Part 4 (2/2)
They have resolved, therefore, to adopt the following measures:--First, they limit the staff of English missionaries to the number of men (thirteen) now left in the field. They desire that steady efforts shall be made to place all the churches under the pastoral charge of suitable Native ministers. They desire that all the local and incidental expenses of the mission shall be entirely defrayed by the Native Churches. Lastly, they will limit their grants from England to the allowance of the English missionaries.
XIV.--INCOME AND EXPENDITURE.
1.--RECEIPTS.
1. CONTRIBUTIONS FOR GENERAL PURPOSES--
a. Subscriptions, Donations, and pound. s. d.
Collections 56,685 2 11 b. Dividends 584 4 9 c. Australian Auxiliaries and Foreign Societies 3,191 6 10 d. Legacies 10,875 13 7 e. Fund for Widows and Orphans and Retired Missionaries 4,500 15 0 f. Mission Stations, English and Native Contributions, raised and appropriated 19,414 16 4 g. Ditto, additional from the South Seas, unappropriated 1,070 19 5 ------------ 96,322 18 10
2. CONTRIBUTIONS FOR SPECIAL OBJECTS--
a. For the Extension of Missions in China 552 12 10 b. For the Extension of Missions in India 371 5 4 c. For Madagascar Mission 1,521 7 11 d. For Memorial Churches 1,267 17 0 e. For Training Native Agents, other than in India 1,000 0 0 f. For Missionary s.h.i.+p 253 19 0 g. For Expenditure of 1867 and 1868 79 7 8 ------------ 5,046 9 9 ------------ Total Income 101,369 8 7
3. Balance in hand, May, 1868 1,062 8 4 4. Funded Property, Tasmania Bond, paid off 500 0 0 5. Value of Stock transferred from s.h.i.+p Account 2,432 0 0 6. Rev. Dr. Tidman's Testimonial Fund 3,483 18 11 ----------- 7,478 7 3 ------------ 108,847 15 10 ============
2.--EXPENDITURE.
1. FOREIGN EXPENDITURE.
a. China Mission: allowances of the English Missionaries; Rents; Repairs; Sick Leave; Expenses of Itinerancies; Native Agency; Education, and the Press (as detailed in the last Annual Report) 10,103 7 3 b. India Missions: Bengal and North India; the Madras Presidency; and Travancore 35,386 13 11 c. Madagascar Mission 6,686 4 4 d. South Africa Mission 9,872 1 6 e. West India Mission 9,225 10 9 f. Mission in the South Seas 13,454 19 2 g. Education of Missionary Students 2,109 10 1 h. Retired Missionaries; Widows and Orphans 3,398 8 0 ------------ TOTAL FOREIGN EXPENDITURE 90,236 15 3
2. HOME EXPENDITURE.
a. Expenses of Administration 1,913 16 10 b. Expenses in Raising Funds 3,477 12 4 c. Periodical Literature 1,539 1 1 d. General Home Expenses 794 19 8 ----------- TOTAL HOME EXPENDITURE 7,725 9 11 ------------ Total expended in 1868 97,962 5 2 3. Investments 9,017 0 0 4. Balance in hand, May 1, 1869 1,868 10 8 ------------ 108,847 15 10 =============
This statement shows that the greater ordinary income secured during the past year is needed every year, to maintain the Society at its present strength. Even with revised establishments working at a reduced cost, the Directors still require 75,000 pounds a-year to meet the various items of general expenditure for which they have directly to provide. But that is precisely the amount which the revived interest and the earnest exertions of deputations and collectors have brought into their hands; and no margin is left at their command to cover any extraordinary expense which may arise.
Nowhere, therefore, may our friends relax their efforts or diminish their recent gifts. Givers, collectors, ministers who plead, are still invited to uphold the hands of the Society, and to urge its claims. And if we look to extension, that extension which comes naturally to a prosperous field: still more to that extension for which the field untouched cries mightily day by day: how shall this enlargement of our operations be secured but by still augmented resources, by still higher consecration, still greater liberality, and more earnest prayer?
The SOCIETY DESERVES such help from our Churches; its history, its sphere of usefulness, the spirit in which it is managed, the rich prosperity which the Lord has granted to its labours, all appeal in its name. THE FIELD DESERVES AND NEEDS IT. How little has been accomplished of the holy purpose which Missions have in view.
Compared with the millions unevangelized, the converts gained are numerically nothing. Indeed, the sphere of our labour has continued ever to grow wider, and every answer of G.o.d's providence to the Church's gifts and prayers and self-denial has been to extend its power to be useful and give it much more to do.
And does not the LORD CLAIM from us this larger service? He has shown the need of the heathen world more clearly, and made the argument for instructing it unanswerable.
We have prospects for the future to which the gains of the past are poor. With our skilled agencies, all shaped by experience, with plans well-tried, with our versions and our literatures in every tongue, with China opened widely in answer to prayer, with India deeply moved, with Africa free, with Polynesia raised and civilized, with Madagascar purified by fire--what tokens have we of manifest blessing, of approval, and of divine help! The old systems have fallen, or are paralysed, or are trembling with fear; and the young life of the world is drawing towards freedom and truth. Our results are incomplete; they are but an earnest of successes yet to be gathered; and the full reward will be reaped more truly as the years go by. But how n.o.ble that reward will be!
A pleasant custom prevails in India which will ill.u.s.trate our position. At all the military stations of the Empire, the troops are summoned to parade in the early morning by the firing of a gun. The night may still be dark; the restless sleeper may fancy it will yet be long. But suddenly amid the stillness loud and clear booms out the morning gun. The stars are still s.h.i.+ning, and the landscape is wrapped in gloom. But THE DAWN IS NEAR; and soon every eye is open, every foot astir, and the busy, waking life of men again begins. The fleecy clouds that hang on the eastern horizon grow ruddy with gold; and the arrowy light shoots its bright rays athwart the clear blue sky. The dust and foulness which the night has hidden stand revealed.
But in the forests and hills the pulses of nature beat fresh and full; the leopard and the tiger slink away; the gay flowers open; the birds flit to and fro, and with woodland music welcome the rising day. In the city all forms of life quicken into active exercise. The trader sits ready on his stall; the judge is on the bench; the physician allays pain; the mother tends her child. The claims of human duty come again into full force; benevolence is active; suffering and disappointment, forgotten in sleep, press with new weight on weary hearts. What a mighty change one hour has made!
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