Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XI.djvu/667

 FOREIGN MISSIONS 649 been friendly to the new religion from the first, and is a member of one of the native churches. Ever since the death of the first queen, the missionaries have enjoyed the lar- gest liberty in the prosecution of their work. Nearly half a million of people have already renounced their idolatry ; the state idols have been burned ; large congregations are gathered every Sunday for Christian worship ; thou- sands have learned to read, and 60,000 are numbered as communicants in the churches ; a change more rapid and remarkable than in any other mission field. Turning westward again, it is something noticeable that Protestant mis- sionaries are now laboring in Italy, Spain, and Austria ; countries from which until quite re- cently they were excluded. The Protestant church members in Italy are now 4,000. Such are some of the changes in the old world. In America, the labors of the missionaries among the Indians have not been altogether in vain. The Creeks, Cherokees, and Choctaws had virtually received the Christian religion 20 years ago, but the civil war deprived them for a time of their religious teachers and retarded their progress. They, however, have schools, churches, and native pastors, supported by themselves. Missionaries are also at work among the Chippewas, the Sioux, the Paw- nees, the Delawares, the Oneidas, the Nez Percys, and other tribes within the territory of the United States. English missionaries are in like service in Manitoba, around Hud- son bay, in British Columbia, and on Macken- zie river. Sixteen different societies have mis- sions among the Indians of North America; and it is estimated that 10,000 of them are now members of Christian churches, and 75,000 including women and children, have settled down to habits of civilized life. The present attitude of the government is regarded as highly favorable to greater success in Chris- tianizing the Indians. The Moravians have 24 missionary agents, 45 native assistants, and 948 communicants among the Greenlanders ; and 45 missionary agents, 36 native assistants, and 434 communicants in Labrador. Through all this modern missionary era many of the blacks of the West India islands have been regard- ed as but little better than pagans, and Eng- lish and American missionaries have labored among them with great self-denial. It is esti- mated that 80,000 are now members of Prot- estant churches. Protestant missionaries, 12 in number, are laboring in Mexico, occupying six of its principal cities, with 12 congrega- tions in and around the capital. Great num- bers of Bibles are sold ; the people are asking for schools and learning to read, a new thing with them. A like work has been begun in Colombia, Chili, and Brazil, from which coun- tries Protestant missionaries were excluded until within a few years. The Moravians have long had a prosperous mission in Surinam, and now have 13 stations, 65 missionary agents, 406 native assistants, and 5,507 communicants. In the islands of the Pacific all was pagan, and a large part cannibal, 60 years ago. The people were without written languages, with- out books, without schools, and sunk in the lowest degradation. English and American missionaries have vied with each other in the work of elevating them. Twenty languages have been reduced to writing. Elementary books and translations of the Scriptures have been prepared in them, schools opened, teach- ers trained for them, and hundreds of thou- sands of the people have been taught to read. Churches have been organized and na- tive pastors placed over them. Men are now preaching the gospel on these islands who had participated in a hundred cannibal feasts. The first missionaries to the Hawaiian islands landed there in 1820, and since that time the number of converts received into their churches is about 70,000; the present number is 12,360, gathered in 57 churches, most of them having native pastors. These churches, with some aid in men and means from the American board, themselves now sustain a foreign mis- sion in the Micronesian islands, 3,000 miles S. W. of their own country, and another on the Marquesas islands, nearly as far S. The Ha- waiian islands have been for some years re- garded as Christianized, and no longer mis- sionary ground. Like changes have occurred further south, under the labors of English missionaries, of the London, Wesleyan, and Church missionary societies. They have la- bored in New Zealand, and in the Society, Friendly, Feejee, and other islands, with such success that idolatry and cannibalism have dis- appeared from almost the whole of eastern Polynesia. More than 300 islands have almost entirely relinquished their heathenism, and more than 400,000 of these recent savages are virtually Christianized. The number of com- municants gathered into their churches was long since reckoned at 50,000, and now can hardly be less than 60,000. According to the estimates given, the number of converts now living and gathered into Christian churches by the labors of Protestant missionaries through- out the world is as follows: in China, 10,000 ; Burmah, 20,000 ; India, 60,000; Turkey, 4,000; west Africa, 20,000; south Africa, 30,000; Madagascar, 60,000; the Indians of North America, 10,000 ; the blacks of the "West Indies and Guiana, 80,000 ; and the Pacific islanders, 60,000 ; making a total of 354,000 communi- cants, representing communities of nominal Christians to the number of nearly 2,000,000, without including the scattered few in Japan, Siam, Persia, Syria, Egypt, Greenland, Mexico, Peru, and Brazil. There are now about 2,000 Protestant missionaries engaged in the work, aided by 10,000 native pastors and preachers whom they have trained; and missionaries have translated the Bible and many other books into nearly 200 languages and dialects. Prob- ably 100 of the missionaries are medical men, who combine the healing art with their reli-