OUR ORIENTAL MISSIONS. VOLUME I. INDIA AND CHINA. BY EDWARD THOMSON, D. D., LL. D., CINCINNATI: NEW YORK: CARLTON AND LANAHAN. I to Lib Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, BY HITCHCOCK & WALDEN, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington. THE Journal kept by the writer during a visit to the missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the years 1864-65. It was not with. the intention of publishing it that the Journal was written, but with a view to make out a full report to the Church in case it should be called for. Brethren, in whose judgment the narrator confides, have latterly urged him to give it to the public, and as it cost him but little pains to revise it, he yielded to their opinion. In the revision he has modified here and there an observation, and put reflections in a new form, but has made no material alteration. Our missions in the East are, it is hoped, destined to become very important, and the time may come M302619 3 when their history shall be written. Perhaps this volume may furnish some dates and materials for such a history. It will certainly serve as a mile-stone to mark progress. Scarcely four years have elapsed since these pages were written, and yet the intensely interesting letters of Bishop Kingsley, which the reader has most assuredly read, and which ought to be given in book form without delay, will show a marked advance, not only in the progress of religion in the East, but in the condition of the world. Now one can circumnavigate the globe with much more ease and safety than he could in 1864; and, go where he will, he will find society advancing, and in the great centers where the Christian religion is permeating the minds of men. It is a matter of profound regret that the Methodist Episcopal Church has not done more for her missions than she has. The Centenary, the vast field opened at home, and the results of the war will naturally be referred to as accounting for our want of enlargement abroad, but we must not plead any excuses hereafter. Let us look forward, not backward. If this |