FOREIGN MISSIONARY CHRONICLE. VOL. V....No. 1. PITTSBURGH, JANUARY, 1837. WHOLE NO. 45. WESTERN FOREIGN MISSIONARY SOCIETY. INTERESTING TO CHRISTIAN LADIES. Where they could not do all by their own personal effort, they might induce others to share the The following extract of a letter from a labor; some engaging to raise ten dollars, five lady in Maryland, to one of the Secretaries, dollars, or smaller sums, whilst each of the contains a suggestion of so much interest, and original names would consider herself responis written in such a truly Christian spirit, that sible for fifty dollars. The more individuals There are, I we earnestly recommend it to the prayerful actively engaged the better. consideration of our Christian female friends in think, many places in the country, where sociall the churches. We trust it will meet eties cannot be formed, because there are few to care for the heathen; but where females with a response in many a bosom so cordial, that the number of Christian ladies engaged of communicating much information, and enmight, by personal application, be the means in this labor of love and mercy will soon listing the kind feelings of numbers who will amount to hundreds. This lady pleads the do little or nothing without such efficient efforts. cause so well, we deem it unnecessary to Collecting money is not a pleasant work; but add to her remarks. Who will send in their are we, therefore, to do nothing? We might names to make up the first twenty she speaks be ashamed to mention it, when we reflect upon of? Who will make the first fifty-the first what those are doing, who have left all for hundred, and so on, till the number be so Christ's sake, to save those who are perishing. large, that the poor dying heathen shall hear | Have we the least measure of their spirit, if of them, and rejoice in these self-denying la- we shrink from any thing we can do here, to bors of Christian females? "If ye fulfil the aid them in their work-promote the glory of royal law of the Scripture, thou shalt love God-the salvation of a lost world, and hasten thy neighbor as thyself, ye do well." James on that day "when every knee shall bow at the name of Jesus." Will you bear with me, sir, for encroaching so long on your time? The cause of foreign missions has long been very dear to me; but latterly the Lord has, I trust, inclined me more habitually to look to him, and ask what he would have me to do, and for the heart to do it. That God may abundantly bless you in your labor of love is the prayer of Yours, &c. 2:8. Nov. 15, 1836. I feel greatly rejoiced in what the Lord is putting it into the hearts of his people to do for the Western Board; and I feel grateful to you, sir, for your kind and encouraging note accompanying the circular, and acknowledging the receipt of my remittance. But it was not my gift. True, I collected it; but I was only one of many donors. If permitted, I will collect that sum for the same purpose two years longer;| The circular referred to in the preceding and, in addition to this, I have resolved, the letter was issued in October last. It was Lord enabling me, to endeavor, within a year printed on a separate sheet, and circulated from this time, to collect fifty dollars for your to some extent in that form. It has since Society. It has pleased God to bless my ef- been copied into the columns of some reliforts, so far beyond my expectations in similar gious newspapers. Its publication in the attempts, that, looking to him for help, I would Chronicle has been perhaps unduly delayed. again trust his faithfulness. I mention this to As it appears to be yet in demand, and it is you now, because I have a suggestion to make. Asa special and systematic effort in a benevo- probable that many of our female readers in the west and south have not yet seen it, we lent enterprise, with dependence on divine aid,] always insures more efficiency, I have thought insert it in the present number, for their pegood might result from proposing to twenty rusal, in connection with the foregoing artiladies of our church, or as many more as would cle; persuaded that both will tend to engage be willing to make a similar attempt, that each them with great cordiality in the foreign should agree to collect the sum above named. missionary enterprise. The Executive Committee of the Western Foreign Missionary Society to the Female Members of the Presbyterian Church. CIRCULAR LETTER. CHRISTIAN SISTERS: he has left for our instruction coincide with the pure, and holy, and active benevolence of his life. "Love thy neighbor as thyself. Whatsoever you would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them. Freely ye have received, freely give." If the inhabitants of a neighboring city or county were perishing with a deadly malady The Executive Committee of the Western and you had the knowledge of the only remeForeign Missionary Society have felt them-dy for their cure, could you keep that knowselves called, in the providence of God, to sub-ledge to yourselves and rest easy under the mit to the churches a great work for promo- certainty that they were going down to the ting the kingdom of our blessed Savior among grave by thousands, on account of your neglect? the dark and benighted nations of the earth. Yet this is the case with the dying heathen; Their proposed missions have been for some while you are reading these lines, they are time before you, and in deciding on this en- perishing for want of the knowledge of the larged plan of operations it is due to you, Chris-Savior, because we have not sent to tell them tian sisters, to say, that to enable the Execu- that God has found a ransom. Is it not time tive Committee to carry it forward, and to sus- for the churches to awake? Is it not time for tain them, as well by necessary contributions, professing Christians to inquire what spirit as by humble, fervent, and daily prayer, they they are of? There is a series of responsibililooked to you with entire confidence, for active, ties here, that if we could realize them would zealous, persevering, and self-denying co-ope- make us tremble. The ministers of the Gosration in this blessed work. They found it pel have their responsibilities; the elders of recorded, that the first Missionary Society was the church theirs; the managers and officers of a female Missionary Society. Matt. 27:55, 56. our Missionary Society theirs; and, Christian Mark 15:40, 41. Luke 8:2, 3. Had any of you sisters, on none do these responsibilities rest lived in the days when our blessed Lord was with more weight than on you. Do you ask in the form of a servant, would you have hesi- why? Could we exhibit to your view the detated one moment in making one of that lovely graded, miserable, wretched state of woman in company "which ministered to him of their heathen lands, you would have the answer. substance?" If He, who, though he was rich, To describe that degradation, as it actually exfor your sakes became poor, when he was go-ists, is impossible-but were space afforded, ing about doing good, had called at your door, facts could be related that would melt the would you have closed it upon him? Rather hardest heart. The heathen female, from her let us ask, would you not have welcomed him birth to her death, is in a condition only to be to the best and choicest of all in your house, envied by the convicted felon. First the vicfeeling at the same time, that you were not tim of the caprice of parents without natural worthy that he should come under your roof. affection, then subjected to the cruel tyranny Now, although he is ascended up on high, of a husband who looks upon her as belonging and his name is exalted above every name in to an inferior race, and created solely for his heaven and in earth, his cause is as dear to his service and his pleasure. She is denied every heart-the glory of God is as dear to him, and means of instruction, and then is upbraided the salvation of a dying world is as dear to him, and villified for her ignorance. In some counas they were when prostrate in the garden of tries she is shut up and excluded under the Gethsemane, or when he bowed his head upon pretence that she is not to be trusted; in others, the cross. How dear these were to him then, her honor and herself may be purchased, even may be found in the inspired record. Earnest- from her husband or her father, for the smallest ly and thrice he prayed, that if it were possi-trifle. In some populous regions it is expressble the bitter cup might pass from him. This ly denied that she is a moral agent, and in was not possible, unless, at that awful moment, others she is the devoted victim of a dark and he had given up the work of man's redemption. cruel superstition. But in this mighty work, he yielded not, he faltered not. "For the joy that was set before him he endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God." "If any man have not the spirit of Christ he is none of his." Now the spirit of Christ is the spirit of Missions. His errand into our world was one of mercy and of love and good will to man. "God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved." The precepts This is but a general outline of the picture of the degradation and wretchedness of woman, in heathen lands. All, who have witnessed her condition there, unite in saying, that to be fully understood, it must be seen. The following are some of the statements made by those who saw what they relate : In relation to China, the Rev. Dr. Morrison observes: "The abject condition of women in China, and the contempt thrown on them, by the doctrines of their Atheistical philosophers, tend to harden the hearts of wives and moth |