded in cutting off the stream of passers-by, but in drawing off by degrees the crowd from the jugglers, so that, before our long and very interesting meeting was ended, we had the field to ourselves. At this place (MinHaing) as well as some other places, numbers of the people seemed desirous that a place should be opened for the regular preaching of the Gospel among them. This, we trust, may soon be effected in many places; but as yet, unless the truth take a very marked hold of the minds and hearts of some, leading themselves to move in the matter of getting places opened for preaching, it seems better to keep to our boat on the water, and scatter our efforts over a wider field. "You will see from the little incidents of our late journey (and our experience on this occasion is but an average specimen of what we have been meeting with during the past few months), that the field here is indeed open for evangelistic efforts of the kind in which I am now privileged to be engaged. The level nature of the country in this neighbourhood, and the complete network of rivers, creeks, and canals which traverse it in all directions, render it, as you are aware, much more easily accessible than the country in the south, where I have previously been. Of the importance of this fact the missionaries here are aware; formerly they were afraid, even on board, of being longer absent from Shanghai than, at most, a day or two, lest they should be charged with violating treaties with foreign powers; but of late, emboldened by some successful attempts to go to greater distances, and remain longer absent, they are beginning to feel as if, though forbidden the land, they were allowed the water." A LONDON CITY MISSIONARY'S GLORY AND JOY. "For ye are our glory and joy."-1 THESS. ii, 20. "DRINK has been the ruin of me," is the confession of multitudes, and might be the confession of multitudes more. "I have been through the workhouse," says the missionary; "I have conversed with, I have questioned, each inmate; with a few exceptions, all have been brought where they are by one cause-Drink." What fills our police-courts? Drink. What arms the husband against the wife? the father against the child? Drink. What strips the cottage of every comfort, and deprives the children of bread? Drink. Drink comes as a bitter foe between man and himself, between man and his neighbour, between man and his God. Yet such is the subtle strength which this sin, in common with every other sin, possesses, that when once it has taken hold of a man, it is like a possession of the devil, it casts him into the fire, it casts him |