the nature of
our work to take their summer vacations. The educational work of the
American Missionary Association is through and through a missionary
work. It is begun with a missionary purpose and is carried on in the
name of Christ to disciple the people, that they may know Him who is
the Way, the Truth and the Life. All of our teachers are sent to be
missionaries. Many are returning now to their fields of service with
which they are well acquainted, and some are going for the first time.
Among these, questions are raised as to the requirements needed in
those who are to go. We have thought that a few suggestions given to
the candidates for the China Inland Mission by Hudson Taylor, might be
properly repeated here for those who are to take upon themselves these
responsible Christian duties. He says:

First of all, it is absolutely essential that those desiring to be
missionaries should have a deep love for Christ, a full grasp of His
plan of salvation, and be wholly consecrated, in their inward lives,
to Him. Mission work is not preaching grand sermons, or witnessing
marvellous baptisms; it is a patient Christ-like life, day by day,
far from external help, far from those we love; a quiet sowing of
tiny seeds, which may take long years to show above the ground,
combined with a steady bearing of loneliness, discomfort and petty
persecution. The work demands of every worker very real and manifest
self-sacrifice and acts of faith. It aims at, and ought to be
satisfied with, nothing less than the conversion of the people to
God. Not witness-bearing merely, but fruit-bearing is the end in
view. Anything short of the salvation of souls is failure.

It is generally found that when people are of no use at home, they
are of no use in the mission field. The bright, brave, earnest
spirit, ready to face difficulties at home, is the right spirit for
the work abroad. A patient, persevering, plodding spirit, attempting
great things for God, and expecting great things from God, is
absolutely essential to success in missionary efforts. Those will
not make the best missionaries who are easily daunted by the first
difficulty or opposition, but those whose strength is equal to
waiting upon God, and who fight through all obstacles by prayer and
faith. The spasmodic worker, frantic in zeal one month, and at
freezing-point another, will be weary