djr ^iDfumg llori^on in CIjina Bp BISHOP J. W. BASHFORD BOARD OF FOREIGN MISSIONS OF THE METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH CHINA CENTENNIAL COMMISSION 150 FIFTH AVENUE NEV^ YORK Printed in February, 1907 THE WIDENING HORIZON IN CHINA The jMissionary work of the Alethodist Episcopal Church in China is practically confined to seven of the twenty-two provinces. One of our missionaries crosses the Yangtze at Kiukiang and thus does some work in an eighth province, Hupeh, where we have some splendid native Christians. Moreover Chinese Chris- tians returning from California have of their own initiative preached the Gospel, led souls to Christ, built a church, and established a school in the Kwangtung Province. This work has been visited by the bisho]") resident in China. One native mis- sionary, who is supported in part by the local church and in part by Chinese Christians in California, was ordained. We also have a very few missionaries across the line of Chihli, in the region of iManchuria, now diVided into three provinces. The provinces in which our missionaries labor contain one hundred and eighty-eight million people, while the provinces thus far not entered by us embrace two hundred and fifty million people. Were any similar pagan population discovered in any other part of the world without a IMethodist missionary, our people would pour out their money and would have men on the way to save these millions within the next six months. Nearness, to be sure, would give an added emphasis to any such need or opportunity. But nearness, or, in this case, distance, ought not to be the influencing factor in the work of the kingdom of God. Surely the number thus far unreached by us, tlie openness of the Chinese for the Gospel, and the fact that we have mastered the language, have translated the Bible and have created some Chinese Christian literature, and can reach these millions in connection with our other work, make the appeal for the expan- sion of our work in the Chinese empire an irresistible one. 4 THE WIDENING HORIZON IN CHINA PROPOSALS FOR EXPANSION I. Reenforce JJ'esf C/iina Mission If the order of expansion can be planned, the first step to take is to reenforce immediately onr work in West China so that we may at least retain the territory in that province which we have cultivated during the last twenty years. This territory embraces one sixth of the Szechuen province, with one third of its popula- tion of sixty-eight million people. Our iMethodist missionaries, being among the first Christians to enter this province, naturally settled along the Yangtze from Chungking, the commercial metropolis, through the Chentu plain to Chentu, the political capital of the province. This Chentu plain, according to ^Ir. Archibald Little in “The Far East.” has a denser population than any other spot on the face of the earth except possibly the county in which London is located. Here our missionaries have labored and prayed and built up a native Methodism. Our gains in the West China Mission have averaged 29 per cent a year for the last two years. Ninety per cent of our church members are mature men, and only ten per cent women and children. Ninety per cent of our church members can read and write as compared with ten per cent of the surrounding adult male population. MY must receive word in the very near future that we can add four or five additional married workers to the force in West China, or else we must surrender to other societies a part of this mo.st fruitful field. Surely Methodism ought to exert herself mightily to hold her possession in this garden spot of the world. II. E.i'tcnd file present boundaries of Foochow and Hinghna Conferences The boundaries of the Foochow Conference ought to be en- larged in a northwesterly direction until they meet the boundaries of the Central China Conference. The boundaries of the Cen- tral China Conference ought to be extended fifty miles to the south that they may touch the southern end of the Hinghua Conference. In addition, the boundaries of the Hinghua Con- ference should be extended in a westerly direction until they THE WIDENING HORIZON IN CHINA 5 unite with the eastern limits of the Central China Conference. This would connect these three conferences and bring our mis- sionaries into closer relations ; would enable us to transfer mis- sionaries from one field to another according to the relative needs of each field, and would contribute in every way to the enlarge- ment and improvement of our work in those fields already occu- pied. To make these extensions would necessitate the adding of perhaps four missionaries and their wives to the force of the Foochow and Hinghua Conferences. III. Divide Central China Conference into tzvo parts With this slight enlargement of what is now the Central China Conference, it should be divided into two conferences. This con- ference now has work in the four provinces of Kiangsu, Anhwei, Kiangsi and Hupeh, with an area as large as that of all New England, New York and New Jersey, and with a population of about one hundred millions. We have for this vast territory and enormous population but five foreign presiding elders, and the whole force at each of its five mission stations is entirely inade- quate. To do any kind of justice to this work we ought immedi- ately to double the number of presiding elders in Central China, and also add largely to our teaching and medical forces. The Central China Conference is located in the great Yangtze valley, one of the most fertile farming sections in the world. Here also are great coal and iron resources. It has a perfect network of canals and streams. Moreover, being on China’s great waterway, the Yangtze River, it is easy of access and is in touch with the outside world. Here is a great population waiting for us to give them the Gospel. Surely Methodism will arise to this opportunity, and not make it necessary either to abandon territory or else to fail in this strategic region. IF. Organize Shantung District into Shantung Conference In the Shantung Province of the North China Conference we have one presiding elder's district for a province larger than New York State and a population of thirty-eight millions. The Parent 6 THE WIDENING HORIZON IN CHINA Board has three missionaries and their wives and the Woman’s Foreign iMissionary Society three workers for this entire province. This is the province which has been exploited to some extent by the Germans. It has vast coal and iron resources, and along with Shansi, promises to be the Pittsburg region of the Chinese empire. Indeed railroads are already building and the mines are being opened. This presiding elder's district should be expanded into the Shantung Conference. It should be extended south through the fertile territory lying along the Grand Canal, that ancient and noted artificial waterway, until the Shantung Conference connects with the Central China Conference. This would connect four of our five conferences in China. Here is another opportunity which Methodism must not allow to pass by through failing to respond in her providential hour. I’. Enter Manchuria Xearly all of the territory formerly known as Manchuria has been made into the three provinces of Fengtien, Heilungkiang and Kirin and incorporated into China proper. Their latitude ranges from that of Columbus, Ohio, to that of the southern part of Canada, and their total area equals that of Ohio, Indiana, and Te.xas combined. The population has in twenty-five years in- creased from seven and one half millions to twenty-one millions. The soil is much like the black soil of Illinois and Iowa and is verv fertile. This natural resource has been made available to the natives through the railroads which have been constructed by the Russians, and the railroad running from Tientsin, the com- mercial center of North China, through the Great Wall, to Mukden, the capital of Manchuria. There are also splendid coal and iron mines as yet unworked. Great developments are to take place there and the population fifty years hence will probably reach one hundred millions. Only two missions of any church arc at work there now'. Methodism should enter the field at once and occupy the place as worker there which the situation demands of her. 17 . Begin zvorb in Shansi Proz'ijicc Shansi Province lies west of Chihli Province and occupies about 81,830 square miles. Its population is 12,200,000. Baron THE WIDENING HORIZON IN CHINA 1 Richtofen, in his three-volume report to the German Government, startled the European nations by his statement that the Shansi Province contains the richest coal and iron deposits in the world. This report led to the attempt to divide China, which attempt failed only through the intervention of Secretary Hay and the I'nited States. Richtofen says that there is coal enough in Shansi to supply the whole world for several thousand years. This is confirmed by the report of the second German commis- sion in 1897-8. The mountains which contain the coal have been so upheaved that they can be mined on a level without sinking shafts. Railroads are already building in these fields and the dawn of a mining era is at hand. Coal in some places lies three thousand feet above the Pacific, so that with suitable railroads gravity will bear the mined coal to the sea. A tremendous amount of Chinese labor is at liand and in a comparatively few years Shansi will be the Pittsburg, the Birmingham, the West Virginia of Asia. Such is the character of the field which calls us as a church tO' a decided advance. The list below gives what must be pledged before the work should he opened in either iManchuria or Shansi, and is by no means all that is needed adequately to man either one of these fields. Five missionaries — one physician, two teachers, and two evan- gelists, at $2,000 each for outgoing expenses and salary for two years Sio,ooo Five residences for the above, at $2,500 each 12,500 One hospital, at $5,000 5.000 Two school buildings at $5,000 each 10,000 Native chapels, workers, etc 2,500 $40,000 The accompanying table shows the size and the population of the various provinces and the number of people to each mission- ary. A glance at this table, together with the foregoing pres- entation, will show that in our proposals for strengthening exist- ing work and for expansion, we have asked for it for the most fertile portions of the empire or else for those of largest manu- facturing and mining possibilities and probabilities, where the largest number of people will be reached with the least possible efifort. <5 THE WIDENING HORIZON IN CHINA Area Population Pop. Miss’ns Mission - Inhab. Sq. Mi. arics Per Miss. Anhwei S 4 . 8 io 23,670,000 432 8 90 263,000 Chekiang 36,670 11,581 ,000 313 10 270 43,000 Chihli ii!;,8oo 20,Q'?7,000 I8I I 2 273 58,000 Chinese Turkestan :;SO,000 1 ,200.000 2 FpTIOrtipn ^0,000 I 2 ,000 .000 240 F ukien 46.320 22,877,000 494 8 363 63^000 Heilungkiang 140.000 2,000,000 14 Honan 67,940 35,317,000 519 7 93 380,00c Hunan 83.380 22,1 69,000 266 9 87 255,00c Hupeh 71,410 3 5 ,280,000 494 15 220 160,00c Kansu 12.S.450 10,385,000 83 3 57 182,00c Kiangsi 69,480 26,532,000 382 6 165 161 ,00c Kiangsu 38,600 13,980,000 362 20 360 39,00c Kirin 90,000 7,000,000 77 Kwangsi 77.200 5,142,000 66 2 13 395,00c Kwangtung 99.970 31,865,000 319 19 419 77.00c Kweichau 67,160 7,650,000 1 I I I 25 306,00c Shansi 81,830 I 2 , 200,000 149 7 I 2 I 1 01 ,00c Shantung 55 . 970 38,248,000 683 14 225 1 70,00c Shensi 75.270 8,450,000 I I I 5 84 100. ooc Szechuen 218,480 68,725,000 314 7 252 273,00c Yunnan 146,680 I 2 ,3 24,000 84 2 37 333.00c China Proper 2,362,420 429,532,000 259 20 3.249 1 32,00c Mongolia Dependencies 1 ,367,000 5.000,000 4 Thibet Dependencies. . . 738,000 3,500,000 5 All China 438,032,000 100 For more definite information as to special needs and oppor- tunities, write to Dr. F. D. Gainewell, 150 Fifth Avenue, New York city.