distinctions that are so well-understood in America. Such differences as are necessary in China might be provided for by recognizing the liberty of the local church and the individual believer to hold whichever phase of the truth might be preferred. The China Inland Mission has shown that this plan is feasible. It is composed of missionaries of all Protestant denominations, but they work in harmony and build up a Chinese church by recognizing the right of brethren to differ in the same organization.

Doubtless isolated cases of embarrassment would occur, but they would be insignificant in comparison with the embarrassments inherent in sectarian divisions. Denominational uniformity is bought at bitter cost when it separates Christians into rival camps. Unity in essentials and liberty in non-essentials are far better than a slavery to non-essentials which destroys that oneness of believers for which our Lord prayed. In the presence of a vast heathen population, let Christians at least remember that their points of disagreement are less vital than their points of agreement, that Christianity should, as far as possible, present a solid front, and let them devoutly join the Conference of Protestant missionaries in Japan in the ringing proclamation ::-"That all those who are one with Christ by faith are one body, and that all who love the Lord Jesus and His Church in sincerity and truth should pray and labour for the full realization of such a corporate oneness as the Master Himself prayed for in the night in which He was betrayed."

It is true that an advanced position on comity sometimes operates to the disadvantage of the denomination that espouses it. But let us be true to our ideals even if some whom we might have reached do go to heaven by another route. Other churches are preaching the gospel and those who accept it at their hands will be saved. We are in Asia to preach Christ, to preach Him as we understand Him, but if any one else insists on preaching Him in a given place and will do so with equal fidelity to His divinity and atone

ment, let us cooperate with them, or federate with them, or combine with them, or give up the field to them, as the circumstances may require. The problem before us is not simply where we can do good, but where we can do the most good, how use to the best advantage the limited resources at our command. Givers at home have a right to demand this. Many of their gifts involve self-sacrifice, and they should be used where a real need exists. "There remains yet very much land to be possessed." I have seen enough of it to burden my heart as long as I live, toiling, sorrowing, sin-laden multitudes, who might be better Christians than we are if they had our chance, but who are scattered abroad as sheep having no shepherd. And shall we multiply missionaries in places already occupied and dispute as to who shall preach in a given field, when these millions are dying without the gospel?

PART V

The Future of China And Our Relation

To It

W

XXV

IS THERE A YELLOW PERIL

ILL China ever be able to menace the nations of the West? This is the startling question that many sober-minded men are asking. Some writers, indeed, make light of the "yellow peril," characterizing it "a mere bugaboo of an excited imagination," because, as they allege, China has neither the organization nor the valour to fight Europe, and because, if it had, it could not transport its army and navy so vast a distance.

But surely organization and valour can be acquired by the Chinese as well as by any other people. Their present helplessness before the aggressive foreigner is rapidly teaching them the necessity for the former. As for the latter, it is well known that the most dangerous fighter is the strong but peaceablydisposed man who has been goaded to desperation by longcontinued insult and injustice. Americans may discreetly remember that they themselves were once sneeringly described as "a nation of shopkeepers who wouldn't and couldn't fight."

It is easy to be deceived by the result of the China-Japan War of 1894. The Japanese were successful, not because they are abler, but because they had more swiftly responded to the touch of the modern world and had organized their government, their army and their navy in accordance with scientific methods. More bulky and phlegmatic China was caught napping by her enterprising enemy. Despising the profession of arms, China gave her energies to scholarship and commerce, and filled her regiments and ships with paupers, criminals and opium fiends, who were as destitute of courage, intelligence