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The Measure of Missionary Spirit'

By F. W. Hewes

HILE it is not true that " money In their earlier history, especially before is the measure of all things," it 1845, some denominations had but a is undoubtedly true that peo- single board, carrying both foreign and home missions under one organization. In later years, and especially since the Civil War, auxiliary boards have greatly multiplied. One after another the larger home mission boards have separately organized their Sunday-school work, church erection, educational work, and relief for worn-out and disabled ministers; and instituted various women's missionary societies. Work among the freedmen has also in most of the larger denominations a separate organization. The foreign mission societies, except for women's auxiliaries, even in the largest denominations, still report receipts (contributions) in a single sum, embracing all divisions of the work, literary, educational, church erection, medical, and all other.

ple contribute money to aid any undertaking just as they sympathize with the object of the undertaking. In this sense, then, money contributed for the support of missions is a measure of the missionary spirit of the population or of any particular denomination.

Some months ago The Outlook asked the writer to ascertain, if practicable, whether the present generation is contributing as liberally to missionary work as past generations. The initial proposition of the inquiry embraced only the five larger denominations, but it soon appeared that some of the smaller bodies were quite as important to the investigation as the larger ones, and therefore these were included, embracing in all fourteen active missionary denominations and the American Tract Society.2

The procuring and completion of these reports has required patient and persistent correspondence and much tedious personal search. In many cases the only way to obtain the records has been to pick them out year by year from treasurers' reports as published in the minutes of the annual conventions of the various bodies. Besides this, some denominations divide their work among so many auxiliaries as greatly to increase the labor of securing the records, and the care to avoid duplications.

The writer wishes hereby publicly and heartily to thank the many Secretaries of Mission Boards and their assistants for their cheerful and efficient aid, by means of which he was enabled to accomplish this investigation, and for their expressed personal interest in the results of the inquiry.

2 Efforts to secure satisfactory annual records of the Lutheran bodies, German Evangelical Synod, Colored Baptists, Christians, Evangelical Association, Friends, and others of the smaller denominations, had, with much reluctance, to be abandoned. It would have been a pleasure also to have included the American Bible Society, but its missionary record is available only in twenty-five-year periods up to 1892; and that of the American Sunday School Union, had its record been received in time. The addition of all these would not, however, have much increased the grand aggregate or in any way changed the general conclusions; for the records collated show so general uniformity of increase and decrease at the same periods as clearly to indicate that their variations are typical of all missionary contributions. These records cover a period of eighty-six years, beginning with the first annual report of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1811) and including the several reports of 1896,

Annual Record. Enough has been said to show the nature and scope of the inquiry, and attention is therefore directed to the results. The aggregate annual contribution is graphically shown, year by year, from 1844, in "Study No. 1." The previous history shows only slight variations in the annual aggregate, very similar in general characteristics to that of the first ten-year period (the 1850 period) at the lower left-hand corner of the diagram. The 1860 period introduces marked irregularities of annual contribution. The 'panic of 1857 produced a decided decrease in 1858, which was only fairly recovered in 1860. The Civil War wrought sad havoc with progress.1

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The most notable check of progress was made by the "long panic," 1872-1879. From that date until 1892 the increase was uninterrupted and rapid. The apparent checks at 1885 and 1889 are evidently due to extraordinary legacies in 1884 and 1888. The depression beginning at 1893 is seen to be more disastrous

1 It is necessary to remember that specie payment was suspended in 1862 and not resumed until 1879. Also that from 1862 to 1865 the Southern bodies reported their contributions in Confederate money. Therefore all records of contributions for the seventeen suspension years are reduced to a specie basis, and each of the "studies" portrays the history on the uniform basis of specie payment for the whole time.

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than any other except that occasioned by the Civil War.

Ten-Year Records. While the annual record portrays the history of the chief financial struggles and triumphs, the general history of progress is better learned by the study of averages. "Study No. 2" begins thirty years earlier than No. 1, with the 1820 period (1815-1824), in which the aggregate contribution averaged $40,600 per year, as noted with the 1820 dot at the lower left-hand corner of the diagram. That was in the infancy of the existing Protestant missionary organizations. The increase, period by period, is best read from the diagram itself.

The chief lesson is that, in spite of the marked irregularities shown by the annual record, the ten-year averages show a steady and remarkable progress, culminating in the 1890 period with an annual average increase over the 1880 period of more than six million dollars, in spite of its two panic years, 1893 and 1894; or, starting with the Civil War period (1860), a total increase in thirty years of almost 460 per cent. This is marvelous progress, and one wonders whether it can be continued in future years.1

Touching the question of generations, it will aid the inquiry to consider that average business activity covers a period of about twenty years, and that average active contributions to missions covers about the same period. On that basis the history under review embraces four generations, and it is very evident that the fourth generation, including the 1880 and 1890 periods, very greatly outstripped its predecessors in its absolute contribution.

The next step is to analyze this remarkable history by comparing the contribution with the population. An increased total, however large, does not prove increased liberality, for the population making the contribution may have increased just as rapidly.

I Before leaving this study it is due the reader to explain that these ten-year records include important averages which, owing to peculiarities of the reports of some denominations, could not be ascertained for individual years, but could be satisfactorily embraced in the ten-year groupings. As examples of the principal additions: Episcopalians reported several branches of their work trienníally, and the United Brethren in Christ report all of their contributions quadrennially instead of annually; while Congregationalists reported their unclassified contributions annually for only ten years past. These additions swell the ten-year averages materially as far back as to the 1850 period, but are less important in the earlier periods.

Per Capita. The census enumeration of population at each decennial year may properly be taken to represent the annual average population for the ten years beginning five years before the opening of the census year and ending five years later. The periods adopted for this investigation are the periods just described. It therefore becomes a simple matter to compute the average annual per capita contribution for each such period. "Study No. 3" portrays the result of that compu tation. By this it appears that for the first full period of the record, dated 1820 on the diagram, the contribution averaged four-tenths of a cent per year for each man, woman, and child in the United States. The record of subsequent periods is so clearly shown on the diagram as to need no other tracing. The increased contribution for each person, starting at the Civil War period (1860) of course not as great as that of absolute contribution, but makes a record of over 180 per cent., and emphatically proves an astonishing increase of liberality as measured by population.

To better understand what this means, it must be recalled that this "each man, woman, and child" includes over fifteen million children under ten years of age, and more than six million persons over ten years of age unable to write. It also includes all the helpless, the idle, the criminals, the insane, and the inmates of hospitals, asylums, and poorhouses; all the foreign population and Indians; all the Roman Catholics, and all who attend no church. Very few of this vast multitude ever contribute at all. Were all these non-contributors excluded, and only the probable contributors included, how the contribution per capita would be multiplied, and what a record it would be! For it must be remembered that the contribution to missions, as such, is only a small part of the contribution to the support of the Gospel in its many manifestations.

It may be answered, however, that all this does not satisfy the inquiry; that the Nation has become very wealthy; and that each person represents many more dollars than four generations ago. It therefore becomes necessary to proceed to the next step of the investigation.

Per Wealth. This fourth inquiry pre

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sents a difficulty which, while easily surmounted by statisticians conversant with the history of census records, is not so easily met by others. The first wealth census of the United States was made in 1850, and "estimates were made for earlier census years. Later knowledge clearly indicates that the 1850 census only partly covered the wealth, and that the "estimates were also out of joint with fact. One evidence of this appears in the per capita wealth of population, which, according to those "estimates," declined from $388 in 1820 to $308 in 1850, or almost twenty per cent. Another very clear evidence is seen in " Study No. 3," just examined. A population in process of pauperization would not increase its per capita contributions to missions from four mills in 1820 to sixty-eight mills (seventeen-fold) in 1850.

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Study No. 4" therefore presents the results as based on the census reports and "estimates" in full black dots, and also what seems to be a reasonable variation from the 1840 and 1850 "estimates" (for the 1850 census was scarcely more than an estimate) in open circles. Those earlier records may, however, be wholly omitted; for, taking the 1860 period as a starting-point, the 1890 record shows that wealth had increased its proportionate contribution almost forty per cent.-a truly wonderful achievement; and yet it is since 1860 that the phenomenal growth of wealth has been made.

Nor is this all. The contribution for each $1,000 of total wealth, as shown in this exhibit, is only a fractional part of the whole. In the first place, the limited number of denominations embraced in the exhibits do not include all of the organized missionary contribution of the United States. In the second place, since the close of the Civil War, and especially during the past twenty years, there has developed within some of the larger denominations a practice of sending a considerable proportion of the total contribution to foreign mission fields direct, and none of these moneys are represented in the exhibits, for they do not appear in the official reports of the missionary societies.

Besides this, there is an increasingly large fund contributed annually by Sunday-schools and young peoples' societies

to a very diversified range of home mission work, little of which is ever included in official reports of the regular missionary organizations. Besides this, many communities sustain by popular contribution hospitals, orphanages, and other benevolent institutions, which, although wholly unrelated to mission boards and their organized auxiliaries, yet receive their contributions largely from the same individuals.

Beyond all this, the last few years have witnessed, in all our larger cities, in the same spirit, a great development of institutional and social mission work. All these should be reckoned in, to ascertain the full measure of the missionary spirit among those whose only way of obedience is to give money, that others may give personal service.

What a magnificent total it would mean! What a marvelous record of growth it would show, especially in the fourth generation! Not only would the 1870 and 1880 records rise much further above that of 1860; the 1890 record would tower upward so far, outstripping the increase of wealth, as to shame every carking, croaking pessimist.

The inquiry is answered. It would, however, be an added satisfaction to many readers to know how the denominations are sharing in this great work. Which denominations contribute the larger totals? Which make the greater contributions as compared with their membership and church property?

The answers to these questions, so far as the records provide it, therefore appended. It should be kept in mind that this exhibit covers the whole of the 1890 period of ten years (1885-1894), so that it may not be thought to be too limited in scope to give a satisfactory comparison, as would be the case if it covered only a single year.

Total Denominational Contribution. It

In presenting the denominational contributions, it is due all denominations to say that in collecting the records the effort was made to exclude the valuation of boxes of clothing and other supplies contributed and sent into needy helds. To illustrate: One of the pub lished reports of the Presbyterian Church (North) includes the valuation of boxes in its record of contribu tion to home missions, and another excludes that valu ation. Without mentioning this, some earnest Presby terian might have claimed that their thermometer in the upper exhibit did not fully represent their work. It is also due to Baptists (North) to say that no record of their Freedman's work could be obtained, and that some of their other auxiliary records were too fragmentary to be satisfactory.

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