Dr. JULIA BISSELL,
Ahmednagar, India.

Dr. MARY A. HOLBROOK.
Kobe, Japan.

MEDICAL MISSIONARIES- -WOMAN'S BOARD OF MISSIONS.

(Congregational-Auxiliary to A. B. C. F. M.)

generous practical recognition of it. It is something so new and difficult of comprehension by the average mind of man that even Christendom is not entirely free from the subtle sway of the pagan conception. Israel of old could hardly grasp the significance of missions, and to this day there is need of a far more loyal and generous appreciation on the part of the Christian public of this regnant thought of the Gospel. Christendom is too busy, or too preoccupied, or does not realize as it should, the value of an individual soul in God's sight, although, to its immortal honor, the Christian Church, and to some extent its environment of Christendom, is recognizing with new enthusiasm the supreme obligations of spiritual unselfishness as a first law of the Gospel. Even mission fields are bringing forth fruit, and missions are reduplicating themselves abroad.

This new outlook dawns slowly both in Christendom and outside of it, but it comes with the acceptance of Christianity. The vision seems to tarry, but the prospect brightens. The world needs this new atmosphere in the home, this new spirit in the community, this new force in the nation, this new estimate of the value of man as in God's likeness and in God's care. Have we not, even in contemporary European history, evidence at once painful and startling that the heart of civilization does not yet beat at all true to the idea of human brotherhood? This is the spirit of Christian missions, in whose outlook upon humanity "there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for all are one in Christ Jesus."

IV

Christianity provides a code of ethics which is both essentially valuable and sufficiently authoritative. The value of an ethical system depends upon several vital points: (1) The ideals

The true criteria of value in ethical systems.

should be correct. (2) The precepts should be right. (3) The motive should be sufficient. (4) The authority should be supreme. Tested by these criteria the value of various systems of ethics in force among non-Christian peoples becomes open to question; yet an imperfect or a partially effective ethical code may not be without a certain value. It may be good and useful in some particulars or up to a given point, and even though it may be positively objectionable in some respects, yet its usefulness as a whole may not be entirely destroyed by this fact. The ethics of Confucianism and Buddhism, for example, whatever may be the

imperfection which characterizes them, have nevertheless differentiated the existing civilization of Asiatic nations from barbarism and bestial savagery. They have accomplished this, however, because there is in them something of essential excellence, and owing to the fact that they teach many things which are found in more perfect form in the Christian code. They reflect the natural conscience of man, and represent, although in a disproportionate and disjointed system, much of the ethical content of primitive revelation and of the later Hebrew Decalogue. In fact, the ethics of non-Christian religious systems, where they have not been made subservient to evil desires and prostituted in fleshly compromise, are in a large sense the analogue of Christian ethics, but in an emasculated state-the life-essence having been withdrawn, the moral force weakened, and the impelling motive enfeebled. We may change the illustration and say that the various parts of the skeleton are to be found in a more or less imperfect state, but without proper articulation, and of course unclothed with flesh and destitute of vital energy. Life, the symbol of authority and the mystic sign of an indwelling spirit of power, is wanting. The graces and signs of righteous living-in biblical language, the "fruits of the Spirit"-as the culmination and crown of a vitalized ethical code, are not present.

ethical element in

religions.

The best side of ethnic religions is, however, their ethical teachings. A religious system can hardly afford to fail altogether in its theory of morals. Even whatever of moral laxity, judged The importance of the by Christian standards, exists in the ethics of Buddhism or Mohammedanism, for example, is stoutly defended by the disciples of those religions as correct and unobjectionable from an ethical point of view. No serious religious system can safely risk its influence and its prestige by upholding a moral code which offends the universal natural conscience of mankind. We do not expect, therefore, to find that the ethical standards of the great non-Christian religions do serious violence to the natural instincts and the imperative moral judgments of mankind. Their defects and failures will appear rather by comparison with the revealed will of God and the religious sanctions which He has established for the guidance of human conduct. It will be found that their basis of morals is insufficient and that the source of authority has been perverted. It is because the wisdom which propounds is inadequate, and the power which commands is deficient, that non-Christian ethics reveal such fatal weakness, and result in such an abortive practical outcome.

Another point which deserves emphasis in this connection is that ethics as at present under discussion are not confined merely to the

How can the value of an ethical system be verified?

theoretical code, but include also the practical outcome as historically exemplified in the moral life and conduct. By Buddhist ethics, for example, we mean not only the didactic code of morals covering the right and wrong of conduct which is taught by Buddhism, but the resultant which we find in the life and conduct of its followers. A theory of ethics is of little value if it is not exemplified in practice and if it has not the power to vitalize the moral nature and govern the conduct of its adherents. The serious point of difference between the ethics of Christianity and Buddhism is not chiefly in the content of their respective codes, but in the spiritual completeness and the impelling power towards realization which are characteristic of Christianity. Christian morals are not only pure and perfect in substance, but they are gifted with that subtle energy which marks the Gospel as a spiritual force. They are not concerned simply with what ought to be, but they demand realization in the life and conduct. In estimating the ethics of ethnic systems we should not fail to take into consideration, in addition to the morals which are taught in the code, those which are revealed in the life. When we speak, therefore, of the importance of transformed ethics in non-Christian lands we refer not only to the necessity of a new ethical code, but to the urgency of a new moral life. In fact, the advent of another system of ethics would be useless if it did not result in a corresponding change of conduct. An additional emphasis is given to this point if we note that even the theoretical ethics of ethnic religions are virtually out of sight in the practical life of the people. Society is ruled rather by the law of custom-the ethics of the status quo-than by the ideal code which is recorded in the books. Ethical principles have been largely supplanted by the unwritten law of custom, so that when we speak of Buddhist ethics, for example, we are referring for all practical purposes to Buddhist living rather than to its ideal code. The latter, although not perfect, is quite a different thing from the ethics which we find embodied in the moral habits of the people. Even their moral judgments have, as a rule, drifted away from the code, and reflect rather that environment of traditional custom which has become the standard of social morality. The ethical development has been chiefly in the wrong direction, and has culminated in fixed habits of life, which have become the reigning force in society rather than the authoritative moral code which is in the background. The resultant life is either utilitarian or hedonistic or ascetic rather than strictly moral in its controlling motives. It lacks sound fibre, has little, if any, consciousness of God, a feeble