CURRENT LITERATURE.
Missionary Enterprise in the East. By Rev. R. Collins. (Henry S. King and Co.)—Mr. Collins was formerly Principal of the Syrian College, at Cottayam, near Travancore, and the most interesting part of his volume, which indeed is readable throughout, is his account of this institution_ Its history brings us face to face with one of the most difficult questions of missionary work,—the attitude which ought to be assumed towards ancient Churches which the missionary finds already existing in his field of labour. The theory of the matter is perfectly simple to most English Churchmen. Fraternise with them, they will say, or if they refuse fraternisation, leave them alone. In practice, when it is found that these Churches often really are communities hardly to be distin- guished from the heathen around them except by their fetish being a cross, things are not so easily settled. The Church Missionary So- ciety at Cottayam, for it is to them that the College belongs, started on the fraternisation principle. The College was under the joint government of the Society and the Syrian hierarchy. It was in such favour, that a very considerable part of the Syrian priesthood was edu- cated at it. Yet it could not be found that its alumni were at all better, more disposed to reform in life, or discipline, or doctrine than their brethren. After a while the policy was changed. Friendly relations were still maintained with the Syrians, but the College held its own position. The missionaries spoke plainly on what they deemed to be faulty or wrong in their neighbours. And the end has been, Mr. Collins thinks, a success. The number of worshippers has increased in about twenty years from 4,836 to 9,093, and the effect on the Syrian Church has been to inaugurate a movemeut of reform. Our High- Church friends will whisper " schism." But let them remember that these Syrians are Eutychians. " Unus ipse Emmanuel, et non divisus, post unionem inseparabilem, in dues natures," occurs in the Mass, and in the service for Christmas Day the words, "He who imputes to Him two persons and two natures is cursed. Hallelujah ! let him inherit hell," —a vigorous expression which the pseudo-Athanasianists may well envy...
Previous page
