Tux reports of the Chefoo Missionary Conferences, which we have recently from time to time presented to our readers, have exhibited a great variety of opinions. The right of free speech, which has been frankly conceded to all the members present, has been as frankly used, and we have a number of opinions of all degrees of value, and all shades of interest, on several of the chief points that "exercise" the minds of Missionaries. If there are occasionally crude views put forth, it.is the result of the constitution of the assembly, and springs from the admission of young Missionaries into the Conference. We conceive that the deliberations would be facilitated, and certainly rendered more fruitful of good results, if there were an Upper and a Lower House, and if the Lower House presented their opinions in the embodied form of resolutions to the considera. tion of the Chamber of Elders. We say this, because, as a rule, every young man in every profession goes through a certain round of mistakes while he is learning that profession, and these had better be got over decently in comparative privacy. It is unkind to expose a man to the temptation of talking in an assembly, whereof the proceedings will be printed, on subjects with which he is imperfectly acquainted, and upon which he will, in all probability, give vent to opinions which he will have outgrown in two or three more years. The late F. W. Robertson was, if we remember rightly, once sorely tempted to publish a book on certain theological and metaphysical difficulties that oppressed him, but he made a manful and memorable resolution "to consume his own smoke, and not to vomit it out to darken further that which was already sufficiently obscure." The determination did him credit, and a determination of a similar character would, we conceive, improve the flavour of the debates at the northern watering place.
Having discharged ourselves of the only objection to the Conference that overs to us, we must express our satisfaction with the general tone of the speakers at the fourth meeting. The subject selected was one of vast interest and importance, as nothing can affect the future of Christianity in China more than the attitude taken by the propagators of the new religion towards the literature and religious systems of the country. There can be no doubt that the early Missionaries made a great mistake when they indulged in rash invectives against the great names that have been reverenced in the Flowery Land for two thousand years. The destructive instinct, which is too often paramount in reformers, got the better of them, and they fulminated against Confucius and Mencius without having studied their works. A wiser generation has grown up now, and it is a matter for congratulation that such is the case. Instead of hearing a preacher assert that the father of Chinese philosophy is now burning in penal fires, we find a Missionary of learning and experience avowing his belief that "the writings of Confucius and Mencius would as certainly be integral parts of the future Christian civilization of this country to which they looked forward, as the De Oficits of Cicero had been in the civilization of the West."
Now this surely is a healthier view to adopt than the old one. In all disputes there can be no doubt that it is wise to begin by seeing what are the grounds of agreement; and according to Dr. Martin, "no one who had read Confucius could revile him, for while here and there they might meet with a statement to be condemned, for every one such there were ninety-nine with which they agreed, and which would be incorporated into the future Christianity of the country." This is excellent; and we may venture to add that a Missionary certainly misses an opportunity who neglects to call the attention of the more educated of his congregation to the doctrines of their own neglected sage Moh-Ti, who was actuated, if any man ever was, by that
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.