Reminiscences of Montclair, New Jersey

Reminiscences of Montclair
Chapter 15
MORAL & RELIGIOUS GROWTH

That the moral and Christian interests of the country and world are keeping pace with the advancing material and educational activities is an interesting fact as results indicate, viz.: The abolition of duelling which was once popularly considered the proper method of adjusting questions of personal honor; the almost entire extermination of the lottery, which formerly was so far sanctioned as to be used to raise funds to build churches, together with the growing public enticement against all forms of gambling; the abolition of human slavery from the entire world; the popular temperance sentiment as compared with the days when liquor was in common use in the harvest field and on all public occasions, and on the family sideboard when it was considered common courtesy to treat guests, particularly the minister on his pastoral calls; the growth in the spirit of public sympathy and the active efforts to relieve suffering humanity as appears in the great and finely equipped hospitals, asylums, reformatories and the various institutions that Christian charity has provided for the sick and injured, the crippled, the blind, the deaf and dumb, the inebriate and the criminal; the organized plans for the poor, as the Fresh Air Fund for the relief of the children and mothers in congested city districts, and the self-denying social work for the uplifting of the less favored classes in the great cities, as the East Side Settlement Work.

In this advancing line of cooperative Christian work may be mentioned the change from the early sectarian sentiment to the broad catholicity and spirit of Christian brotherhood so prevalent throughout the Church today. In the same line and spirit is the world's movement for universal peace and the ending of bloody warfare through plans of manly arbitration.

This partial list of the world's great Christian charities seems in full accord with the prophetic Messianic words of Isaiah, "Sent to bind up the broken-hearted," and the heralding of the Angelic host, "On earth peace among men."

In ordinary reasoning there seems no other explanation of such results and the world-wide reaching out of Christian charity, than the life teachings, mighty works, suffering, death, resurrection and ascension of the one personality Jesus Christ who said, "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto Myself." We do not find among the teeming millions of the Orient anything like this beneficence resulting from the teaching of Buddha, Confucius or Mahomet, which are ethical and of high moral character, but in practice these ameliorating conditions of charity and standard of morals do not prevail. On the other hand the united testimony of credible men who have visited, and many who have spent years of close study in those countries, disclose practices in social life and religious customs that are superstitious and degrading. So hopeless is the outlook for the welfare of these vastly populous countries for their present or future life, that Christendom has been stirred to give them the teachings of the Bible, which have produced such beneficent results in all lands where they have been taught and of which the period in review has seen a marvelous growth in on-Christian lands. The magnitude of the undertaking of a Christian Mission for these millions of people, some of whom close their gates to all foreign ingress, led many in the Church to regard the purpose with disfavor, and the heroic faith and zeal with which such early missionaries as Judson, Cary, Martyn, Morrison, Duff, Paton, Moffat and Livingston were inspired was needed for the undertaking.

The transformation in these countries to the student of Christian Missions of today is amazing. While there is no pretense that the millennium is reached, either in Christian or heathen countries, a great advance has been made. The one obstacle that seemed insurmountable in the memory of many - the exclusion of all foreigners - is no entirely removed, and with this has appeared a growing interest in political and religious thought and an open mind and heart for western education and religion, resulting in the establishment of large numbers of missionary stations in these countries, with many adherents to the Christian faith, including a large number from the higher classes, with churches, schools, universities, colleges, medical schools, hospitals, asylums, etc. A statistical report of the Protestant Missionary Societies of the world for the year 1907, furnished by Rev. D.L. Leonard, D.D., gives the following aggregate of the American churches, viz.:

The number of Missionaries: 5,909
Number of Native Ministers and layworkers: 26,760
Number of Schools: 8,855
Number of Stations: 12,817
Number of Scholars: 344,213
Amt. of Home Income for the work: $9,458,633

For Christendom, he reports:
Mission Stations and out-stations: 40,535
Total Number of Missionaries: 18,499
Total Number of Native Helpers: 95,876
Total Number of Full Church Membership: 1,816,450
Funds from Christian Churches: $22,459,680

One of the strongest educational influences, particularly in China, is the Medical Missionary whose skill in treating disease is recognized by the common people as superior to the ridiculous concoctions of native medical men who are regarded mainly as fakirs.

The schools and institutions for higher learning are a strong factor in disseminating Western education and Christian knowledge, and have awakened a wide interest in Eastern nations. Robert College of Constantinople, in which our townsman, Dr. Orville Reed, was tutor for three years, is sending students of high grade to fill positions of influence in the empire.

Foreman Christian College at Lahore, India, has a student enrollment of 394, of whom 198 are Hindus and 130 Mohammedans. Another Missionary College of India is located at Allahabad, and has 104 students, in which Carol Thompson, one of our town boys, is teacher.

Peking is the educational and political center of China, and affords access to every part of the Empire. Here is located the Imperial University of which Rev. W.A.P. Martin was the head, whom the people of Montclair will remember from his lecture on the Boxer outbreak before the Outlook Club. Miss Alice Carter of our town has been located at this station for some years. She is still doing missionary work there with her husband, the Rev. William H. Gleysteen, to whom she was recently married.

The Shantung Protestant University is mentioned as one of the most conspicuous institutions of learning in the far East. One hundred and twenty-eight students were matriculated in the college last year. Mr. Robert E. Speer, who has visited and made a close study of missions in China, says this institution has led and still leads the higher education of the whole Empire. Its students have gone out into the provinces as Christian ministers, evangelists, teachers, government officials and into commercial life.

The following comment was made in a recent issue of the New York Sun in connection with the decease of Morris K. Jesup, who had helped so largely to create and sustain the English-speaking university in Beirut, Syria. It mentions as its founder and first President, the Rev. Daniel Bliss, D.D., and his son and successor, Rev. Howard S. Bliss, D.D. who was the esteemed pastor of the Christian Union Congregational Church of Upper Montclair: "The institution is a thoroughly organized and a perfectly crystallized university with a faculty of fifty-eight accomplished and eminent men and eight hundred and seventy-eight students from all parts of the Turkish Empire, from the greek Islands, from Egypt, from Sudan, from Persia, from India and the very heart of Arabia, pursuing both academic and professional studies under physical and intellectual conditions precisely similar to those obtained in any American college of equivalent importance. The strictest Musselman, the most orthodox Jew, the fastidious Hindu are found together in the College Library helping each other in the use of reference books, or in the football field amicably and even fraternally commingling in the fiercest rushes. How can you exaggerate its interest as a fact or overestimate its significance as a factor in the making of the future history of the New East?"

The Mission Press in Shanghai is an ally and powerful agency for good throughout the Empire. It is spoken of as the most important mission press in the world. Connected with it are a type foundry, electrotype and stereotype rooms and bindery.

Its reported output for the year ending June 30th, 1907, of Chinese works, Scriptures, commentaries, hymn books, works on Christianity, text-books for schools and colleges, Scripture tracts, periodicals (weekly, monthly and quarterly) was 1522,102 besides 132,474 English and bilingual works.

A special feature has been the work done for medical missionaries. A second edition of Dr. Cousland's Physiology, also an illustrated edition of diseases of the skin and of the eye by Dr. J.B. Neal.

One hundred and thirty-one thousand of Dr. Halock's Chinese Almanacs were printed for the 1907 issue, giving notes on astronomy, geography, science, Chinese and world statistics, with information as to the Christian life.

The potential influence back of all this aggressive Christian work is the one text-book, the Bible. The agency through which it is published is the American Bible Society, located in New York, organized in 1816 with the Hon. Elias Boudinot, of Burlington, N.J., as its first President, who was President of the Continental Congress at the time of signing the treaty of peace with Great Britain. The increase of its publications and circulation in nearly all languages and countries is a record of advance and activity that compares well with the other industries of the past century. the first annual issue was 6,410; its last annual report gave its number 2,236,755.

The entire Bible has been translated and published in one hundred and one languages, but the actual circulation of the Scriptures and portions of them in foreign languages and dialects if 443 versions among nearly all the nationalities of the earth. The circulation in our new possessions, the Philippine Islands, during seven years, was a total of 6,45,541 copies.

A written copy of the Bible in the thirteenth century cost L30, equal at that time to fifteen years of the money earnings of the laboring man. The American Bible Society is now furnishing the entire Scriptures in English for seventeen cents.

It is but just to state that a large part of the advanced work of the Christian Church is represented in the colleges and literary institutions of our own country. A very large proportion of the 578 universities and colleges have their origin in, and affinity with, the Christian Church, many of them denominational and many non-sectarian.

That the Church is not abating in interest and effort its beneficent work is indicated by a recent daily newspaper notice. The New York Tribune of January 18th, 1908, states some facts with comments on the annual report of several New York churches: "The pew rent respectively of St. Bartholomew's and St. Thomas' Churches were $44,000 and $55,000, and for hospitals, Summer homes and Fresh Air Work, to the maintenance of the vast social work on the East Side, and to mission work of all sorts all over the world, St. Bartholomew's congregation gave last year $271,000, or seven dollars to others to each dollar spent on themselves." Gifts for corresponding purposes in St. Thomas' Church were $214,764. After reporting two other churches of the same denomination and mentioning their phenomenal growth in membership, the comment is, "Nothing in the business world has grown faster, and the spiritual work of the parishes is stated to keep pace with the material."

It is well understood that these are large and wealthy parishes, but the same magnanimous spirit of self-denial and zeal may be found in the report of other denominations who, with the above, count themselves in Christian charity the one universal Church with desire, in the spirit of its Divine Head, for the betterment of the entire world.

At a recent meeting held in Philadelphia of about sixteen hundred representative men of the Presbyterian Church in a three days' conference, the question of its responsibility, under the present opportunities for extending the knowledge of the Christian faith throughout the world, was seriously discussed with marked ability and earnestness; and the conclusion was reached to make strenuous effort to induce every member of its communion to share in the purpose with prayerful interest to increase its benevolence from its last annual amount of $1,276,748 contributed to $6,000,0000.

The reported increase of membership on profession of faith in this Church for the last evangelical year was 85,820.

One of the most energetic and successful Christian efforts of the last fifty years has been the Young Men's Christian Association, which has spread throughout this country and the world. Its growth in membership and good works is phenomenal. Originating in London in 1844, its influence reached this country in 1852, and in 1867 the first Association building was erected in Chicago and a few years later one in New York at a cost of $500,000. And now throughout the States and Canada fine Association buildings may be found in nearly every city and very many of the large towns, which is also largely true of Christian Europe. In the far East, as Japan, China, India, Korea, Persia, South Africa, and in the Islands of the Sea and Mexico, are many well equipped Associations in successful operation.

The last annual report for this country states the number of Association buildings to be 589 and the aggregate value $34,132,245. It does its work among the men engaged in the various commercial and large corporate industries, in the army and navy, colleges, railroad companies, mining camps, etc., furnishing every appliance for physical culture, healthful entertainments, baths, reading rooms, lectures and Bible studies, so that its members have every opportunity for sane amusement and physical development, with educational and moral training under Christian influence.

The large corporations, particularly the railroad companies, so appreciate its moral effect on their employees that they have expressed it in words and deeds. They have set aside for the special use of the railroad men fifty buildings, and beside these there are one hundred and twelve buildings owned and occupied by Railroad Associations, making the property value of this branch $2,039,200. A like interest is reported of large manufacturing concerns who furnish facilities and opportunity for noon hour meetings, etc.

One of the most fruitful fields of the Association has been the army and navy, giving them the home comforts and Christian influence of which their duties deprive them, in buildings like the one at Brooklyn Navy Yard, the gift of Miss Gould, resulting in moral renovations and large money savings for the boys. So far is its benign influence over men recognized by our General Government that it has expressed its approval by the provision of four buildings placed at the disposal of the Association in their work among the many employees on the Panama Canal. Robert G. Goodman, one of our town boys, is doing active Association work in this important field.

Its efforts in the Far East have been received with marked favor, particularly in Japan, where large and kindly service was rendered the army during its war with Russia, and since then expressions of appreciation and thankfulness have been received from that nation's high officials. The growth of Association work has been attended with marked success in China, Korea and India and many other Eastern cities, where large Associations have organized, many with finely equipped buildings. Physical culture is a popular and promising feature with the Eastern people. Mr. John Mott, one of our town men, as a representative of the International Association of North America, in a recent tour of inspection and study of foreign Associations received ovations from high government officials that have never been accorded to a foreigner before. This organization is under the management of an International Committee of able men, of whom our neighbors, Mr. James M. Speers and Secretaries John R. Mott and Fred S. Goodman, are representatives, giving the entire work their constant care, holding frequent International Conventions, giving close study to the varied interests of the Association, and holding, besides, periodical world conferences, including representatives from all parts of the world. Meetings of this kind have been held in London, Paris, Berlin, Stockholm, Geneva, etc., some of which have been attended by our local residents who speak of them as marked with great interest and promise for mankind.

To have lived during a major part of these years, reviewed and witnessed the growth of the town in its many details from a population of about 500 to its present number, nearing 20,000, and during a period covering twenty Presidential terms, some of them attended with great political agitation and interest, including the exciting years of the Civil War with its sad details; and to have seen the country's and the world's marvelous growth in material, educational and moral development in a panorama the magnitude and interest of which are hard to realize; and going with it the benign influence and growing zeal of the Christian Church that is reaching out with its well organized system and advancing spirit of Church federation, seeming to portend the apocalyptic vision of St. John, "The Kingdom of this world is become the Kingdom of our Lord and his Christ," is a privilege for which to be profoundly grateful.

Reminiscences of Montclair (NJ) was written in 1908 by Philip Doremus
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