ople
already intelligent, industrious, and Christian? Surely, if talent is
needed anywhere in the kingdom of Christ, it is in the missionary work.
That minister, whose talents and piety make him so useful at home that
he _cannot be spared_, that is the minister who is needed abroad. The
foreign field calls for no laborers who can be conveniently spared.

Then, is the church of a pastor wealthy and influential? It is the very
church that needs to be aroused by his leaving it. Or is he connected
with a literary, or theological institution? Some thus connected are
needed to go, to produce the best impression on the young men who are in
training. The more important and influential then one's place is, the
more like a rushing flood do reasons crowd upon him to arise and go.

It is very common for men to excuse themselves from the work of
missions, on the ground, that they are somewhat _advanced in years_.
There is weight in this excuse. That person would exhibit the want of a
proper balance of mind, who should urge all indiscriminately, whatever
their age and however circumstanced in life, to go forth to the heathen.
But still the excuse of age ought to be looked at cautiously.

Age implies experience, authority, dignity, and wisdom--the very
qualities most wanted in the difficult work of missions. The work of
tearing up and laying anew the foundations of society, moral, religious,
and social, is a task that ought by no means to be committed to the
young and inexperienced. It is preposterous to commit altogether to
novices in the ministry a work so new, so complicated, so beset with
difficulties, on the right hand and on the left, and so momentous, too,
in its responsibilities. Can Satan be driven so easily from his own
territory, that none but raw troops are needed for the contest? Can the
broad and deep intrenchments of Paganism, Mohammedism, and Romanism be
so easily taken, as not to need men of age, experience and skill, to
direct the assault? Can the snares in which the heathen are held; which
are laid with all the subtlety of the arch-fiend, be so easily divested
of their specious character, and traced into their thousand windings, as
not to require the wisdom and experience of age? A minister has age: he
has then one great qualification for the work. "Paul the aged" had none
too much experience, dignity and wisdom, for the work of a missionary to
heathen lands.

But age, it is said, is a great barrier in acquiring