y of our zeal is before us here and now. We may measure the value
of our professions for ourselves.

At this present time the need of the Indians for missionaries is greater
than ever before. They have reached not only a new crisis, but a crisis
of a new kind. Practically speaking the Government has done what it can
for them, or very nearly all. The Indian has law, land, education, he is
fast becoming absorbed in the surrounding people, but never was he in
worse need. All these great fundamental principles of social life have
been thrust upon him, oft against his will and largely unprepared;
certainly with very little comprehension of their resulting privileges
or duties. He needs a friend beside him at every step. Thrust out into
an alien and hostile community, he is in some sense in a worse case than
when he dwelt alone in undisturbed barbarism.

And again, civilization is not Christianity. This truth, so obvious
everywhere else, seems to be lost sight of when the Indians are
considered. We discover that, although educated, they will not stay
refined, that they are civilized, but will not remain moral. Behold,
says the caviller, there is no good Indian until he dies, and even his
friends complain that the young men will "go back" to gambling games and
horse races. It is true that some measure of refinement and fine morals
is peculiarly necessary to the Indians just now, but these are not any
necessary part of civilization. They are, however, inseparable to
Christianity, and by this token the red man needs Christianity for his
everyday life even more than the white man, who is surrounded by a
Christian atmosphere. If we would have the newly-liberated Indians a
valuable and reliable part of the community in this world they must be
Christianized. Just why goes back a long way; but a fact it is, that
whatever may be true of Chinese or Poles or Bohemians, if the Indian is
to have any staying power, if he is to be anything but a despair to his
friends and a curse to all around him, he must be _converted_ as well as
civilized. The use of his land, the best system of law, an absolute
restriction upon liquor, all together, will do no more for him in the
Northwest than it has done for Cherokee or Choctaw. It is the building
up of the individual that is needed to-day quite as much as any
legislation which shall improve the community.

Not only has the Indian come to a time of special need, not only does he
need Christianity to