1912 Watch Tower - A2Z.org

are almost exclusively along the lines ofsecular education. Although this is notChristianizing work, it is, of course, agood work, for the poor Orientals surelyneed education.R5015 : page 136In your Committee's opinion, however,there is less need for Academic andCollegiate education, such as the Missionariesforward, than for CommonSchooling. The Oriental, after obtaining higher education,is spoiled for the common affairs of life about him,and aspires only to teaching, clerkship and office holding,which are over-supplied. Unable to get such employment,he is in trouble. He will not dig, and to beg he is ashamed.But the general Common School education, your Committeebelieves, could best be done by the Government,and along unsectarian lines, after the method followedby the United States of America in its supervision of thePhilippine Islands. Christians, of course, would be thebest for teachers.III.--"What are the teachings, and what are the inducementsto accept Christianity, and how enduring arethe results?"Answer.--There are evidences of positive teachings inthe past, but there is very little religious teaching now beingdone, because the people would resent it, and keeptheir children from the schools. We heard of instanceswhere a small coin per day was given to each child attendingschool; but, aside from the schooling, the inducementsoffered by the Missionaries are chiefly social andmedical.Of late the natives are more and more averse to apublic avowal of Christianity, because with increasingintelligence come doubts. The tendency of the times inthe Orient, as in the Occident, is toward unbelief in anyreligion. If a Missionary falls from faith in the Bibleinto "Higher-Criticism-Infidelity," he may continue hisoffice and profession. But the Orientals have no such inducementsto outwardly profess what they no longer believe(except native teachers). Besides, these Orientalsare very honest in respect to their religious professions,except where spoiled by contact with the hypocrisy of thewhites.IV.--"What is the attitude of heathendom toward theMissionaries, and toward Christianity, and what is theprospect of Foreign Missions becoming self-supporting?"Answer.--The Orientals are remarkably tolerant of allreligions, but are often perplexed at the Missionary competitionand opposition of Christian denominations. Thehigher castes consider the medley of Christian doctrinespresented to them less philosophical than their own. Theirown, however, is not satisfactory, they confess. But beforeexchanging for another they want to know that the