rsity of California
ithern Regional
BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
PRINTED BY
SPOTTISWOODK AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE
LONDON
LIFE AND LETTERS
OF
EDWARD BICKERSTETH
BISHOP OF SOUTH TOKYO
BY
SAMUEL BICKERSTETH, M.A.
VIOAR OF LEWISHAM, S.E.
LONDON
SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & COMPANY
(LIMITED)
St. IDunstan's fsousc
FETTER LANE, FLEET STREET, B.C.
1899
TO THE BELOVED FATHER
TO WHOSE PRAYERS, EXAMPLE, AND TRAINING
ALL HIS CHILDREN OWE MORE THAN WORDS CAN EXPRESS
AND WITH THE EARNEST DESIRE
THAT THE EXTENSION OF CHRIST'S KINGDOM
SO DEAR TO HIM AND TO HIS FIRST-BORN SON
MAY BE ADVANCED BY THIS RECORD
OF A MISSIONARY'S LIFE
AND WORK
2O662O2
PREFACE
To write a biography is an attempt to prolong and extend
a personal influence. After my brother's death in August
1897, a desire was expressed not only in England, but
also in Delhi and in Japan, that some authentic account
should be written of the work which he was called of God
to do, first in the East and afterwards in the Far East.
At the request of Mrs. Edward Bickersteth, my sister-
in-law, I undertook to write this biography. I had hoped
to complete the work within a year, but I could not fore-
see that the increase of population in the parish of Lewis-
ham, rapid for many years past, would have developed
during the last two years at a pace in excess of the growth
of any other part of the metropolitan area. This has
made it almost impossible to give continuous thought or
study to the Life, except during absence from home.
While it may be granted that the choice of a near
relative as a biographer has some advantages, there are
obvious dangers involved in such a selection. I cannot
say how far I have avoided them ; at least, I have tried to
do so. As a Commissary in England to my brother during
almost all his episcopate, I was necessarily familiar with
Vlii BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
his Japanese work, but I have special reason to thank those
who by the loan of letters and documents have enabled
me to deal, as fully as space allowed, with the years during
which my brother was head of the Cambridge Mission.
I am thus indebted to the present Bishop of Durham, the
Bishop Designate of Lahore (Dr. Lefroy), the Master of
Pembroke College, the Rev. S. S. Allnutt (now head of the
Cambridge Mission), the Rev. Dr. Weitbrecht, and especi-
ally to Canon Stanton, of Trinity College, Cambridge, who
has been intimately connected with the Mission from its
start and kindly allowed me to read over to him the
Chapters II. to V. As a graduate of the University of
Oxford, I have felt it a special privilege to be allowed to
write the story of this well-known Cambridge Mission.
In the early part of Chapter VI. will be found, in a letter
addressed by the Bishop to the Master of Pembroke, a terse
and vivid account of the state of Japan in 1886. But I
have purposely avoided overloading the book with facts and
figures connected with the marvellous story of Japanese
enterprise since 1868, as travellers, artists, and journalists
have already made the world familiar with this romance of
modern history, its contrast with the preceding centuries
of apathy, its encouragement to believe that what the
Japanese have already done is but the preface to the
volume of their future achievements, if once the gold of
Christianity mingles with the quicksilver of their national
temperament. To them imitation does not appear to mean
limitation, as it so often does, because they are careful also
to adapt, as well as to adopt, western ideas, reforming
PREFACE IX
them where necessary to suit their own habits of thought
and life. The late Sir Rutherford Alcock once pointed
out to me, in the course of conversation, that more than
once in their history the Japanese had shown great ability
in seizing upon new ideas, but for his part he was doubtful
as to their power ' to keep on developing ' unless Chris-
tianity added stability to the national character.
I have intentionally put together into separate chapters
information about the organisation of the Cambridge Mis-
sion, the Nippon Sei Kokwai, and Community Missions,
because happily in these days not only several English
Bishops expect their Ordination candidates to take up a
missionary subject, but also young Church people all over
the country voluntarily submit themselves to examination
in missionary knowledge. It will be convenient, I hope,
to such students to have ready to hand, and disentangled
from biographical details, information upon such missionary
methods, while for those who have time for fuller study
the intervening chapters will illustrate the way in which
the Bishop applied his principles.
I desire to take this opportunity of thanking those, and
they are many, who have sent me personal recollections of
my brother's work, which every reader will feel to be a
great addition to the value of the volume, especially the
well-known traveller, Mrs. Bishop, Colonel Gordon Young,
the Rev. F. Armine King, Warden of St. Andrew's Mis-
sion, Tokyo, the Rev. John Imai, and others, as well as
Mr. A. C. Benson for leave to reproduce some of his father's
letters.
X BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Chiefly I have to thank my sister-in-law, not only for
putting unreservedly at my disposal all my brother's
papers and .letters, but also for helping me in every way in
her power, especially where her residence in Japan, which
I have never visited, enabled her to supply my lack of
knowledge.
Some words of my predecessor in this parish, the
present Bishop of Lichfield, to whom I had written
acquainting him with my purpose of writing my brother's
life, have often come to my mind, and supplied me with
an inspiring motive : ' Your brother's memoir will be much
more than a valuable contribution to missionary literature.
It will be an incentive to missionary zeal, and to self-
sacrificing love for the Master and for the souls He
loves.'
If it should please God to fulfil this hopeful forecast, it
will be an answer to many prayers, and a rich reward for
any labour involved in the task.
THE VICARAGE, LEWISHAM, S.E.
Festival of S. Michael and AH Angels, 1899
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
PAGE
Birth at Banningham Parentage, Edward Bickersteth of Watton, ' Ed war
Henry,' of Exeter Baptism Childhood at Hampstead Schooldays
at Highgate Foreign travel Scholarship at Pembroke College,
Cambridge Degree Death of his mother and of two sisters
Selection of assistant curacy Ordination Work at West End,
Hampstead Fellowship Personal appearance Characteristics
Relationship to Church parties . . . . . . I
CHAPTER II
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI
Return to Cambridge Recollections by Rev. C. W. E. Body Desires
for missionary work, to what due ? First idea of the Cambridge
University Mission Influence of Dr. Westcott and Dr. French
Bickersteth's offer to go out to India Testimony of Professor Stanton
and Rev. S. S. Allnutt to his influence His paper on Cambridge
Mission before Cambridge Church Society The four-fold object of
the C. M. His paper in ' Mission Field ' Why Delhi was selected
Community Missions then a novelty Affiliation of Cambridge Mission
with S. P.O. Statistics of S.P.G. at Delhi Letter of Rev. R. R.
Winter Consecration of Dr. French as first Bishop of Lahore
Formation of Cambridge Committee Departure of the first two
missionaries, Edward Bickersteth and J. D. M. Murray, for Delhi . 2O
CHAPTER III
CAMBRIDGE MISSION, DELHI (THE WORK)
Arrival in Delhi Visit of Bishop (Johnson) of Calcutta First impres-
sions Teaching in St. Stephen's High School Training of Catechists
Christian hostel for boys Furlough of the Rev. R. R. Winter-
Serious illness of the Rev. J. D. M. Murray Bickersteth left alone in
charge of the mission Recollections by Mrs. Parsons His efforts to
teach the teachers Necessity for Christian masters in secular schools
Arrival of the Rev. H. C. Carlyon and Rev. J. D. Blackett
Bickersteth's views on bazaar preaching His evangelistic labours
among Kolis and Chamars His views on relative merits of Hinduism
Xli BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
and Muhammadanism and their mutual influence on India and on each
other Arrival of Rev. S. S. Allnutt and Rev. G. A. Lefroy Deci-
sion of the C.M. to prepare candidates for the Calcutta (B.A.) degree
Appeal of Bishop French and Bishop Lightfoot to Cambridge
Meeting in College Hall, Westminster Speech by Dr. Westcott The
beginning of the Higher Education Visit of Rev. E. H. Bickersteth
to Delhi Bickersteth's illness and enforced furlough Personal
Recollections by Dr. Weitbrecht ....... 47
CHAPTER IV
CAMBRIDGE MISSION, DELHI (THE LIFE)
Spiritual power dependent on devotional life Bickersteth's appreciation
of Retreats and Quiet Days His advocacy of intercessory prayer
Other plans for deepening spiritual life His vindication of ' rule ' in
prayer, and conviction that missionaries, above all men, need a regulated
devotional life Effects of the spiritual fervour of the Cambridge mis-
sion in (a) stricter discipline, (b) more definite teaching, and (c ) the spirit
of brotherliness among the members of the mission Recollections by
Rev. G. A. Lefroy By Bishop (Matthew) of Lahore By Col.
Gordon Young Address of native Christians to Bishop of Exeter on
hearing of Bickersteth's death 79
CHAPTER V
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN
Continued ill-health Letters to Rev. G. A. Lefroy, S. S. Allnutt, H. C.
Carlyon Forced to take another year of furlough (1883-4) Depar-
ture of Rev. J. W. T. Wright and Rev. Arthur Haig for C.M.,
Delhi Permanent Relations of C.M. with S.P.G. Endeavours to
organise Zenana work into a Community Mission for women At
Cannes for the winter Letter on the unseen world Correspondence
with Allnutt and Lefroy Summer in England Again forbidden to
return to India (1884) Acceptance of. Rectory of Framlingham
Bishop'French's offer of Archdeaconry of Simla and Indian Chaplaincy
Correspondence re Headship of C.M. Refusal of Archdeaconry and
decision to return to Delhi Again forbidden to rejoin mission (March
1885) At last allowed to return (Sept. 1895) Called to Japan as
Bishop (October) His training for that post Grief at giving up
the C.M., Delhi Letters to Lefroy Consecration Departure for
the Far East . . . . . . ..... . . 109
CHAPTER VI
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE (l886-l888)
Outward bound Journal Visit to Jesuit Missions at Shanghai ' Open :
letter to Dr. Searle on the State of Japan Landing at Nagasaki
CONTENTS Xlii
PAGE
Holy week at Osaka Important conference there Arrival at Tokyo
Meeting with Bishop Williams (American) and Bishop Nicolai
(Russian) First idea of Nippon Sei K5kwai (N.S.K.) Second
' open ' letter to Dr. Searle on St. Andrew's Mission, to be established
at Tokyo First missionary tour (Northwards) to Yezo and the Ainus,
(Westwards) to Kiushiu First- proposal for Ladies' Institute (Educa-
tional) at Tokyo Letters to his fourth brother on his beginning the
clerical life Three conferences at Osaka His first ordination in
Japan To Nagasaki again and back by Shikoku Easter (1887) in
Tokyo First local council of N.S.K. Visit to Korea with Bishop
(Scott) of North China (Sept. 29-Oct. 6) Beginning of St. Andrew's
and St. Hilda's Missions Holy Week (1888) in Tokyo and ordination
of John Imai Bishop's First Pastoral Return (May 1888) to Lambeth
Conference Five months in England Speech in St. James's Hall
His part in the Lambeth Conference Summer holidays with the
Bishop of Exeter Return with recruits to Japan (October 1888) . 149
CHAPTER VII
S.P.G. and C.M.S. Missions Bishop Bickersteth's paper on 'Variety of
Methods' (1893) Letter from Canon Tristram The Ladies' Institute
(Education) Community Missions St. Andrew's for men The
Bishop's idea in starting it Its first members Its rule of life Vows
Miss Tsuda's paper on the position of Japanese women St.
Hilda's Mission for women Exterior rule of the community The
Bishop's letters on the necessary qualifications of its members Its
special work Consecration of the chapel, with the Bishop's address
Its medical work Orphanage Recollections by Miss Thornton and
by Miss Bullock . . . . . . . '.'V "' . . 206
CHAPTER VIII
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE (1888-93)
Landing at Tokyo (St. Andrew's Day) 1888 Statistics as to the strength
of the missions of the Church of England in Japan Christmas at
Tokyo Letters from the Inland Sea Visit to Kagoshima, his most
southernly station Travelling hard and fast, late and early Second
Lenten Pastoral (March 1889) on (i) Reunion, (2) Standards of faith,
(3) Ritual controversies at home, (4) Ecclesiastical courts in their effect
on missionary enterprise His first (English) ordination to priesthood,
Easter 1889 St. Hilda's Hospital Second Biennial Synod Scheme
for Pastor Funds Journey to Yezo (2,000 miles in 17 days) Tour in
Southern Japan Ordination of Rev. John Imai to priesthood
XIV BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
FACE
First thought of bishopric of South Japan (January 1890) Pastoral
letter to university students Third Lenten Pastoral Visit of Duke
and Duchess of Connaught And of Bishop Corfe (of Korea) -First
extempore address in Japanese Autumn journey to Western Japan
Fourth Lenten Pastoral (1891) At work on Commentaries Canon
Barnett's visit and reminiscences Third Biennial Synod and visit of
Bishop Hare (American) Letter on Prayer Book Revision Visit of
the Bishop of Exeter and party Terrific earthquake A year of
journeying (1892) Visit to Luchoo Islands First baptism of Ainus
Return to England (December 27, 1892) -via Delhi Conference
with Archbishop on Episcopal Subdivision In England February to
October 1893, with incessant travelling His marriage (September)
and return to Japan via Canada . . . . . . .254
CHAPTER IX
NIPPON SEI KOKWAI
(Holy Catholic Church of Japan)
Its intention Two defective views of a missionary's duty Archbishop
Benson on the opportunity thus offered The Bishop's sermon before
the First Synod (1887) The resolution adopted at Osaka The rela-
tion of the N.S.K. to other bodies of Christians A conference with
Protestant Nonconformists The constitution and Canons of the
N.S.K. Was its formation premature? Letter from the Bishop on
ritual points Revision of Japanese Prayer Book The principles which
underlay it Pastoral letter from the Bishops of the Anglican communions
in Japan The decision as to the Thirty-nine Articles The marriage
laws Letter of Archbishop Benson, and joint Pastoral letter on this
subject Successive synods and their work Home and foreign missions
of the N.S.K. Extension of the Episcopate Recollections by Bishop
Fyson and Bishop Evington. . . . ... . . 301
CHAPTER X
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE (1893-97)
Success of his efforts for the increase of the episcopate in Japan Con-
secration of the Bishops of Kiushiu and of Yezo His visit and appeal
to the Church in Canada His impression of the missionary oppor-
tunities of that Church Fourth General Synod Welcome to the
newly consecrated American Bishop (McKim) Special General Synod
on Episcopal Jurisdiction His proposal to the Archbishop of Canter-
bury to form a bishopric of Osaka (June 1894) His appeal to
Canada to send a Bishop to the West Coast The war with China
and its effect on missionary inquiry His special collects for use of
soldiers Revision of Japanese Book of Common Prayer Conduct of
CONTENTS XV
PACK
the Japanese during the war The Bonin Islands Visitation of the
West Coast Eighth Lenten Pastoral (1895) First meeting of
Bishops of the Anglican Communion in Japan (June 1895) Summer
holidays in Karuizawa Summoned to England to confer about Osaka
Bishopric Return with Bishop (Awdry) of Southampton appointed as
First Bishop of Osaka A bright Easter (1896) General Synod at
Osaka Letters written while on a ' pioneer ' tour Recollections by
Miss Rankin Disastrous floods in Gifu Serious illness and final
return to England Recollections by Mrs. Bishop . . '' . . 360
CHAPTER XI
INTELLECTUAL STANDPOINT
His natural love of reading Criticism on books in his letters home r
Value of early Greek Fathers to the modern missionary References
to books which attack the faith To biographies, Manning, Pusey, &c.
His views on the Atonement On Sacrifice On the ' Lux Mundi '
school of thought On Old Testament criticism On Keswick teach-
ing On Reunion with Nonconformists On the Pope's Encyclical
On the Imperial position of the Church of England On Church Re-
form the true cure for lawlessness His defence of the Miracle of the
Resurrection in the 'Japan Mail' His teaching on private con-
fession Non-communicating attendance Fasting Communion
Some letters of spiritual counsel His ideal of the Episcopate and
efforts to reach the ideal Appreciation of his character by the Rev.
F. Armine King By Rev. John Imai By the Bishop of St.
Andrews ........... 397
CHAPTER XII
THE CALL HOME
The Bishop's death at an early age not premature Months of illness
Lambeth Conference Last earthly days The funeral at Chisledon
Reception of the news in Japan Address from Kobe Christians
Extract from the ' Japan Daily Mail ' Memorial services, with address
by Archdeacon Shaw Resolution of the Diocesan General Synod
Permanent memorials Personal letters ...... 454
APPENDICES . . . . . . . . . 475
INDEX . . . . . . . . . 493
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PHOTOGRAVURE PORTRAIT ..... Frontispiece
PEMBROKE COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE . . - . . To face p. 20
CAMBRIDGE MISSION AT DELHI . -. . . 49
BlCKERSTETH HALL, DELHI ..... 6l
GROUP OF CAMBRIDGE MISSIONARIES AT DELHI . 79
FRAMLINGHAM RECTORY t 130
ST. ANDREW'S HOUSE, TOKYO . . . ' -. - ' 224
GROUP OF CLERGY AND DIVINITY STUDENTS . 290
VIGNETTE PORTRAIT . . ... L v 300
GROUP OF THE MEMBERS OF THE SYNOD OF 1893 351
BISHOPSTOWE, TOKYO ( i 365
ST. ANDREW'S CHURCH, TOKYO v .1 w . . 368
THE BISHOP'S GRAVE AT CHISLEDON ... . ' , '. 474
MEMORIAL BRASS IN EXETER CATHEDRAL . . page 474
MAP OF JAPAN
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
EDWARD BICKERSTETH, the third in direct succession
who has borne the name during this century, was the
eldest son of Edward Henry, Bishop of Exeter. He was
born June 26, 1850, 'at Banningham Rectory, Norfolk.
He sprang, however, from a family which had originally
come from the North. Nowhere do the waters gleam and
curve with greater beauty than along the winding banks of
the Inline, as it nears the little country town of Kirkby
Lonsdale in Westmoreland. The old pastoral republics
which peopled the valleys and hills in the good old days of
the Cumberland and Westmoreland estatesmen produced
many gentle in heart and soul, and wise and shrewd above
their class. Of these the Broughams, the Sedgwicks, and the
Bickersteths are examples. The Bickersteths, or Bicker-
staffes for down to the last century the name was spelt in-
differently in either way were lords of the manor of
Bickerstaffe, near Ormskirk, in Lancashire, from a period
anterior to the reign of King John, and played a not in-
considerable part in local history during the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries, two members of the family represent-
ing the county in Parliament, Sir Ralph (who was several
times High Sheriff of Lancashire during the reign of
Edward II.) in 1313, and Henry de Bickersteth in 1339.
In 1376 the manor passed by the marriage of an heiress
to an ancestor of the present Earl of Derby, but more than
B
2 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
one branch of the family continued to reside in the neigh-
bourhood, and a second Henry de Bickersteth acquired
through his marriage with Malma, daughter and co-heir of
Gilbert de Ince (circa 1420), an estate in Aughton, the
adjoining parish to Ormskirk, which remained in the pos-
session of the family down to 1736. From this Henry
was lineally descended Thomas Bickersteth of Aughton,
whose third son James, after studying medicine under Dr.
Longworth of Ormskirk, settled as a surgeon at Burton-in-
Kendal. He was the father of Henry Bickersteth of Kirkby
Lonsdale, who as a surgeon was well known in the town,
and honoured far and near.
Henry Bickersteth married a lady named Elizabeth
Batty, of Deansbiggin, a remarkable woman, shrewd,
strict, and stately, called the Queen of Kirkby Lonsdale.
They had five sons, the eldest of whom, James, was lost
at sea ; the second, John, was a learned divine and hymn-
writer, and was the father of Robert (Bishop of Ripon,
1857-1884) and Edward (Dean of Lichfield) ; the third,
Henry, became Senior Wrangler (1808), subsequently
Master of the Rolls (1836-1851), and was called to the
Upper House as Baron Langdale. 1 The fourth was
Edward, and the fifth Robert, who having settled at
Liverpool, became one of the first medical men in the
north of England.
This fourth son, Edward Bickersteth, the father of
the present Bishop of Exeter, was the grandfather of the
subject of this memoir. He came to London on January I,
1 80 1, when only fourteen years of age, to take a clerkship at
the General Post Office. He was a youth of eager tempera-
ment, possessed of great energy of character, and had a
1 He married Lady Jane Harley, daughter of Edward, Earl of Oxford and
Mortimer, but had only one daughter, who pre-deceased him. He was offered,
but declined on the score of health, the great seal of England. '
INTRODUCTORY 3
passion for reading. His duties at the Post Office occupied
him daily from 10 to 3, but within four years we find him
offering his services to a lawyer for eight hours a day in
addition to this. These hours had to be fitted in between
6 to 10 A.M. and 3 to 1 1 P.M. In his new work he employed
himself with such success that in due time he himself became
a solicitor, a profession which he only relinquished, together
with an annual income of 8oo/., in 1815, on taking Holy
Orders. He undoubtedly bequeathed to his grandson his
love of learning, while his character and career probably
shaped the thoughts of the younger man in more ways
than can be definitely traced. For Edward Bickersteth, in
exchanging the legal profession for the ministry of God's
Word and Sacraments, had not only given up excellent
worldly prospects for the kingdom of God's sake, but knew
that he would be at once sent out on a special mission of
inquiry to Africa, the western shores of which were then
invested with peculiar terror owing to the grievous mortality
among the missionaries. He had, however, for years been
a missionary at heart, and was ordained Deacon (being then
twenty-nine years of age) on December 10, 1815, by the
Bishop of Norwich, and Priest on December 21, within eleven
days, by the Bishop of Gloucester (on Letters Dimissory).
This enabled him to proceed in full orders to Sierra Leone,
where he himself prepared the first six native converts for
the Lord's Supper, and admitted them to those Holy
Mysteries.
Subsequently, he was resident for many years at the
C.M.S. House in Salisbury Square, E.G., as one of the
secretaries of that society, and as Rector of Watton, Herts
(1830-1850), he was ' in labours abundant, in journeyings
oft' on behalf of the foreign missions of the Church. He
was called to his rest on February 28, 1850.
His only son Edward Henry (through his marriage
4 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
with Sarah, eldest daughter of Thomas Bignold, Esq., of
Norwich) was born on St. Paul's day 1825. He had five
sisters, two of whom became widely known through the
book called ' Doing and Suffering.' l After taking classical
and mathematical honours at Trinity College, Cam-
bridge, and obtaining for the first time then on record the
Chancellor's medal for English verse three years in suc-
cession, he was ordained in Norwich Cathedral in 1848
(where his father had been ordained twenty-three years
before), and appointed at once as curate-in-charge of the
small country parish of Banningham in Norfolk. He
had married the same year his cousin Rosa, daughter of
Sir Samuel Bignold, M.P. for Norwich. Their first-born
child was a daughter, the eldest of ten sisters, and the
next a son, Edward, the eldest of six brothers. He
was born at the Rectory on Wednesday, June 26, 1850.
Against this event the following extract stands in the
Bishop of Exeter's diary : ' The mercy of its being a boy,
whose birth my father anticipated with joy, and whose
blessed standard of the Gospel may God grant him one
day to uphold.'
It will be seen, therefore, that from the first day of his
earthly life the child thus welcomed was dedicated by the
piety and prayers of his own father to the work of uphold-
ing, if not of carrying into distant lands, the Cross of
Christ. For indeed the father himself had fully inherited
the ardour of the missionary spirit, and although in God's
never-failing Providence not allowed to offer himself for
1 This book recorded the correspondence between the elder sister Eliza-
beth (wife of the Rev. T. R. Birks, Professor in Moral Philosophy in the
University of Cambridge), and Fanny her younger sister, a great invalid,
and was written by their sister Mrs. Ward, afterwards the devoted godmother
of .Edward Bickersteth. Of the other sisters, one, Mrs. Durrant, is now a.
missionary ut her own charges in connection with the C.M.S. in North-
West India, and another, Mrs. Cook, is the mother of two medical mission-
aries in Uganda.
INTRODUCTORY 5
the mission field (an honour which he had in early life
once coveted), yet he became the spiritual father and
supporter of many who gladly sacrificed all for Christ's
sake and the Gospel's, and lived to send his eldest son as
his representative.
Edward was baptised by his father on Sunday, July 28,
-1850, his godfathers being one of his uncles, the Rev. T. R.
Govett, M.A., and John McGregor, Esq., better known as
' Rob Roy,' who had been a bosom friend of his father's
at Trinity College, Cambridge. 1 At the baptism the
father preached from the words, ' Of whom the whole
family in heaven and earth is named ' thinking of
his own father, then in Paradise, and of the little boy
added that day to the Church below.
In 1851 Edward Henry Bickersteth was appointed by
the philanthropist Earl of Shaftesbury, his own and his
father's friend, to the Rectory of Hinton Martell in
Dorsetshire, and while there Bishop Denison of Salisbury
visited the parish and gave his blessing to the future
missionary. In 1855, however, Mr. Bickersteth was chosen
by trustees for the Vicarage of Christ Church, Hampstead,
where he continued to reside for thirty years, until he
was selected on the nomination of Mr. Gladstone first
for the Deanery of Gloucester, and shortly after for
the Bishopric of Exeter, over which see he now presides.
The change of the parental home to the pleasant vicinity
of London (Hampstead is only four miles from Charing
Cross, and was then much less built over) solved the educa-
tional problem, as there were exceptionally good schools
in the neighbourhood.
The vicarage, built in the time of Queen Anne, was
1 It is interesting to note that another Cambridge friend and cotemporary
of his father's, also of Trinity College, the Rev. Brooke Foss Westcott, had
visited the rectory shortly before.
6 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
a roomy house, secured for Christ Church during the
vicariate of my father's predecessor, Thomas Pelham
(subsequently Bishop of Norwich), and commanded
splendid views across London from Primrose Hill to the
Crystal Palace, and on a clear day as far as to Knockholt
Beeches, near Sevenoaks ; while it had a garden which
recalled Tennyson's lines:
Not wholly in the busy world, nor quite
Beyond it, blooms the garden that I love.
News from the humming city comes to it
In sound of funeral or of marriage bells ;
And, sitting muffled in dark leaves, you hear
The windy clanging of the minster clock.
There many happy hours were spent, and a healthier
place in the neighbourhood of London could hardly have
been found.
In the autumn of 1859 Edward went to a dame's school
(Mrs. Smallwood's), situated in North End, on the farther
side of the Heath, and stayed there for two years and more.
Each morning he shared his father's early cup of coffee,
and was then accompanied by him across the Heath,
which was at that time infested by very rough characters. 1
Father and son, however, went both of them together,
and reached the school daily in summer and winter by
7 A.M., at which hour the boy's work began.
In 1862 he was sent on to Highgate School, which was
founded in 1565 by Sir Roger Cholmeley, Chief Justice
of the King's Bench, and was then under the Rev. John
Bradley Dyne, D.D. This entailed a daily walk of four
miles to and from school, in winter across the Heath and
along the high road which led through Caen woods, the
1 On three occasions the boy when returning home from Highgate School
was stopped in the fields, and once robbed of watch and chain, and another
time of money.
INTRODUCTORY 7
property of the Earl of Mansfield ; in summer by a slightly
shorter route across the fields which lay to the north side
of Traitor's Hill. The father still accompanied the son
daily, unless hindered by private or pastoral duties, de-
lighting in making him familiar with the Latin names of
birds, trees, &c., and in following all his classical studies.
Within a term or two a cousin, Edward Bickersteth Birks,
came to reside at Christ Church vicarage for several
years, 1 and the two cousins, thus thrown together, became
almost like brothers.
Edward's seven years at Highgate School were in every
sense happy, and while proving him to be keen in the
acquisition of Greek and Latin, and unusually fond of
reading, also showed tha^: he was not devoid of a healthy
interest in games. Football he never cared for, but
excelled so far in cricket as to play in the First Eleven
during his last term, obtaining that year the highest score
in the Old Cholmeleian match. 2 He was also fond o{
entomology, and collected many good specimens on the
Heath and in the Highgate woods. He was taught swim-
ming and riding, the latter accomplishment giving him a
firm seat and confidence on horseback, and being of special
use to him in after years, when he had to scour the plains
round Delhi in visiting different mission stations, or make
his way along untrodden paths in Japan. At school he
showed no aptitude for modern languages, though as a
missionary he mastered six eastern languages.
Edward Bickersteth continued at Highgate till 1869,
in which year he obtained the school exhibition and also
1 Edward B. Birks obtained the School Exhibition in 1867, also an open
scholarship at Trinity College, Cambridge, in the same year, and a Fellow-
ship in 1871. He is now Vicar of Kellington, Whitley Bridge, Yorks.
2 He never lost his interest in this game, and in his many voyages was
always 'ready to join in a deck game ; and the cry of 'Well bowled, Bishop,'
was not infrequently heard.
8 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
an open classical scholarship at Pembroke College, Cam-
bridge, thus half supporting himself while he was an
undergraduate at the University. His father wrote in his
diary : ' His scholarship crowned his patient diligence at
Highgate ; his school course has never caused an hour's
anxiety, but has called for continual praise.'
Dr. Dyne, 1 his head master at Highgate, writes thus :
Rogate, Petersfield : September 24, 1897.
(
Dear S. Bickersteth, You ask me to send you any
reminiscences I can of your brother Edward's schooldays,
or of the influence he exerted in the school. I gladly do
so as far as I can, for the whole of his school life was most
gratifying to me ; although from his living with his parents
at Hampstead, not under my roof, or in a boarding house
at Highgate, but merely coming over to school daily, I
had not the opportunity of knowing his inner life which I
had in the case of boys living under me out of school.
He was of a retiring character, loved his home, whither he
generally went when work was over ; so that, always
without reproach and happy with his school-mates, 2 and
sociable, whilst with them he did not attain that command-
ing influence amongst them which a senior eminent in.
school sports does.
He entered the school in January 1862, after the
Christmas holidays, at the bottom of the third form.
We generally printed our school list in October : and
in the list of that year I find his name at the top of
his form. This was an augury of future industry and
love of study, and I may add of doing his duty to his
parents, always a ruling principle with him. From the
third form he gradually rose through the fourth and fifth,,
always taking a high place amongst several clever con-
temporaries (E. B. Birks being one), to the foremost place
in the sixth form in 1869, when he was senior prefect,,
and left the school carrying off not only the Governors'
1 Died January 1899, when nearly ninety years of age.
- The boys of Highgate in after years collected an annual sum of money
for the Delhi Missions while Bickersteth was connected with the Cambridge
Mission. On his consecration as Bishop his old school-fellows at Highgate
presented him with a pastoral staff, still in use in the diocese.
INTRODUCTORY 9
gold medal for Latin verse, but the first exhibition to the
university, the Burdett Coutts prize for mathematics, the
first prize for Divinity, and several others.
At one time several boys walked over from Hamp-
stead with him to school, and I always spoke with praise
of the punctuality of my Hampstead contingent led by him
. . . Pray excuse this rambling letter from one many years
past the allotted life of man but thankful to have been
so long spared.
Yours sincerely,
J. B. DYNE.
Edward's summer holidays were spent as a rule under
the roof of his grandfather, Sir Samuel Bignold, who
resided at Norwich, but who had also a seaside home at
Lowestoft. Twice the Lake district was visited while
staying at the house of his aunt (Mrs. Robert Bickersteth)
at Casterton Hall near the old home at Kirkby Lonsdale,
and once in 1867 he had a delightful tour in Norway
and Sweden with his father, during which they took an
extended tour up the Fiords, journeying over 2,000 miles.
On that occasion he became familiar with the great Uni-
versity at Christiania, where they were the guests of Pro-
fessor Voss, and with which in after years (1886) he
compared the modern University of Tokyo.
It will thus be seen that his boyhood and early youth
offered no striking features worthy of notice, but were
essentially ' home-spun,' to use a favourite expression of
his father's, and redolent of the simple joys so beauti-
fully described by John Keble, himself brought up in a
clerical home.
Sweet is the smile of home, the mutual look
Where hearts are of each other sure,
Sweet all the joys that crown the household nook,
The haunt of all affections pure.
At the same time proximity to London, with occasional
visits to St. Paul's, to Westminster Abbey, to the Royal
10 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Academy, and to the House of Commons l (in the pro-
ceedings of which throughout his life Edward Bickersteth
took an unflagging interest), prevented any stagnation of
mind. His father's varied circle of interests parochial,
ecclesiastical, literary widened his horizon. These early
years make a reposeful background on which the eye lingers
fondly, when it is contrasted with the far distant scenes in
which the boy, thus trained, was to spend his strenuous
life.
Spiritually, he was from his earliest years devout. It
seems in keeping with his subsequent well-balanced judg-
ment and sagacity that he never passed through any
violent epoch of conversion, but ' grew on before the Lord.'
As early as December 1856, among his father's memo-
randa occurs this note, ' I trust prayer is a real tJiing with
our boy.' He was then six and a half years old. In his
fifteenth year (March 1865) he was confirmed at Hamp-
stead Parish Church by the Bishop (Tait) of London.
His father, who himself prepared him for confirmation,
was engaged at that time with his poem ' Yesterday, To-
day, and For Ever,' in which the son took intelligent
interest and delight. Then, as throughout life, he seemed
to have a shrinking from coarse expressions and evil ways,
and was never entangled in those moral difficulties which
threaten the soul with shipwreck.
In 1857 and again in 1863, God gathered from the
home two little ones, Constance and Eva Mabel, but no
desolating bereavements swept over it till Edward's
Cambridge career was nearly over.
Among the younger members of the family the
' Brother,' as he was often called, being at one time the
only son among five daughters, won himself an unques-
1 He was present at the great debate in the House of Lords on the
Disestablishment of the Irish Church.
INTRODUCTORY 1 1
tioned place in their estimation, while in after years the
youngest ones looked up to him not without awe, though
with much affection. He stood godfather to his sister Effie
on her baptism in 1867, and greatly valued that relation-
ship.
In the summer of 1869 he spent six weeks travelling
through Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, and France, in
company with his father and mother and three of the elder
sisters, and in the autumn of that year he went into
residence at Pembroke College, Cambridge, as a scholar.
It was then a small college, but had already begun to
expand under the inspiring organisation of the Rev. C. E.
Searle. During his time as tutor, and since 1 880 as Master,
it has been partially rebuilt and has doubled its size.
Between the scholar and the tutor a friendship of no
ordinary tenderness and tenacity sprang up, and through-
out his life Edward Bickersteth could always rely on the
confidence of Dr. Searle in his different missionary under-
takings.
In the autumn of 1870 he accompanied his father
for a tour of some weeks in America. The father will
never forget his son's ' exquisite delight ' on first hearing
of the plan. He was always an excellent traveller.
Among his contemporaries and friends at Cambridge
may be mentioned C. W. E. Body, W. Lawson, Heriz
Smith, A. F. Kirkpatrick, V. H. Stanton, C. H. Prior,
A. J. Mason, A. W. Verrall, G. H. Rendall, with some of
whom he went upon a reading party in the Isle of Wight
(1871) under the guidance of his cousin, Professor Joseph
Mayor.
Edward Bickersteth went up to the university set on
obtaining a good degree, and determined to take
advantage to the fullest extent of the intellectual oppor-
tunities there abundantly opened to him. From the
12 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
first he and two friends read with a view to obtaining
Fellowships, and consequently his failure to obtain a first-
class in the Classical Tripos (February 1873) was at the
time a bitter disappointment to him, probably one of the
keenest trials of his life. 1
In April of that year he visited Rome with his cousin
Edward Birks and an old school friend Dorsay Cremer 2
and made a tour in Italy, which in after years he was able
twice to revisit. Few travellers were more untiring than
he in absorbing all that the magnetic influence of historical
sights and scenes is able to impart.
On his return he was anxious to take Holy Orders at
once, saying that enough money had been spent on him,
but yielded without delay to the earnestly expressed
wishes of his parents that he should continue at Cam-
bridge and read for the Theological Tripos. The college
offered to extend his scholarship for another year, and the
following spring he was rewarded by being placed with
two others in the first class, obtaining also the Scholefield
and Evans prizes, so that in the spring of 1875 he was
elected to a fellowship at Pembroke College. But his
mother was not spared on earth to share in the joy of
these successes. On August 2, 1.873, while staying at
Cromer in Norfolk, she had been suddenly called to enter
nto her rest. It would not be easy to reproduce in words
the perfect sympathy which had always bound together
the mother and son, or to bring out how great a depriva-
tion to him was the loss of her discriminating judg-
ment and devoted love, for which he had never looked in
vain. The death of the mother had followed upon the
' home call ' 3 of his sister Alice Frances, eleven months
1 He was bracketed seventh in the second class.
2 Now Vicar of Eccles.
3 She was aged 19, and inherited her father's gift of song ; see ' The
Master's Home Call,' by the Bishop of Exeter (Sampson Low & Co.).
INTRODUCTORY 13
previously (September 16, 1872), and of the youngest
sister Irene (November 12, 1872).
There had always been the strongest affection between
Edward and Alice, and it is also remembered with what
poignant sorrow Edward grieved over the sudden death of
Irene. Thus death had entered into the vicarage three
times in twelve months, and although by the clear insight
of my father's strong faith we had been taught that those
in Paradise were the living ones, those on earth the dying
ones, yet the earthly home could never be the same again.
Edward never destroyed one of his mother's letters,
which unfailingly reached him two or three times a week
during his undergraduate life ; but they do not offer
material for quotation, being full of the home interests of
a large family, in which then, as afterwards in India and
Japan, he never failed to keep up an unbroken interest,
and in which he expected to be most fully posted up.
An exception may be made in the following three letters,
considering the intimate influence which the two men
therein mentioned were to have on his life.
On November 12, 1871, his mother wrote : 'How kind
Mr. Westcott seems to be to you and your companions.
I am sure his teaching must be very valuable.' Or again :
< It is interesting to us that you should be enjoying Pro-
fessor Westcott's lectures, when twenty-five years ago he
and your father were together.' Such allusions are fre-
quent, while on November 28, 1871, she wrote :' Father
and I, with Lily, went to St. Pancras yesterday and heard
a most wonderful preacher of the same class as Mr. Body.
It was Mr. Wilkinson, 1 and he certainly gave a wonderful
sermon. I never saw anyone, perhaps, who seemed so
vividly to realize eternal things while speaking. It was a
very great help.' While with regard to his first curacy,
' Now Bishop of St. Andrews.
14 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
which had been already under discussion, she wrote
(May 17, 1872): 'Did father tell you that he lunched
with Mr. Thorold one day this week to give him
American information, as he is hoping to go there this
summer, and Mr. Thorold still so wishes to have you
for his curate ? I do feel it would be a great privilege
to you to work under such a man, and your position in
every way would be a good one. It makes my heart so
happy to think of you in the ministry, telling of the
Saviour's love to perishing souls, and I often and often
commit it in prayer to our gracious Father, my dear boy.
Father has said sometimes that he thought if he could see
you preaching the gospel he could say from his heart,
" Lord, now lettest thou Thy servant depart in peace ;" but if
He spares us to see you established in the ministry, and
your work blessed of God, it would be indeed a blessing.'
These words were written within three months of her death.
Mr. Thorold ' was an old friend of Edward Bicker-
steth's father, and godfather to his son Hugh. He
had been persuaded by him to leave Westmoreland for
work in London, and a curacy under him would have
been congenial work and valuable experience. But his
mother's death made Edward wish to reside as near as
possible to the old home, so that eventually he accepted
the offer of a title from a neighbour of his father's, whose
parish all but adjoined that of Christ Church, Hampstead.
He was ordained deacon at St. Paul's Cathedral by
Bishop Jackson of London, being first among the candi-
dates, on the fourth Sunday in Advent, 1873.
The recently formed parish of Holy Trinity to which
he was licensed was administered by the Vicar (the Rev.
Henry Sharpe) on more extreme Evangelical lines than
his new curate felt in sympathy with, so it turned out
1 Afterwards Bishop of Rochester, and then of Winchester.
INTRODUCTORY 15
happily that the little hamlet of West End (now a large
suburb) was intrusted to his care. There within two
years he succeeded, with the help of many of his father's
friends, in building an excellent mission church of brick,
which has now become a centre for a new ecclesiastical
district. This his first scene of ministerial labours never
ceased to be regularly remembered by him in intercession
up to the end of his episcopate.
On December 20, 1874, m tne same place, and by the
same Bishop of London who had set him apart for the
diaconate, Edward Bickersteth was advanced to the
priesthood. His father wrote in his journal : ' This day
my beloved Edward was ordained Priest. His diaconate
has been full of promise, and full of realised blessing, a
wise tact in dealing with many minds, and a constraining
desire to preach Christ, a full Christ, to his flock. And
this while pressed with many literary works the Theo-
logical Tripos examination, in which he came out first
writing for the Hulsean, trying for the Carus, and prepar-
ing for the examination of priest. But now his preparation
work is over, and he is fully on his ministerial way. The
Lord grant that, abiding in Jesus Christ, he may bring forth
much fruit, and win many jewels for the crown he will cast
at the feet of his Lord. His dear mother's image has
seemed so present the last two days. Surely through
Jesus she knows all.'
It was during these years (1873-5) that Bickersteth
greatly enjoyed the friendship of Mrs. Charles, one of his
father's oldest friends resident at Hampstead. The gifted
authoress of 'The chronicles of the Schonberg Cotta Family'
was, as all who knew her will admit, most stimulating as a
conversationalist, and very sympathetic in her power of
appreciating the intellectual workings and spiritual aspira-
tions of younger minds. He also regularly attended the
1 6 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
conference of the London Junior Clerical Society, of which
he was one of the first members. This society used to meet
at a Lecture Room in King's College, London, and among
its members at that time were the Rev. H. J. Mathew
(late Bishop of Lahore), the Rev. John Oakley (late Dean
of Manchester), the Rev. Brook Deedes (now Rector of
Hawkhurst and sometime Archdeacon of Lahore), the Rev.
A. J. Worlledge (now Chancellor of Truro), the Rev. J. W.
Horsley (Vicar of St. Peter's, Walworth), and others. The
Rev. Charles Kingsley, the Rev. Alfred Barry (afterwards
Bishop of Sydney), and the Rev. W. D. Maclagan (now
Archbishop of York), used to attend the meetings from
time to time and address the members. In all such intel-
lectual discussions Edward Bickersteth took a thoughtful
part.
In appearance he was tall, being just over six feet
in height, always very thin, with grey eyes and some-
what marked features, his chin being unusually long.
His voice, though not powerful nor remarkable for its
musical cadences, carried well, and seldom if ever failed
him. His forehead was of noble proportions and marked
him out as a man of thought. His eyes shone with keen
intelligence, and a smile of singular sweetness lit up his
whole face, and revealed as in a moment the man himself.
All his movements were quick, and he walked always at a
great pace.
Although a poet's son, Edward Bickersteth was never
himself a poet, nor was his expression of ' thought much
tinged by emotion.' In writing he aimed rather at lucidity
of style than at rhetorical effect, and he set more store on
introducing an historical precedent than a glowing simile.
From his father he inherited his strong will and great
tenacity of purpose, coupled with a gentleness of bear-
ing and a singular gift of patient waiting upon God;
INTRODUCTORY \J
while from his mother he derived a marked tenderness, a
cautious sagacity in judgment, the reticence of reserve,
as well as a disinclination to self-advertisement. Like all
highly strung natures, he could be deeply stirred, but by
God's grace he learnt to curb his impatience, so that the
peacefulness, seldom broken in upon in later life, carried
with it a note of victory. These characteristics, disciplined
and matured by experience, developed in him not only
a vocation of leadership, but also made that leadership
eagerly looked for by friends and acquiesced in even by
those who differed from him.
To the fact that he was born and bred among the
Evangelicals may be attributed his early sense of the
seriousness of life, of the necessity for personal religion, of
the reality of divine mercy and judgment, and of the con-
straining force latent in the words ' For Christ's sake.'
This spiritual birthright he never lightly esteemed, and
never forfeited by a rash exchange into a wholly opposite
school of thought ; but his natural disposition, his love of
learning and of precision of thought, his appreciation of first
principles and of historical precedents, and his balanced
judgment made it certain that fuller sacramental teach-
ing when presented to him would find a ready response
and satisfy the deeper instincts of his nature. Moreover
in God's providence he went up to the University two
years before the Cambridge School of Divinity received
its most powerful recruit in the person of Dr. Westcott
(called in 1871 to be Regius Professor of Divinity), and
the influence of his Alma Mater, interpreted for him by
Lightfoot, Westcott, and others, completed his mental and
spiritual evolution, more especially after his return to the
University to reside as a Fellow.
But there is no doubt that his early training enabled
him to see from the inside the aspirations and methods
c
1 8 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
of truly spiritually minded men, both clergy and laity,
belonging to the Evangelical school of thought. The re-
membrance of this experience was of special use to him
when called upon to supervise the work of strongly
Evangelical missionaries in Japan. Many years later
writing in Japan from a mission station where he was stay-
ing, he expressed himself thus in a letter to his wife :
These are people from whom I feel one may learn
much. Their hearts are really in their work, and they
pursue it simply and loyally for Christ's sake. Of course
I do feel a great lack of church privileges and of the sense
of need of them. They would be stronger and better if
they would only superadd them to what they have. But
their lives seem otherwise set. Their very reading is in
the main of a dissenting order, and their thoughts get that
tinge. Still, with it all there is a personal love of our Lord
and a loyalty to Him which makes their work not what
it might be, but still very valuable and with a beauty of
its own. God give us increasingly what they have, as well
as all the truths of the other order which complement it.
Again :
These dear people live as if no great movement had
ever passed over the English Church with all its teachings
fifty years ago, (indeed, almost as if the Church were
not, in many of its aspects and directions), though un-
consciously they are much the better for its influence.
But I had even to remind them it was Lady Day. Would
that they could learn to add the idea of the sv arwp.a and
all it means to that of the iz>
1 In 1892 Archbishop Benson, speaking at a meeting in
St. James's Hall on behalf of the Society for Promoting
1 Speaking at the I95th Anniversary of that Society, Archbishop Benson
said : ' We talk familiarly about people being ' ' High Church " people, or
" Low Church " people, or " Broad Church" people ; but there is an un-
occupied word which I want to come, if not into our lips, at least into our
minds, and hearts, and lives. It is the word " Deep." What I want is
" Deep Church " for all ; Deep Church that can be produced only by Christian
knowledge and by the " principles" of Christian knowledge.'
INTRODUCTORY ip
Christian Knowledge, pointed out that in the nomenclature
of Church parties one word had been left unemployed, and
pleaded in favour of 'Deep Churchmen,' as distinct from
High, Low, or Broad, while embracing many character-
istics of all the three. It would be presumptuous to imply
that Edward Bickersteth realised that description, it is
quite certain that it expressed his ideal.
c 2
20 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
CHAPTER II
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI
' The very fact of their having received the training and education of one
University will be a bond of sympathy between the missionaries of no ordinary
strength. Our English Universities have a character and tradition of their own,
which are impressed by a thousand subtle and indefinable influences on those
who pass through them, and will naturally engender unity of feeling and
similarity in modes of thought. We refuse to regard the consideration of such
influences and associations as merely sentimental rather we believe that they
should be carefully taken account of, and consecrated by combined action in
the service of Christ.' Rev. EDWARD BICKERSTETH, t'u the ' Mission Field?
March 1877.
IN May 1875 Edward Bickersteth returned to Cambridge,
having been elected to a Fellowship at Pembroke College,
on which foundation he had already held a scholarship.
Those were the days before the last University Commis-
sion had reorganised the conditions on which Fellowships
are held, and there was no rule of compulsory residence at
the University, nor indeed any rule attached to the tenure
except that a Fellow could not be married.
As a matter of fact, Bickersteth retained his Fellow-
ship for eighteen years, the larger part of which time he
was absent from England either in India or Japan, and
only for the first two years took his full share in lecturing
and other collegiate duties. He always held that if
Fellowships were ever to be allotted to specific objects,
it was not unreasonable that one should be held by a
missionary. He maintained that the Christian sons of
an ancient University were responsible not only for the
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 21
confirmation of the faith, but also for its propagation.
He had reason to believe that his brother Fellows, or many
of them, the tutor especially, took his view, and approved
of one of the governing body being thus employed on
foreign service ; and there can be no doubt that the news
from the front which Bickersteth from time to time sent
home, and his letters from Japan addressed to the Master
of Pembroke on some important new departure in his
-work, not only excited interest in the college itself, but
were widely read in other colleges as well. He did not
retain rooms in college after he left Delhi, but his sermons
.in chapel and occasional lectures during his enforced and
prolonged absence from India, or on his brief visits from
Japan, brought home to many younger men their own
share of responsibility for imparting as well as for retain-
ing the faith. Certain it is that Pembroke College never
failed to have a place in his intercessions, and if the
mission to Delhi gained greatly in prestige through its
first leader being on the governing body of a college, the
college itself lost nothing by sharing some of its material
resources with the East, and by giving one of its sons for
this work of the Lord.
The following recollections, contributed by the Rev.
C. W. E. Body, D.D., Professor at the Theological College,
New York, and formerly Provost of Trinity College,
Toronto, give a contemporary picture of Edward Bicker-
.steth's college life.
Amongst my most valued recollections of happy Cam-
bridge days are those of a little group of younger Fellows
and graduates who were accustomed to meet two or three
times a week at the lectures of Dr. Westcott, then Regius
Professor of Divinity, or at the meetings of the University
Church Society, a society founded largely at Dr. West-
cott's suggestion. Under the influence of the deeply
spiritual teaching with which we were thus constantly
22 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
surrounded we were drawn together in bonds of mutual
sympathy and affection of a somewhat unusual kind.
Coming from various colleges, with every variety of
temperament and standpoint, we felt ourselves united in a
living harmony of developing faith. Such intercourse and
fellowship I shall always look upon as among the most
precious formative influences of my life. Among these
friends Edward Bickersteth occupied a foremost place.
He possessed a remarkable combination of qualities
not often given to any one man ; on the one side one was
instinctively drawn to him by his affectionate nature, with
all its delicacy of consideration and sympathy, whilst very
soon one felt oneself to be in the presence of a singularly
resolute will informed by a well balanced conscience, and
even masterful in its grip and influence.
Strength and tenderness were blended in him in
singular beauty, and to the last the attractiveness of the
combination was felt by all who knew him well. A slight
lisp in speech, and that half-suppressed laugh which
seemed to flow instinctively from his buoyant nature, might
have seemed in others a defect or an affectation ; to
Bickersteth's transparently genuine nature these were soon
felt to give an additional charm.
The Monday evening class on the Epistle of St. John,
as well as the more formal professorial lectures on the
Introduction to Christian Doctrine in the quaint old
Divinity Schools, in which from many sides we were led
up to the fulness of the Christian faith, were to him an
unfailing source of ever fresh delight. I can still re-
member the joyous enthusiasm with which in our afternoon
walks he would discuss some wider thought thus opened
up to him. His buoyancy and depth of faith gave a special
kind of inspiration to his society, marking him out as a
future leader in the world of men.
Hence when his name was announced as the head of
the new University Mission to North India his friends
recognised a special appropriateness in the selection.
How memorable was that service on Sunday evening
in St. Giles's Church, at which Dr. Lightfoot, with even
more than his usual forcefulness and sympathy, gave the
farewell address, 1 and the Bishop of Ely (Dr. Woodford)
1 As a matter of fact, this sermon was preached a year before the Cam-
bridge Missionaries started, and was entitled, 'The Father of Missionaries.'
For some quotations from it see p. 42.
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 23
sent forth the first two University missionaries (Bickersteth
and a dear personal friend, the Rev. J. D. Murray, Scholar
of St. John's College) to North India.
We felt that it was a representative offering which was
then made. We were sending out in faith and hope that
which seemed most distinctly characteristic of the best
Cambridge life of our day. This conviction was only
deepened by subsequent events. Through all the neces-
sary difficulties of the inception of such a work, in the
delicate task of remodelling an established S.P.G. Mission
to adapt it to the special type of university brotherhood
and educational work we had set before ourselves, Bicker-
steth's affectionate tact and unswerving loyalty to his own
ideals were alike everywhere felt ; of all this, however,
others will speak with far more intimate knowledge than I
possess. Two or three years after Bickersteth's departure
to Delhi I was called to work at Trinity College, Toronto.
When we were again brought into close contact Bickersteth
was Bishop in Japan, and we were endeavouring to send
out from Trinity a Canadian mission on something like
the old Cambridge lines. As he spoke in our Convo-
cation Hall for this mission the same spiritual attractive-
ness and impelling force of statesmanlike conviction were
as strongly marked as ever. There was nothing limited
or negative about his nature all was positive to the
highest degree, positive to the point of a bold insistence
as he depicted our opportunity and responsibilities. To
his encouragement and zeal whatever success has attended
the mission is largely due.
The same qualities were conspicuous in his earnest
desire that the Church of Canada should send out a Bishop
of its own to assume in its name chief oversight over a
large district in Japan in which the Canadian missions
were situated. He had little sympathy with that point of
view which, contrary to all apostolic precedent, assumed
that a young National Church should first prove itself
perfectly able to bear alone all its own internal burdens
before it ventures forth, in obedience to our Lord's com-
mand, to plant the faith in the regions beyond.
Although at the last meeting of the Canadian General
Synod the proposal of the Japanese Bishops was felt to
be at that time impracticable, one may confidently hope
that the day is not far distant when those greatly to be
24 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
regretted obstacles will be removed, and Bishop Bicker-
steth's desire is, by God's mercy, carried to a successful
realisation.
In what so unexpectedly proved to be his last illness
I was privileged to be with him once in New York on his
way to England, and subsequently in London. The same
heroic discontent with present results and glad pressing
forward to new activities remained with him to the last ;
that in some sense almost unique combination of faith and
hope and love which it was permitted him to embody and
to leave as an abiding legacy to the Church he so dearly
loved.
But when Bickersteth returned to Cambridge, had he
then definitely before his mind the idea of offering himself
for mission work abroad ? There had been various pre-
disposing influences at work for many years, leading him
to ' look at the fields ' white for the harvest. At Christ
Church Vicarage, Hampstead, he met many missionaries,
and his father remembers in particular the deep impres-
sion left on his son's mind after a missionary meeting
addressed by the Rev. Robert Clark (of the Punjab) and
the Rev. J. Welland, two missionaries of the Church Mis-
sionary Society.
He had never thought of offering himself either to the
S.P.G. or C.M.S., so far as is known at the time he returned
to Cambridge. His election, however, to a Fellowship
after he had experienced two years and more of pastoral
work in England placed him in a position in which he was
bound to look at his life from a new standpoint. What
was to be his future ? At home or abroad ? And if the
latter, how could he work in and bring to bear most fruit-
fully the academic resources and advantages now open to
him ? I remember well his expressions of surprise and
regret when it was pointed out (I think in some periodical)
how few University graduates, and how much fewer honours
men, had followed the lead which Henry Martyn had
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 25
given to his University. 1 Whatever occupied Edward
Bickersteth's mind he was sure to pray about. It is not,
therefore, strange that he who had already listened to two
out of the three most memorable commands ever uttered
by our Lord ' Look at the fields ' and ' Pray the Lord
of the harvest ' soon heard with increasing clearness
the complementary words, ' Go and make disciples of
the nations.' He had taken stock of the facts, descried
the paucity of the labourers, and in his perplexity had
turned to pray ; so in due order he was led to obey the
third command, not by securing a deputy in lieu of per-
sonal service, but by offering himself. This seems to be
a sufficient explanation of his desire for missionary work,
and of his decision to go. What led to the realisation of
his hope, and to the formation of the Cambridge Mission
must now be told.
The entry occurs in his father's diary, July 25, 1875 :
My beloved son's election to a Fellowship in May was
indeed a signal mercy as crowning his long work of
patient study, and now he has opened up to me a thought
which has long been in his mind of trying to organise a
band of missionary labourers in Cambridge, and himself
going forth with them to India after a while. I feel that
it is the greatest gift I could give to the missionary cause,
for I had often counted on Edward being the stay of my
declining years, and the stay of his brothers and sisters ;
and if once he is called to missionary work, though he
may come home from time to time, he will not look back,
having put his hand to the plough.
The father's insight into the tenacity of his son's purpose
proved true, but his foresight could not tell that the work
begun in India and then checked through disease would be
1 See Mr. Eugene Stock's ' History of the Church Missionary Society '
vol. ii. ch. 36, for an interesting account of ' Some recruits from the Uni-
versities.'
26 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
continued in Japan, and ended so far as earth's activities
are concerned at the comparatively early age of 47.
There can be no doubt that the Cambridge Mission,
the first Community Mission sent out by any University in
modern times, is greatly indebted in its inception to the
influence of two distinguished men the Rev. T. V. French,
sometime Fellow of University College, Oxford, and
the Rev. Professor B. F. Westcott, formerly Fellow of
Trinity College, Cambridge, who were each in the Provi-
dence of God recalled to reside at their respective
Universities early in the seventies. Mr. French, as Rector
of St. Ebbe's in Oxford, and Dr. Westcott, as Regius
Professor at Cambridge, were both deeply impressed with
the needs of India and with the special aptitude of the
Universities, ' by the happy discipline through which they
combine reverence with freedom and enthusiasm with
patience,' to meet those needs. The one had formed his
opinions through his own prolonged experience as a
missionary in Northern India, especially as Principal of the
Lahore Divinity School ; the other had arrived at the same
conclusions by independent thought and study, but both
alike felt that ' the Universities are providentially fitted to
train men who shall interpret the faith of the West to the
East, and bring back to us new illustrations of the one
infinite and eternal Gospel.' They inculcated their views
on all who came under their influence, and Edward Bicker-
steth, as it so happened, was naturally brought into touch
with both. Mr. French had served with his father (the
Rev. E. H. Bickersteth) at Christ Church, Hampstead,
during a few months in 1863, and their common love for
missionary enterprise had cemented so fast a friendship
between the two men that Mr. French always revisited
Hampstead when he returned to England. Professor
Westcott, born in the same year and the same month as
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 2/
Mr. Bickersteth of Hampstead, had first met him when they
were both undergraduates at Trinity College, Cambridge,
from which time dated a friendship destined to be lifelong.
Edward, who had been himself accustomed to hear fre-
quently from his father's lips the wise counsel, ' Thine own
friend, and thy father's friend, forsake not,' cannot have been
uninfluenced by Mr. French's missionary ardour during
his visits to Hampstead, and when in due course he
himself had gone up to Cambridge he was not slow to
claim an introduction to Professor Westcott on the score
of being his father's son.
In this way it may safely be asserted that the younger
man was gradually put on terms of easy friendship with
these two master minds, and was therefore the more ready to
receive the contagious influence of their teaching and their
ideals. But we are not left to weave together conjectures
on this point. Professor V. H. Stanton, his contemporary
and close friend, writing in the ' Cambridge Review '
(October 14, 1897), has recorded that Edward Bickersteth
had himself stated that a letter of Mr. French's to him in
1875 suggested the first idea of a Cambridge Brotherhood
to his mind. The paper read by Mr. French on the in-
vitation of Edward Bickersteth before the Cambridge
Missionary Aid Society, February 16, 1876, on the pro-
posed Cambridge University Mission in North India is
unquestionably the result of much previous correspondence
between the two men. It may be here noted that
Bickersteth himself had read a paper on February 9, 1876
(the week previous to Mr. French's visit), before the Cam-
bridge Church Society on the same subject.
While, therefore, fully acknowledging all the indebted-
ness of the Cambridge Mission to these two leaders for their
large share in the first suggestion and direction of the move-
ment, there can be no doubt that the Rev. S. S. Allnutt
28 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
(the present head of the Cambridge Mission) was justified in
writing, in the 'Delhi Mission News' (October 1897) : ' It
is certain that to the energy, enterprise, and devotion of
Edward Bickersteth it was due that the idea of a Uni-
versity Mission did not remain a splendid dream, but was
so speedily translated into actual concrete form and em-
bodiment. How well I remember the walks during which
he unfolded to me the main principles on which it was
proposed to start a missionary Brotherhood, and the role
it was to seek to accomplish. The subject had taken
entire possession of him, and to his contagious enthusiasm
was due the fact that with only one exception the band of
men who with himself composed the original staff of the
Brotherhood were won by his own personal influence.
This alone testifies to the force of character as well as the
consuming zeal that marked the man then as afterwards
throughout his career.'
Professor Stanton, in the paper already quoted, writes
to the same effect, ' that Edward Bickersteth made the
general idea which he derived from his teachers thoroughly
his own, conceived with the definiteness and force that
were necessary in order that the project should succeed,
how the life and work of such a body of missionaries
should be organised, saw from his own study of foreign
missions what the defects of ordinary methods were which
needed to be remedied, and was the first to point out fully
what the secrets of strength of missionary work conducted
by a community would be. He stated with perfect
clearness the advantages of the proposed plan precisely
as they are to this day insisted on by those who have had
experience of their working. And it should be remem-
bered that there was not then any mission, even belonging
to a religious order, which could serve as an example,
certainly none which would naturally occur to the mind.'
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 29
But this point can be best cleared up by the words of the
present Bishop of Durham (Dr. Westcott). Writing to me
on October 8, 1897, from Auckland Castle he says : ' No-
thing, as you know, gave me greater joy in my 'Cambridge
work than the foundation of the Delhi Mission, and your
brother was made to embody the ideas which it represents.'
What, then, were the advantages which Edward
Bickersteth hoped for from the establishment of a
University Mission ? In his paper read before the Cam-
bridge Church Society he sums them up under four heads :
I. Concentration of effort on a particular city or small
district.
II. Continuity in work done, involving the possibility
of subdivision of labour in (a) controversial, (^) literary
undertakings.
III. (And on this he desired to lay special stress).
Opportunity afforded for united religious exercises and
services, and
IV. The connection of the mission with Cambridge,
securing a supply of men, as well as substantial aid by
research carried on at home in libraries and colleges, and
thus enabling the University to perform one of her most
sacred duties.
It is suggestive that in this his first statement he fore-
casts the time when ' the whole would be handed over to
Indian teachers and the Indian Church,' thus incidentally
showing how early rooted in his mind was the value of the
principle of autonomy which in after years, by the Provi-
dence of God, he was to be the main instrument for
securing to Japan, by the organisation of the Nippon
Sei Kokwai (the Holy Catholic Church of Japan).
He impressed the spirit of brotherhood on the whole
scheme by the choice of the three words which he placed
at the head of his paper :
crvvspyoi, <7Vfnro\irai,
fellow soldiers fellow workers fellow citizens
30 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
In drawing up the memorandum circulated in Cambridge
in June 1876, Bickersteth elaborated with greater detail the
aims with which the Cambridge Mission was begun. He
wrote that ' the many resident members of the University
who felt that Cambridge ought to be connected with a
characteristic missionary work believed that the present
needs of India pointed towards fresh efforts in the direction
of education, especially the education of native Christians,
a work which would naturally belong to the province of
an English University. This belief had taken shape in
the original resolution that
The special object of the mission be, in addition to
evangelistic labour, to afford means for the higher educa-
tion of young native Christians, to offer the advantages of
a Christian home to students sent from mission schools to
the Government College, and through literary and other
labours to reach the more thoughtful heathen.
In further explanation of this resolution he wrote in the
' Mission Field,' 1 March 1877 :
The direct work of preaching and evangelisation needs
no comment. . . . All recognise the importance of training
a native pastorate. Such a work could only be under-
taken by the Cambridge Mission in years to come. It
demands a full mastery of the language, and an ac-
quaintance with the customs and habits of the people
and their characteristic modes of thought. The value
of controversial literature as a means of reaching the
more thoughtful has long been appreciated. A more
pressing need is the supply of doctrinal and devotional
books for the native Church. A University mission will
naturally attempt something in this direction. An over-
burdened missionary, who bears alone the manifold cares
of a whole station, has but little time for such labours.
1 It is a strange coincidence that the very next article in this issue of the
Mission Field deals with the progress of missions in Japan, and also that
Mr. Bickersteth, in the opening sentence of his own article, cited India and
Japan as two countries which illustrated the greatly changed character of
missionary work since Gregory sent Augustine to Kent.
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 31
The education of young native Christians is an important
part of the machinery of the native Church, which has as
yet received comparatively little attention in India. . . .
The only other object specified is a Home of Christian
Students at the Government College. At Delhi there is no
Christian College, as at Calcutta, Madras, and Agra, and
Government education is purely secular. Now, by way of
comparison, imagine the general moral effect on an average
English youth who had been brought up at a Christian
school of spending two or three years at Oxford or
Cambridge, and finding that the curriculum of study and
discipline of his college rigidly excluded from first to last
all provision for religious instruction or services. But this
is no imaginary case in India, and how much worse is such
an ordeal for those who have only recently abandoned
heathen practices, and are perhaps as yet only partially
instructed in Christian truth. How likely that philosophy
divorced from religion, science without God, history apart
from its moral teaching, should lead them, not to their old
superstitions those they have abandoned for ever but to
the negation of the atheist, the doubting of the sceptic,
or it may be to the cheerless creed of the Positivist or
Secularist.
The perusal of the article from which the above extracts
have been taken makes plain (i) that Delhi had been
decided upon as the city which was to be occupied with
all the strength that the University of Cambridge could
put forth, and (2) that the Cambridge Mission was to be in
affiliation with the S.P.G. Some explanation is necessary
in order to show by what considerations and negotiations
these two important matters had been settled.
From the first it had been understood that India should
be the chosen country, but at one time Amritsar and some
unevangelised country district within reach of that city had
been thought of as the best field for a University mission.
Characteristically, Bickersteth had written in February
1876:
All such questions may be safely and gladly left to
32 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
those whom years of experience have taught the most
urgent wants of India, and the most fruitful method of em-
ploying whatever resources England, and especially our
Universities, may supply.
Certainly no efforts were spared to find out what city
or province was pointed out by God's Providence as being
most urgently in want The influence of Mr. French was
naturally cast in favour of the Punjab, the scene of his
own missionary labours. He pleaded for a district to be
occupied accessible both by rail and steamer to the Indus
and beyond the Indus to the great mountain barrier such
as Multan, which is by rail only a night's journey from
Lahore and Amritsar, or Alwar in Rajpootana, from which
Jaipur with its large and thriving market-place and famous
for its massive temples and gorgeous palaces, could be
visited, and from which Ajmeer and Mount Aboo were
an easy distance. He enforced his appeal by recalling
the opinion of Sir H. Lawrence, who had urged him to
get a mission planted or to go himself among the original
Bheels and Minas singularly unprepossessed and likely
to be readily impressed with the Gospel. He cited the
words of the Rev. Robert Clark, 1 a veteran missionary of
the C.M.S., who had lately written :
I do not know a more hopeful field than we have in
the Punjab, a people for centuries accustomed to conquest
and government, and who have in them the spirit to con-
quer and govern for Christ, when once God's Holy Spirit
of Life has been imparted to them.
Then as regards affiliation with any existing Missionary
Society, many considerations suggested an appeal to the
Church Missionary Society. It was known that the C.M.S.
Punjab Conference had urged on that society the establish-
1 The Rev. Robert Clark, of Trinity College, Cambridge, was 28th
Wrangler, and is still, after nearly fifty years' service engaged in active
missionary work in the Punjab.
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 33
ment of a Christian college, and that one of their mis-
sionaries, Mr. Baring, had had the importance of such work
in his mind for many months, and had had much corre-
spondence with the secretaries in Salisbury Square about
it. It was pointed out that for a number of young men to
go out without any connection with any society, and with-
out any of the experience gained during a whole century,
would endanger greatly the success they so desired. They
must have some head, or the body would suffer greatly.
They must not be independent of existing missions, or
there would be a collision. They must rather work in
with existing societies than independently of them. Mr.
French himself in his visit to Cambridge (February 1 876)
had felt at liberty to plead for the C.M.S. ' as the society
to which the proposed mission should be affiliated, on
the score of the prolonged, patient, diversified, and costly
efforts made by that society in North India, which gave
them a sort of claim not to be set aside in any decision
arrived at regarding the Missionary Order to which the
Cambridge men should ally themselves, he would not say
identify themselves.'
It is certain that there was no wish on the part of
Edward Bickersteth to set aside the C.M.S. On the
contrary, his grandfather's connection with that Society as
one of its secretaries (1815-30) and his father's devoted
support of it as a prominent member of committee, made
it natural for him to desire that the Church Missionary
Society should be approached in the first instance. Besides,
one of the men who had offered to join the Cambridge
Mission was the son of a strong C.M.S. supporter, and his
father would have been glad if the proposed connection
with that Society had been found feasible, though when
that arrangement fell through, his hesitation was in the
end removed by the assurance he received from Professor
D
34 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Westcott that the lines on which the mission was founded
and would be worked were distinctly those of moderate
churchmanship.
In a letter to me from Pontresina (September 12,
1875) my brother wrote :
I am very glad you like my plan. It will have to be
steered, I expect, between many rocks and quicksands,
and maybe will never reach harbour, but I am hopeful.
Its three masts are :
1. A close connection with Cambridge and Oxford.
2. An affiliation to one of the societies.
3. A connection with one of the missionary bishops
who are shortly to be appointed.
As regards the C.M.S., I should not myself much mind
being under it, only I think, and indeed know, that this has
been a difficulty to some men, and I should be glad to lift
it out of the way. Still, independent work would look like
opposition, so something must be excogitated if possible
between dependence and independence.
Mr. French had indeed foreseen the possibility of ' an
a priori dim apprehension of not being able to work in
harmony with C.M.S. principles and methods of action,'
and had asked that if the way was not clear at once to join
themselves with the C.M.S. that they would hold their judg-
ment in suspense for two or three years, and make them-
selves practically acquainted with the working and workers
of both C.M.S. and S.P.G., relying meantime on their own
resources or funds guaranteed them by friends. Clearly
there was no lack of deliberation. Writing later to me in
June 1876 from Pembroke College, Cambridge, my brother
speaks of a missionary conference to be held at Christ
Church Vicarage, Hampstead, on the I4th, which French
came from Oxford to attend, and when the Rev. H.
Wright (Chief Secretary of the C.M.S.), the Rev. R. Clark
(of the Punjab), the Rev. H. U. Weitbrecht l (a C.M.S.
1 Of Simla, formerly of the Divinity School at Lahore, and now at Battala.
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 35
missionary himself and the son of a C.M.S. missionary),
and General Maclagan all met under the roof of the Rev.
E. H. Bickersteth to discuss the affiliation of the Cambridge
Mission with the C.M.S.
But discussion only served to bring out the difficulties
which at all events seemed to be insuperable at that time.
There was no lack of sympathy with the missionary ardour
of the Cambridge graduates on the part of the C.M.S.
Committee, but the idea of a Community Mission called a
' Brotherhood ' was then too novel to be acceptable, and
too strange a method of working to be easily understood.
Although no vows were taken by the members, yet it was
understood that they could not marry and remain connected
with the mission, a condition of membership open to much
criticism in the judgment of some C.M.S. supporters.
This is perhaps worth noting, as it is a proof that during
the last quarter of a century the organisation of the
Cambridge Mission and its success has done much to
educate the opinion of Church people, and to familiarise
their minds with the idea of Brotherhoods, now well
known and adopted in England as well as in the mission
field. 1
The Rev. A. Clifford, C.M.S. Secretary at Calcutta (now
Bishop of Lucknow), in a paper read before the Calcutta
Diocesan Conference (February 9, 1889), noticed this
change of sentiment in the following words :
Next let me state briefly why I think that the Com-
munity system represents a method which God's Provi-
dence is calling us to use. Twenty years ago if it had
been proposed to either of the two great missionary
1 At the end of the Second Report of the Cambridge Mission, published
at the University, the Cambridge Committee ' hail with deep thankfulness
and satisfaction the prospect of the mission to Calcutta which is now being
undertaken by the sister University of Oxford, and they rejoice to believe
that the two missions will support one another in advancing towards one
common end.'
D 2
36 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
societies of our Church to recognise the Community life as
a practicable missionary method, the proposer would, I
think, have been told in very emphatic terms that his
suggestion was entirely visionary. He would have been
told that he lived 500 years too late, that the Community
system belonged to mediaeval times and was contrary to
the spirit of the nineteenth century. Ten years ago the
reply to such a proposal would have been more hesitating,
but it would still almost certainly have been voted unor-
thodox. To-day it is plain that a very great change must
have come over the mind of the Church, when not only
can we be calmly discussing the question here, but when
it is a fact that within a month we may expect to see a
Community actually started in this Province by the most
evangelical if the least conservative of the two great mis-
sionary societies.
In answering the question, What has brought about
this change ? Mr. Clifford gave as his first reason the effect
of the example set by the Cambridge Mission to Delhi, as
well as by the Cowley and Oxford brethren.
The selection of the missionaries, again, was a point
which involved some difficulties. It was felt that Cam-
bridge graduates who would be willing enough to be
nominated by a sub-committee consisting of three Uni-
versity professors (such as was afterwards appointed)
would not submit to a further examination by the com-
mittee of the C.M.S. Also, it was felt on the side of the
Cambridge men to be essential in order to keep up the
interest of the University in the proposed mission that
reports should be made direct to the committee in Cam-
bridge, and this was contrary to one of the rules of the
C.M.S., by which all workers for whom they are in any
way financially responsible must make their reports direct
to Salisbury Square. These considerations, apart from
any possible doctrinal differences, were in themselves
sufficient to make co-operation unworkable.
The result of the failure to come to terms with the
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 37
CM.S. was that application was made to the S.P.G., whose
rules of procedure enabled them to dispense with some of
the conditions which the C.M.S. had laid down. 1
But it is time to explain how it was that Delhi
was chosen in preference to any other city in North
India, such as Amritsar, Alwar, or Multan. The opinion
may be hazarded that from time to time God wills that
certain cities should be strongly occupied, so as to make
them centres from which the gospel of His grace should
sound out throughout a large region. It was so in the
Church of the first days, as we may see from the forces
brought to bear upon Ephesus (Acts xviii. 24-28, xix.).
He guided first Aquila and his wife Priscilla, then
Apollos, and then St. Paul to come to that city and
there reside. The consequences were felt throughout
all the province of Asia. The Church grew and mul-
tiplied, and a fierce opposition, helping the cause which
it attacked, sprang up. So it has been again and
again in the Church's story. So it has been, as it is
reasonable to believe, in the case of Delhi. Missionary
work was commenced there on behalf of the Church of
England by the S.P.G. in i854, 2 and continued with great
promise till the Indian Mutiny, when four missionaries
and two native Christians were amongst its first victims.
1 It was settled that if Cambridge raised 5oo/. a year towards the
continuous maintenance of the mission, the Standing Committee of the S.P.G.
were willing to supplement such contributions, and generally to afford every
assistance to the mission, while leaving the nomination of the missionaries to
the sub-committee of Cambridge professors. Eventually it was determined
that the S.P.G. subsidy should take the form of personal grants to the
missionaries, each of whom were to receive 7$ a year besides a grant for
their outfit.
2 The Rev. J. S. Jackson and the Rev. A. R. Hubbard, both of Caius
College, Cambridge, the former being a Fellow, commenced work there on
February II. Mr. Hubbard was killed in the Mutiny. The Rev. T. Skelton,
Fellow of Queen's College, Oxford, offered in 1858, and recommenced the
work in 1859. See S.P.G. Digest, p. 615.
38 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
The mission was re-formed in 1859 and made steady pro-
gress. Canon Crowfoot (now of Lincoln) had resided there
for three years, and had kept up a remarkable influence by
lectures and private intercourse over the boys, who, having
been educated in St. Stephen's High School at Delhi,
were afterwards drafted into the Government College.
There also a devoted man of great powers of organisation,
of restless energies, of impulsive enthusiasm, the Rev. R.
R. Winter, with his wife, had been labouring for eleven
years without furlough. Both were filled with missionary
ardour, and had taxed and even over-taxed their strength,
but they could not be persuaded to take any rest until it
was possible to supply their place, and so had stayed on
year after year. In the year 1875 there had been ninety
baptisms, chiefly from the Chamars. The agencies con-
nected with the mission were very numerous, and of a
more representative and diversified character than was
then customary, as may be judged from the following sta-
tistics, which are copied from a statement drawn up by
Mr. Winter himself.
'The district entrusted to the mission contains over
3,000,000 people. Work is carried on, not only in Delhi
and its suburbs, but in fifty towns and villages, by three
English clergy, two native clergy, two laymen (voluntary
Europeans), forty-nine catechists, readers, and school-
masters, thirty-eight non-Christian masters, fourteen
European zenana missionaries, ten native Christian mis-
tresses, four parochial mission women, twenty-six Hindu
and Muhammadan female teachers, and one medical mis-
sionary with three assistants.
' Eight hundred and fifty-seven boys were taught in the
higher class of schools, 777 boys and young men in schools
and evening classes for the lower orders, 443 pupils in
zenanas, and 396 in schools for women and girls, showing
a total of 2,473 under instruction.
' The statistics of the Medical Mission for the previous
year showed 9,058 separate cases treated, with an aggre-
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 39
gate of 29,798 attendances and a daily average of 101
sick attended.
' The total number of Christians was 650, and frequent
applications for Christian teaching were being received
from the villages round.'
All this organisation had been worked by mis-
sionaries connected with the S.P.G. and maintained by its
financial support, and Delhi was the city above all others
in the north of India on which they had been led to con-
centrate their forces. When, therefore, the application
was received from the Cambridge graduates, who were
prepared to go out to India and had been advised to think
of Northern India as the scene of their future labours,
what more natural than that the Standing Committee of
the S.P.G. should welcome their aid and direct their atten-
tion to so hopeful an opening as Delhi undoubtedly was ?
It so happened also that a letter written by Sir Bartle
Frere early in the year 1876' had been received in
Cambridge and had excited much interest there. Sir
Bartle Frere had visited Delhi in the suite of the Prince of
Wales, and had thus written :
I have been to call on Mr. and Mrs. Winter at Delhi,
and find them both much overtaxed. I am much mis-
taken if you have not a larger Tinnevelly at Delhi in the
course of a few years, but they need more money and
more men, especially a man to take charge of educational
work and a medical man to supervise and direct the
Medical Female Mission, which really seems doing wonder-
ful work. Delhi seems quite one of the most hopeful
openings I have seen.
Yet another circumstance was overruled of God to
the selection of Delhi. Edward Bickersteth's article in the
' Mission Field ' (March 1 877) already quoted fell under the
eye of Mr. Winter himself at Delhi, and led him at once to
1 January 16.
40 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
write off to the Bishop (Johnson) of Calcutta, recently con-
secrated as successor to Bishop Milman :
Your Lordship will have thought me long in writing
on the subject of forming classes for the B.A. degree in
connection with this mission, but it seemed better to put
off doing so till the fate of the Government College was
decided. It has now been closed on financial grounds.
Will the Cambridge Mission fill the gap left vacant? Our
plan has hitherto been to educate only up to the Matricula-
tion examination in our High School, and then to draft
the boys into the Government College. / see by an article
in the ' Mission Field ' for March that this formed part of
the plan of the Cambridge men, as well as a home for
Christian students in the Government College. . . . When
the college is thoroughly efficient we might hope to
attract students from other mission schools in the Punjab,
for no mission whatever in this province has B.A. classes.
In that case it would be most useful for them to open a
boarding-house, or extend an existing one, not only for
Christians but for non-Christian students. If the Cambridge
Mission will undertake this, most of the educated young men
of the city will pass under its influence,
The Bishop of Calcutta's comment on this letter will be
readily endorsed. ' My own mind [he writes in reply to
Mr. Winter] is that this seems to be quite providential in
that an opportunity offers for securing the Christian educa-
tion of young men up to the taking of the degree.'
Yet one more unforeseen coincidence may be regarded
as a providential sanction, vouchsafed by the Divine guid-
ance. In the autumn of 1877 the Rev. T. V. French was
appointed to be the first Bishop of Lahore, and Delhi was
transferred from the see of Calcutta to the newly created
diocese. Episcopal control more sympathetic, more
painstaking, more inspiring, could not have been found
anywhere by the Cambridge Brotherhood than was
assured to them by the fact that they would have as their
father in God the very man who had come over from
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 41
Oxford to Cambridge on purpose to advocate the selection
of some city in Northern India as the most suitable
place for this new departure in missionary methods. How
little could it have been foreseen early in 1876, when the
first proposals for the establishment of the Cambridge
Mission were being publicly discussed, that before the end
of the year following the principal speaker at the meeting
would have been consecrated the Bishop of the first two
men who had come forward to join the mission.
All the pourparlers were so far settled that on
November 29, 1876, the Rev. R. Bullock, the Secretary of
the S.P.G., was invited to Cambridge and attended the first
meeting of the Cambridge Committee, which consisted of
thirty-four well-known resident members of the University.
Among them were the Rev. the Masters of Clare, Pem-
broke, and Magdalen Colleges ; Professors Westcott, Light-
foot, Cowell, and Paget, M.D. ; the Rev. F. J. Hort, D.D. ;
the Rev. C. W. E. Body, now Theological Professor at
New York ; the Rev. J. W. Hicks (Sidney), now Bishop
of Bloemfontein ; the Rev. A. F. Kirkpatrick (Trinity),
now Master of Selwyn ; the Rev. E. T. Leeke, now Sub-
Dean of Lincoln ; the Rev. A. J. Mason (Trinity), now
Lady Margaret's Reader in Divinity ; the Rev. C. E. Searle,
now Master of Pembroke ; the Rev. V. H. Stanton (Trinity),
now Ely Professor of Divinity. The Rev. Edward
Bickersteth was appointed secretary, and in a private note-
book, where he entered the briefest possible memoranda,
are the following entries :
November 5. Twenty-first Sunday after Trinity.
Pembroke College Chapel. Subject for praise and prayer
at the Holy Eucharist, that ' the S.P.G. have accepted
our scheme.' Gratias Deo. This week I am to speak on
the subject before the Church Society. Our prayer must
be constantly for His direction.
November 29. First committee meeting of Delhi
42 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Mission. Mr. Bullock attended from London. So far,
gratias Deo, all gone well. May He give us the means
we need.
November 30. St. Andrew's Day. Was engaged in
drawing up circular. Searle sent ioo/. In the evening
Bishop Lightfoot's sermon. I made use of the Cuddesdon
manual of devotion for foreign missions.
It may be of interest here to note that on December 4
and again on December 5 occurs the entry, ' Had walk
with G. A. Lefroy, who thinks of missionary work.'
The following quotation from Bishop Lightfoot's well-
known sermon (alluded to above) on ' Abraham, the
Father of Missionaries,' will show how vigorous an appeal
was made to Cambridge to support the new mission.
Taking as his text Hebrews xi. 8, the preacher
pleaded :
God grant that this noble army of missionaries may
never want recruits ! God grant that, as from time to
time its ranks are thinned by death, or as new levies are
raised for some fresh campaign in the service of our great
Captain, men may press forward from this our own dear
Cambridge to fill the vacant places, and do battle for the
truth !
I need hardly say why I have put these thoughts
before you this evening. You yourselves will have
anticipated the moral. These annual days of intercession
have not been without their fruit. Some among ourselves
have heard the call and are ready to obey. Steps have
been taken for the formation of a Cambridge Mission to
North India. Two volunteers have already come forward.
The headquarters of the mission are to be fixed at Delhi.
Delhi ! What associations do not gather about the
name ? Delhi, the immemorial centre of Hindu tradition,
the chief stronghold of Muhammadan power, the capital of
the descendants of Timur, the seat of the most splendid,
if not the most powerful, of Oriental monarchies, the city
of many sieges, Tartar, Persian, Mahratta, English Delhi
the beautiful, the cruel, the magnificent, the profligate.
And a name, too, of not less absorbing interest to the
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 43.
Christian than to the Englishman. The Delhi Mission
was still in its infancy when the Mutiny broke out. The
Delhi Mission was baptised in blood. It was literally
murdered. But here, as elsewhere, the blood of the
martyrs was the seed-plot of the Church. The work of
evangelisation has revived. A memorial church, bearing
the name of the first martyr, St. Stephen, commemorates,
the death of these, his latest successors. No missionary
field in India, we are told, is more promising than this.
Only men are wanted to aid in the work.
And to Cambridge more especially the call comes. It
is the blood of Cambridge martyrs which cries out of the
ground for revenge, the noble revenge of bringing the
gospel of love and peace home to the hearts of that people
by whose hands they were slain. The Delhi Mission was
in its origin essentially a Cambridge Mission. Its martyrs
were Cambridge men. Its first founder, the chaplain, had
been a Fellow of Christ's College. Its acting head at the,
time when the Mutiny broke out was a member of Caius
College. Another student attached to the mission was a
near relative of one who now holds an honourable office
in our University. All these were among the first fruits
of the slain. Shall their blood cry to us in vain ?
It is therefore in some sense in fulfilment of a pledge
which Cambridge has given to Delhi that our two
volunteers have devoted themselves to this work. Before
we meet together on St. Andrew's Day next year they
will already, if it please God, have left our shores.
On Sunday, October 21,1 877, Dr. Vaughan preached the
University sermon, and the Bishop of Ely (Dr. Woodford)
preached at Pembroke College Chapel, and on the follow-
ing day he ordained Mr. Murray to the Diaconate in
Great St. Mary's Church. 1 The ordination sermon was
preached by Dr. Westcott, and Dr. Lightfoot gave a
luncheon party in his rooms, at which, among others,
the Bishop of Ely, and the Rev. E. H. Bickersteth (now
1 Mr. Murray was ordained priest at Lahore by Bishop French, Arch-
deacon Matthews preaching the sermon, on December 21, St. Thomas'
Day, 1878, being the first anniversary of the Bishop of Lahore's consecration.
Mr. Bickersteth, as examining chaplain, went up from Delhi to be present.
44 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Bishop of Exeter) were present, as were the first two
members of the mission. In the afternoon a committee
meeting was held in Dr. Westcott's rooms, and in the
evening a farewell service was held at St. Michael's Church,
when the Bishop of Lichfield (Dr. Selwyn) preached,
taking for his text Psalm cxxi. 8. Writing a year later
to the Rev. R. Bullock (October 16, 1878) from Faredabad,
sixteen miles south of Delhi, Bickersteth said :
I cannot close this letter without a reference to
the loss which we feel the Cambridge Mission has sus-
tained in the death of Bishop Selwyn. 1 To have been
allowed to listen to his strong and loving words of
counsel in leaving Cambridge was a singular privilege. I
have very often thought of his parting good-bye, ' The
Lord preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this
time forth for evermore.'
That same evening after the service, Dr. Lightfoot gave
a soiree in his rooms, when the Bishop of Lichfield was
present, and also three former workers in the Delhi Mis-
sion, Mr. Jackson, Mr. Skelton, and Canon Crowfoot. The
next morning there was a farewell breakfast at Pembroke
College, and later in the day Bickersteth left Cambridge
and returned to Hampstead. The day after he went down
with one of his sisters to spend a quiet day at Watton, the
scene of his grandfather's pastorate (1830-50), and where
his own mother and his sister Alice, with three other sisters,
had been laid to rest.
His father had married the previous year as his second
wife, Ellen Susanna, daughter of the late Robert Bicker-
steth, Esq., of Liverpool. Between her and her stepson
there grew up a true affection, and twice over, once in
Delhi (1881) and again in Japan (1891), he was able to
welcome her, when, accompanying his father, she visited
the scene of his missionary labours.
1 The news of his death reached Delhi, May 4, 1878.
RETURN TO CAMBRIDGE AND CALL TO DELHI 45
Writing to me at St. John's College, Oxford, on the
night before he left the old home, he said :
Christ Church Vicarage, Hampstead, N.W.
October 29, 1877.
I have your letter, a thousand thanks for it, and for
the very dear little Bible. Fancy me translating out of it
to a Hindu two years hence. All has now been nicely
arranged ; everything, even to the cake for Rosie, 1 packed.
Dearest boy, I know your thoughts will be with me to-
morrow, and very often all the time we are parted one from
the other. Thank God, those who have the same Christ
are not really altogether parted. ' Peace I leave with you,'
pray it may be true of me and pray it still more for father.
It is his grief at losing me that grieves me most, and will
for long. But I feel sure he will be comforted, some special
gift of peaceful comfort will be given him of God. And
may He comfort you I know He will and guide you
in every difficulty, and strengthen you for all the strong
work you have before you, and give you the happiest
Oxford life, shall ever pray,
Your affectionate Brother,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
Next day, Tuesday, October 30, he left England,
accompanied by his father as far as Dover, and by
Murray. In the train between London and Dover the
father engaged in prayer with his son and his companion,
and it was then that in answer to a request from the
former he chose the words evsica e/uov ical rov svayys\iov
to be their guide and inspiration. These words were
chosen as expressing the only but sufficient consolation
which the father felt in giving up his firstborn son to
the mission field. Ever since these words have been
preserved as the motto of the Cambridge Mission, and
have been printed on the first page of all its reports, and
they are now cut into the coping stone of the grave of its
first head.
1 His eldest sister, Mrs. Rundall, then living at Kharwarra in Rajputana.
46 EISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
By these providential leadings the steps of the Cam-
bridge Brotherhood were thus ordered by God to the
ancient city of Delhi, where the two first members arrived
early in December 1877. In order to sustain the full
efficiency of the work, it was felt to be most desirable that
the mission should consist of not less than five men, and
if possible of six. The first members left England knowing
that the Rev. H. F. Blackett, Scholar of St. John's College,
purposed joining them the following year, and they soon
received the gratifying news that the Rev. H. C. Carlyon,
M.A. (formerly Scholar of Sidney Sussex College), had
offered to come out with him, and that his offer had been
accepted by the Cambridge sub-commitee. Both these
missionaries started on November n, 1878, by which time
the committee were able to announce in their ' First Report
of the Cambridge Mission to North India (Delhi),' that
'they had reason to believe that before the close of 1879
two others will be ready to follow.' These two latter were
the Rev. Samuel Scott Allnutt, M.A. (late Scholar of St.
John's College), and the Rev. G. A. Lefroy, B.A. (Trinity
College), who went out in 1879, thus bringing the mission
up to the number originally contemplated.
Thus had the great Head of the Church heard the
prayers offered up with fervent faith, and been pleased to
send out in three successive years these men, ' two and two
before His face,' into the city, whither He Himself would
come.
47
CHAPTER III
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI
I. THE WORK
' Certainly I feel, if possible more vividly here than in England, that the
Church will never regret any single labourer sent to North India.' Letter of
the Rev. Edward Bicker steth to the Rev. R. Bullock at the end of his first year.
' WE offer, then, in the name of our friends at Delhi to
those who are able to join them the life and the work. We
want the best men that Cambridge can give, and we have
nothing to offer them but the life and the work.' In these
words, on May 24, 1882, speaking at a meeting held by
the London Committee in the College Hall, Westminster,
Professor Westcott summed up the situation some five
years after the Cambridge Mission at Delhi had been in
full activity.
There is no doubt whatever that Edward Bicker-
steth would have cordially accepted the dichotomy thus
characteristically drawn between the inner and the outer
aspects of the mission which had been undertaken by his
University. Indeed, it may weir be that the teacher was
quoting from his own pupil's words, for writing to
Dr. Westcott on September i, 1881, he had closed his
appeal : ' Very gladly shall we welcome to a share in our
life and work any who, otherwise fitted, will join us in the
spirit of our motto " For My sake and the Gospel's." '
The phrase 'the life and the work' was so constantly on
Bickersteth's lips, and his own example showed how
48 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
important he felt it to maintain the life as well as the work,
that the principle involved in the distinction may be said
to give the key to his character. He would often point out
how choked with care and jejune, work must become unless
it is continually fed by the forces which alone refresh the
inner life and keep it calm and vigorous. The spirit of
the work was more to him than the work itself.
In describing Edward Bickersteth's share in the
inception and organisation of the Cambridge Mission, I
purpose, therefore, to devote this chapter to a statement
of the work undertaken by that mission, so long as he was
officially connected with it (1877-84), and to attempt in
a subsequent chapter to discover the springs and secret
sources of the life which took shape in the work now to
be recorded. I say so long as he was officially connected
with it, for it will be easy to show that the Cambridge
Mission never ceased to hold its place in his affections and
in his daily intercessions.
The voyage out was in no way eventful, Bombay being
reached on November 21, 1877. During his two days in
this city, Bickersteth saw the Robert Money schools, and
made a memorandum that there had been no conversion
in those schools for twelve years, though much moral
influence had been exercised.
On the 23rd he left for Kharwarra, where his eldest
sister and her husband Lieutenant F. M. Rundall x were
staying among the aboriginal Bheels. 2
Mr. Murray had arrived in Delhi on December 12,
1 Now Colonel Rundall, D.S.O.
2 It will be remembered that Mr. French had quoted Sir Henry
Lawrence's opinion that missionary work among the Bheels would be a
promising opening. It is pleasant to know that although Edward Bickersteth
was led further afield to Delhi, his sister collected funds to build a church
at Kharwarra, while his father supplied the Church Missionary Society with
the stipend of a missionary.
49
having spent several days in seeing the principal towns on
the route from Bombay. Of his own arrival Edward
Bickersteth writes in his Journal :
It was still dark when I reached Delhi from Kharwarra
on the morning of December 13, so that I had no oppor-
tunity of seeing the city as I entered. I succeeded, however,
without difficulty in rinding the mission compound, which
is near the station, and in arousing Murray, whose room
opened on the garden. I need hardly say that I had a very
warm welcome from Mr. Winter, when at daybreak he came
to see if I had arrived. As the Bishop (Johnson) of Calcutta
was to arrive the next afternoon, all that day was engaged
in getting the necessary furniture for our house, which is
on the other side of the compound to Mr. Winter.
The Bishop, who was then engaged in making the
acquaintance of his huge diocese, came to Delhi to visit
the work before ceding it to the newly constituted diocese of
Lahore, and stayed there from Friday, December 14, for a
fortnight.
Bickersteth described this visit with all the enthusiasm
of a new-comer.
Our first work was to arrange a whole scheme of
engagements with the Bishop. Nearly every day was
occupied, and sometimes the Bishop gave three or four
addresses on the same day to different audiences, hold-
ing a confirmation on Christmas Eve, and first baptising
59, of whom all but 10 were adults. This is considerably
the largest baptism that has ever taken place in this part
of India. Nearly 200 were confirmed. Bishop Milman
was about to hold a confirmation here at the time of
his lamented death, so that there has been considerable
delay and the number has accumulated. This and the
celebration of Holy Communion on Christmas Day, at
which 150 communicated, were perhaps the two most
intensely interesting services I have ever attended.
The Cambridge Mission, therefore, were clearly happy
in the hour of their arrival, so far as the Bishop's visitation
E
5O BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
led to a review of all the forces that made for Christianity
in and about Delhi, and enabled them to take in at a glance
the varied work that had been started by Mr. and Mrs.
Winter, and in which they were henceforth to take so
important a part.
From what was said on page 38, it will be remembered
that Delhi and its districts were so organised by Mr. Winter
as to be able to satisfy all the forecasted requirements
of the Cambridge missionaries. The city itself, divided
into nine separate divisions or parishes, each with its
catechists and readers, seemed to Bickersteth's sanguine
anticipations 'to fall in with the future organisation
of the Cambridge Mission, and to make it quite easy
to arrange to give each English missionary, when he has
obtained a sufficient knowledge of the language, a practi-
cally independent sphere of work, in which he will be able
to work out, with the assistance of his own catechists, and,
when the time comes, of native pastors, his own plans,
educational or otherwise, while he himself will live at our
central Mission House.' ('Journal,' January 1878.)
St. Stephen's High School and many vernacular schools
which were carried on among the very numerous class of
Chamars (workers in leather, a staple trade of Delhi), made
educational work possible from the first. Bickersteth wrote
in his first letter to Mr. Bullock :
A low caste vernacular school in Delhi differs almost
as much from St. Stephen's High School as at home a
ragged school from a public school.
And again, Jan. 3, 1878 :
We are to have some personal experience of St.
Stephen's High School, the highest educational institution
of the mission, almost at once, as Murray and I have agreed
directly the school re-opens to give an hour and a half each
of us three times a week to taking a class.
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 51
The school had been worked on the principle of
enforced Christian instruction, on the wisdom of which
Bickersteth desired further light, and with his characteristic
preference for wide research before forming an opinion on
a debatable point, he wrote home :
It would, I think, help to the solution of this difficulty
if someone were willing to devote time to collecting
accounts of the various methods of instruction that have
been in favour in the mission schools of past ages, and
accompany them with such opinions and judgments on
the one side and the other as are given in the Allahabad
Conference Report. I have not seen any such compre-
hensive articles, though General Tremenhere's pamphlet
and the late Bishop Douglas's letters are heavy blows
aimed against the present system, or, as its advocates say,
against its abuses.
With regard to catechists, he wrote that Bishop John-
son's suggestion of assembling them for some regular system
of instruction, each catechist spending at least two months
in the year under instruction at Delhi, ' seems to open out
a prospect in the direction of what should be the most
characteristic work in days to come of the Cambridge
Mission, as some of these men if further instructed would
(Mr. Winter thinks) make excellent native ministers.'
But it should be stated that although the catechists
benefited greatly as preachers by the instructions they
received, the expectations that several might advance to
the ministry has not been fulfilled.
The advantages of a Christian Home or ( Hostel ' for
students sent from mission schools to the Government
College had been one of the plans also mentioned in the
original circular, and it became possible at once to take up
that kind of work, inasmuch as there was already the be-
ginning of a Christian Boys' Boarding School. Bickersteth
expressed his hope that they might become an important
E2
52 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
agency in training the members of the native Church,
and in supplying suitable men as native catechists and
pastors. Already keen to promote any work which would
indirectly build up the native Church, he agreed to take
over the school, the headmaster of which, Janki Nath by
name, was a graduate of the University of Calcutta. He
had formerly been a Brahmin. 1 The boys were thirteen
in number.
But one entry in the Journal already quoted needs
some notice. ' I must hasten to mention that at a meeting
of the Delhi Mission Committee held on Saturday, De-
cember 21, the care of the mission during Mr. Winter's
absence was formally handed over to us.' This entry is
explained by the 'memorandum on the Cambridge Mission
to North India (Delhi) ' published in Cambridge by the Uni-
versity Committee, March 29, 1 878. We read : ' After Delhi
was chosen as the first seat of the mission, the Cambridge
Committee heard that it would be necessary for the Rev.
R. R. Winter, who, with the help of the Rev. Tara Chand,
had been in charge of the S.P.G. Mission there, to return to
England for two years in the early part of the present year.
Under these circumstances, by agreement with the Com-
mittee of the S.P.G. they authorised Mr. Bickersteth and
Mr. Murray to take charge of the work during his absence.'
Accordingly on April 2 Mr. and Mrs. Winter left for
their much needed furlough in England, and did not return
to Delhi till December n, 1879, on which day Mr. Winter
came back to India in company with Mr. Allnutt and
Mr. Lefroy, Mrs. Winter returning a year later.
It is plain that although the Cambridge Committee
added that ' the letters which they had received satisfied
them that this arrangement will be of the greatest service
1 The Rev. S. S. Allnutt writes : ' Janki Nath is a man of very high
principle universally respected by all, Christians ancl non-Christians alike.'
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 53
in supplying under favourable conditions the objects of the
Cambridge Mission,' yet the whole burden of responsibility
must have weighed very heavily on the shoulders of a
young Cambridge graduate, not yet twenty-eight years of
age, unacquainted with the languages in daily use and
unversed in oriental methods and manners, who had only
been resident four months in the land of his adoption.
He was left practically alone, for a great misfortune had
befallen the mission, of which the Cambridge Committee
knew nothing when they passed their memorandum just
quoted.
On March 1 1 Mr. Murray fell ill with a slight attack of
haemorrhage, and the entry in Bickersteth's Journal is :
March 12-20. During this time Murray had one or
two very slight returns of haemorrhage. He was unable to
move himself, and this has been his worst day. Very weak
and depressed.
March 21. Murray decidedly better, and has been out
in the garden. Gratias Deo.
March 22. A return of haemorrhage the worst he
has had.
April 7. Murray has been going on well since March
22. To-day he has been walking in the compound ; but
on the nth he was taken ill again, and on the 22nd he
left for Meerut en route for Simla.
Thus Bickersteth was brought perilously near to the
situation which he had described only to deprecate, and
which it had been hoped the Cambridge Mission would
render next to impossible : ' An over-burdened missionary,
who bears alone the manifold cares of a whole station.' *
It must not be supposed that he so much as hinted
that he felt oppressed. In fact, with his usual reticence,
he said very little, if anything, about it, not only nursing
his brother missionary with unremitting care till he left
1 See chapter ii. 30.
54 I5ISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
for Simla, but in the midst of that anxiety saying farewell
to Mr. Winter, and with a stout heart setting to work at
once to keep pace with all the multifarious calls upon his
time. In writing at the end of his first year to Mr. Bullock
to excuse himself for not having written reports of their
proceedings at certain stated intervals, he says :
My excuse must be the ready but true one, that when
I agreed to the rule as proposed I had no idea of the inces-
sant demands which a mission like that of Delhi would
daily make on time and strength. Life in Delhi itself, if
any progress at all is to be made in the essential work of
learning the language, leaves no leisure for writing reports.
I take the opportunity of being out for a fortnight among
our distant country stations with the Bishop of Lahore to
send a letter. Since the beginning of April, when Mr. and
Mrs. Winter left for England, the mission has been in my
charge. I had thought that this great responsibility would
have been shared by the daily co-operation and counsel of
my friend and colleague Mr. Murray, but God's will was
otherwise, and owing to the illness which prostrated him
in March, he has been condemned to very unwilling exile
in the Himalayas for the past six months, and is forbidden
to return to Delhi till this time next year. A short three
months in Delhi had already given him great influence in
the schools which were under his charge. His time at
Simla will not be wasted, as he is at work on the language.
Of course Edward Bickersteth could not be left only
with the assistance of his native colleague, the Rev. Tara
Chand, and there is a note of relief in the brief entry
on April 24 : ' Telegram saying that Hunter is coming.'
Mr. Hunter was assistant to Mr. Bray, the S.P.G. Secretary
at Calcutta, who, at the cost of greatly adding to his own
labours, spared him to come and work at Delhi.
Two young laymen also gave their help one Mr.
Bridge, whom the Bishop of Calcutta had brought with
him from Assam, and the other Mr. Maitland, of Trinity
College, Cambridge. The latter had been visiting the
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 55
celebrated cities of the world, and felt an especial
attraction to Delhi and its mission. He daily taught
English to the boys in the Upper School, and passed six
of them into the Punjab University largely by his exertions.
He also helped to nurse Mr. Murray. Mr. Bridge lived in
the Mission House for nearly a year, ' making the longest
stay hitherto of any of my companions ' Bickersteth
writes in a letter dated April 29, 1879, a fact which shows
how fragmentary was the help on which he could rely.
The recollections sent to me by Mrs. Parsons, Zenana
(S.P.G.) Missionary at Delhi, prove how others appreciated
his efforts at that time of stress.
In February 1878 I had the privilege of being engaged
in the S.P.G. Zenana. Mission, and placed at the Ladies'
Home. The Winters were going on furlough, and the
mission, including the many branches of women's work,
was to be left in sole charge of Mr. Bickersteth. The
Home at that time consisted of six Zenana teachers and a
training class of five pupils, all quite young. In allotting
my work to me Mrs. Winter said : ' Refer every matter of
difficulty to Mr. Bickersteth. He is young, but very wise
and good.'
In a very little time Mr. Bickersteth began to acquaint
himself with each of the different institutions, 2nd got to
know all about everything. Of his large minded sympathy
and tact, which seemed to extend to every case, one could
never say too much. . . . Soon we learnt we could always go
to him in every case of difficulty, great or small. . . . One
great feature of his character was his treatment of the
erring. His rebukes were given with the gentleness of
a loving woman and the firmness of the Master. His
presence among us seemed to bring with it a desire for
higher aims for ourselves, and a feeling of affectionate
reverence for him.
We went once to bring some orphans from the Poor
House. (1877 had been a year of famine, and there were
many destitute ones left in 1878.) We found them all
looking miserable, like bundles of dirt and rags, some very
famished. After Mr. Bickersteth had selected as many as
56 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
he thought fit, as we were going away he saw two girls,
one rather big who was crippled after rheumatic fever, and
one little one quite blind. He looked at them and said,
4 We must take these two also, and see what we can do for
them.' So he lifted each one, and, carrying them himself,
put both into his tonga, to the surprise of the natives
standing by, not one of whom would have liked to touch
them. For the cripple girl he got the best treatment to
be had, and after some time she could walk : she never
forgot the Padre Sahib's kindness.
Sometimes if a matter taken to him were rather serious
he would say : ' Come to-morrow, and I will tell you what
to do or say.' Then we knew that our Head was going to
pray over it before deciding what was to be done about it.
Once a girl in the Orphanage was bad with cholera, and
he went twice every day to see her, and would sit a long
time beside her. One would have thought the girl might
have been his own kith and kin. In no case was his
sympathy and help given in a half-hearted way.
He was so much reverenced in Delhi that a letter
addressed ' To the Chief Christian in Delhi ' puzzled the
Post Office until the postman insisted it must be for Mr.
Bickersteth, and so indeed it proved. In the Zenana
Mission we all felt that Mr. Bickersteth was indeed our
guide and friend.
But h^ could write at the end of the first year, ' AIL
the old machinery has been kept in operation,' and this
included the Sunday and daily services in St. Stephen's
Church, the evening services for Christians in different
parts of the city, the high and low caste schools, preach-
ing in the bazars, the Zenana work, the hospital and
dispensary, the two boarding schools, and the refuge.
The lamented death of the excellent Dr. Bose, who had
been suddenly called to his rest shortly before Mr. Winter
left, called out in a home letter the expression of the hope
that ' Cambridge may speedily send us a duly qualified
doctor ; ' but no man offered, nor has any medical graduate
of Cambridge yet joined the mission. In the autumn of
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 57
1878 he writes that 'the medical lady in charge of the
mission hospital and dispensary broke down after eleven
years of Indian work under the great pressure of a fever
epidemic caused by the subsidence of an unusual overflow
of the Jumna in last October and November. She has
since been ordered to spend two summers at home, and
has left for England.'
The principal new efforts of the year were a class for
the lower grade of catechists or readers, and a monthly
devotional service for the English-speaking mission
workers. Of the service something will be said in the
next chapter, but he wrote of the class : < 4 r
It represents at present a very rude endeavour to improve
the attainments of our native teachers. The idea of the plan
we pursue was given to me by Pastor Luther, 1 of Ranchi,
who visited us last winter to place his son in our Boarding
School. The village readers, who are employed during the
week in teaching in their schools, come into Delhi on Friday
evening and stay till after morning service on Sunday.
In company with teachers of the same grade who are
employed in Delhi itself they receive during the time
lessons in the Bible and Prayer-book, dictation and read-
ing, besides listening to parts of the ' Pilgrim's Progress '
read aloud to them.
Periodical examinations were held and an order of merit
published, and it was decided that the amount of the stipend
they received should be partly dependent, as in the case of
the Bengal Missions, on their place in the list.
In one most important branch of the work, St.
Stephen's High School, the lack of any visible results
caused the young missionary much thought and some
misgivings. Commenting on the results of the last year
he writes home :
1 An S.P.G. Pastor of the Kol Mission.
58 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
No boy from the High School has this year become a
Christian. There seems no other means for reaching the
upper classes in India which covers the same ground ; at the
same time, no doubt, knowledge of Christianity is imparted
under extreme difficulties in our high schools. The boys
cannot be regarded in any sort as religious inquirers. They
are sent by their parents to the mission school because the
fees are somewhat less than the Government School, and
during the latter part of the course, when their minds
would naturally be more open to new truth, they are
engrossed in the one object of acquiring sufficient know-
ledge to pass the University Entrance Examination as a
preliminary to obtaining a Government post. Under these
circumstances, it seems to be the opinion of the most
experienced teachers that little immediate result can be
expected, but that success is rather to be looked for in a
higher moral standard in after years, induced by contact
with the moral beauty of the New Testament teaching
and a certain familiarity with the example of our Lord's
life. Something more might perhaps be hoped for from
the personal influence of Christian masters who would be
willing to lay themselves out to obtain influence over the
scholars out of school as well as in, as was so remarkably
and successfully done by Mr. Noble at Masulipatam. From
this point of view the increase in the number of Christian
masters is very greatly to be desired, and also the addition
of a higher college class, as at present the boys are often
removed under alien influences before their education is
completed.
Mr. Winter had always taken a somewhat different
view, holding that 'for secular teaching non-Christian
masters are not only indispensable, but that they form
a link between the missionaries and the boys with their
parents,' bringing ' an efficient and thoughtful body of
men into contact with the missionaries, and whose habits
of loyalty to their employers kept them from acting
against Christianity.' Bickersteth, while admitting that
there were collateral advantages in a mission possessing
a large institution like St. Stephen's School and its
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 59
branches in a place like Delhi inasmuch as it added
greatly to the general reputation of the mission, bringing
the missionaries into contact from time to time, in a way
that would not otherwise be possible, with the native
gentlemen of the city yet was thankful when he could
write to Dr. Westcott to the effect that ' we have been
able slightly to increase the number of Christian masters
in the High School and its branches, sufficiently to give us
one Christian master to each branch ; ' and he added, ' We
are still very far short of the standard which I see the
well-known native Madras clergyman, Padre Sattianadan,
considers essential to the profitableness of the school from
a missionary point of view that one half at least of the
masters should be Christian.'
He was deeply thankful, also, when the arrival of
Mr. Carlyon, just before Christmas Day 1878, enabled
him to put him in charge of the High School and its
branches, and to entrust the keeping of the Christian Boys'
School to Mr. Blackett Mr. Carlyon also started a Bible
class on Sunday afternoons for young men able to speak
English who had already embraced Christianity. It was
the same feeling which led Bickersteth four years later to
begin what Mr. Allnutt described as a most useful course
of lectures to masters, on the Characteristics of the Old and
New Testaments, a course which was only interrupted by
the illness which obliged him to return to England.
Delhi itself, of course, offered scope for bazar preaching,
and the Cambridge missionaries were able to increase
somewhat the frequency and regularity of this branch of
work in different parts of the city and suburbs. Bickersteth
wrote :
So far as I have hitherto observed, the only opponents
to our preachers are Muhammadan moulvies. One of
6O BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
these is a Wahabi preacher also on his own account.
He generally takes St. John's Gospel as his text-book,
and though his aim certainly is far more to invalidate
the Gospel than to use it for the instruction of his
hearers, yet I have sometimes thought that he is not
altogether uninfluenced by what he has read. In
argument it must be admitted that it sometimes so
happens that the Muhammadans have the best of it.
A moulvie one day in my hearing stoutly maintained that
Our Lord's words, ' There be some standing here which
shall not taste of death till they see the kingdom of
God,' involved a plain historical inaccuracy, and the
catechist, though not an illiterate man, had no answer to
give.
This led Bickersteth to draw the conclusion that
' knowledge of the Bible more than controversial books
was the main need of their teachers and preachers ' a need
which he at once set to work to try to supply, not only by
the weekly Bible-readings for those in Delhi (as mentioned
above), but by encouraging the Reverend Tara Chand to
hold a class on the first Sunday in each month, when all
the catechists came in from the districts. Between the
monthly meetings each catechist was expected to prepare
so many chapters of one of the Gospels, the commentary
in use being that of the Rev. Robert Clark (C.M.S.) and
of Moulvie Imad-ud-din.
A few sentences from a letter to Dr. Westcott, written
much later on September I, 1 88 1, give his more matured
opinion. He writes :
Our first circular also referred to evangelistic labours.
All work in a heathen land is this more or less, for
even a sermon in church may be listened to by a crowd of
Muhammadans and Hindus in the church porch. But
perhaps bazar preaching has the best claim to that title.
Its value is universally recognised when the speakers are
intellectually and spiritually qualified for the work, but
the criticism to which all missionary operations are now
B1CKERSTETH HALL, DELHI.
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 6 1
subjected has condemned many efforts in that line which
once would have passed muster. Two improvements may,
I hope, be shortly possible in our present practice. The
one is a preachers' class, where subjects may be carefully
prepared and digested beforehand .... the other a
preaching-room. The difficulty is that the bazar is after all
common property, and the Christian preacher has no real
authority to regulate the crowd who listen to him. 1 The
case would be quite different in a preaching-room, or,
still better, a chapel by the side of the way. It would, I
think, be specially useful among a Muhammadan popu-
lation. The adherents of a religious system to which
love is almost unknown enjoy heated controversy, but
get no good from it. We are at present looking out for
a suitable site. If we obtain one, and can erect a
building 2 on a sufficiently large scale, we hope that some
of the most able and thoughtful of the native clergy
and others in North India will be willing to deliver
lectures in Delhi.
Outside Delhi many thousand representatives of the
Koli or weaver class, and of the caste of Ckamars, or shoe-
makers, were gathered in small village communities.
It was among the latter that so many had been baptised
1 ' The preaching in the bazar (at Biwari) was not very satisfactory ;
very large crowds gathered, but they were disorderly, and no inquiries
followed as to our lodging-place.' Again at Kalanam : 'We went to their
little bazar, and for some time sat and talked, but the place was too noisy to
be satisfactory, and the cattle being driven home at night continually broke
up the audience. ' Again : ' A little friendly conversation resulted, as it was
meant to do, in a request to sit down in the place for conversation attached to
their mosque, and a little crowd soon collected. Such an opportunity is much to
be preferred to preaching in the open bazar, when the audience consists of
Muhammadans. The Christian is on their ground, so to speak, and if he came
unasked still they have requested him to remain. We talked for awhile of sin,
and of escape from it, not without some attempt being made to get the conver-
sation away to those metaphysical points which the Muhammadan always
prefers to moral teaching. The one flatters his real or supposed intellectual
acuteness, the other condemns his daily life ; the one fortifies him in the sup-
posed sufficiency of his creed, the other suggests doubts which he would fain
banish as to whether it answers his real needs.' (Mission Field, June 1882.)
2 Such a building was erected in Delhi soon after Bickersteth had been
obliged to leave India, and[received the name of the Bickersteth Hall.
62 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
by Mr. Winter in recent years. Of these Edward Bicker-
steth writes :
There is a little Christian colony of the Koli caste,
some fifty miles to the south of Delhi, at Biwari. They
consider themselves somewhat higher in social rank than
the Chamars, but both are very low in the social scale.
It seems likely that of God's mercy Christianity will have
a rapid and wide extension among these classes. More
than once during the last few months we have had requests
for instruction from distant villages. The Chamars live,
alike in the city and in the villages, apart by themselves
in small mud huts, which are often neatly arranged in
squares and alleys. Each hut as a rule contains one
or two rooms, and possibly a very small verandah to
keep off the hottest of the sun's rays. The furniture
consists of one or two charpoys (bedsteads), some cook-
ing utensils, and possibly a piece of carpet and a stool
for a visitor. . . . The master of the establishment may
generally be discovered sitting on the ground in front of
his house at work on his shoes (an active worker can make
a good pair in about two days) ; his wife, her dark-skinned
children hanging about her the while, is commonly engaged
in some culinary occupation not far off, which frequently
involves the whole prospect in a cloud of smoke. In the
evening, should a pair of shoes have been completed, it is
usual for the head of the establishment to make a visit
to the bazar in hope of a purchaser. . . . One excellent
native custom, by which the chief men of a particular
district form a kind of court of arbitrament among their
fellows, Mr. Winter has perpetuated among our native
Christians. . . . The people of one entire square of houses of
this kind in Delhi are now all but entirely Christian. This
square or 'basti,' as it is called, lies just within the city
walls, not far from our mission house, at the north-east
corner of the city, close under the battered and shapeless
mass of the Mori bastion, a name very familiar to those who,
twenty years ago, followed in breathless anxiety the
fortunes of the siege of Delhi. ... I believe that many
will be found to pray that these poor Christians may live
worthily of their profession, and as I was trying to teach
them last night (the strangeness and picturesqueness of the
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 63
phrase seemed to strike them at once), be ' fishers of men '
among their heathen brethren around.
Rohtak (forty-four miles west of Delhi), Kalanam
(a village consisting mainly of Muhammadans), Biwari (a
large commercial city), Dadri (the capital of a native
State), and many others were places frequently visited by
Bickersteth, accompanied by Mr. Carlyon or else by Mr.
Lefroy as well as by a catechist. 1 Daryagunge, a district of
Delhi itself, was always accessible and was visited bi-
weekly (on Thursdays and Saturdays). Bickersteth had
taken special charge of that district. On arrival the
two missionaries and catechist used to pay several pastoral
visits, and then the simple evening service was held, if
possible in a chapel, which formed one side of the court.
It consisted of a bhajan (or hymn), the Confession,
Absolution and Lord's Prayer, Magnificat and Creed,
then a chapter read and expounded, after which followed
the sermon, another bhajan, and a few more prayers. The
hymn was especially popular, and it would scarcely have
been a service to these people without one or two bhajans,
which conveyed in the roughest metre some simple
Christian truth.
The more distant stations, best visited in the cold season,
such as Rohtak (with 1 5,000 inhabitants and twenty-four
mosques), were reached by dakgari (post carriage), or, if the
road was very bad, in ekkas or native pony-carts, ' a method
of procedure which effectually prohibits any use of books
by the way ' being Bickersteth's characteristic comment. 2
Here is a shortened account of one of these periodical visits.
1 Yakub Kishan Singh, who was his frequent companion, was ordained
subsequently to Bickersteth's departure from Delhi, He died in October 1897
at Gurgaon, where he had retired with his son, and thus was called to his rest
within two months of the death of his English friend.
2 '.Yakub found us an empty native house at Rohtak, with, of course, no
64 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
January 12, 1882, I left Delhi with Carlyon at IOP.M. ;
owing to the dreadful state of the road after the winter
rain we did not reach Rohtak till three in the afternoon.
There one of our two native deacons is placed, an old
gentleman with white beard and venerable l aspect, but with
natural strength unabated. He owes his Christianity (it
is thirty-one years since he was baptised) to the zeal of a
Christian officer in the army. As a boy his father had
given him a good education in ancient Hindu learning,
and much he laments over its decay. He has known
many missionaries, among others Dr. Pfander, who used to
read with him at one time in Agra. Rising early, the
missionaries went out and sat for some time talking, now
with a little group of saltpetre manufacturers, now
in the ' baithak,' or place of conversation attached to a
mosque, later in the day spending the time in looking
up the scattered Christians, mostly poor, and receiving
little parties of native gentlemen, masters perhaps from a
Government school, and in the evening preaching in the
bazar. ' We also believe in the Trinity/ was the some-
what abrupt announcement of one of the masters [he was
the head master, and had been trained in the mission
school at Delhi many years ago]. This led to a con-
versation about mysteries and our duty to accept them on
sufficient evidence, even when they are wholly beyond our
power to comprehend. This is a point which the more
educated Hindus are very slow to allow, though it is
plain that all men do it in a multitude of instances.
Sometimes much interest attached to the personal
history of some of the scattered Christians. Thus Bicker-
steth writes :
Part of the object of our visit was to see Jumna
Das. He was formerly a sadhu, 2 or holy man, a Hindu,
furniture or carpets, but it is wonderful how soon, when one has disposed one's
effects about one and got out one's books, ; &c. , one begins to get fond of one's
abode and to regard it as a kind of quasi-home for the time being.' Letter,
Jan. 12, 1882, Mission Field.
1 He was ordained by Bishop Milman. The other, Asad Ali, was
ordained to the diaconate by Bishop French (1880). 'A special interest,'
wrote E. B., ' attached to Ali's ordination by his former teacher at the Lahore
Divinity ..School, where he|had been the senior student of his year.'
2 Sadhu or saint = holy man. Fakir = poor man.
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 65
baptised three years ago by Yakub. A special interest
about him is that he still retains much, perhaps too much,
of his old manner of life. Certainly nothing has been
done to alter or denationalise the outward man or old
surroundings of this strange convert. Scanty dress, rough
hair, vvcatherbeaten countenance, dwelling and occupation,
are all just as they were before the Hindu sadhu took on
him the yoke of Christ. He lives on a plot of land of
which he is owner, and satisfies his wants, which are simple
enough, by its cultivation. His house is little more than
a hut of reeds, just sufficient to keep off nightdews quite
insufficient, I should say, to shield him from heavy rain.
His house is close to the road, and travellers often stay to
get water from his well during the hot weather. To give
water to passers-by is a recognised meritorious action of
Hindus. It is pleasant to think that in one spot at least a
good work, to the performance of which by Christians a
special promise is attached, is not neglected. Who can
tell the results of the quiet talks that doubtless go on
sometimes between the Christian guru and the thirsty
travellers who resort to him for water. Jumna Das soon
caught sight of us as we made our way to his little hut.
Apart from his own conversation, you would perhaps only
find out his Christianity from his books, but you would
probably not discover his library at once. It is contained
in a large earthen pot, such as is commonly used for
holding water in India. The possible dangers attached to
this method of storing his treasures the old man recently dis-
covered to his cost, as several were stolen from him. The
accomplishment of reading is an immense gain in the case
of a solitary Christian. For instance, he is shortly to be con-
firmed, and I was able to give him an excellent little Hindu
book on the subject (S.P.C.K.). He will study it word by
word, but without this his preparation must have been con-
fined to the very scanty instruction Yakub can give him on
very occasional visits. We stayed with him some little time,
and had reading and prayer. He is very honest and real.
Again :
The native Christian whose name is Hassu seems to
be doing his work l fairly well. His early life was a strange
1 I.e. teaching a school of little urchins belonging to the Koli caste on the
outskirts of the city of Bihwari.
F
66 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
one. He belonged to a Muhammadan family, whose chief
occupation is to take care of the ruinous tomb of an old
Muhammadan ' pir ' or saint. He spent his young days in
the service of this tomb, and participated in the alms of
the faithful. He was baptised some years since, having
heard the Gospel, I believe, first during street preaching.
I went with him to see his relations, whose countenances,
as is commonly the case with this class of people, had very
little to recommend them. Degradation had too certainly
followed on the idleness in which their ancestor's sanctity
enabled them to live. A curious part of their story is that
the people who now support them are Hindus, not
Muhammadans. The 'pir' seems to have been reverenced
alike by both classes of religions, but in the case of the
Hindus, who should naturally have been hostile to him and
his religion, reverence has survived to later generations,
and some poor idolaters of a neighbouring village still hope
to win merit hereafter by supporting his descendants on
part of their produce. This is but one of the many curious
instances in which Hinduism and Muhammadanism have
managed to dissemble their differences in outlying places
in India. Islam has, I think, in all cases been the loser,
adopting the superstitions of its natural enemy without
inclining in the least towards the truths which the super-
stitions feel after. The followers of a system based on the
sternest monotheism have been saint worshippers, but
none, I think, till they accept the truth, regard incarnation
as within the limits of revelation.
It may safely be asserted that at no time was direct
evangelistic work (whether public preaching, Bible classes,
or the care of three of the Delhi districts and three
out-stations in the surrounding district) neglected by the
Cambridge Mission, nor did it cease to have a powerful
attraction for Bickersteth. Preaching in bazars in a
popular style was not his forte, and, to quote a Devonshire
proverb, the fodder he provided was too high up for the
cattle ; but he was at his very best when engaged in earnest
conversation with some inquirers who remained behind
after the audience had broken up, or who, Nicodemus-like,
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 67
sought further light in the seclusion of the house or tent
after nightfall.
These longer evangelistic tours, undertaken on the apos-
tolic method of journeying two and two together, greatly
enriched the experience of the Cambridge missionaries,
and led Bickersteth to dwell much on the relative good
and evil of Hinduism and Muhammadanism, and to think
deeply about the best method of presenting Christianity to
the adherents of both these religions. 1 In regard to their
distinctive tenets, he saw how ' the impersonality of the
Supreme Being is a fundamental doctrine of Hinduism,
and affects their whole system.' ' This/ he writes, ' seems
to be frequently forgotten by those who argue that, owing
to its theory of incarnations, the system of Hinduism is far
nearer to Christianity than that of Islam.' In a letter of an
able Sanscritist he had read : ' In Hinduism the principle of
Divine Incarnation abounds to utter extravagance. It is
like a tree which needs nothing but the pruning knife
vigorously applied.' Upon which he commented : ' If the
incarnations of Hinduism were incarnations of a personal,
self-conscious Being, it would be so, but they are not.
They are rather means by which a being, impersonal and
incapable by itself of attaining to conscious existence, is
enabled through contact with matter to attain to person-
ality.'
In answer to the question, ' Has the presence of Islam
in India been for good or evil ? ' he believed it to be
' impossible to give any simple and unqualified reply.'
In a lecture which he delivered after his return to England
(before the Cambridge Graduates Mission Aid Society,
March 1883), he argued :
1 With regard to methods, he looked forward hopefully to the influence of
the Christian 'guru' (Hindu religious teacher) and his disciples as ' potent
auxiliaries, perhaps even chief agencies, in spreading the Gospel in India.'
F 2
68 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
On behalf of Islam it may fairly be contended that
the protest it has maintained for certain fundamental
truths of religion has not been without influence for
good, such as the personality of God, the essential
brotherhood of man with the consequent duty of charity,
and the sinfulness of idolatry and drunkenness. . . .
But heavy counts may be brought to prove that this gain
has been largely counterbalanced. If it asserts the person-
ality and unity of God, it also, by the denial of the fact or
possibility of incarnation, places an impassable barrier
between Him and His creatures. If it rightly proclaims
the essential brotherhood of all men, it finds a false basis
for it in fact, in a common submission to the claims of
Mahomed. Again, taking it as a whole, its moral code
and its practice is lower than that of Aryan nations. A
considerable school of living writers has so minimised
these and other vices and deficiencies of the system as to
justify a verdict almost wholly in its favour. This incon-
siderate partisanship produces a result as far from the
truth as the indiscriminate condemnation which it succeeds.
Good and evil are so intermingled in the system as
necessarily to produce results which cannot be tabulated
under either head, and any estimate of Islam which neglects
this is essentially defective.
More quotations in the same vein might be given, but
enough has been cited to prove the spirit in which
Bickersteth approached some of the problems presented
by comparative religious philosophy, and which he
aimed at impressing on all who came to work with him.
His was a mind from the first singularly free from pre-
judice, and therefore especially fitted to draw up a fair
statement of the strong and weak points of any faith
which has claimed the moral allegiance of the human
heart, and then strike a balance and justify the position
which he himself held.
Education, especially higher education, had been
from the first the principal object in the eyes of those
who started the Cambridge Mission.
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 69
The arrival of the Rev. S. S. Allnutt and the Rev.
G. A. Lefroy at the close of December 1 879 had greatly
added to the strength of the mission, and justified the
serious contemplation of a more elaborate educational
programme. From the first Mr. Allnutt identified himself
with the educational work of the mission, for which he
had great ability. Between both these two valuable recruits
to the mission and Edward Bickersteth there grew up the
warmest brotherly affection.
It will be remembered that the charge of St. Stephen's
High School (with 150 boys), training up to the standard of
the University Entrance Examination, was entrusted to the
mission at the beginning of 1880, as was that of several
branch schools in which from four to five hundred boys were
under preparatory training. By the end of 1 880 the mission
was able to undertake an important and characteristic edu-
cational work. It was decided to form classes in order to
supply the need felt since the Government College at Delhi
had been closed, and so to prepare candidates for the B.A.
Examination of the University of Calcutta. This privilege,
indeed, had always been possessed by St. Stephen's High
School as affiliated to that University, but it had long been
held in abeyance. This decision was not arrived at without
prolonged inquiry and prayerful thought. As long before
as October 1878, the Bishop of Lahore had spent three
weeks at Delhi with Bickersteth, and they had visited
together for the first time, but by no means for the last,
the most distant out-stations. 1 They frequently discussed
the educational problem, especially an Arts College, the
1 Writing to Edward Bickersteth from Peshawar (March 16, 1885) the
Bishop says : ' I had two days also with Winter also at Balandshar, and looked
with happy recollections on the road which you and I traversed by Toglaka-
bad to the villages beyond it ; journeys it may yet please God to permit us to
repeat either in the neighbourhood of Delhi or on the frontier.'
70 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
proposal to establish which fell in with the views of the
Bishop, who had himself spent the first years of his
missionary life in a similar college at Agra. The Bishop
had felt (and also had written home to the Cambridge
Committee) the great and urgent importance of there
being a college, as complete as possible in its proportions,
religious, scientific, philosophic, at Delhi and in connection
with the mission there.
In his original paper before the Missionary Aid Society
Dr. French had referred to the Alexandrian schools of
thought and inquiry as supplying the exactest and most
practical model of a Christian Educational Institute, which
in its class-rooms and lectures should be exhaustive of all
the great branches of science and problems of thought on
which the human mind is exercised. He had pointed out
that 'at Alexandria Christianity found ready to hand
great schemes of education encyclopaedic in character,
well compacted and organised in system, expansive and
even tolerant in principle,' and that ' it needed only the
mind of a philosopher and the heart and mind of a
Christian to see how happily all this might be fertilised,
fecundated, refined, and even glorified by being brought
into combination with that seed of the Word God's
divinely appointed instrument of growth into that Divine
Image in which man was created : which, while raising
him out of himself, makes him to be himself in the truest
best sense, humanises most while it most divinises him,
when he is most, as Hippolytus expressed it, Osoiroiovpisvos'
He had further brought out that for the realisation of this
ideal there must be an enquiring as well as a learned
people as a condition of hopefully attempting to introduce
the Alexandrian School system and programme, because
unless there had been a stir and a ferment the scheme
would fall to the ground flat and abortive.
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 71
Now from investigation made on the spot in the daily
companionship of the head of the Cambridge Mission, the
Bishop's spirit was deeply stirred within him. As he
mused the fire burned, and he wrote to Cambridge
describing the opening and the need of a college ' which
should (by God's help) rally round it the more highly
educated natives, and Hindus trained at the primary and
middle Government Schools, training them indeed for
M.A. degrees, both at Lahore and Calcutta, but with the
loftier and purer aim which Christian teaching imparts to
other studies when that teaching is seen to be not merely
a bye-end of an institution, but its quickening, informing,
and binding principle.' He drove home the plea by
illustrating ' the happy results ' which had followed the
establishment of such colleges by Theodore and Hadrian
in Canterbury, by Alcuin at York, at Alexandria in earlier
times, and recently at Calcutta and Bombay by the Jesuits,
and forcibly clinched his argument by the assertion :
' This is the very crisis, Delhi is the very place, the
Cambridge Mission is in several respects, to say the least,
the very instrument which seems to me needed.' Thus he
reaffirmed the verdict passed by the Bishop of Calcutta in
1876, on the opportunity opened for Cambridge by the
closing of the Government College, and at last his ideal
based on the Alexandrian method of combining theo-
logical and general learning took shape not only in his
Theological School at Lahore, but also in the Arts College
at Delhi.
That Bickersteth himself had already made up his
mind in the direction indicated by the Bishop can be
gathered from his appeal to Cambridge, when he had
pleaded for the establishment of a college where teaching
would be given by Christian teachers and be permeated
with Christian ideas, and added : ' Will two laymen of
?2 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
sufficient attainments and of high aims offer to undertake
this work ' ? while in a later letter to Dr. Wcstcott
(September I, 1881) he described the situation thus :
As regards the college, I have mentioned that our
original proposal extended only to establishing a hostel
for Christian students attending the Delhi Government
College. The Government Institution was, however, closed
shortly before we arrived in Delhi ; and we found that
a scheme had already been set on foot by some of the
wealthier inhabitants of the city to establish a native
college, to which it was expected Government would give
the usual grants in aid. We were anxious that if possible
nothing should be done by us which might prejudice an
independent and public-spirited movement of this kind.
At the same time we felt that far more beneficial results
might reasonably be looked for from an education which
was completed under Christian influences, than if boys
who had been trained in our schools passed just at the
period when their minds are naturally most susceptible of
impressions into a college which at best held a neutral
attitude towards religious truth. Under these circum-
stances it was during last summer agreed that the mission
should undertake to open college classes from January
1 88 1 for pupils from St. Stephen's and other mission
schools. The limitation left a wide field for independent
enterprise. The promoters, however, of a native college
failed to collect sufficient funds to secure the support of
the Punjab Government. Their scheme, therefore, has
fallen into abeyance, and is not now likely to be revived,
Since this happened we have received an intimation to the
effect that a missionary college open to all students,
whether of Government or mission schools, and conducted
by our mission, would probably receive liberal support
from the Government. Proposals made by us in reply,,
having reference mainly to the amount of pecuniary
assistance we should require, are at present under the
consideration of the Punjab authorities. If these negotia-
tions have a satisfactory termination, the higher education
of so large a district as the South Punjab will for the first
time have been placed in Christian hands.
The news of this opening was received with enthusiasm
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 73
by the Cambridge Committee, and at their request the
Bishop of Durham (Dr. Lightfoot) penned a vigorous and
characteristic appeal to his old University to rise to this
occasion.
After reminding Cambridge that as himself responsible
for the working of a large, populous, and undermanned
diocese, and eager therefore to welcome zealous and earnest
recruits for his own work, he yet gladly made himself
the mouthpiece of the cry from Delhi, regarding the
mission there as the first charge on the evangelistic zeal and
devotion of Cambridge, he then proceeded to quote the
passage from Bickersteth's letter given above as best
describing ' a signal opportunity, unforeseen when the mis-
sion was planned.' In conclusion he asked for five more men,
two for the new University and three for the more general
work of the mission. ' But what have the committee to offer
in return ? Certainly not wealth or luxury or ease, but a
modest stipend sufficient for maintenance, brotherly co-
operation and sympathy, opportunities of common prayer
and devotional exercises, and, above all, a great work to be
done for Christ's sake. Are there not five true sons of
Cambridge to whom such a prospect is far nobler and
brighter and more alluring than the immediate comfort of
a country curacy, or the ultimate prospect of a country
rectory ? Are there not five men who are prepared to lose
their souls that they may find them ? '
This appeal was circulated in November 1881, and in
the following spring (May 20) a largely attended meeting l
was organised by the London Committee at the College
1 At the meeting the Rt. Hon. G. Cubitt (now Lord Ashcombe) presided,
and the speakers were Bishop (Lightfoot) of Durham, Bishop (Harvey Good-
win) of Carlisle, Dr. Westcott (now Bishop of Durham), Bishop (Benson) of
Truro, Rt. Hon. H. C. Raikes, M.P., Mr. Dalrymple, M.P., Canon Farrar
(now Dean of Canterbury), Rev. E. H. Bickersteth (now Bishop of Exeter),
Rev. Brownlow Maitland, and Mr. C. Raikes, C.S.I.
74 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Hall, Westminster, to make the opportunity more widely
known. On that occasion Dr. Westcott reminded those
present that :
In the other Indian universities English had been the
one medium of higher education. In that of the Punjab
it was proposed that while the subject-matter remained
unchanged, instruction might be given in the vernacular. 1
Everyone could see at once the vast difficulties and the
corresponding advantages offered by that scheme. It
involved nothing less than quickening into vigorous
growth the language which answered to the characteristic
modes of native thought. Let them consider for a moment
what would have been the loss to England if all higher
education had been given to them through the medium of
Greek, what would have been the loss to the apprehension
of Christian truth. No one could feel more intense
gratitude than he for the lessons which Greek had taught
them. But the Christian truths have passed into our
common tongue and received large enrichments in the
process. This represented to them, he believed, what we
may look for in India. Let the treasures of western
thought find expression it would be a long and hard
work he knew in the vernacular, and there would be a
double gain of incalculable value. India would be the
richer, and they would be the richer. Not only would there
be the power of conveying all that they had learnt of truth
to every native in its most effective form, but they would
learn in due time those aspects of the one Faith which in
the order of Providence the Indian mind was fitted to
present in virtue of its peculiar endowment. For they
must be blind to the teaching of the past, if they did not
believe that God would enable them to see hereafter more
of His counsel through the races of the East. He con-
cluded by describing the educational work at Delhi as an
opportunity for sharing, however humbly, and it must be
very humbly, in moulding the moral and spiritual bent of
a great people, a sacred charge which had been undertaken,
1 It may be well to explain that all instruction in the arts course is
given through the medium of English, though at the same time there are
Arabic and Sanscrit classes connected with the University, which have been
a step in the direction pointed out by Dr. Westcott as so full of promise.
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 75
or rather which had been given and not refused. It could
not now be laid aside, and they wanted men, Cambridge
men, to fulfil it. icaXov TO a6\ov KOI 17 gXvrts
On the point of language, Edward Bickersteth himself
used to point out that 'there is probably no Christian
doctrine, however deep and intricate, which the copious
and pliant language of India, with the aid on the one side
of Sanscrit, on the other of Persian and Arabic, will not
eventually be able to express in a suitable terminology.'
He also felt that there was a profound truth and insight in
the forecast of his old teacher Dr. Westcott, that ' the
intellectual and spiritual sympathies of the leading peoples
of India are with Syria and Greece rather than with Rome
and Germany, that they will move with greater power
along the lines traced out by Origen and Athanasius than
along those of Augustine and Anselm which we have I
followed.' Bickersteth held that this opinion would in
time be confirmed by all experience in eastern lands.
The St. Stephen's College at Delhi was eventually
founded, and in October (1882) the Act was passed
which constituted the Punjab University College at
Lahore a college complete in all its functions, St. Stephen's
College being at once affiliated to it. But by that
time Edward Bickersteth had been invalided to England.
He was forced by repeated attacks of fever to leave India
in the August of 1882, confidently expecting to be back
again before Christmas. As a matter of fact, he never saw
again the scene of his first missionary labours until the
early spring of 1893, by which time he had been seven
years Bishop in Japan.
Among the happiest experiences of his Delhi life was
the winter visit paid to him in 1880-1 by his father and
stepmother. After Mr. Bickersteth had been twenty-five
76 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
years vicar of Christ Church, Hampstead, his parishioners
presented him with a cheque, requesting him to spend
part of it in a visit to India to see his son, well knowing
that no suggestion would be more agreeable to him.
Accordingly my father, leaving England in October, was
met by my brother at Calcutta, and travelled with him
for several weeks, ten days being spent at Delhi, inspecting
missions in North India.
There are very few letters of this Delhi period of my
brother's life preserved, and one note book in which he
jotted down scant memoranda is missing. The absence
of these must be a loss to the biographer, but enough has
been said to show the part and lot in the founding of the
Cambridge Mission which in the Providence of God
Edward Bickersteth was allowed to fill ; and the harder
task now remains of trying to draw back the veil from the
inner life of the mission, rightly hidden from the world,
but for all that ' the very pulse of the machine.'
In conclusion, the following paper of personal recollec-
tions, kindly contributed by the Rev. H. U. Weitbrecht,
D.D., C.M.S. Missionary at Batala, will be read with
interest :
My first introduction to Edward Bickersteth was in
February 1 876, when he was residing at Pembroke College
as a Fellow. Having resigned my curacy at Liverpool, I
was on the way to London to offer my services to the
C.M.S., and spent some days with the Rev. T. V. (after-
wards Bishop) French, whose appeal on behalf of the
Lahore Divinity School had drawn my attention. Mr.
French's thoughts were naturally full of the plan then in
hand for starting a Cambridge University Mission, and he
offered to take me with him to a meeting which was to be
held at Cambridge to discuss and set forward the project.
I was only too pleased to go, and still more gratified on
arriving at Cambridge to find that my host there was the
man who was the moving spirit of the whole scheme. The
THE CAMBRIDGE MISSION TO DELHI 77
days spent in Bickersteth's rooms at Cambridge saw the
beginning of a lifelong friendship.
In May 1876 I went to reside at Cambridge for three
months for the purpose of reading Sanscrit, and during
that time we had many opportunities of discussing the
work of missions, past, present, and future, and especially
the great questions of how to influence the philosophical
and educated classes of India, and to train the clergy and
preachers of her Church. So strong were our sympathies
that Bickersteth proposed to me to join the new Brother-
hood, but being already pledged to the C.M.S. this was
impossible.
It was, however, a delight and a privilege that I
repeatedly enjoyed, to have the opportunity of intimate
intercourse with Bickersteth in India, where he followed
me a year later. Early in 1879 I saw him at Delhi, and
wondered at the progress he had made in the language
amid the enormous mass of work that had devolved upon
him when left in full charge of the widely ramified
mission in his first year. Two contrasting pictures of him
come to my remembrance in that year. The first is that
of a little service with a handful of Cliamar Christians in
one of the bastis of Delhi. We sat on a charpoy (cot) ; a
few prayers were read, a rude hymn sung to ruder instru-
ments, and a simple address given by Bickersteth. The
other scene was laid in Simla, where we met a few months
later. Bickersteth had readily accepted an invitation to
lecture in English to an audience of non-Christians, con-
sisting chiefly of well educated and high-caste men con-
nected with the Government offices in Simla, many of
them adherents of the theistic Brahmo Samaj. The subject
that he chose was the trial of Jesus Christ. In his keen
and polished, yet earnest and sympathetic style, he drove
home forcibly the argument for the divinity of the Saviour,
from the fact that He staked life and reputation on the
truth of His assertion that He was the Son of God. Not
long after, when we were on a walking tour together, some
remarks on the same subject in a Brahmo journal called
forth a letter from Bickersteth, which he read to me before
sending it. It was in the same style as his lecture that is
to say, a specimen of what Christian controversy should
be. One cannot be too thankful that the Oxford Mission
to Calcutta, a result of the stimulus which Bickersteth gave
78 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
and which deals with the same class of people, fully main-
tains the same tone.
The walking tour that I referred to covered a happy
ten days of that same summer holiday. We had for com-
panions Murray and (I think) one other, and we walked
fifty miles out toKotgur by the Simla-Tibet road, returning
the same way. Delightful was the first nearer approach to
the great snow range of the interior Himalayas, delightful
the talks by the way and the Greek Testament readings in
the forest or the hospitable mission house in the secluded
station of Kotgur.
Three years later came the sad news that Bickersteth
was invalided home. The meetings at Diocesan Synods,
ordinations, and like occasions were at an end, nor did I see
him again till after he had been for some time as Bishop in
Japan. In April 1891 I \vas passing with my wife, who
was recovering from a long and weary illness, through
Tokyo, and there we were warmly welcomed by our old
friend, and spent some days in his house. Here it certainly
seemed to me that his special gifts had found a fit field for
their exercise. Faithful and strenuous in whatever task he
was called to do, whether small or great, he was, I take it,
more especially fitted to deal with the larger questions of
policy and principle, and to teach, influence, and guide
educated men and women. How effectually he did so his
biography will sufficiently show.
The last time we met was early in 1893, as Bickersteth
was passing through India. Even t\vo years before he had
seemed to be exhausted by work beyond his strength, and
now his old Indian trouble had returned to some extent.
But he was full of interest in all that he saw at Batala, where
I was then stationed, and ready to hold a Bible reading for
the missionaries, which brought to memory our Himalayan
intercourse. I parted from him with apprehension ; yet
God allowed him to work a while longer, and when the sad
news of his departure came one could but feel that a full
life-work had' been crowded into his comparatively few
years, and thank God for that life with its deeds and
memories.
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CHAPTER IV
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE
' You have given much attention to the methods and helps which con-
tribute to the cultivation of the spiritual life, and I am sure that this should
be the distinguishing mark of a Brotherhood, and that on it eventually, all
special success will depend. ' Letter from Rev. Edward Bickersteth to the
Rev. G. A. Lefroy, November 20, 1884.
' THE picture I have always had of him is at the close of
a day in Delhi. I stayed with them once in the hot
weather, when we all slept on the roof. When we had
all laid down, he walked up and down the parapet, as I
thought praying over the city from a place where he could
look down upon it. His tall figure against the dark sky
made quite an impression on me, and I feel sure that the
burden of the city's needs weighed on him nobly. ... It
was he who placed the Delhi Mission on a very high level
of continual consecration.' So writes (August 1897) the
Rev. J. H. Lloyd, now Vicar of St. Giles', Norwich,
formerly Principal of St. John's College (C.M.S.), Agra.
' His was indeed a consecrated life, and India can never
forget him,' was the testimony of India's late Metropolitan
Bishop, Dr. Johnson of Calcutta, in a letter of the same
date.
Now it will be conceded that spiritual consecration
issues in devotional life and craves for expression in
devotional habits, and it is the purpose of this chapter
to draw aside the veil as far as may be, and show how
' frequent opportunities of united devotion ' was the rule
SO BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
of the Delhi Brotherhood as conceived by Edward
Bickersteth. In his first paper before the Cambridge
Church Society (February 9, 1876) he summed up the
advantages of a Community mission, looked at from this
aspect, in these words :
Then, and on this I lay especial stress, there is the
opportunity which will be afforded for united religious
exercises and services. Without wishing for one moment
to impugn the belief in the special presence of God with
the solitary labourer, yet to most men there is no greater
help in a work of abounding difficulty than the opportunity
and the obligation of common devotion. It is striking
to notice that even a St. Francis Xavier, after one of his
great missionary journeys, refused to set forth again
until he had time to recruit his spiritual force by staying
awhile in the retreat of his college.
' Frequent opportunity of united devotion ' was there-
fore quite as much the aim of the Cambridge Mission as
even concentration of effort, subdivision of labour, con-
tinuity of teaching, and leisure for literary work. Edward
Bickersteth, although brought up among Evangelicals, who
twenty-five years ago had not yet made up their minds as
to the spiritual results of such times of retirement, was
indeed not unfamiliar with the blessing of retreats and
quiet days, for his father, who had taken the lead in this
as in other matters, had for some years planned and
carried 'out an annual Retreat at Christ Church, Hamp-
stead. Among the conductors appear such names as the
Rev. Canon Thorold (afterwards Bishop successively ot
Rochester and of Winchester), the Rev. Canon W. H.
Fremantle of Claydon, Bucks (afterwards Dean of Ripon),
the Rev. Canon Garbett, and the Rev. W. Boyd Carpenter
(afterwards Bishop of Ripon).
Another help to his devotional life came to him through
his friendship with the Rev. Canon Wilkinson (then Vicar
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 8 I
of St. Peter's, Eaton Square, and successively Bishop of
Truro and of St. Andrews), with whom he stayed in the
spring of 1877, and who became, in God's providence,
one of the strongly formative influences of his spiritual
life.
Bickersteth therefore left England for his new work
strongly imbued with the conviction that prayer is worth
our best time, ' more things being wrought by prayer than
man dreams of,' and also not without some experience
as to the best way of organising concerted action in
prayer.
It was to him a matter of special thankfulness that
the ten days' visit of the Bishop of Calcutta to Delhi
(which, as already mentioned, followed close on his own
arrival there) ended with a quiet day of devotion :
A practice which will (he writes), I hope, at intervals
be always continued in our mission. . . . We found the
practice quite as helpful here in a heathen land as some
of us in former days had done in London. There was a
peculiar sense of calm and strength in the gathering of
our little company to pray both for itself and for the great
heathen city, whose cries we could so plainly hear as we
knelt in our silent church.
While, writing after a year in India, we find him ex-
pressing the hope :
That it may be possible to arrange for a longer period of
withdrawal from direct work [than is afforded by a quiet
day]. If this is necessary in England, it is still more so in
India. Mission life is life at high pressure, and in itself
seems to have but little leisure for cultivating recollected-
ness and prayerfulness of spirit. For the sake of the
mission itself it will be very desirable, I believe, from time
to time to escape from missionary duties altogether.
A paper on ' Missionary Training,' which he read in the
G
82 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Selwyn Divinity School, Cambridge (April 9, 1884), sums
up his experience gained at Delhi in these words :
No men, I believe, as a class so need the help of a
regulated devotional life as missionaries. Contact with
heathenism and Islam tends more rapidly to exhaust
spiritual energy than anything else. Happy, then, those
whose spiritual training has led them to value regular
reading of Holy Scripture, meditation, frequent com-
munions, daily times of retirement, retreats, and the other
different helps to spiritual progress for the voluntary use
of which opportunity is now, as a rule, given in our
theological colleges. The exigencies of foreign work may
in after years cut them off for a time from some of these
blessings as, for instance, from Holy Communion ; but if
it be so, they will carry with them the desires and habits
which the holy practice of their years of training will have
implanted in them, and that sense of the Divine Presence
which regulated practice so fosters that it abides, even
when the practice itself must for a time be laid aside.
Of a piece with this was the great value which Bicker-
steth had learnt to set on intercessory prayer. He writes :
The Book of Prayers published by the S.P.G. is in
daily use at our Mission House at three o'clock in the
afternoon, which, allowing for the difference of time
between India and England, associates us with you in
common supplication about the same hour. 1
This conviction of the duty and privilege of regular
and detailed intercession only deepened as years went
on, so that during his episcopate of Japan, and right on to
the last week of his life, not a day passed without his
bringing before God the needs of each mission station in
1 From a paper issued in Cambridge it appears that a short service had
been started at 9.30 P.M. on the first Saturday in each month at the Mission
House in Jesus Lane, Cambridge, ' as Mr. Bickersteth had asked that those
interested in the mission would specially remember it in prayer that day,'
bc>ing that on which the monthly service for English-speaking workers was
held in Delhi.
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 83
his diocese and its workers. No matter where he was at
the hour assigned to that duty (generally about 2 P.M.)
in crowded railway train or busy steamer, or in the quiet of
his study the closed eyes and recollectedness of bearing
would tell those who knew him best that the Bishop had
entered the presence of God bearing his people on his heart.
The following letter touches on these points.
Delhi : November 8, 1878.
My dear Sam, You are the most excellent of fellows
in writing me letters. I quite look forward to getting them,
and I am the worst of replyers, if such a word there be.
But I must send you a line to-day, even though Hunter is
away at Kurnal, and I have both churches (station and
mission) to preach in on Sunday, which meaneth three
sermons.
Before I forget it, about the Highgate boys. I'll try
and send them a letter for their magazine in December.
I have already sent to the printer a letter to Mr. Bullock
of the S.P.G., of which I will send copies home as soon as
it is ready, and you can send them I am afraid it is not
much of an epistle to Wordsworth, Holland, Dalton, &c.,
with my love.
An article I have written on ' retreats ' in the ' Indian
Christian Intelligencer' is, I hope, better worth perusing.
It ought to have been out now, but the MS. was mislaid,
and it will appear in the December number.
If I feel one thing more strongly than another about
this missionary work, after a year's thought and work
(more work than thought though), it is that the ' Wilkinson '
idea of missions is the right one. I call it the ' Wilkinson
idea ' because I got it most, and realised it most, in talking
to him. I mean that the results, as far as results are
granted, will be in proportion, generally speaking, to the
spirituality of the agents. Increase your central fire ; i.e.
be more filled with the Spirit, have a stronger hold on
verities, live more in the sense of the unseen, realise (like
Brother Lawrence) the overshadowing Presence, let Christ
dwell in our hearts Bia rrfs tria-rsajs (taking those words in
their mystery and fulness and blessedness), crush down
selfishness and sin, and then through perhaps only two or
84 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
three such agents more good might be done in a short while
than by fifty ordinary Christians. Our present Bishop ' goes
towards the ideal ; none, of course, attain it, as its measure
is ' the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ ' but
he exemplifies to me to some extent the idea one can form
and dimly strive after. Such men breathe a power around
them ; they are not, like your Evangelistic preachers, always
aiming at conversions in the narrower sense of the term ;
but still their whole life tends to convert people, whether
dead Christians or inquiring heathens. They are not always
talking about the Cross, but yet they lead men to it and,
too, induce them to take it up ; they deal with all truths
as they come across their path, thankful to set men right
on any point, or to plant any seed which may grow and
fructify.
What a wonderful thing is that peace which God can
give to those who ' walk in the light.' Emphatically it is
a gift : it is no use striving after it directly : aim more
singly at God's glory, strive to be purer, holier, better,
and God gives it as a reward which indeed passeth under-
standing.
There is evening church bell, so I must hasten on.
Later, after church. Some business turned up just before
church, so I had to stop ; but I have given up my ' basti '
service to-night to our schoolmaster, so that I may get
through some letters. One of the trials of this life is the
multiplicity of small things : so likely are they to disturb
that peace I was speaking of if one lets them e.g. since I
began to write, a letter from a young lady to say she would
be glad if I would send her a cheque for travelling expenses
(I have just engaged her as Zenana teacher) ; the names
of my class to be called over ; some money to be sent to
Hunter in the district ; a man to be talked to who wanted a
tip and didn't get it ; a letter about a house which has just
turned up and might suit our girls' school, and I dare say
some other matters which I now forget. There is a fine
passage in chap. iii. of the ' Imitation ' (wrongly translated
in the English version, the ' ones ' should all have capital
O's) about the unity of work. It isn't so easy to see that each
of the manifold trifles tends towards the development of
' the kingdom of God,' but it is plain that none of them
'I.e. Bishop Thomas Valpy French, of Lahore.
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 85
could be omitted without detriment to that little part of the
kingdom where each little trifle arises.
Ever your most affectionate Brother,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
A new feature of the first year's work in Delhi was the
establishment in St. Stephen's Church of a monthly
devotional service for English-speaking workers, consist-
ing of a lesson, two hymns, a missionary litany, and an
address.
Among the subjects which have occupied us
hitherto, (he writes) have been ' Times of Retirement '
' United Action,' ' Prayer,' ' Holy Communion,' &c.
This and the daily use of a series of special collects have
been found by all real helps towards realising the oneness
of our work and its dependence on the one Source of life
and strength.
Out of this monthly service sprang daily morning
prayer and a Thursday celebration of Holy Communion
for English-speaking mission workers.
Even in itself (Bickersteth writes in 1879) there is, I
think, real use in the bell of a Christian church being heard
twice a day in a city where the cry of the muezzin is never
omitted from the platform of a hundred mosques.
And in 1882 he writes:
Hindus consider us a very irreligious people, and
it has been thought that one reason of the fewness and
the want of stedfastness in Muhammadan converts is to
be found in the inadequacy of the provision for public
devotion in the Church. Muhammad knew what he was
about when he established the five obligatory hours of
prayer, besides three others for the specially religious.
A weekly devotional meeting for catechists and native
Christian masters was started in October 1878, and the
Bishop of Lahore (Dr. French), who was then on a visit to
86 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
the mission, conducted the first of these. Bickersteth
writes that 'it will be calculated to give a tone to the
week's work,' and it was this higher and more spiritual
tone on which he set an ever-increasing value as he saw
more of missionary success and missionary failure. He
also circulated a special subject for prayer every month in
the mission, to secure that prayer should be offered with
the understanding as well as with the spirit.
The need of pastoral and devotional books, which
hitherto had been infrequently used in Delhi, was much
felt. Bickersteth often alludes to it, and regrets that the
catechists had no such book to use on their way to their
work and again on their return. It is characteristic of
him that on his arrival in Delhi his first present to each
of the native catechists had been a copy of St. Augustine's
' Confessions ' 'a book [he writes] which has been recently
translated into Urdu, and which seems wonderfully to
commend itself to the native mind.' l
But ' a man's praying power is not a mere arbitrary
possession.' He cannot command it when he will. It is
the result of the growth, generally of the slow growth, of
his spiritual character, the development of a faith that
has long communed with God. No account of the inner
life of the Cambridge Mission would be complete without
some reference to the private habits and personal religion
of the first head of the mission. In God's providence he
was sent to Delhi not only to plant the Cambridge Mission
but also to purge the mission in Delhi of many weak
adherents to the Christian Church, and to raise the standard
of personal holiness among the Christian converts as well
1 It may here be noted that a book of historical sketches, entitled The
Women of Christendom (published by the S.P.C.K.), was written at his
request by his friend, the late Mrs. Charles, author of The Chronicles of the
Schonberg Cotta Family, for use in Zenana work.
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 87
as among the European workers. This result could never
have been attained had it not been for his own strenuous
strivings after holiness. He was not a man who kept a
devotional diary in which he poured out his soul almost
with the freedom and fulness with which a man talks to his
friend. But he began a habit (February 1 876) a year before
he left England, which he seems never to have intermitted
during his sojourn at Delhi and for years afterwards, of
noting down each occasion on which he received Holy
Communion the place, date, and the special subject of
prayer, thanksgiving, or intercession then uppermost in his
mind. They are noted with the utmost brevity, but they
supply a continuous comment on his life of spiritual
endeavour, and few, if any, of the chief interests of his work
fail to find a place in these entries as the years roll on.
In giving a few examples as a key to some of the self-
discipline and training of the future Missionary Bishop, it
must be understood that he himself would have been the
first to deprecate their being regarded as other than
the ordinary practice in the life of a growing Christian.
Often these eucharistic resolutions (whether made in
Pembroke Chapel or in the cities and villages of Northern
India) were of the simplest, as :
To look day by day for a happy sense of the Presence
of Christ ;
Or,
For an immediate reference and obedience to Him
such as was that of the disciples to the Son of Man in the
days of His ministry.
Or,
For early rising [which for long was a difficulty to him,
but for which he continuously strove until he acquired
the habit].
Lent was always observed with special attention, care
being taken at Easter to note down with frank fidelity
88 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
success or failure, progress or defeat. Thus after his first
Lent in India he notes on Easter Day (April 21, 1878):
My Lenten Rule has been much broken, partly by my
own want of zeal, partly by Murray's illness and the great
rush of work which came in on me on Winter's departure.
Then follows reference to the points of fasting and
self-denial, which he had set himself to observe, with the
characteristic touch of common-sense : ' Remember that
any fasting which weakened would be wrong in this
country,' and then follow these resolutions :
A. During this hot weather it is essential for me to rise
and go to bed at such hours as at all cost to obtain time
for prayer.
B. To daily pray amid the great responsibilities of my
office for very special grace and power, and for
C. Calmness and the sense of Christ's Presence amid a
multitude of little things, and
D. That my sense of responsibility as a minister of the
Church may not be weakened by isolation or residence
among heathen.
At times he would take one main subject for a whole
year, and e.g. try to practise humility in various ways
throughout that time. So he would resolve :
Not to read for the sake of having read.
Not to speak for effect in the presence of superiors or
inferiors.
Not to love authority for its own sake.
To care for truth, not supremacy in argument.
To guard against over-sensitiveness, probably due to
pride (think of Christ's humility).
For guidance on the subject of confession.
Or he would seek for a ' love of souls born of love to
God,' and would pray that he might ' maintain an intense
desire for the conversion and helping of souls,' and that he
might ' let nothing interfere with the actual effort to draw
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 89
souls to God, or nearer to God.' At this time he had
been much impressed with the burning love of the Rev.
R. Bateman, C.M.S. missionary at Narowal, of whom in
after years he loved to speak as 'the apostle of the
Punjab.'
At another time he took a year of ' seeking God's glory
because I love Him, and progressively as I love Him more
so overcoming (i) passion ; (2) self-seeking and selfish-
ness, specially in unreadiness to give up plans ; (3) unreadi-
ness to meet others.'
Sometimes he would concentrate his thoughts on inter-
cession, and the names of his fellow-workers (Carlyon,
Murray, Lefroy, Allnutt, R. R. Winter) constantly recur
in this way.
Nor did he omit thanksgiving e.g. ' because his midday
and pre-Communion meditation had been blessed,' ' because
he had been able to control his thoughts at the time of
consecration,' or ' for the experience of a deeper reverence
at the time of reception of the Holy Eucharist,' or ' because
of some glimpses of His Presence.'
It will be understood that these resolutions, which I
have here necessarily strung together, were used by him
singly, and that this watchful soldier of the Cross let his
whole soul go out, now to one point and now to another,
in which he sought a closer likeness to his Lord. Though
he framed for himself, and used at intervals, a carefully
constructed scheme of self-examination based on his
ordination vows, yet he never practised and never advised
the indiscriminate use of a long list of questions which tend
either to depress or to deceive the questioner. Those
who, in India or elsewhere, have attended retreats and quiet
days conducted by Edward Bickersteth have borne witness
to the power of his addresses, not only as uplifting, but as
most practical, and his spiritual counsels to others could
90 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
never have been so thorough, so searching, or so stimulat-
ing had they not been the reflection of his own spiritual
life.
Further proof of Bickersteth's sense of the great impor-
tance of an ordered devotional life is given in a paper on
' System in Private Prayer ' which he read on his return
from India in the rooms of his friend, the Rev. Heriz
Smith, Fellow of Pembroke College. After anticipating
' the objections often brought in perfect good faith against
method in devotion, on the ground that though order and
form were necessary for public worship, yet nowhere is a
method less needed, or perhaps more out of place, than in the
access of a soul to God, and in its personal and private
approach to Him, he acknowledged that anything which
could interfere with the sense of filial confidence towards God
on the part of the suppliant must be opposed to the first
principles of our Lord's teaching, and he wholly refused to
admit as valid a priori objections to a systematised religion.
Taking the seventeenth century as his example a century
which has not yet been adequately appreciated, as it was
the century of Bacon, Descartes, and Leibnitz in philosophy,
of Harvey, Newton, and Halley in natural science, and in
religion of the Oratorians, Port Royalists, and Quietists
with Fenelon in France ; of Spener and the Pietists in
Germany ; of Molinos in Italy ; and of the school of
Bishop Andrewes, the Puritans, and the Cambridge Platonists
in England he went on to cite the example of Bishop
Andrewes (once Master of his own college) a man great
alike as a scholar, a preacher, an administrator, and a
linguist of Nicholas Ferrar, of George Herbert, of Bishop
Cosin, as evidence of the very partial application of such
objections. He then enumerated the positive advantages
which had led men of great spiritual discernment to the
adoption of system in prayer and the other parts of
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 91
devotion. Among these were : (i) the maintenance of due
comprehensiveness and variety in prayer ; (2) the readiest
help against wandering thoughts ; (3) security for terse
and simple language, such as becomes creatures in the
presence of a Creator, servants before a Lord, sinners before
a Judge ; (4) the means of bringing into use the treasures
of the past.' In conclusion he said :
We have had a great deal of thinking done for us, and
this is no less true of devotion than of philosophy. It is
not possible to believe that God can have so endowed the
Church of later days with the bequests of the past, and at
the same time have meant them to lie idle and infructuous
on the shelves of libraries, instead of being, in proportion
to their power and excellence, still used as the vehicle of
prayer and intercession.
In accordance with this was Bickersteth's frequent
advice to use at the time of private devotion, first, ' a
book of prayers by some approved author or collector,
reverent, sober, and full the gain being great if such a
book was interleaved and secondly, a MS. book in which
each missionary should arrange and collect for himself such
prayers as he valued.'
The testimony of Dr. Phillips Brooks (afterwards Bishop
of Massachusetts) on this point is striking. Speaking in
1885 at the College Hall, Westminster, he thus referred to
his visit nearly three years previously to the Cambridge
Mission, Delhi :
I was struck by the consecration of the missionaries
to their work, and by their sincere piety. I shall never
forget those simple noonday services in the little mission
chapel, in which they consecrate themselves and their
work to God. I have been present at no services which
left upon my mind a more profound impression.
Enough has been said to prove the spirit in which the
first Head of the Cambridge Mission girded himself for
92 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
the work, and it is time to try and trace the results of the
devotional system thus definitely adopted and diligently
maintained.
To it may be attributed certain marked features of the
mission : (a) its definite discipline, (b) its clear and dogmatic
presentation of the Christian faith, and (c) the singular har-
mony which knit together the brotherhood, and which has
characterised the community from the first day until now.
(a) Discipline. It will be remembered that Bickersteth
was called upon within two or three months of his arrival
to take over the supervision of the complex machinery of the
whole mission at Delhi. While he found much to admire,
he found also some things to criticise, and in his judgment
there was need of greater firmness in the administration of
discipline.
During the few years preceding the establishment of
the Cambridge Mission large numbers of the Chamars or
shoe-makers had been baptised by Mr. Winter, sometimes,
as Bickersteth was led to think, upon insufficient proof of
faith and repentance. Shortly after his arrival he noted
in his Diary (January 1878) :
In the evening after service we were surprised by a party
of 1 1 people (7 men and 4 boys) coming in from , all
wishing for baptism. Mr. \Vinter explained to them the
seriousness of the step. They are to stay the night.
The next day he adds :
The eleven Christians were baptised this evening.
They just know the elements of Christianity, and had an
earnest desire for baptism. Is this quicker than St. Paul
and the jailer ?
In his first formal letter to Mr. Bullock (October 1878)
we find him uttering a warning note :
Most of the Christians are as yet very poor and very
ignorant, understanding but little of the step they have
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 93
taken, but they have at least been brought under the influ-
ence of a new and higher life. It is true one sometimes
reads almost in despair St. Paul's descriptions of his recent
converts in such passages as I Thessalonians i. ; but never-
theless it would be faithless not to thank God for what we
have, and to pray, work, and look for both their social and
spiritual advancement.
In the following February (1879) Bickersteth took
advantage of the annual church meeting, consisting of
mission agents and members of the ' Panchyats,' or local
councils, to bring up for discussion the desirability of a
service of admission for catechumens. He writes :
All agreed as to the desirability in many cases of admit-
ting catechumens by a regular service in church ; with the
less educated especially, who require a longer preparation,
it would prove of very great service. . . . Special cases, of
course, might occur in which baptism could not be delayed.
The plan was tried, and proved so beneficial that in a
letter to Dr. Westcott, written two and a-half years later,
Bickersteth was able to say :
Besides this, after full discussion with Mr. Winter and
our native brethren in the missionary council, some rules
of discipline have been laid down. These relate mainly to
two points, the instruction of candidates for baptism and
admission to the Holy Communion. With regard to the
instruction of candidates we have adopted the plan of a
catechumens' class, into which all candidates are admitted
by a short service. As regards the difficult point of admis-
sion to and exclusion from Holy Communion, the best
criterion seemed to be attendance at the ordinary services.
By the admirable arrangement of small school-houses and
chapels which Mr. Winter has established in various parts of
the city these services are brought close to their very doors.
Great negligence in attending them is therefore particularly
culpable, and seems to warrant exclusion from the higher
ordinance. The number of baptisms and communicants
on the system is at present very small. Perhaps this is
for a while not greatly to be regretted. Among a class so
94 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
degraded and yet so comparatively unprejudiced rapid
advance may I think be looked for, when once a few
persons alike well instructed and devoted are leading the
way.
On Mr. Winter's return from his furlough in England
(December 1879), he was at first inclined sharply to differ
from the views taken on this matter of discipline by the
younger man who had acted as his locum tenens, but
eventually he himself came to the same conclusion. This
change of mind resulted in a change of policy, which three
years later bore fruit in a general gathering of the converts
to Delhi, where steps were taken to test both their creed
and conduct. A picturesque meeting, lighted by the fitful
gleam of torches and prolonged far into the night, resulted
in a diminution of the number of converts but in a
strengthening of the morale of the mission. Although this
event took place a few months after Bickersteth's return to
England on sick leave, yet it was the result of the more
searching standard by which he tested missionary work.
(#) Purity of doctrine. The same spiritual insight led
him from the first to see the inherent weakness of teaching
Christianity through those whose grasp on its fundamental
doctrines was feeble.
A mind less trained to meditate on eternal truth
might have lost sight of principles under the superincum-
bent weight of daily details loudly calling for immediate
attention ; but devotional feeling, by teaching the soul to
linger in the presence of its Lord, teaches Christians ' not
only to talk with Him face to face as a man speaketh with
his friend, but also as brethren of the only Son to seek and
embrace the faith in full liberty of the Spirit.' :
This led Bickersteth from the first to be keenly
sensitive to any dimness of apprehension in the con-
' II. T. Liddon, The Priest in his Inner Life, p. 38.
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 95
verts as to the Divine claims, and to set great store upon
methods calculated to help them to know God and His
Son Jesus Christ.
He wrote home (1878) :
A greater efficiency combined with a raised spiritual
tone in our teachers, a truer and more vivid sense of the
blessings of which they have been made heirs, and a
stronger desire to make others partakers with themselves,
are perhaps even more to be desired at present in our
mission than an increase of converts.
Again :
An improvement may, I hope, shortly be possible
to our present practice, that is a preachers' class, where
subjects may be carefully prepared and digested before-
hand. Our native brethren experience no such difficulty
as Englishmen often would in filling half an hour with
talk on a religious topic. But too often it happens that
while each sentence of the sermon which is delivered
is sufficiently excellent, the sermon as a whole is too
discursive to leave any lasting impression. A class in
which the subject will be talked out with such helps as
books may supply may, I hope, partly correct this.
Again, later (1881):
Their danger is to be content with a minimum of reading,
while constantly engaged in preaching and teaching.
These extracts are sufficient to prove how keenly he
was alive to the prime necessity of teaching the teachers,
if they were to become weapons meet for the Master's use.
He was well aware that the errors of teachers become the
teachers of error, if we may revise Bishop Beveridge's
aphorism.
This view of Edward Bickersteth's spiritual influence
on the mission is confirmed by the recollections of the Rev
S. S. Allnutt, who writes to me (October 20, 1898) :
p5 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
He was wholly right in his judgment as to the
spiritual condition of the converts, and his spiritual instinct
had discerned what was lacking, ' My people have perished
from lack of knowledge.' It was to supply this that was
the most crying need at first, and so he was led to set
about introducing measures whereby the teachers should
themselves be instructed and their standard of Christian
life raised. What Pere Gratry calls in his life of Pere
Perreyve, ' Organisation de la Vie,' was to all intents and
purposes an unknown factor in the otherwise complete
organisation of the mission. The book I mention was
o
a favourite one of E. B.'s, and he gave it me in 1875 on
my ordination as Priest.
The following letter and extract from a speech show
how fully he believed the Church of England to be called
of God to maintain and hand on this purity of doctrine.
Cambridge Mission, Delhi :
3rd Sunday after Trinity, May 1881.
My dear Sam, I have two letters of yours unan-
swered. Thanks much for them. And, what is more,
time is getting on, and your ordination by the time this
reaches you will be hard at hand ; so, contrary to custom,
I must send you a Sunday line.
I have a good deal on hand just now : a lecture
Wednesday week in Urdu on ' The Jewish Expectation
of a Messiah at the Christian Era.' This is the main
subject There will be some comparison, also, of the
vaguer Gentile hope. This is to be given to a class of
Hindu and Mahomedan masters. I rather think of
writing a little set of lectures in this line : such as
' Heathenism at the Christian Era,' ' The Jewish Sects,'
' How Christ fulfilled the Expectation of the Jews,' &c.
This indirect but, perhaps, not less forcible line of argu-
ment stirs less opposition and has perhaps more weight.
Then I have two sermons in thought : one on ' The
Church' for native Christians, its gradual rise, and the
folly of supposing they can commence building de novo,
and the advantages they gain from being heirs of the
struggles and victories of the past ; and then an ordination
sermon for Trinity Sunday at Amballa. I am glad I shall
be at an ordination service that day. You partly sug-
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 97
gested me a subject. I am going to take the combination
of St. Paul's two great phrases, Xpio-Tos vjrsp and Xpicrroy
h. What you wrote so truly about an historical creed
seems to me to be summed up in these two phrases. Be-
sides, it seems to me that their combination is really that
which we are asked for 'a Gospel for the nineteenth
century.' Speaking generally, Reformation theology and
the modern Evangelical school have laid stress on the virep,
and the Fathers and the modern High Churchmen on the
sv, and just as Dorner has shown in another great subject
that the Godhead of Christ was mainly insisted on till
century XVI. and His manhood after that century, so, I
should say, the work of the nineteenth is to combine
the two teachings. A new Gospel cannot be anything
srspos, or it will fail and come under St. Paul's malison
(Gal. i.) ; but it may be a far more harmonious setting
forth of the old truths in their connection, and not merely
in their distinctness, and in proportion as it is so it will
attract men and satisfy real soul needs. . . .
. . . How thankful we ought to be for this dear old
English Church, and to be allowed to work in her ! With
faults patent enough (especially of organisation) I believe
she goes nearer to the (unattained) ideal of a body which
should teach revealed truth in its manifoldness and har-
mony than any Christian society has done since the first age
(and they probably taught without, not through, formularies).
And I fancy one of the first delights you will find in
ministerial work will be that of finding your daily occupa-
tion to be the assimilation of revealed truth in order to
the dispensing of it. ' Confirma et sanctifica me in veritate,
Sermo tuus est veritas.' May this, dearest brother, indeed
be true of you, and may you all through your life have the
joy of seeing Christ's truth, ministered by you, the means
of spreading the Christ life among your people. Every
past struggle and victory will assuredly help towards this.
I am sending you 5/. to buy books with. Get such as will
be useful for your work ; especially commentaries, histories,
and books on doctrine and sermons not that 5/. will go
far in so many lines !
God bless and keep you, and make you a blessing
prays ever
Your affectionate Brother,
BlCKERSTETH.
H
98 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Speaking at the Church Congress at Portsmouth, 1885,
he said :
The second suggestion I have to make is in connection
with what I may call the liberty which would be given to
native Churches in India. No doubt our primary duty is
to hand over to them the fulness of the Catholic faith, and
of the Church's organisation. But it is not necessary to
hand over to them anything that is distinctly western. At
the last Pan-Anglican Conference (1878) a resolution, I
think, was passed with reference to the translation of the
Prayer Book into other languages. I venture with great
humility to suggest to your lordships that you should
consider at some future meeting what is the minimum of
conformity which will be required in future between
Oriental Churches and our own Church. I have noticed
in an ecclesiastical paper a report (I do not know whether
correct or not) that the Episcopal Church of America has
announced that it is willing to take into communion with
itself any body of Christians that retains the Episcopal
form of Government, the Holy Scriptures, the Creeds, and
duly consecrated and administered Sacraments. May I
suggest that it may be possible that, in future, we may
receive into communion with our own Church in England
any bodies of Christians who in these four points are at
one with ourselves ? As has been already mentioned, there
are a large number of Christians not belonging to our
communion scattered throughout the length and breadth
of India, but they all look up with reverence to the
English Church. If we of the English Church have those
advantages together which other communities possess
separately namely, an orthodox faith, an unbroken past,
and individual liberty it is our duty to hand these advan-
tages to others ; but as regards the form in which we our-
selves have them, we need not go further than ask them to
receive from us the Divine Word, and the Creeds and the
Church's Ministry and Sacraments, as we have them our-
selves. If the suggestions I make could be carried out, I
think we should have done something towards the develop-
ment of the Church in India.
(c) Spirit of brotherliness. With regard to the harmony
which knit together the Cambridge men into one brother-
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 99
hood, no testimony can be more valuable than that of
the Rev. G. A. Lefroy. Mr. Lefroy was chosen after an
interval to be second Head of the mission, a position
which he has only resigned on his call to be the third
Bishop of Lahore. In a letter to me (dated September
1898) which he sent with his recollections he wrote :
I feel so utterly unable to reproduce on paper any sort
of picture of what he really was to us. You know, I think,
something of what he was to me more than any other
individual, he has been the inspiring example of my life.
Yet we were only together two and a-half years, and that
was fifteen years ago. During that time I was the junior
member of the mission, and was not nearly so much in his
counsels as, e.g. Carlyon and Allnutt
Frequent visitors to the mission at Delhi have recorded
the impression, made upon all of them alike, that those living
there in community were indeed living together as brothers.
Thus the idea of fellowship, emphasised in the first syllable
of the three Greek words placed by Bickersteth at the head
of his paper before the Church Society, 1 proved to be no
standard impossible of attainment, but the inspiration of
their daily life.
From the Rev. G. A. Lefroy
My recollections of contact at Cambridge with Edward
Bickersteth, before the mission started for Delhi, are very
slight indeed. I remember a walk in the Botanical Gardens
shortly after I had, in consequence of a sermon preached
by Dr. Lightfoot in Great St. Mary's, asked to be accepted
as a member of the Brotherhood. One or two more similar
walks I know followed, and then I have a clear recollection
of a characteristically University gathering at which, the
full number of six who had been asked for to start the
mission having been completed, we inaugurated our under-
taking by a breakfast in Pembroke College in the rooms of
1 ffwarpaTiH-rai, ffvvfpyoi, ffv/jLiro\'trai. See Chapter II. p. 29.
H 2
100 BISHOP EDWARD fclCKERSTETII
our leader. And I have often thought that it was a marked
sign of the hand of our God upon us for good from the
first, that although of the six who so sat down to breakfast
in the spring of 1 877 only two were able to go out that
year, two more the next year, and the remaining two not
till the autumn of 1879, yet eventually, without a single
loss or withdrawal from any cause, the same six met in
December 1879 for breakfast and a truly 'common' life
in Delhi. Of the subjects of conversation in those first
walks I remember nothing, but I do know that the sense
of enthusiasm and of keen, though restrained, energy which
so markedly characterised Bickersteth did not wholly fail
of their due effect upon me. In Delhi, while as quite the
youngest and most inexperienced member of the mission
I was unable to enter so thoroughly into the plans and
difficulties of our Head as the elder members, such as
Murray, Carlyon, and Allnutt, yet, on the other hand, just
because of my youth I was brought into specially close
contact with him of another kind, acting as a kind of curate
to him in several departments of our work, notably the
ministerial charge of Daryaganj, one of the most important
of the city districts, and also of Mehrowli, a principal out-
station lying some eleven miles to the south of Delhi.
After the lapse of more than fifteen years, handicapped
as I am by an abnormally weak memory, I am quite unable
to recall specific incidents illustrative of the relationship
so established, and of what it became to me, yet I do
know that in the quiet walks home, late on Sunday night,
from Daryaganj to our own house, a distance of about
two miles, along a road often bathed in the glorious Indian
moonlight, and running between the old Mogul fort of
Delhi on our right hand and the solemn and beautiful
Jama Musjid on the left, while further on we passed through
the historic Kashmir Gate, with its undying Mutiny
associations, ideals were suggested to me, and a force of
character and depth of piety brought home to me, which
in those first days of my ministerial life were of simply
priceless value, and to which I believe I owe more of
inspiration and strength for that life than to any other
individual influence outside the innermost circle of my own
home. The drives out to Mehrowli, too, were full of interest
and helpfulness, though that part of our work together is
more saddened in recollection by its frequent connection
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE IOI
with weakness or suffering on Bickersteth's part, for it was
often resorted to when overstrain of work or fever in Delhi
made some little change imperative. And how frequent
such occasions were I have realised more than I ever did
before by reading through, for the purpose of these notes, .
a diary I used to keep at that time. It is of the very
barest kind and scarcely suggestive of anything of interest
for my present purpose, but it is remarkable that out of a
large number of allusions to Bickersteth in it nearly half
consist of such remarks as ' E. B. very seedy,' ' bad night,'
' high fever,' ' headache,' or the like. In point of fact, there
is no doubt that almost from the first the intense summer
heat told unduly on a mind and body which was always
working at the highest possible point of energy and
intensity. I know that often) as we lay out on the roof at
night side by side, I would turn over in a sleep which,
though somewhat disturbed by the heat, had yet plenty of
restorative power in it, to find Bickersteth literally gasping
alongside of me, and quite unable to get to sleep at all.
Then two distinct experiences stand out in my mind
with special clearness the one my ordination to the
priesthood at Amballa, the other a walk deep into the
Himalayas from Simla which Bickersteth and I took in
the autumn of 1881.
For the ordination, on Trinity Sunday, June 12, in the
very greatest heat of a hot year, we stayed at the Chap-
lain's house. There were together for about four days
before the Sunday, Bishop French, that true father in God
to so many of us in the Punjab, Bickersteth, as examining
chaplain, another Englishman besides myself for Priest's
orders, and a native, still working with an unblemished
name and very high character in one of the C.M.S. stations
of the Punjab, also for Priest's orders.
As in other cases so here, in my inability to recall
details I can only say that the whole time, the close
contact with, and the addresses of, the saintly Bishop, the
walks with Bickersteth, and his sermon at the ordination
itself, formed one of the most impressive experiences of my
life.
In our Himalayan walk we were naturally brought
into the closest and most continuous contact that I
enjoyed during that two years and three-quarters of life
together in India. Away from all the engrossing occupa-
102 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
tions and distractions of Delhi work, we were for nearly a
month practically quite alone together, scarcely meeting
another Englishman along the road, usually sleeping in
the same room, walking, talking, playing chess together.
Into this trip also, however, the experience of sickness
entered, as both on our outward and homeward march we
had to lie by for one or two days owing to slight attacks
of, as I believe, the very same trouble which at last took
him from us.
And from all these diverse experiences, while the
separate details which went to form them have passed from
my mind, a figure stands out of the clearest, most impres-
sive, most unforgettable personality possible. If I were to
try and single out special features of it which is difficult
to do I think I should give the first place to two piety
and energy.
All he did was, as we knew and recognised instinctively,
based on prayer and communion with God. His devotional
addresses were full of the deepest spiritual power. One ot
the most distinct contributions of all that he made to the
organisation of the work of the Delhi Mission was the
deepening in the native agents the sense of the supreme
need of earnest personal prayer and of systematic Bible
study for the efficient discharge of the very difficult work
to which they were called. Additional opportunities and
services for this end were afforded, while he regularly every
week had any catechist, or other agent with whom he was
in direct contact, to his own room for conversation and
prayer together. Far as we have fallen short of his
standard in this respect, I do yet hope and believe that
the principles which he instilled into us, and on which he
based the early life of our Brotherhood, have not been
lost.
And then there was his incessant energy of body and
mind. I always think of him as living at the highest
possible strain of all his powers. If he walked it was, even
in the middle of the hot weather, at a pace which few cared
to keep up with, at any rate without protests, uttered or
thought ; if he rode and this he frequently did, though it
always seemed to me as though he was not a true horseman
in the sense of enjoying the riding for its own sake, but
that he simply viewed it as a convenient and rapid means
of getting from place to place no grass grew under the
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE 103
pony's feet. So it was in his study of Urdu and Persian,
so it was in every single thing he took in hand. That this
intensity of disposition was, at any rate at that compara-
tively early part of his life, accompanied by some of the
defects which almost inevitably go with that type of
character cannot, I think, be doubted. There was at
times a tendency to impatience, and not infrequently the
worries and difficulties inseparable from a work and life
such as ours, and which on some occasions became very
grave indeed in connection with our position and work in
Delhi, told upon him in a way that he was, I am sure,
himself the first to regret.
But, on the other hand, the spirit of high enthusiasm,
the thoroughness, the devotion to work as also to play,
while he was at it the high aims, the wise, large-hearted
plans for their attainment, and the depth of personal holi-
ness and of striving after an ever closer and closer walk
with God, which were embodied in him, were both to the
mission as a whole and to each of us individually an
inspiration such as we can never forget, and have, especially
in conjunction with his peculiar position as the first Head
and one of the first founders of the mission, secured a quite
unique position in the annals of the Cambridge Mission to
the name of Edward Bickersteth.
G. A. LEFROY.
Cambridge Mission, Delhi : September 29, 1898.
St. Michael and All Angels.
The late Bishop Matthew, in writing to me in the
autumn of 1897, said that in Edward Bickersteth ' strength
and sweetness were blended in quite an unusual degree.'
A pathetic incident attaches to the following letter, as
it was penned a year later within a few days of his own
sudden death.
From the Right Rev. H. J. Mattkeiu, late Bishop of
Lahore
Bishopsbourne, Lahore :
October 22, 1898.
Dear Mr. Bickersteth, I have once more to apologise
for being behind time in sending this, but I have only just
104 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
returned from a visitation tour which has been more than
usually fatiguing. But I am afraid that I have been
dilatory on this account more than any other, that I have
become more and more alive to the want of materials which
would contribute anything of interest to your biography of
your brother. A careful search through my correspondence
failed to find any letters which would be of use. That is
not surprising, as Edward Bickersteth never wrote for the
sake of writing, and our work was not in any way connected,
mine being at that time entirely English work, while he was
studying and endeavouring to solve missionary problems.
Hence our intercourse was limited to the few visits
which he was enabled to pay to us at Simla, and which
were generally at a time when either he came to Simla
as examining chaplain to the Bishop (French) on duty, or
when compelled to suspend work from ill-health. I should
mention that your brother was very strict in his abstinence
from discussing matters in which there might be a difference
of opinion between himself and other members of the Delhi
Mission. And although there were questions of some im-
portance upon which there was not unanimity between the
representative of the old S.P.G. Mission and its Head and
the Cambridge men, yet in reference to these E. B. was
always very reserved. So that it comes to pass that,
greatly as I valued his friendship and enjoyed the oppor-
tunities of having his society, there is left little beyond the
recollection of his strong but gracious and gentle personality.
I had first seen him as long ago as 1875, when he was
assistant curate to the Rev. H. Sharpe at Hampstead and
I was taking charge, during my furlough, of an adjoining
parish. Since that time his ecclesiastical position had some-
what changed, and he had arrived at that via media which
is so admirably represented in his legacy to the ' Nippon
Sei Kokwai.' { The perusal of that book has reminded me of
many a conversation on the themes therein treated ; the
place of the sacraments in the Christian system, the relation
of confirmation to baptism, and the like. On these sub-
jects we were very much of one accord. When I was
obliged to leave India in 1885, after a long term of service
at Simla, it was the great desire of Bishop French that
1 I.e. 'Our Heritage in the Church,' being papers written for Divinity
Students, published by Sampson Low & Co.
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE IO5
your brother then holding the college living of Framling-
ham, and unable from considerations of health to return to
Delhi should come out, at least temporarily, as Chaplain
of Simla. The offer of the Bishopric of Japan came and
put an end to this scheme, but had not a higher call come,
in Simla he would have had a field for which he was in
many respects admirably suited. The congregation of
Christ Church, Simla, contains the heads of the Govern-
ment of India, both civil and military, and no single con-
gregation, either at home or in the dependencies of the
empire, represents such vast responsibilities of rule.
In the early spring of 1886 Mrs. Matthew and I had
the great pleasure of a visit from Edward Bickersteth at
Bologna when he was on his way to Japan after his conse-
cration. We had a day of sightseeing it was a Saturday
and on the Sunday he was to leave at 9 A.M. for Brindisi
to join the mail steamer. When he and I arrived at the
railway station it was to learn that the train would be two
hours late. During those two hours we paced the long
platform and had a most interesting talk. The principal
subject was the strength and weakness of the Evangelical
party to which few dealt more equal justice.
Once more I had a visit from him on his way from
Japan to England in 1893. He spared me a couple of
days of his short sojourn in India, and one of the chief
recollections of that visit is that he was in buoyant spirits,
and his looking into my library with a ' Come out for a
walk ' was like the summons of an undergraduate for a
'constitutional.' In 1896 he wrote suggesting that in the
following spring I should join him in Japan, and that we
should voyage together to the Lambeth Conference. That
delightful programme was not to be. He was driven
home by illness earlier than he had proposed to go, and I
was detained in my diocese by plague and scarcity. But
among the companions I have known I recall none whose
society was more stimulating or more edifying.
Believe me,
Yours sincerely,
HENRY J. LAHORE.
While at Delhi, as afterwards in Japan, Bickersteth
always tried to cultivate cordial relations with those of his
\
106 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
countrymen who were employed in the civil and military,
or in diplomatic and naval life. The following testimony
of a layman will thus add completeness to what is already
written.
Recollections of Colonel Gordon Young
Stockton House, Fleet, Hants.
Sept. 9, 1898.
Dear Mrs. Bickersteth, I am sorry to think that I
have not complied with your brother-in-law's request
that I should write a few recollections of Delhi days in
connection with the life of your dear husband, late Bishop
of South Tokyo.
This has not been from any unwillingness, but positively
from my sense of absolute inability from a literary point
of view, and in the absence of memoranda of any sort, to
write anything that should in the least help to convey to
others an idea of how his life at Delhi impressed those
who were outside the immediate sphere of his daily
work.
The beauty of his character is much better known
to you and to those of his own circle than to any others,
and the scope and earnestness of his work and his devotion
to it can only be told by those with whom he was associated
in it all.
I do not know if you know Delhi at all ; if so, you may
remember Ludlow Castle, which was my residence as
Commissioner from 1879 to 1883, with a break of ten
months' furlough. This house and the mission residence
were almost contiguous.
When I went to Delhi Mr. Bickersteth reigned as Head
of the Cambridge Mission there and was almost my nearest
neighbour. We soon became acquainted, and though he was
absorbed in the labours of evangelisation, controversy with
Muhammadan doctors of the law, supervision of schools,
and general administrative work of the mission, we were
sometimes able to persuade him to come to tea and a game
of tennis with us, which little piece of relaxation he seemed
greatly to enjoy.
He seemed almost a shadow in those days, so thin was
he ; but he had physical strength, upheld no doubt by his
THE DELHI MISSION THE LIFE IO/
high spirit, which enabled him to do more in the way of
walking and working than anyone would have given him
credit for possessing. However hot and oppressive the
night had been, the very earliest dawn saw him struggling
along towards the city, white umbrella in hand, for several
hours' work before breakfast with unfailing regularity and
this was only the beginning of what went on till nightfall.
The missionaries' residence being half or three-quarters of a
mile outside the city of Delhi while their work was chiefly
inside, although it was no doubt good as a matter of health,
yet added materially to the exhaustion all felt by nightfall,
owing to the constant running to and fro in the blazing
heat. Of all this, however, others will have given you the
fullest details.
It was a special privilege and delight to us when from
time to time he was prevailed on to preach to us at St.
James's Church ; at such times his face, and especially his
eyes, seemed literally illumined with a holy light, which
made it quite beautiful to regard. I can recall the look at
this moment.
His nature invited confidence, and the kindest hearing
and wisest counsel might always be relied on by those
who sought his advice.
He certainly had very great persuasive powers with his
opponents in religion amongst the Muhammadans of Delhi,
and had he stayed he would, I doubt not, have succeeded
to a large extent in affecting the attitude of many of the
moulvies towards Christianity. Lefroy, as you know, has
worthily followed his steps in this direction, and, I believe,
with marked results.
When my wife was in England and I a temporary
bachelor, I was a not infrequent guest at the Mission
House at the evening meal on Sunday, when the burden
and heat of the day were over. Very delightful were the
conversations which then ensued between your husband
and his friends Blackett, Lefroy, Allnutt, and others
among them a Mr. Maconochie, of the Civil Service, who
used to come in from a neighbouring district for the
day ; and it was interesting to remark the gentle way in
which Mr. Bickersteth's influence pervaded the whole
and elevated it
Though these few lines seem hardly worth sending
you, so bald and trite are they, yet I would not have you
108 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
think me to fail in love and veneration for the late dear
Bishop, and so they must go to you imperfect as they are.
Believe me, Yours truly,
G. GORDON YOUNG.
In concluding this chapter on the life, as distinct from
the work, the following touching letter from the native
Christians at Delhi will show how the influence of the life
outlasts the work, and in fact enables one who, as men say,
is dead, yet to speak.
From the Native Christians at Delhi
Delhi : August 20, 1897.
To the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of Exeter.
My Lord, I humbly beg to say that I write the
following lines on behalf of the native Christians of Delhi :
' We, the members of St. Stephen's Mission Church,
Delhi, were grieved to hear of the death of your dear son,
the Right Rev. Edward Bickersteth, Bishop in Japan.
He was at one time the life and soul of the Cambridge
Mission to Delhi, and we enjoyed the privilege of having
him with us and among us for about five years. His zeal
and earnestness in preaching Christ to our fellow country-
men and his love and kindness had endeared him to
us. Unfortunately, the climate of Delhi did not agree with
him, and he was obliged to leave us ; when we consoled
ourselves that, though he was taken away from us, yet he
was called to a higher sphere of Christian work for the
extension of the kingdom of Christ in Japan. Now that
he has gone behind the veil our sorrow is revived ; still,
faith and hope in Christ assure us that we shall meet him
again, never, never to part.
1 We heartily sympathise with you in your present
bereavement, believing firmly that God the Comforter will
comfort you, as well as those who now mourn for our once
beloved pastor, teacher, and friend.'
I am, my Lord,
Your most obedient servant,
JANKI NATH.
Head Master, St. Stephens High School, Delhi.
[Here follow the signatures of thirteen of the leading Christians.]
109
CHAPTER V
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN
' It is a much harder task to wait than to work, I fear, but perhaps in
God's eyes one may conduce as much as the other to the final end.' Letter
of the Rev. Edward Bickersteth to S. P. G. in reporting Mr. j\ fun-ay's illness
(1878).
IN September 1882 Edward Bickersteth landed in
England from his first missionary journey, and though he
thrice essayed to return to Delhi, the Spirit suffered him
not. When he again left England for the mission field,
three and a half years later, it was as Missionary Bishop in
Japan.
His return from Delhi was dictated wholly by reasons
of health, and, as has been said, he anticipated a very short
furlough of not more than three or four months. But the
disease of dysenteric fever, from which he eventually died,
had laid a deeper hold upon him than he or others knew.
His temperament led him never to spare himself, and we
find Bishop French writing to him as early as July 1878 :
' I am sorry to gather you are not thinking of a breath of
the hill air. If I have a house of sufficient size I must
write and beg you to run up to Simla, if even for eight or
ten days, to be revived and refreshed.' At this time
Bickersteth was bearing alone the burden of all the work
organised by Mr. and Mrs. Winter (S.P.G.), and which the
Cambridge Mission had taken over during Mr. Winter's
furlough. The strain of this single-handed work told upon
1 10 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
him, and it was then undoubtedly that the seeds of his
illness were sown. Later on, also, when itinerating with
Bishop French (a workman who was also wholly unable to
spare himself), he had a severe attack of fever. He first
tried the effect of residence at Simla, whence he wrote to
Mr. Lefroy :
The Priory, Simla : June 7, 1882.
My dear Lefroy, I am bowing with the best grace I
can muster to Ross's dictum, but I don't at all like it nor
believe it to be altogether necessary. However, a doctor's
order backed by all the injunctions of the people I know in
Delhi and here, and the Bishop's expressed wish seem to
leave no loophole, so I hope it is for the best. [After
asking for several books he continues :] You asked for a
prayer for Holy Communion. Here is one by Bishop
Moberly wholly in the words of the English Office. It
omits the ava/j,vr)<ri$ r rrpo dsov side of the service, otherwise
I like it. I have been round Jakko this morning on
Micks, who is in capital form, though, being shoeless, he
finds the stones a little awkward.
Ever your affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
But two months later the doctors were imperative that
he must return to England at once. There, like too many
other missionaries on furlough, he went about too much,
and simply transferred the scene of his labours from Delhi
and its environments to Cambridge, London, and other
parts of the country which he visited to enlist new recruits
or to awaken a sense of missionary responsibility. He was
able to write from Hampstead on March 22, 1883.
My dear Lefroy, . . . . Now for a happy piece of
information. My silence about men hitherto has been
because there has been nothing to tell since Haig l definitely
offered. At last Wright 2 has been able to make up his
mind, seeing his way clear. I heard of it only yesterday
morning. I believe we have in him one of the most
1 Rev. A. Haig. * Rev. J. W. T. Wright.
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN III
valuable men that will have been in India for some time.
He was the man selected for the work by both Dr. West-
cott and the master of Pembroke, though he has offered
quite spontaneously. As a great friend of Haig's alike at
school (Cheltenham) and college (Pembroke), and as both
now working as curates (St. Mary Abbot's, Kensington),
our new colleagues will have much in common. I have
eight sermons this week, so no more from your affectionate
brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
He went to Rome and Italy with three of his sisters
after Easter, and spent August and September at Pen-
maenmaur, whence he wrote to the Rev. S. S. Allnutt :
September 6, 1883.
My dear Allnutt, I have been seduced into reading
longer than I meant by a chapter of Huxley's ' Lay
Sermons.' It is my rule to read a book on natural science
or art each vacation, so I have taken to this. A good deal
of it is antiquated already by what has occurred since it
was written e.g. the advocacy of natural science education
in the Universities, &c. a good deal also of defence of his
science against clergy and theologians perhaps he might
think less necessary now than twenty years since. Some
paragraphs are wholly regrettable e.g. a section on the
' worship of the Unknown ' being the highest we can
attain and likely to produce the noblest sentiments ! and,
lastly there is a very great deal which to the mere t'Stwr^y
in natural science (why don't we talk about naturals ? it is
as good a word as mathema^y as far as formation goes
and much more exact and expressive) is suggestive and
helpful. ... I have been reading a good deal here
(between walks) of one kind and another. ' De la Con-
naissance de Dieu,' by Gratry, which a sister and I have
just finished, is extremely well worth the reading, and has
a good deal in it which may be useful, especially as to the
way of putting truth before unbelievers.
Rosmini's ' Five Wounds of the Church,' which
Liddon has just published, I have also read but am much
disappointed in, except in the chapter on clerical educa-
tion. Tulloch's ' Rational Christianity ' I have also
accomplished. The second volume is an account of the
112 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Cambridge Platonists. I told you that Dr. Hort suggested
them to me as a study. As a useful study for oneself I
have no doubt he was right. Their noble ' rational ' (in
the highest sense) method of theologising is a model, but
I doubt if there will be very much in them which will be
directly useful for Indian work less than in the great
Fathers. By the bye, Professor Wace (the editor of the
dictionary), with whom I went up Camedd Llewellyn,
told me that Westcott's article on Origen is the most
wonderful production, a book in itself, and most sug-
gestive and thorough. It is to appear in the fourth
volume. Also, I am reading as a ' Sunday book ' Fair-
bairn's ' Studies in the Life of Christ ' a book you will
enjoy for its suggestiveness. The author is a Presbyterian
not the same man that wrote the ' Typology ' a younger
and more modern-minded man, so much so that there is
very much in his book that I dislike.
I have just accomplished also 'John Inglesant,' 'The
Monastery,' and ' Abbot ' (nearly), besides Neander's ' Life
of St. Bernard ' ; so I have not been wholly given to oriental
studies these few weeks.
Your ever affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
But the effect of his over-activity was too apparent
when, in the autumn of 1883, he had actually taken his
passage for his return to Delhi. The day had been fixed
(October 22) for Bishop Lightfoot of Durham to preach
the farewell sermon for himself and the two new mission-
aries (the Rev. A. Haig and the Rev. J. W. T. Wright)
who were to accompany him. On the eve of departure,
however, he was suddenly prostrated by a severe return of
his illness. He explained the situation in the following
letter to Mr. Carlyon :
Christ Church Vicarage, Hampstead :
October 19, 1883.
My dear Carlyon, This letter is a sad one for me to
write, and I know it will be a sad one for you to receive.
To tell you the cause at once, owing to an attack of fever
which came on without expectation or notice last Saturday,
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 113
the doctors have ordered me another year in Europe, and
at Westcott's express wish, all but command, I have been
obliged to consent.
To give you more particulars. I think I told you,
writing on Friday last, that my head was very dizzy.
However, I anticipated no evil, and started Saturday
morning for Cambridge for an executive committee.
I walked up to my brother's rooms (a Pembroke freshman)
in Tennis Court Road, and when I was half-way there, to my
surprise I got all the symptoms of the old ague, which I
had had no attack of since last January. However, there
was nothing for it, and I got on to our committee, which
lasted two hours, during the whole of which I was most
wretched. . . . On Sunday the fit had gone, and I was able to
get through though it didn't do me much good the work
I had arranged. Westcott, dear loving man, pursued me by
two letters, one urging me on his own account to see doctors,
and another on behalf of a number of the committee, whom
he had taken the trouble to see. So perforce I went. . . .
On Tuesday I saw Dr. Charles, till 1880 the first man
at Calcutta and now an Honorary Physician to the Queen,
so I suppose there could be no higher authority. He
examined me thoroughly, and, though he said there was
nothing organically wrong, positively forbad my return,
like Gowers, for a year. His reasons were that I am still
very liable to fever and wholly anaemic, so that (he said) 1
should not have a chance of getting through the rains,
either in the hills or plains, without breaking down. He
wants me to spend all the winter, doing only four hours a
day work, in Italy and the Riviera, and then next summer
(except two months) in Wales and Scotland. Then, and
this is the only good part of it, he says I shall be up to
another five or six years in India. Less than two winters,
he thought, never really eradicated fever, if it had at all
badly taken hold of one.
Well, it seemed utterly sad, and to break up all one's
plans and ideas. However, after having agreed to go and
see the doctors, and my father and Westcott being so very
decided that I ought to obey what they said, there did not
seem a loophole of escape for this year. Another year
away from Delhi and a year's practical idleness are a
sufficiently unwelcome prospect ; and the Providence which
assigned it, just as I seemed so very much better in health
114 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
and was all prepared to start, is certainly very inexplicable ;
one can only believe if grace be given for it that the reason
and result will be seen hereafter. It is so sad to me to
think of not seeing you all for so long, and also to feel
that my work is burdening other shoulders, which have
more than enough of their own ; but I must look forward
to next year, and you will too.
My plans are to leave this on the 3Oth of this month
get to Bordighera in about a fortnight move about the
Riviera places (Cannes, Mentone, Sec.) till February, and
then go on to Rome. A sister goes with me, and another
will join me later.
Your affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
While to Mr. Allnutt he wrote a week later as follows :
Christ Church Vicarage, Hampstead :
October 26, 1883.
My dear Allnutt, . . . The service of farewell for
Wright and Haig on Monday was very well attended, and
all, except that the Bishop had a very husky voice, went
well. The sermon was striking, though not equal to ' the
Father of Missionaries.' You will see the last half in
the ' Guardian ' of next week. The first part was on the
phenomenon of the vitality of so small and insignificant a
nation as Israel among the great empires of the past.
There was also a striking parallel, quite new to me, between
the revivals which at times now take place of false systems
under the influence of Christianity and the revival which
took place of the old heathenism between the time of
Pliny's letter and that of Antoninus Pius. . . .
Fare thee well in the name of the Lord. Alas that I
am not to see you for so long. I have the kindest and
most loving letters from everyone but it is a sad dis-
appointment, which I feel more daily.
Your very affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDW. BICKERSTETH.
This reluctance to give up even temporarily his work
at Delhi will be seen to be a proof of his characteristic
tenacity of purpose, especially in the light of a letter written
three months before to Mr. Lefroy. Writing on St. James's
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 11$
Day, 1883, after referring to matters then being debated
between the S.P.G. and the Cambridge Mission, he said :
Now, lastly, as to myself. I strictly meant what I said
several mails since that no plan whatever should be made
to hinge on me for some time to come. When I came
home I went to a London physician (Dr. Gowers), an
uncommonly able fellow, who said in effect : ' You have
been very ill indeed ; I can cure you this time, but if you
get as ill a second time you will not recover.' Practically,
I consider that he has kept his word as to curing me through
God's mercy ; though not well, I am very much better.
I have been to him several times, and he is reconciled
to my returning to India. This being so, I propose to
return to Delhi in October and not elsewhere. If I fail
and get serious fever again I should probably try to start
some hill mission work, or to carry on literary work in the
hills for the rest of the year ; but in this case it would be
right that someone else be appointed Head of the Cambridge
Mission. . . .
Murray, Maitland, Haig, and Wright all meet here
to-morrow. Christmas together, God willing, in Delhi.
The truth is that neither then nor later in Japan did he
know when he was beaten, and so often did his excellent
constitution and the buoyancy of his temperament respond
to the calls made upon them by his faith in God and the
fervour of his missionary zeal, that his power of recovery
may well have seemed to himself well-nigh inexhaustible.
But although the head of the mission was thus obliged
to direct its affairs from a distance for yet another twelve-
month, there were one or two matters which he could
handle all the better for being accessible to Cambridge and
to London. Notably was this the case with regard to (i)
the permanent relationship of the Cambridge Mission to
to the S.P.G. Mission in Delhi, and (2) a proposal to start
a Community Mission for Women there.
With regard to the former, it was inevitable that the
successful starting of a University mission within the area
I 2
Il6 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
of an S.P.G. district, much in the same way as a College
Mission has of late years been grafted upon the parochial
system in South London, would raise questions as to the
permanent relationship between the two organisations
which required careful handling if the work was to be
strong and to last on after those acquainted with its
original foundation (such as the Rev. R. Bullock, Secretary
of the S.P.G. till 1878) had passed away. This was in-
evitable, quite apart from the personal equation of those
concerned. The settlement of the matter was further
complicated by some divergence of view between Mr.
and Mrs. Winter and the members of the Cambridge
Mission. This difference never caused disruption, and in
the end Mr. Winter approximated more nearly to the
views taken by the Cambridge Brotherhood ; but the
way by which progress towards identity of policy and
harmony of teaching was reached led through a prolonged
and tangled correspondence.
In a memorandum (dated May 4, 1883, Pembroke
College, Cambridge) for the Cambridge Committee
Bickersteth wrote :
When the rules were laid down under which the
Cambridge Mission started, it was declared that the
arrangement contemplated in them was temporary. Mr.
Winter had informed the Cambridge Committee that he
only expected to return to India for a few years, and
Mr. Bullock, though entering into no agreement on behalf
of the society, looked forward to the mission being carried
on in the future by Cambridge only.
The point which Bickersteth always pushed to the fore
was that ' only thus could the Cambridge Mission give full
effect to its principles and methods of work. This cannot
be till the opportunity is given it of attempting to carry
out all branches of mission work, and more especially of
organising and training a native Church, through which
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN II.;
alone the methods and principles of a mission can widely
influence the people of India? He therefore thought it would
be well if the Cambridge Committee would request the
S.P.G. to consider whether they would not be prepared to
entrust their mission at Delhi to the members of the
Cambridge Mission, to be worked by it after Mr. Winter's
retirement, and in the meantime not to send more mission-
aries of their own to Delhi.
No useful purpose would now be served by giving
copious extracts from the letters which passed between
Delahay Street, Westminster, and Cambridge and Delhi ;
but the points at issue involved (i) the possible amalgama-
tion of the two missions, as when a college mission some-
times takes over the administration of a whole parish, its
titular head being Rector or Vicar of the old parish ; (2)
the future title of the mission ; (3) the possibility of a
married missionary being connected with the Cambridge
Mission, whose wife could keep up some of the zenana
agencies started by Mrs. Winter ; (4) the supervision of
educational work solely by the Cambridge men.
Canon Crowfoot of Lincoln was a personal friend of
Bickersteth's, and as he had also previously worked at
Delhi and was a member of the S.P.G. Standing Committee,
he was a valuable intermediary. To him Bickersteth wrote
as follows :
Christ Church Vicarage, Hampstead : July 30, 1883.
My dear Crowfoot, I received a copy of Winter's
letter and a letter from Winter himself some weeks since.
It seems to me to be in all main points eminently
satisfactory, and quite such as our [Cambridge] Committee
will be able to accept. . . . Winter's suggested title,
' Delhi and South Punjab Mission,' could not be used in
documents to be circulated in Cambridge. I propose
' the Cambridge University Mission to Delhi supported by
S.P.G.' This, I think, might be used both by us and by
the society, which would be a great gain. His (Mr. Winter's)
IlS BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
plan differs toto azlo from the other, 1 which I think could
under no circumstances be accepted by us. To agree to it
would be, I am sure, practically to condemn the University
Mission to a condition in which it could at the best only
hope to prolong a weak and lifeless sort of existence. . . .
As to the whole mission, or the lead of the mission
reverting to S.P.G., I do not think we need consider it
now. It is most unlikely, I think, that it ever would be so,
though if we could avoid leaving a legacy of doubt to our
successors it would surely be better. With the scheme as
a whole I heartily agree. . . .
Yours very sincerely,
EDW. BICKERSTETH.
The return to England that summer of the Bishop of
Lahore (Dr. French) enabled the matter to be discussed
with all the chief authorities concerned. As to the division
of the Cambridge Mission into two branches, one to continue
as a purely educational body at Delhi, the other to open
up more varied missionary work at Cawnpur, 2 Bishop
French, then staying with Bishop Lightfoot, wrote to Dr.
Westcott as follows :
Auckland Castle : October 15, 1883.
My dear Professor Westcott, I had sent to Bickersteth
three days before as full an explanation as I could of my
views on the knotty point of the precise relations to be
sustained by the Cambridge Brethren towards the S.P.G.
and its missionaries. This paper will doubtless be for-
warded for your perusal, as also for that of the Bishop of
Durham, whose guest I am at present for a missionary
anniversary.
I am so very thankful to be allowed to hope that there
will not be a break up of the Cambridge Mission Brother-
hood, and a severance of it into two bands, by which the
original idea of the mission will be almost wholly frustra-
ted. It is a grand field viewed in its various departments,
1 The reference is to an alternative plan proposed to S. P. G. , but not
adopted.
2 It is interesting to note that the work contemplated at Cawnpur has
since been undertaken by two of the sons of Bishop Westcott, who with the
help of the S.P.G. started a missionary Brotherhood there in 1895.
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 1 19
and can be occupied without the intrusion of rival missions.
I pray God that the plan may be adhered to in its entirety
and integrity. . . .
Yours very truly and obliged,
THOS. V. LAHORE.
In the following October Bickersteth wrote to Mr.
Carlyon that the S.P.G. passed a resolution to the effect
' that the society agrees very carefully to abstain from
doing anything which will prevent the eventual succession
of a member of the Cambridge Mission to the headship of
the Delhi Mission.' The Cambridge Committee, under-
standing this resolution to mean that ' nothing would be
done to prevent the management of the Delhi Mission
coming into the hands of the Cambridge Mission,' agreed
to it, and so Bickersteth had the satisfaction of leaving a
few days later for his enforced sojourn on the Riviera
knowing that this question of the relationship between
two bodies which were ' separate yet connected ' had been
placed in a fair way for final settlement.
On the lamented death of the Rev. R. R. Winter in
1891 the S.P.G. put their work under the supervision of
the Cambridge Mission. In Delhi there was one paid
missionary and one honorary at the time. The present
title by which the mission is known is ' The Cambridge
Mission to Delhi in connection with S.P.G.' There are
branch missions in Karnal, Rohtak, Gurgaon, Rewari, and
other places.
The other matter which Bickersteth endeavoured to
forward was the establishing of some organised women's
work at Delhi to help in the zenana work started by Mrs.
Winter, as well as in the medical work.
As far back as October 1881 he had written to Dr.
Westcott (from Kotgarh, in the Himalayas, where he and
Lefroy had gone for a holiday) :
I2O BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
The Zenana mission is, of course, no immediate part of
our work, but at the same time it vitally affects the whole
mission organisation. A mission to men unsupported by a
mission to women would indeed be now quite an anachronism
in India. The influence of the Zenana on Indian youth
from the despotic old grandame downwards is proverbially
strong, and efficient Zenana mission work is the only hope
of purifying this influence and turning it in a right direc-
tion. So far, then, as this is concerned, the position of the
Cambridge Mission is at present a very unfortunate one.
He felt that neither the existing S.P.G. Lahore Diocesan
Committee, whose chief work was the distribution of funds,
nor the monthly mission council at Delhi, on which natives
sat, could be a governing body for a Zenana mission.
In the summer of 1883 and throughout 1884 he corre-
sponded much with Canon Crowfoot of Lincoln and with
the members of the Cambridge Mission in Delhi on points
of detail.
The points which seemed essential to Bickersteth were
that the head of the whole mission should be head of the
zenana work ; that the Zenana mission should in future be
formed into a community, with a rule of its own, superin-
tended by a lady trained herself under rule in England ;
that the then band of workers, older or younger, should be
admitted only as assistants ; that there should not be the
smallest hesitation in admitting Eurasian and native help
to the full position of Sisters, if otherwise fit ; that the
proposed community should be in immediate connection
with an English institution. With regard to the vitally
important principle of 'a reasonable agreement in theo-
logical matters,' he wrote to Mr. Winter, who feared
development on extreme lines, to re-assure him.
Christ Church Vicarage, Hampstead :
July 1 8, 1884.
My dear Winter, . . . To be definite, I should not
wish to have Sisters at Delhi who make a daily celebration
FURLOUGH FKAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 121
a condition of uniting in any plan. Not that I object to
the daily celebration in itself; if I did, I should go against
a great number of good people, St. Austen included, but
that at present I do not think it would be desirable at
Delhi ; nor again should I wish to have Sisters who made
Confession compulsory, and a good many practically do
so. ...
Ever affectionately Yours,
E. B.
He was eager to choose St. Hilda as a name for the
women's mission. ' I find her,' he wrote, ' described as
" sancta, prudens, literata," in a note to Bright's " Early
English Church." '
A memorandum for circulation in England was drawn
up by Bickersteth and sent by him to Canon Crowfoot
' for criticism and suggestion,' and then laid before Dr.
Westcott and the Bishop of Lahore, who gave it their
full approval. The death of Mrs. Winter, and her call to
rest from her incessant labours early in the autumn of 1884,
made it more urgent than ever to provide for the future of
zenana work. ' The name [he wrote] has been altered
from St. Hilda to St. Stephen at Mr. Winter's request. I
think for the worse, but we thought we ought to yield.'
But the appeal, so carefully discussed, although printed
in December, was not widely circulated, for a letter came
from Mr. Winter begging for still further delay. Bicker-
steth wrote to Lefroy : ; ^ :
Rectory, Framlingham : December 19, 1884.
... I heard yesterday of Winter's return and that he
wishes no steps taken in re Sisterhood till he comes. Give
him my love and tell him he was just in time to stop our
second circular, as before our first. Do not tell him that I
am absolutely certain that his attempt to establish a Broad
Church Sisterhood, which is what his letter to Crowfoot
amounts to, is foredoomed to failure. A Sisterhood need
not be on extreme lines, but I feel sure that for success
122 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
the Sisters must be not only ' learned, with piety taken for
granted,' but come out because they have a real vocation
and also possess, and so are able to teach, a full and clear
creed.
Your loving Brother sv Xpia-Tw,
E. B.
For the time being no further steps could be taken.
The present zenana and medical work is carried on from
St. Stephen's House, Delhi, by eighteen workers, as well as
at four other centres.
The first week in November 1883 saw Bickersteth with
one of his younger sisters, May, settled at the Hotel de la
Terrasse, Cannes, for the winter. Then began between
this brother and sister that close friendship and community
of interest, intellectual and spiritual, which was to bear
fruitful results in after years when this sister became the
organising secretary of the Guild of St. Paul in support
of Community missions in Japan. Brother and sister paid
a visit to Avignon, ' the old papal chateau or fortress,' on
their way out, and he wrote to Mr. Lefroy to announce his
arrival.
Hotel de la Terrasse, Cannes :
November 9, 1883.
My dear Lefroy, Here in Cannes we are going to
stay, and not in Bordighera, as I thought when I was
writing before. I shall send to Bordighera to see if any
letters have gone from you to me there. Several reasons
have induced us rather to choose Cannes. One that Dr.
Charles is here, the physician who sent me abroad ; then
that we have several friends ; also, I regret to say that we
have a young cousin, a girl of nineteen, one of the ablest
that has been to Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, exceedingly
ill of consumption and with only a slight hope of temporary
betterment, living at Grasse, a place close by. Such is life.
Here am I positively doing nothing walks, shoppings, tea
parties, luncheons, &c., &c. and that at a time when I
expected to be back with you all and in the thick of work.
I am here because there seemed positively no alternative,
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 123
and, as it was said to me yesterday, there are instances
in which vox medici is vox Dei. I cannot but admit,
after my last attack of fever (as my own feelings told
me), that the doctors were for once right. I am doing
nothing, because having consented to come it seems folly
to defeat the end of coming by work, as they tell me I
assuredly should.
And there are you, doing far more work than you
ought, and this partly because you have mine on your
shoulders as well as your own. With the general disposi-
tion of things, rest content. It is a nobler call far to work
than to rest, and you are worthy of it. But for this very
reason you should not exhaust your strength. It was
utterly foolish of you not to take a holiday, and I hope
you will get some change during the winter. . .
Ever your affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
Six weeks later he wrote again to Mr. Lefroy a letter
which shows his inability to keep his mind from perpetually
working on Indian problems, though it also illustrates his
sense of humour.
Cannes : December 29, 1883.
My dear Lefroy, I have only a talkative salon to
write to you in just now, so won't be altogether responsible
for the coming production. So many thanks for your
letter, which reached me from Bordighera. I do feel it
indeed sad to be separated in ' presence ' and work for
another year (only ten months now), but though I am really
getting on here, I cannot say the doctors were wrong.
I might have got back to India and to work for a bit, but
I think it would probably have been, as they said, to
topple over, like a house of cards, before so very long.
Now I shall quite hope, God willing, for a spell of work ;
and experience has shown that in most cases it is only
periods of work on which reasonable expectations of
results can be based. (There ! I have got a word ; a
nervous old lady is chattering on draughts. There ! she is
gone. Expect a slight improvement in composition.)
Now about the two or three things you mentioned.
First about the catechists' class. I am very glad you are
going to take the Church history. Should I take it again,
124 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
you are not likely to have exhausted that endless subject ;
but in all this work I think it will be better that you should
not look on what you are doing as temporary (except so
far as you may be overtaxing your strength in taking it up
at all). What I mean is that when I come back to India
I think that it will be well for a year or two that I should
do work which does not involve any great change of
organisation &c. if I give it up ; e.g. I can preach, take
tours, visit Muhammadans, give a course of lectures to
masters if you want one, and I hope get to work on some
book. These kind of things can be dropped if I get ill,
and the literary work I could take to the hills with me.
Furthermore, if I find it necessary to work sometimes at
half-pressure, I should not feel tied by such work in the
same way as by work which recurred on fixed days. I
do not mean that if I keep well I should not try to get to
something more regular, but that, as I said, for a time I
think this would be a wiser arrangement. So in anything
you start for the class don't feel only ' in charge.' And
still more with Daryaganj, about which I want a long
letter a little bird whispered to me that it was going on
admirably. You must be their permanent pastor and
priest in every sense, though of course I will give you any
help I can.
The plan of the Cambridge Mission Commentary on
the New Testament was to get the books divided out
among certain men of whom we should have the choosing.
I thought it would be best to endeavour in all cases to
put a native and European together, the former to supply
illustration and to ensure intelligibility the latter for
information, and to counteract the fancifulness &c. of the
native brother. Further, I thought the commentary should
be, if possible, very much shorter, and if the language
admits it terser, than Clark's and Imad-ud-din's (I doubt
theirs being much read) ; and then if ' our ' commentary
were published in moderate sized volumes there would be
a hope of catechists taking it about with them on their
tours and so forth, or at all events not being afraid to
begin a volume. Further, I had the idea that it should be
in a native-looking form and style, so that an inquiring
moulvi might not disdain it. I should not mind if the
comments were printed round the paper, Quran and
Persian poetry fashion. I think the idea is worth recon-
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 12$
sidering, though two years ago the Bishop thought it prema-
ture ; but now if you and Allnutt could contribute and, say,
Shirreff, Hooper, and Weitbrecht, there would at least be a
nucleus of an English company. Short essays on such
subjects as you mention, ' the authority of the Christian
Ministry,' might certainly very well be added, and some
detached notes, without making the volumes too bulky.
I'll send you a tiny paper of headings for an essay on that
same subject next week. The Bishop of Durham com-
plains in the last edition of his ' Galatians ' that he has been
much misrepresented and misunderstood in what he said
about ' episcopacy.' Of course, as a necessary conse-
quence, he is now accused of having changed his opinions
since he became a Bishop !
I hope the new men will take to school work, and
very much hope that with your powers of picking up the
language, making its sounds and understanding them, you
will be able to throw yourself into vernacular and literary
work. But you will be guided by circumstances that is, by
the Hand which makes the circumstances. Tell me when
you write what you are doing in the language line. Have
you learnt any Persian ? If so, don't stay too long over
the dull books. Some of the poetry and philosophy I
read with Cowell is most interesting.
E.g. : the Masnavi, of which (book i.) there is an
infamous translation in the library.
Aklagi Jalali, an Orientalised Aristotle's ' Nico-
machean Ethics ; ' there is a still worse translation in an
old Oriental Society's series.
Umr Khaiyairis Rubaiyat. I think I sent you out a
translation in the last batch of books.
Also, have you done any Arabic ? I find I can read
the Quran with the help of Penrice's dictionary, a transla-
tion, and notes ! ! ! and you might certainly get so far and
much beyond, but so far is distinctly useful. There is an
excellent new manual of Hindi ; it is up three flights of
hotel stairs or I would give you the name, as it is I'll put
it on the outside. It contains, I fancy, about all that we
need know.
Well, goodbye (in its true sense),
Your ever affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWD. BICKERSTETH.
126 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
During this time he made many delightful friendships,
seeing much of Dr. Murray Mitchell and others. When
visiting the Riviera myself in the spring of 1895, I came
across several of the English residents there who had
never lost the impression made by contact with his earnest
missionary zeal. His pastoral visits to his young cousin,
Miss Effie Murchison, daughter of the late Dr. Roderick
Murchison, who had come into Cannes from Grasse, were
paid daily, and in January he had to break to her at the
doctor's wish that human skill could do no more to prolong
her life. He wrote to Lefroy (January 1884) :
I scarce know how I got through my task, but she was
far calmer than I ; indeed, I shall never forget her perfect
self-control and peace, and I see her daily TO, avw &TSITS,
TO, avw <})povetT. At least these experiences should be a
help to me to do this.
At Easter he moved on to Rome, and from there
wrote to Lefroy, on hearing of the death of his brother :
Hotel d'Allemagne, Rome: April 19, 1884.
My dear Lefroy, Your letter reached me just before
I left Cannes, and I was very glad to have it. All in-
formation as to how matters go with you all is very
welcome to me, and will be till (D.V.) I see you in
October. Here people wish one another a 'buona
Pasqua ; ' why do not we in England, as much as ' A
Happy Christmas ? ' Anyhow I hope you may have been
having such, and it will not have been the less so in one
sense to you personally that you will have connected it
with the thought of your brother who has been taken from
you. I had not heard of this till I got your letter, and
now I pray God to comfort you and yours in the thought
of him. The truest comfort, indeed, you have in the ' good
Christian hope 'of which you tell me. and Easter fulfils
it, as far as may be, till the stria-way a)<yr) ETT' Avrov with
its wondrous teaching that death is a conquered foe. It
requires much faith though to accept this and all it means.
I have felt this during the winter in attending constantly
on several dying people. . . . Well, I said it requires faith
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 1 27
to believe this that when death seems so absolutely vic-
torious it is not, and yet the two facts of our Lord being the
Second Adam and of His Resurrection carry with them
no less. ' Lord increase our faith.' . . .
Ever your affectionate Brother in Christ,
E. B.
In Rome they met Mrs. Charles, their authoress friend
of Hampstead, and returned to England by way of Assisi,
the home of St. Francis, Perugia the old Umbrian capital,
Florence, and thence back to Cannes, as Bickersteth's cousin
had died there on May 5 and he wished to visit her grave.
Writing to Lefroy from Hampstead, May 16, 1884, he
said :
I hope it has been good for me to have my own
mind so often of necessity occupied with the thoughts of
the other world and the preparation for it, but oh ! how
strange the mystery of it all is, and taken at its fullest
(and I can't quite follow Dr. Westcott's plea for keeping
one's mind all but a blank on the subject), still how little
one knows of the world upon which they enter. I think
it is not sufficiently customary among us to practise
meditation on the other life. I suppose it passed away a
good deal with prayers for the dead ; but if they were at
all generally revived in the form of Scudamore's Saturday
prayer, and if it were more the custom to keep private
diptychs of those at rest (as the prayers of the old Greek
Liturgy form have so passed out of use), I think it would
be helpful and salutary.
And a few weeks later he wrote to Mr. Allnutt from
Cambridge :
Pembroke College, Cambridge : June 3, 1884.
My dear Allnutt, You see I am here again in this
dear old place, which is looking its loveliest and best. I
paid a good many visits yesterday, and have just dotted
down fifteen more that have to be paid to-day and to-
morrow morning. . . .
On the great subject of the Intermediate State, I
don't feel that I have anything helpful to say. Two or
three points strike me in what you say.
128 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
1. If the teaching of many passages on the activity of
the soul in the intermediate state is to be balanced against
the one word Koipdcrdai, it seems to me that the result
must be in favour of the many passages as against the
one word. Koifiacrdat is easily intelligible on the theory of
activity, the other passages are not intelligible on the
theory of a soul asleep.
2. Does not Dr. Westcott's suggestion that the soul with-
out the body has no energetic power seem contrary to his
own constant teaching, that we ought not to give opinions
on matters which our present faculties are not suited to take
cognisance of?
3. May there not be something in the Hindu theory
that the soul after death has an organ of its own through
which it still acts ? This is strongly urged in one of the
last sermons of a volume of sermons by the Nonconformist
preacher Baldwin Brown, which is in my shelf of sermons.
4. Dr. Westcott suggests in a passing sentence of his
new volume of sermons that St. Paul in 2 Cor. v. is referring
to the heathen idea of being unclothed such, I suppose,
as Virgil describes in the meeting of yEneas and his father
in this case I suppose the passage would have no
reference to a Christian view of Paradise ?
Tell me in your next if you have any opinion on this
point viz. what account is to be given of our Lord's human
body still bearing the marks of the Passion if Westcott's
theory (worked out in the ' Historic Faith ') of the soul, so to
say, forming its own body hereafter is to be accepted ?
Your ever affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWD. BICKERSTETH.
That summer he preached at Wells Cathedral and ad-
dressed the members of the Theological College, and stayed
some days with the Bishop of Truro (Dr. Wilkinson) at Lis
Escop. The Bishop introduced him to Sister Julian, Superior
of the Community of the Epiphany, whose friendship he
greatly valued and to whose advice he owed much in later
days when forming and carrying on the work of St. Hilda's
Mission in Tokyo. Later on he visited the Bishop of
Durham (Dr. Lightfoot), and assisted at the marriage of
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 1 29
his friend the Rev. J. D. M. Murray, 1 who had gone out to
Delhi with him (1877). In August he went to Scotland,
from whence he wrote to Lefroy, still under the impression
he was to return to Delhi in October :
Pitlochrie, Perthshire : August 6, 1884.
My dear Lefroy, You will have heard of me indirectly
through Winter, but I indeed owe you some direct reply to
your most interesting accounts. Taking it as a whole, I
am sure we have every reason for deep thankfulness at the
result of your great meeting. 2 Hitherto one has felt that
there has been something behind keeping the men back ;
that even the better sort of them, who attended services
and in part obeyed Christian laws and followed Christian
customs, were trammelled by their connection with their
fellow-countrymen, and so had but little sense of the value
of their new privileges, and less still of the happiness of
true religion. Now I do hope there will be a change.
Decision for God was what was needed, and this seems to
have been after the first few defalcations just what your
midnight meeting has led to.
It will be a great joy to you that your work among
these men during these past two years has led up to this,
and you ought to accept it to the full. Missionaries want
all the joy God sends them. And it seems to me to augur
very well for the future of the Chaiuars in Delhi. Of
course, as you say, there will be still plenty of difficulties,
and the little ship will want piloting amid rocks and quick-
sands for many a day yet. Still, if there are some deter-
mined men even in one quarter of the city who value their
faith and their fidelity to their Lord above all things, in
the end all will be well, and the good neutralise and
lessen the evil from year to year.
With heartiest love, I am,
Your affectionate Brother in Christ,
E. B.
But next month came keen disappointment. The
doctors again refused their permission for him to return,
1 He had retired from the mission in 1880, and died in London,
December 10, 1894.
2 See chapter iv. p. 94.
K
130 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
and would not be moved by his earnest wishes. The
college living of Framlingham, in Suffolk, had just fallen
vacant, and he was strongly advised by some of his friends
to take it. On turning then, as always, to his father,
to Bishop Lightfoot, and Dr. Westcott for advice, he was
surprised to find that they all three agreed that it was his
duty to accept the offer, at least for a time.
The living was one of the best endowed in the gift of
the college, being then of the value of 1,3 SO/, per annum,
with good rectory and grounds. The parish, with the hamlet
of Saxsted, was in the county of Suffolk and diocese of
Norwich, with a population of 3,000 souls. The place was
not devoid of many interests, but owing to the advanced
age of a nonagenarian rector it had fallen behind the
times in the matter of parochial efficiency. To speak
plainly, almost everything had to be done if ' the cure of
the souls of the said parishioners ' was to be fulfilled.
Bickersteth entered upon the work in October and at
once set to work to do what was necessary, but it is clear
he never felt settled there. He wrote to Lefroy :
I am feeling very sad these days, thinking of your
getting my letter at Delhi, and oh ! so wishing that for my
letter and its sadness I could substitute myself and the joy
of meeting you. I cannot bear to think, and do not think,
that all the work we have done (and especially you and I
together) is the work of a closed chapter in life, and I cannot
but feel that we shall be allowed some-while to write it out
to a completer end. It may not be so. God only knows,
and in this thought is, and ought to be, rest.
In a letter to the Rev. S. S. Allnutt he enumerated some
ways in which he hoped still to be of use to the Cambridge
Mission while Rector of Framlingham.
Pembroke College, Cambridge : October 21, 1884.
First, so many thanks for telegraphing. I read into
your words all the love that sent them not that I was
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 131
able exactly to act on them in any literal way. Having
accepted Framlingham, I was forced to go on with
the various processes of Induction, Institution, &c.,
but then you know, as Thiers said about the French
Republic, ' a thing is not eternal because it is estab-
lished ;' so it is with me and this living. If I see my
way opened India- wards again, and some ray of light
showing me that I am to walk along it I should rather
perhaps say, hear some voice bidding me do so no con-
sideration of being in an English living will, I trust and
hope, keep me from coming to you. I feel sure that I was
right in obeying now and doing what I was told, notwith-
standing the grief unto tears which the decision has caused
me ; but I do not at all feel equally sure that to come out
may not be my duty (made plain as my duty) in less time
than most people think. Only I feel I cannot make plans.
When God wills me to come, if so it be (and as I expect),
He will make it plain that I ought to come by giving me
strength perhaps, and opening some special work for me
with you, or making it easy for me to give up work here.
I shall try daily to. pray, 'Make Thou Thy way plain
before my face. '
He also wrote to me at Ripon, where I then resided as
chaplain to the Bishop (Dr. Boyd Carpenter) :
The Rectory, Framlingham :
October 31, 1884.
My dear Sam, It is before breakfast but after chota
haziri (we keep somewhat Indian hours here). As for
writing you a long letter about my doings, don't you wish
you may get it ? Why, you might consider it so interesting !
as to take it instead of the visit you promised me here. I
am expecting you for some of the days you (previous to
receiving this letter) meant to spend (only by a lapse of
memory) at Lancaster Gate. On the whole I shall wish
to have you on the I2th, as a young curate is coming to
stay with me later, and we shall be less cosy (derivation
' causer ' to chat, so equals ' chatable ' or ' chatatory ').
Yes, I am here for a time. I can't think for long
with enough work for ten years in merely getting things
into order. I am thankful to be allowed to work, and feel
better able to do it than previously but. .at present I do
K 2
132 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
not feel, though I shall, I trust, do all I can while here, that
this is to be my life's work. But God knoweth. And, after
all, life is far more like a mosaic of different pieces than a
polished slab, so in a sense it is life's work.
About the word catholic, see Westcott's note in his
' Canon.' The more important of its two early meanings
(universal and proportionate) that is, proportionate has
been forgotten.
Yours very affectionately,
E. B.
To his old head master he wrote :
November 5, 1884.
My dear Dr. Dyne, It was a very great pleasure to
me to receive your kind letter. Leaving Indian work for
the time being (I do not give up the hope of getting back
to it in time) has been a great trial to me, but I believe
that it is God's will that I should be for a while here. I
have a large parish, with two churches and two curates.
Yours most sincerely,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
The parish church of Framlingham needed restoration
and that work he at once began, though he could not do more
than begin it. He was enabled, however, to see some desir-
able alterations made in the chancel, and also in its furniture.
As for the spiritual fabric, he knew it to be a much
more delicate and difficult matter to handle wisely the
spiritual stones of the living Church of Christ. But house-
to-house visitation there, as everywhere, proved an invalu-
able opportunity for explaining alterations, removing pre-
judices, recruiting workers, as well as for that direct appeal to
the human conscience, which the true pastor of souls learns
how and when to make. Some of his friends, notably
Canon Crowfoot of Lincoln, came to his assistance in
beginning for that parish the special use of Advent and
Lent as seasons for spiritual advance. Tho services of
Holy Week in 1885 and the Three Hours' service on Good
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 133
Friday, conducted by Canon Crowfoot, warmed the hearts
of the people for the Easter Festival, the congregations on
that day being full of encouragement. A visit paid to the
parish in 1898, the year after his death and twelve years
after he had ceased to be Rector, elicited from many their
faithful and grateful remembrance of one who in his short
ministry there had led them to Christ.
But had he wished to settle down, his former Diocesan,
Bishop French of Lahore, had no intention of losing
his services in India if he could possibly retain them.
The value which he set on his chaplain's work and
influence may be gathered from a note in his Diary, written
a year later on hearing of his call to Japan :
Bickersteth's withdrawal has stunned me and pierced
me to the quick of my soul. Should I, like Jonah, when
stormy waves beat over our ship, ask to be let down the
side of the ship, not to be swallowed up, even temporarily I
hope, but to be transferred to some small missionary post ?
The diocese should go into mourning, and the Gazette
record it in black-edged notice. I have gone for a day's
outing ^vhen young, and something has happened which
took zest, sparkle, and spangle out of the day's pleasure ;
I am almost tempted to find this in this sorrowful event.
He referred to the same subject in an address to his
clergy at the Diocesan Synod at Lahore, November 23,
1885:
About the transfer of Mr. Bickersteth's services I can
hardly trust myself to speak yet. It ought to be a thought
of comfort, and will be so, I trust, when the first shock of
sorrow and disappointment has passed, that if the diocese
of Lahore must wear the weeds of mourning, that of Japan
may well wear the marriage garment of joy and praise.
It is not therefore surprising that on this occasion he
left no stone unturned to secure his return. On hearing of
the acceptance of Framlingham, he telegraphed at once to
134 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Lord Kimberley (Secretary of State for India) asking him
to confer a chaplaincy on Bickersteth that he might reside
at Simla in the hot weather. The Bishop also proposed
to offer him an archdeaconry. Bickersteth wrote to Lefroy
about what he described as ' this strange disturbing offer of
chaplaincy and archdeaconry : '
Framlingham : November 20, 1884.
Westcott refuses all advice. He says he has none to
give. The offer coming from the Bishop, and yet upsetting
such recently formed plans if it be accepted, are (he says)
the pros and cons, but which should prevail he does not
know ; my father also is undecided. As a consequence I
am trying to work on here as if no such plan had been
proposed, and am laying as I may the foundations of a
parochial organisation. For myself I shrink greatly from
a chaplaincy. . . . Still, if I could see the way open to be
in charge of Simla and of some use to the mission, I do
not know that I ought to shrink from it. I have made the
latter a sort of condition with the Bishop of my considering
the matter definitely. If, e.g., I was assured time each
winter for a spell in the district with one of you, and had
an open house to offer you by turns at Simla in the hot
weather, this would be something. However, I will not run
on in vain speculations. Till I hear, they are vain. Write
me your full opinion.
There was another question which in Bickersteth's
opinion urgently pressed for settlement namely, the suc-
cession to the headship of the mission. As long as he was
in England planning to return at the earliest moment, his
absence, though inconvenient, allowed of his duties being
discharged by deputy. His acceptance of Framlingham
altered the situation. The senior member of the mission,
the Rev. H. C. C. Carlyon, did not wish for the headship,
and Mr. Allnutt felt that he could not go on with his
school work and also lead the mission. Mr. Lefroy was
felt by all to have special aptitude for the duties of head-
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 135
ship, but he was unwilling to assume the work at once.
Moreover, the Cambridge Brotherhood were loth to give
Bickersteth up as long as there was any possibility of his
return. Accordingly, in the letter to Lefroy already quoted
(dated November 20, 1 884), Bickersteth wrote :
The [Cambridge] Committee is this day week, and as
I think I mentioned to Allnutt I have written to Westcott
to tell him that I shall support what seems your quite
unanimous opinion because it is such, and I expect I shall
get your wishes sanctioned, though somewhat against the
independent opinion of the majority, as it is somewhat
against my own. ... I do think and feel that you are
very especially gifted %ptrt Ssov for the office. But this
being so (again but for your letters) I should have de-
cidedly held that you had better be appointed at once.
There are grave evils in interregna : without the fault of
anyone concerned, they keep things in uncertainty. How-
ever, as you think otherwise (and I understand that you
would like some further time for preparation and to look
upon the next year or two as such) I shall, as I said, try
and induce the Committee to accede.
The offer of the archdeaconry with its intermittent
possibilities of still serving the Cambridge Mission in-
creased the uncertainty, but it did not alter Bickersteth's
judgment that Mr. Lefroy should be head of the Cam-
bridge Mission, as will be seen by the following letter :
Gloucester : January 29, 1885.
My dear Lefroy, Consider this scrap, please, a
postscript to a letter which I have written to Allnutt and
which he will send you. You will learn from it that there
is some possibility of my returning to India in October
no certainty and if I return of my eventually doing some
work again at Delhi. Now what I want to say to you is
that I do not think this should throw any doubt or hesita-
tion into your mind with reference to your succession to
the headship of the mission next year. If I return it will
be to spend two years first of all at Simla, and then,
perhaps, not to get more than seven months or so in the
136 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
year at Delhi, of which I should be a good portion travel-
ling in the district. Altogether, the prospect seems to me
much too uncertain to admit of your entertaining any
doubt that it is your duty to prepare during the next
twelve months for accepting the full responsibility of the
headship of the mission at Easter, 1886. I shall for my
part, I believe, if again allowed to take part in mission
work, work quite as happily under you as over you, and
should such be the outcome of a somewhat far-off future, I
see no reason to think that as between you and me there
would be any difficulty. I write this now, however, because
though my prospects of return are distant, your thoughts
and prayers, through which you and the mission will be so
largely shaped and influenced, are immediate.
Your affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
In the event he, however, refused the proffered offer of
the archdeaconry, chiefly on the advice of the Bishop
(Pelham) of Norwich, and determined to make one more
effort to return to Delhi itself. He wrote to Mr. Lefroy :
Framlingham, Suffolk : March 5, 1885.
There are only a few minutes to mail time, but I have
several letters of yours unanswered and must send you a
line, not, however, so much on account of the unanswered
letters, though they are on my conscience, but because I
have just decided, as far as I may for the present, on my
future course. Briefly, I have refused Simla, and told the
Bishop I will rejoin you in October if doctors will let me.
I have been led to this, though after the greatest un-
certainty for four months as to what I ought to do a four
months which have been some of the most trying I ever
spent mainly by the two following considerations :
(a) The Bishop of Lahore has, in a series of letters of
the most affectionate, and, at the same time, urgent cha-
racter, pressed me to return to the Punjab.
() I consulted the Bishop of Norwich, being the
Bishop I am serving under. He said, in effect, ' If you are
allowed to return to missionary work I have nothing to
say, but your work in Framlingham is too important for
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 137
you to give up to take, even for a time, other English work-
in India.'
Well, seeing myself a great deal to be said for taking
Simla for the two years until I could see my way more
clearly, I still did not feel at all certain enough that 1 was
called to this to go against my present Bishop's advice.
On the other hand, I have not been able to do other-
wise than give the very greatest weight to the urgent
invitations of a man I so much respect and love as the
Bishop of Lahore. Well, the result is what I have told
you. If doctors permit, I am returning to India in October ;
but, without the interim of two years at Simla. I am
coming straight to missionary work.
I hope I may still be of some use to the Bishop at
Simla, as for a couple of years certainly I shall have to
be away from Delhi for May and June.
Once again, however, he was denied his heart's desire.
The doctors totally refused to entertain the idea of his
return to India, and he had to write sadly to the Bishop of
Lahore :
The Rectory, Framlingham : March 26, 1885.
My dear Bishop, It grieves me so to be writing this
letter. The way to India for me seems again closed for
the present. I obtained last week Dr. Westcott's consent
to my return and the Master of Pembroke's, but was
totally refused by Sir J. Fayrer when he examined me in
London. He did not, indeed, say that his prohibition was
final, but he did say plainly that I must not come now. I
had only just escaped from a chronic disease, and though
I am getting better I am not well, and that a return now to
the plains and still more to the hills would be nearly sure
to set it up again. The letter he wrote about me was such
as to prohibit our committee from taking me.
The disappointment is very great. I had counted on
getting back now, and somehow believed I should. I can-
not help still believing that it is only for a time : but for
the present it does seem to make it a duty to do English
work, and, I suppose, to work here where I am. My
inclination is to retain my fellowship, and so to be free to
come and go as I like ; but having come here at the advice
of so many whom I am bound to respect, and having
138 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
commenced work here, I do not like to throw it up, unless
there is some call to me to go elsewhere. But wherever I
am I shall always keep India in view as my objective.
Pray for me, please, that I may be willing to accept what is
to me the hardest of all decisions for as long as God
wills it.
It is just mail time, but I felt I must write this
line.
Ever your affectionate son in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
No wonder he excused himself to the Cambridge
Mission at Delhi for not writing to them on the details of
the work as much as he had wished to do on the plea that
' the double anxiety of starting a great parish and negotia-
ting a return to India at the same time has been heavy, and
I fear made me unduly self-centred. You have, however,
been daily in my prayers, if I have not poured myself out
on paper. You know I am, at the best, bad at the
latter.'
During that winter and spring came the interest aroused
by his father's appointment, first as Dean of Gloucester, a
position which he held for a few weeks only, and then by
his call to the English episcopate as sixty-second Bishop of
Exeter. This broke up the Hampstead home after thirty
uninterrupted years. Edward was present with his father
when he was installed as Dean at Gloucester on January 28,
and attended him as chaplain on his consecration at St.
Paul's Cathedral on St. Mark's Day, 1885, little thinking
that within twelve months he would himself be called in
the same place to bear the burden of fatherhood in God.
Notwithstanding these interruptions, the parochial
activities at Framlingham increased every month, and
especially during Lent there was much encouragement n
the attendance of many at the special services. On
Easter Monday my brother wrote to me at Ripon :
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 139
Every good wish of this season. Surely it was a true
instinct which saw in Easter ' the Queen of Festivals.' If
only Christ Risen had been more kept in mind, people
would never have fallen into the mistake of substituting
the acceptance of a doctrine for union with a Person as the
condition of salvation. . . The forbidding of my return to
India has been a great trial. I had made up my mind it
was to be. Now father and all advise my staying here, and
on the principle of not moving till one is called I think I
shall. If I do, I shall try and make this place a centre for
a society of missioners, to preach especially in Suffolk, but
not exclusively. I had my vestry this morning. Only
one opponent of my changes in a large meeting, and he
never comes to church ! Pray that I may be guided
aright.
Your ever affectionate Brother,
E. B.
However, during the next three or four months his
health so far improved as to enable him yet once again to
wring a hesitating consent from his medical advisers to
his return to Delhi. He wrote to Lefroy :
Vicar's Close, Wells : September 9, 1885.
My dear Lefroy, I have been spending another few days
of pleasant holiday with my father on the borders of Dart-
moor, picking up health and strength for India. . . I go
on to my brother Sam's at Ripon, then, I think, to Lincoln,
and then to wind up my affairs at Framlingham and preach
farewell sermons. Even after a short year, farewell-saying
is sore work, especially to the sick and others whom one
has seen often ; and my decision was so pushed off from
week to week by causes that I could not control that my
time is now not long. Perhaps this is for the best.
I do not think that I have attained to the standard you
put before me in this decision of returning to you to which
1 have come, I mean I have rather thought of coming to
make another as persevering an attempt as I may to live
in India and work with you all, than of necessarily coming
to live or die. Perhaps the other would have been and
would be the higher determination, but I don't think that
I can be sure enough of what any resolution I now made
140 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
would be worth at some future crisis, as men of greater
moral strength would be, to make it right for me to act
under the pressure of so high a purpose. Mine, I admit, is
the lower ground not by any means ' a counsel of perfec-
tion,' but safer, I feel, for me. Curiously, as regards leav-
ing Framlingham I was helped by knowing (I should not
like this generally mentioned) that I should not anyhow
have been there for more than a short time longer that is,
in all probability.
I start on October 30, and come by Brindisi ; I fancy
this is best for me medically and otherwise. I may be in
time for the Synod. How very delightful it is to think
that the month after next I shall probably see you all
again.
May God give you and me to do a little more work
together for Him.
There is more to write, but this will do for to-night.
Your very affectionate Brother,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
At my house in Ripon I remember witnessing his
signature to the deed of resignation of Framlingham, the
one and only English parish which he held, and which
henceforth he remembered in prayer every Wednesday.
Had he been minded to settle in England, few places
could have combined more attractions for one who,
whether at home or abroad, never lost the keenest interest
in the vexed and various problems which beset the
development of the Church in England. The ample en-
dowment would have enabled him to carry out any schemes
which commended themselves to his judgment. But
although the work there had drawn out many of his
pastoral instincts, and was rich in opportunities of service,
the missionary spirit had passed into his very soul, his love
for the work at Delhi was little less than a passionate
attachment, and there can be no doubt that he loosed
himself from these moorings with an intense joy at the
thought of returning to Delhi.
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 141
And now he was to be tested by a new call.
His berth for India was taken for the third time, and
the day of his departure in October was settled, when a
telegram from the Archbishop of Canterbury (Dr. Benson)
was destined wholly to change the scene of his future
labours. The Archbishop had entertained Bickersteth
both at Lincoln and at Truro as his guest, and he
turned to him when he had to appoint a successor to
Bishop Poole (Bishop of the Church of England in Japan),
whose deeply lamented death after a brief episcopate of
two years had occurred in the summer of I885. 1
The Providence which thus transferred Bickersteth
from the East to the Far East is unmistakable. In Japan
he carried on his work for eleven years ; it is doubtful if he
could really have stayed as many months in India. In
Japan a man was wanted whose experience had already
taught him the wide difference between the western and
eastern mind ; the delicacy of the relationship between
the principles underlying episcopacy and the accidental
circumstances of which missionary societies are the too
permanent product ; the undoubted advantages attaching
to holy homes in which married missionaries can illustrate
many Christian virtues, and yet the urgent call for Com-
munity missions of women as well as of men not only
or chiefly because more economical, but because apostolic
simplicity and the ' separating ' vocation of the Holy
Spirit can therein be very plainly exhibited ; the real
importance of accurate translations both of Bible and of
Prayer Book, and yet the danger of cumbering nascent
churches with the literary lumber of mediaeval contro-
versies ; the absolute necessity of maintaining the sense of
the presence of God amid the inevitable loneliness of spirit
1 The Right Rev. A. W. Poole, D.D., was consecrated in Lambeth
Palace Chapel on October 18, 1883, and died on July 14, 1885.
142 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
inseparable from missionary life, as well as a rule of life at
once sober and strict for newly won converts ; and, as a
guiding principle, unifying all missionary activities and
dominating them, the keeping in view as the aim in all the
work, the building up of a native Church to be in God's
own time a true branch of Christ's Holy Catholic Church,
an organ for the spiritual development of the nation, a body
in which the Holy Spirit could dwell and prepare the
Bride of Christ.
It is plain to any reader of these pages that Edward
Bickersteth as Fellow of his college, as the head of a Mis-
sionary Brotherhood, as examining chaplain and confiden-
tial friend of Bishop French at a time when the newly
formed see of Lahore was being rounded into separate
existence and made instinct with synodical activities, as
already the painstaking learner of five Eastern languages
and the sympathetic student in loco of at least two of the
great Oriental religions, and as one not wholly unac-
quainted with the details of pastoral and parochial activity
had enjoyed advantages which promised to be of special
use to him as a Missionary Bishop among the progressive
Japanese, however much his appointment may have
severed (as it did) the tenderest ties which fast bound him
to his first missionary home.
But he was not in much doubt as to which way the
path of duty led him. If the Archbishop thought him the
right man, then he was ready to go where he was sent.
As usual, he wrote to Lefroy :
Trinity College, Cambridge : October 30, 1885.
My dear Lefroy, ... I have written to the Arch-
bishop accepting Japan. The day after the mail last week
I got an answer from the Bishop of Durham, quite agree-
ing with Dr. Westcott, and so, as I obeyed before, I have
obeyed again. I believe it is right. I know that it is not
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 143
my own desire. Coming back to you all was a thought of
constant joy to me. Work in Japan at present looks cold
and comfortless. I do not mean that it always will do so.
It has perhaps as great interests as any country could
have, and I doubt not that I shall get to love the people,
the work, and my fellow-labourers (some of whom,
according to all accounts, are very excellent, among others
Foss of Christ's, Lloyd of Peterhouse, Fyson of Christ's)
as time goes on. But I speak of my present feelings.
But we shall be doing one work and for one Master. I
hope, too, the connection between Delhi and Japan may
not be one of letters only. Parts of the country are quite
a sanitorium, and some of you will come, I do trust, from
time to time to see me. Maitland (to whom my hearty
love) will of course abjure Australia in its favour ! I do
not expect to start before January. The consecration day
is not yet settled. . .
Well ! farewell for to-day. My daily thoughts and
prayers are with you.
Your very affectionate Brother,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
Again he wrote to him for the New Year :
The Palace, Exeter: December n, 1885.
My dear Lefroy, I must write you a line for the New
Year, just to wish you in it all the greatest and most
glorious blessings that time, as it goes, can bring with it.
Do you remember our spending New Year's Day at
Mehrowli four years since, and oh ! how I had looked
forward to spending it and this winter in Delhi ! It had
been the point of my hopes, and I seemed just about to
reach it ; perhaps my way of bringing it about was too
self-willed. Anyhow, it has been turned aside from where I
wished it to tend, whither I have no longings or drawings,
and where instead of the re-knitting of old and strongest
affections, I may only look at the most to making new
acquaintances which can never at the utmost be nearly what
the old affections have been and are. Well, it is just that
' are ' which is a comfort to me sometimes. To us being sv
Xpia-Tw there is a true permanence amid all the incessant
changings of this changeful life, something has been gained
by the life and love together which will not ever die.
144 I5ISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
But at present this separation is very hard. I believe
it was right. At least, all wise people told me I had no
choice, and I submitted it to enough of them ; but still, ever
since I agreed to go to Japan I have had such a longing
for Delhi and the society of you all that I dare say I have
painted my future life in duller colours than perhaps it will
actually wear, and, if so, this is not right. I ought, and I
recognise it, to feel thankful that I am being sent to
mission work, and to an important position where there is
more hope of my being able to work continuously than
there could have been in my loved Delhi. And you will
get the wider view-point, too ; indeed, you already have,
and from it the survey of life at least shall have in it hope
and peace, though not all the lights that I had been
making to play around my prospects. . .
With hearty New Year's wishes and love to all,
Your affectionate Brother in Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH.
To Rev. S. S. Allnutt
January 8, 1886.
My dear Allnutt, My consecration is fixed for
February 2, and I am to start about March I. The multi-
tude of meetings, &c., which I am obliged to attend in
order to get up a Japanese fund prevents my taking an
earlier mail. Also, I am trying to get men to accompany
me, or join me in Japan. Meetings in Oxford and Cam-
bridge in February may (as I pray) draw out someone,
but they may not. I have often dreaded a lonely life, and
it may be God's discipline for me for a time that I be
alone. . . .
I know you will give me your heartiest, fullest prayers,
both unitedly and individually, on February 2, and when I
am starting so I need not ask them. . . .
... I shall look forward longingly. In March plainly
1 could not come. Not only the weather is against it, but
much is waiting me in Japan (confirmations and ordina-
tions) which it would not be right to delay. Now that I
have undertaken it, I must bear my burden and you will
help me.
Farewell sv Xptcrr&>. That bond unites absolutely
Your very affectionate brother in Christ,
EDW. BICKERSTETH.
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 145
It is plain that Edward Bickersteth's call to Japan
came from that Spirit Who still, as in the Church of the
first days, uses that word, ' Separate Me Barnabas and
Saul for the work ' a word which now as then cuts to the
dividing asunder of relationships most intimate and friend-
ships most close.
But although the young Bishop-designate he was
then only thirty-five years of -age felt the conflict so
counter and so keen, he at once threw himself with
characteristic energy into all the preparations for his new
work.
The postponement of the time originally fixed for his
consecration chafed him as he longed to start ; but he
occupied the longer interval in trying to catch some fishers
of men who would join the Community Mission of St
Andrew, which he at once determined to found. There was
now also no let to his taking preliminary steps for the
formation of St. Hilda's Community Mission for Women
on the lines which he had already thought out as suitable
for Delhi. Another care was to find a congenial companion
as chaplain. ' Pray for me that I may find a true a-vvspyos
(he wrote to Lefroy). I know too well how often my own
judgments would have been wrong unless they had been
balanced and corrected by you and the others. I want a
man on whom I can rely for the diocese's sake as well as
for my own.'
It was at this time also that he created the nucleus of
St. Paul's Guild for Prayer, the first members consisting
chiefly of his own brothers and sisters. We all met as a
family at Exeter for that Christmas and New Year, and no
one would have known that Edward had to bear up under
the still recent disappointment of not returning to Delhi
and the load of his new duties, dimly descried. He
threw himself into all the home festivities, and we enjoyed
L
146 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
one or two long walks on Dartmoor. On New Year's Day
he wrote to Lefroy, whose father had recently died, and
dwelt much on the permanence of the work done by the
regenerate life.
The Palace, Exeter: January i, 1886.
My dear Lefroy, I only saw a notice in the paper of
the great sorrow which has come to you and yours after
the mail left last week. You will know how much you
have been you are always, but beyond usual in my heart
and prayers since. I know not if you will have heard by
telegram of your father's call ; anyhow, I do not doubt
that to you, who have served Him so stedfastly and lived
with Christ these years so closely, there will be given now,
when you so need it, not the removal of sorrow which
none of us would have even if we could but the deep
divine consolation which assuages it, and in time even
illuminates it. I have been thinking a good deal about
the real permanence of Christian work recently. All these
changes which have come to myself, and perhaps unduly
saddened me, have driven me that way for comfort. The
changeless God ; the eternal fact of the God-man ; the
communication of His life through the Spirit to all
the sons of God and brethren of Christ ; these are the
foundation truths, and from them results this, that all
which they, God's sons and Christ's brethren, do has an
eternal significance too. ' He that eateth of this Bread
shall live for ever.' ' He that believeth on Me shall never
die.' and if so, no work which is done by the energies
of the regenerate life dies either ; it may seem to, but
it does not. It has gone to add something to the
increase, perfection, or beauty of the ever rising temple
of God.
And so your father's long life of usefulness to Church
and parish, every nearest affection, and even perhaps
through God's mercy some fragments of such broken work
as my own, live on.
I have been thinking of you, too, as being called to
give up for India's sake something more than any of us
have been called to. Absence from home we voluntarily
adopt and we need not deny it to be difficult and a self-
denial but it becomes far more so, and therefore by a
FURLOUGH FRAMLINGHAM CALL TO JAPAN 147
divine law which generally, I think, measures ultimate
results to the suffering by which they are brought about,
more fruitful, when it involves being away from those we
love when we would most of all long to be with them.
This great sorrow and its consolations, my dear brother,
are given you not for your sake only, but for the sake of
Hindus and Muhammadans yet outside, that they too may
in years to come ' be comforted with the comfort wherewith
you yourself are comforted of God.' Think of it this way
when you can, sometimes.
A Bishop's duties begin to press on me as in prospect
and reality very onerous.
Yours with abiding love and sympathy,
EDWD. BICKERSTETH.
The day of the consecration was then uncertain, but it
was a few days later settled for the Feast of the Presenta-
tion of Christ (February 2), to be in St. Paul's Cathedral
on the same day as that of Lord Alwyne Compton, who
had been called to fill the see of Ely.
Edward Bickersteth's private note-book of spiritual
resolutions bears ample evidence of the spirit in which he
entered upon the episcopate. At the consecration the
sermon was preached by Canon Paget, now Dean of
Christ Church, Oxford, and the elected Missionary Bishop
of Japan, vested with his rochet, was led up to the Arch-
bishop by the former and present Bishops of Exeter
that is, by Dr. Temple (now Archbishop of Canterbury,
then Bishop of London) and by Dr. E. H. Bickersteth.
Few who were present at the consecration could be un-
moved spectators of this scene when the father led up
his eldest son to the Archbishop of the province to
present him for consecration.
In the huge congregation there was a largely missionary
element, and besides numerous relations there were present
representatives of every period of Edward Bickersteth's
life those who had known him at school, at college, or in
148 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
India while the Delhi Brotherhood telegraphed to him
as the assurance of their prayers, Philippians iv. I/. 1
From henceforth the newly consecrated Bishop never
failed to remember in his prayers the Bishop of Ely, in
company with whom he had received the special spiritual
grace which he firmly believed was granted in accordance
with Divine promise to those who by apostolic succession
had been brought, as Bishops, into a new relation with their
ascended Lord. Within four weeks of his consecration
Bishop Edward Bickersteth left for Japan.
1 He kept the copy of this telegram in his MS. book of private devotions
to the 'end of his life.
149
CHAPTER VI
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888
' I may add that no brighter prospect, I believe, has ever been set before the
missionary than that in Japan.' Letter to Dr. Searle, August 14, 1886.
THE Bishop left England on Saturday, March 6, 1886, for
the Far East, and, travelling by way of Milan and Brindisi,
reached Alexandria on Ash Wednesday, March 10. There
he joined the Rev. H. Maundrell, who, with his wife and
children, was returning after furlough to Nagasaki, 1 a
C.M.S. station in Kiushiu, the great southern island of
the Japanese Empire. Mr. Maundrell, who had more than
once visited Hampstead, proved to be a most pleasant
travelling companion, and it was God's good Providence
which sent to the somewhat lonely Bishop so sympathetic a
friend. Two years later he made him Archdeacon of
Kiushiu, and placed much reliance on his good judgment.
The following extracts are from letters written on the
journey.
To his Father
Alexandria : Ash Wednesday, March 10, 1886.
There could scarcely be a less pleasant way of spend-
ing Sunday than in pouring rain running down the east
coast of Italy for the most part alone in a railway carriage.
1 This well-known port derives a special interest from the fact of its having
been the scene of a large number of the martyrdoms which give lustre to
Japanese Church History in the seventeenth century, while the English
Bishop's chapel now occupies the ground where once renegade Dutch
merchants trampled on the cross as a condition of their trading with Japan.
150 BISHOP EDWARD BICKEKSTETH
However, I read my services, and the earliest Christian
sermon on record outside the Canon, the so-called Second
Letter of St. Clement of Rome, really a homily by an un-
known writer. I must make up my mind, I expect, to a good
many lonely journeys, and seek to realise more fully the
Presence of the Divine Guide. . .
The man I have seen most of (on board) is one of Mr.
Spurgeon's preachers ! . . .
Still, much as I should value Lent in a Christian
country, I am not altogether sorry to be journeying during
it. It will be helpful, I trust, to trying to make the time
a preparation for all the work before me. A strange eight
years and a half indeed it has been since I was last draw-
ing near to Alexandria with dear Murray : full of changes
and surprises but I trust that God has been with me, and
His guidance in the past should give me confidence for the
future. ' Because Thou hast been my help, therefore' &c.
Had I been going back to India the journey would have
been comparatively natural. As it is, I am going again to
the wholly unknown, and this is a great added trial to that
of leaving you all.
S.S. Bokhara, near Aden : March 16, 1886.
A strange party we were on the little launch [at Suez]
Indian officers, missionaries, ladies, Italian workmen hired
for S. Indian gold mines, &c.
I find Maundrell a very agreeable companion, and am
getting from him a good deal of information about Japan.
As yet I have learnt more about Japan than I have of
Japanese. I brought with me so much to do of arrears of
letters, accounts, &c., that my time has been well filled up.
I do not spend more than about an hour and a half on
deck, I think, usually. Almost the only book I have read
at all has been the Report of the Osaka Conference of
1883, which contains a mass of missionary information on
all topics connected with Japan. . . We have a short daily
service every day in the saloon at 10.30 . . . and had two
services on Sunday. None of these have been very well
attended, except the morning service on Sunday. Indians
and colonists, like English farmers, are far too often content
to make their one weekly service do duty for their whole
religion. How we do need a higher standard ! and abroad,
where it should be highest, everything tends to depress it,
and it is lower than at home. . . I am despatching a heavy
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 151
mail to London and Delhi, as well as Exeter so will not
write more. My thoughts and prayers are ever with you.
To Rev. S. S. Allnutt
S.S. Bokhara, Red Sea : March 14, 1886.
In a way there seems something wrong that I am at
last, after so many attempts, coming East, and not coming
to dear old Delhi ; and yet, as I look back upon it all now,
in this the first period of quiet I have had for some time,
I feel that God has been guiding me, though not in the path
I had chosen. Well, if so, some day we shall be able to see
that our plans were better broken and our efforts frustrated.
... In Japan it is at present plainly, from all I have
gathered, the day as yet of small realisations but large hopes.
In one matter, however, which has been a good deal on my
mind, they are ahead of India that is, in their readiness to
undertake, in part or even altogether, their church support.
Of course, in Japan they have profited by Indian experience
of the disastrous results of too much help from England
and America, and lay the greatest stress on independence.
It may be that we have not been bold enough in the matter
as yet at Delhi. Winter, I know, lays stress on the united
service on Sunday morning in St. Stephen's, &c., but I
cannot help thinking more than I did that with so large a
body of missionaries as Delhi possesses, and is likely to
retain, there will be great danger of overshadowing the
native Church, which it is our very object to establish, and
weakening where we think to support. Were the man forth-
coming it would really, I believe, be a healthier thing for St.
Stephen's and its services to be in native hands. Ot course,
I know he is not at present, and it is also much easier to
write about than effect changes ; but I do feel increasingly
alike what the danger is and, therefore, what our object
should be.
To his Father
S.S. Bokhara : March 24, 1886.
I am getting on a little with Japanese under my good
tutor Maundrell's care. . . . To think that this is my sixth
Eastern language (besides Hebrew ) ! I hope it is the
last. . . .
It seems so strange to be so near India, the land where
152 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETII
I had thought to spend my life, and to be going on so
very far beyond ; but as I have been looking back these
days on the last three years and a half, certainly the
Providence has seemed very marked which has led me to
Japan.
The steamer touched at Colombo on Lady Day, and
the Bishop was able to land and see Bishop Copleston, and
go with him to a celebration of Holy Communion. By
April 8 Hongkong was reached and a few days later
Shanghai. From these two places he wrote :
To his Father
C.M.S. House, Hong Kong: April 8, 1886.
I have a good deal of talk with some of my fellow
passengers on religious subjects. Among men in the East
infidelity is everywhere ; partly the misstatements of the
. Creed that have been so rife, above all the crude doctrine
of Atonement that has been taught as if it, and not the fact
it misrepresents, were the centre of the Gospel ; partly the
uncertainty occasioned by the great variety of Christian
sects ; partly the supposed inroads of science, and an un-
defined fear that more will yet have to be given up, seem
to have shaken the faith of men generally in the Far East.
Of course there are many exceptions, but from what I am
told, and the little I have seen, the disease of unbelief
is very widely spread. Still, I am inclined to believe, as
notably the last few years at Oxford, there will be a re-
action before long. Men have been reading Buckle and
Renan as discoverers and innovators, but the novelty is
wearing off, and the hollowness of what they had to say
will surely then become more apparent. . . .
I am longing for news of you all, and shall feel it a
great comfort when the weekly letters begin to arrive.
Shanghai : April 13, 1886.
At Shanghai Maundrell and I drove out to Sikawei, a
great Jesuit establishment about five miles from the city.
Truly as far as buildings and institutions are concerned the
Jesuits have done great things. Sikawei is an immense
collection of large houses devoted to various missionary
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 153
objects. The largest is a college, to which pupils are sent
from the interior, with a grand library, an observatory,
museum, &c., and rooms for a considerable number of
fathers. The rooms certainly were plain enough a bed,
table, and chairs seemed the only furniture. Convents,
girls' schools, orphanages, &c., are at a little distance. We
were shown over the college by a lively French Jesuit in
Chinese costume, pigtail and all complete. It looked
laughable, but ' extremes meet.' Major Tucker and the
Salvation Army are doing the same thing in India, and
think it essential to large success. I wish at all events
that there were in Japan some men like Bateman and
Gordon of the Punjab, who identified themselves in a
wonderful way with the people.
It is extremely hard to find out the moral value of the
results of Roman Catholic missions in these countries. A
Nonconformist missionary after nearly forty years of experi-
ence in the Canton province told me that he believed their
work to be good, and that not a few of the country people
whom he had come across were simple-minded Christians.
On the other hand, Archdeacon Moule had come across
some Mariolatry which seemed little better than a sort
of z'</<?/atry.
On the way back we visited another great missionary
establishment Bishop Boone's, of the American Church.
Unfortunately he was out, and I only just had time to
leave a card and peep into a dear little church, where a
Chinese clergyman was reading the Evensong Psalms.
But the leisure which the voyage afforded had been
turned by the Bishop to a more abiding purpose. In an
' open ' letter which he addressed to the Rev. Dr. Searle,
Master of Pembroke College, Cambridge, he brought under
review the leading features of Japan at that time, its
chief needs and a characteristic proposal for helping to
meet them. That proposal was the establishment of a
University mission in some chief city of the empire,
such as Cambridge had already sent to Delhi.
Before leaving England he had brought this idea
before the notice of personal friends, and addressed two
154
BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
A plea
for Uni-
versity
help.
The claim
of ancient
countries
upon
ancient
Uni-
versities.
meetings, one at Cambridge and one at Oxford, on the
subject. He had argued that :
To allow a great and prosperous nation to adopt the
outward form of our civilisation without the knowledge of
the faith on which it is based would be disastrous to them
and dishonourable to us. To embrace the opportunity
could not fail to ensure the divine blessing alike on them
and us.
He was careful to point out that already the mis-
sionaries supported by the S.P.G. and C.M.S., as well as
those sent out by the Sister Church of America, were doing
excellent work in Japan, but that these missionaries would
no doubt welcome, as they had done in India, additional
labourers in a mission such as it was proposed to establish.
He now wrote to Dr. Searle the following thoughtful
and earnest appeal :
S. S. Ancona, Singapore : March 31, 1886.
The meetings of University men which I was allowed
to address in Cambridge, Oxford, and elsewhere during
last month, and especially the crowded meeting over
which you so kindly presided in the old library of the
college, have left in my mind a hope which I can
scarcely doubt the future will fulfil that my request for a
small body of men to establish a mission in Japan will not
be disregarded. I wish in this letter to put before you
some of the reasons which seem to me to justify this
request at the present time.
It is admitted that the nations which have the chief
claim upon the missionary energies of the Universities are
those which, with ancient histories, civilisations, and re-
ligious systems of their own, have in recent years been to
a greater or less degree permeated by our culture and
knowledge. Particular places in Christendom will naturally
select for their own sphere of work those places in the
non-Christian world in which the characteristic resources
and gifts at their command may find full and special em-
ployment. From this point of view the great nations of
the East, which in place of their ancient systems, in our
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 155
own day and under our very eyes, are adopting the culture,
the philosophies, and sciences of the West, seem to appeal
with special force for that help which our Universities are
best able to give.
There are not very many places in the East in which
as yet this is the case. It may be hoped, too, that in time
to come native Christian Churches will themselves be in
a position to secure that the claims of Christianity shall not
be put on one side in the countries where they are estab-
lished through the pressure of secular sciences. For the
present this is not so, and if to-day Christianity is to
obtain a hearing in the chief centres of literary and
scientific life in the East, the few men of ability and learn-
ing in the native Churches must be assisted by Western
teachers of the faith.
The islands of Japan have a population of about thirty-
eight millions. Their intercourse with the West, after an
interval of more than two centuries, recommenced in the year
1853 ; and it was only so recently as 1868 that the Revo-
lution took place, which resulted in the break-up of the
old feudal system of the country and placed in complete
authority the present dynasty and government. From this
date commenced also the introduction with such startling
rapidity of European methods and customs, and the adop-
tion of the latest discoveries of the West. Railways and
steamers, telegraphs and telephones, post offices and post
office savings banks, and our methods of municipal and
executive government, have all been introduced within the
space of less than two decades into a country which was
wholly unknown to the last generation of Englishmen. It
is expected that the first representative Parliament will
meet in 1890. With the outward marks of our civilisation
has been adopted also our system of education. Japan for
a thousand years has possessed an educational method
founded upon that of China. Since the renewed inter-
course with Europe this has been re-modelled in all its
branches. Between 1873 an d 1883, 29,000 schools had
been built and opened, and more are being established
every year. The chief object of the old method of educa-
tion was the acquisition of the Chinese character as the
indispensable key to all later study of literature and philo-
sophy. Not less than ten years was spent in this unpro-
ductive toil. This study now occupies a subordinate place.
Even
native
Churches
need
foreign
help at
first.
The mar-
vellous de-
velopment
of Japan :
(a) politic-
ally ;
(b) edu-
cationally.
156
mSHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Hence had
arisen a
desire to
learn
about
Christian-
ity-
Proofs of
this desire.
Buddhism
thus
stirred
into recru-
descence.
The ordinary subjects of primary education among our-
selves have, to a considerable extent, supplanted it. Our
text-books of science and literature are being translated,
and English is taught as a classic.
Two other changes seem to have accompanied the
spreading of education among the masses of the people.
On the one hand, they are far more ready than when the
country was first re-opened to give a respectful hearing to
the claims of Christianity. On the other, a determined
and not altogether unsuccessful attempt is being made by
the priesthood to revive an interest in Buddhism.
Many causes, I gather, have combined with education
to produce the change in the popular attitude towards
Christianity, such as the better understanding of its tenets
and character through the labours of missionaries, and the
neutral position in regard to all religious faiths now taken
up by the Government. The change itself seems very
marked. Thus in 1860 a missionary wrote that when he
mentioned the subject of Christianity in the presence of a
Japanese, his hand would almost involuntarily be applied
to his throat to indicate the extreme perilousness of such a
topic. How great the contrast of this with an account in a
recent number of the missionary organ of the American
Church, in which I find that the people of a district near
Osaka, the second city of Japan, are so earnest in their
desire to learn Christianity that they have built a large
house for a school, and are determined to have no one but
a Christian to take charge of it. This feeling has for some
time past been reflected in the native journals. In 1881 a
leading Japanese paper declared Christianity to be the only
religion that can satisfy the aspirations of the Japanese
people to-day ; and another paper in my possession of so
recent a date as last June assigns the spread of Christianity
as the reason of the falling off of the income of a Buddhist
sect.
On the other hand, Buddhism seems not prepared in
any degree to loose its hold upon the people without a
struggle. Mr. Warren, the secretary of the Church
Missionary Society in Japan, wrote in 1879 : ' Buddhism, at
least in one of its branches, the Shiu sect, shows remarkable
signs of vigour. . . It is making strenuous efforts to get a
footing in Satsuma, from which province it has hitherto
been excluded, and it has just completed a large college at
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 157
Kyoto for the accommodation of 600 students. There is a
rumour that some of the numerous students educated there
may eventually be sent to Europe and America for
proselytising purposes.' Mr. Maundrell, a missionary of
the same society who is with me on board, tells me that
he has experienced opposition in Kiushiu, the most
southerly island of the Japanese group, which must be
assigned to the same cause the revived energy of the
Buddhist priesthood. It is well known that Japanese
Buddhists, who have become aware of the vast differences
between Buddhism as they received it in Japan and the
system which 500 years before our era was taught by
Gautama in India, have recently been studying in Europe
the earlier records of their faith. This is another evidence
of the strength of this movement, notwithstanding the
opposition it has met from the progressive party. Such a
renewal of interest in a system which for a thousand years
has exercised supreme influence over the religious opinions
of a great nation was perhaps to be expected. The Bishop
of Durham, I think, has pointed out that the Paganism of
Bithynia, which at the date of Pliny's letter seemed likely
rapidly to die out, had apparently obtained a new lease of
life by the middle of the century. In our own day there
has been a revival of zeal. But the Church, I think, has
nothing to fear from such temporary recrudescences as
these of religious fervour. Rather, perhaps, more genuine
recruits will pass into her ranks at such times than when
the systems which are opposed to her are inactive and
torpid.
But I must turn to a subject which with reference to But the
the proposal of a University mission is yet more important, general
I mean the University which has been founded in Tokyo, contact
the new capital of the Japanese empire. This is a Univer- with West -
sity of which the instruction is given wholly through the ern . clvil ~
medium of European languages. Till recently the pro- [^ds'to
fessors also have been European, German in the medical Agnosti-
and English in the scientific and literary schools ; but cism -
these professorships now as they fall vacant are generally
filled by natives who have studied in Europe. Through
this University have passed many hundreds of young
Japanese. In Delhi, Hinduism lost its hold upon the
faith of young Hindus about the time when they passed
from the upper classes of the school into the college. An
158 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
analogous result has followed in Japan. Belief in
Buddhism and Shintoism has passed from the minds
of the men who have followed the appointed course
of instruction in the Tokyo University ; and they
have returned to their homes, in the various provinces of
the empire, with as little faith in the creeds of their ances-
tors as has the graduate of Calcutta or Lahore in the
divinities of the Hindu Pantheon. But this .is not all.
Had it been so, the work of the University might have
been regarded by the missionary more truly than it now
can be as a prceparatio evangelica. But the mind of the
young Japanese has not only been disabused of the super-
stitions of his youth, but too often he has also been led by
his European teacher to regard the creed of Christendom
as practically on a level with the faith of his own country.
' Europe,' he has been told, ' has rejected the faith of Christ
very much on the same grounds on which you have seen
it necessary to reject the demi-gods of Northern Buddhism.'
I would not be understood to bring a sweeping charge of in-
fidel propagandism against all the European professors who
have taught in Japan. I know that there have been bright
exceptions : men who have not been ashamed of the Cross
amid surroundings of peculiar difficulty. But admittedly the
great majority of those who have left England and Germany
to teach in Japan have not themselves been Christian in
faith, and have led their pupils to adopt their own attitude
towards Christianity. This is an all but necessary con-
sequence. Even if a teacher endeavour to maintain a
negative and neutral attitude in regard to revelation, it is
impossible, I believe, that the minds of his pupils should
come under the daily influence of his mind at an age when
they are most open to new impressions and not catch from
him very much his own view of divine as well as human
knowledge. In Japan, the wide dissemination of literature
which is more or less directly hostile to Christianity is said
also to have had a disastrous tendency in the same direc-
tion. In an able article on this subject, which was read
at a missionary conference at Osaka, I find the works of
Spencer, Mill, Bain, Huxley, Draper, and others men-
tioned as having prejudiced the educated classes against
the study of the claims of Christianity.
I need scarce do more than point out what seems the
legitimate and inevitable conclusion. Through contact
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 159
with Europe, and above all with England, a new era has Is not
been inaugurated in the history of the whole Japanese En g land
people. At the same time, the educated classes of the [bie for
country have learned, chiefly from the lips of English averting
teachers, to distrust all systems of religion, including thls T
Christianity. Under such circumstances it cannot, I think,
be unreasonable or over-confident to believe that the
English Universities will shortly send men to Japan who,
while they shall have full sympathy with the new longing
after exact knowledge and science which has been awakened
in so large a class of her people, shall at the same time
teach them alike by word and life the knowledge of God.
It is recognised that the slave trade and the enforced
commerce in opium have laid us under a special obligation
to send the Gospel to Africa and China. The obligation
cannot be less onerous in the case of a country which has
learned from us the knowledge of science without God and
of philosophy without religion.
I received, shortly before I left England, a letter from A corn-
Mr. Lloyd (formerly a Fellow of Peterhouse, who, now in m ?mt.y
connection with S.P.G., is himself doing excellent work cou i<j do
among the educated classes in Tokyo) in which he urged good
that the establishment of a University mission is particularly servlce
desirable at the present time. In regard to such missions
it may be said now, as could not have been said ten years
ago, when first you were kind enough to go into the
question with me, that experience has proved the method
of working by small brotherhoods of University men to be
alike practicable and effective. In place of the isolation
which has too often been the lot of the foreign missionary,
the members of such a brotherhood possess the privilege of
fellowship alike in devotion, study, and work a privilege
which at Delhi we have found to be invaluable. I plead,
then, for men to carry out in Japan the method of mission-
ary work which has proved so helpful in India. No doubt
India has the first claim upon our missionary resources.
There could be no question between the two countries were
it necessary to select one or the other. But I know that
you do not hold this to be the case. Indeed, with the
interest in foreign missions which is so marked now in both
Universities, it cannot be doubted that they are well able
to establish and maintain a mission of their own in Japan
without any injury to the missions in India. Were it
i6o
BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
And
especially
help to
build up a
native
Church.
otherwise, my love to Delhi is too great to allow me to
advocate the establishment of another mission, even in the
diocese over which I have been called to preside. I may
add that it does not seem unimportant, at a time when
Buddhism is attracting so much interest in Europe, that
the Universities should be directly represented in a Buddhist
as well as a Hindu and Muhammadan country.
There are not a few other characteristic features of
Japanese missions at the present time upon which I should
like to dwell. Such is the development, with a rapidity to
which India presents no parallel, of an independent native
Church, together with the emergence of all those difficult
but most interesting problems which attend the early years
of an indigenous Christian community. Such, again, is the
presence in Japan alone of a powerful and well worked
mission of the Russo-Greek Church, under its influential
and learned Bishop Pere Nicolai. Such is the return to
the Roman obedience by thousands of the descendants of
the Christians who in the first half of the seventeenth cen-
tury gave their lives for the faith. It is an interesting
evidence of the tenacity of the Japanese character that
sufficient fragments of the faith had been handed down
from generation to generation, through more than two
hundred years of separation from all western help, to
induce these poor people again to profess Christianity
when the country was re-opened. And yet again, besides
the missions of our sister Church, there are in Japan at the
present time various bodies of Christians founded by
different Protestant communities in America. But I must
be content with pointing out that the difficult questions
which such circumstances give rise to will especially claim
the study and assistance of a body of University men.
I should indeed most heartily welcome to Japan those
who, with the qualifications which are needed for such
kinds of work as I have indicated, would join me in the
spirit of our old Delhi motto, SVSKSV sfj,ov KOI rov
This letter justifies the verdict of the present Bishop of
Durham (Dr. Westcott) that ' on being called to undertake
the episcopal charge of the English missions in Japan, where
he found a larger field and more favourable conditions
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 l6l
[than in Delhi] for the use of his zeal and experience,
Bishop Bickersteth at once recognised the greatness of the
unique opportunity? l The foundation and building up of
the Nippon Sei Kokwai (Holy Catholic Church of Japan)
was from the first the idea which he had in view, and from
which he never allowed himself to be deterred ' by the
emergence of all these difficult and most interesting
problems ' which his keen foresight told him would be
inseparable from ' the early years of an indigenous Chris-
tian community.'
It was with the feeling of most lively interest that the
Bishop neared Japan on board a steamer belonging to the
Mitsu Bishi Company (one of the largest of the Japanese
steamship companies) in which he had come from Hong-
kong.
In his first letter from Japan he writes :
We had a perfect passage to Nagasaki, the sea like a
mill-pond all the way. The second evening we passed the
Goto Islands, a group of five, where many of the Christians
took refuge in the great persecution two and a half centuries
ago. The Roman Catholics have now again got missions
and congregations there, and I looked at them with the
greatest interest as the first territory on which my eyes had
rested in the empire of Japan. We reached Nagasaki
about i A.M. Sleep had overpowered me, though I meant
to have looked at the entrance through my cabin window.
In the morning when I got up I found we were safely in
the land-locked harbour, which is surrounded by the not
very lofty but picturesque and fertile hills which are
characteristic of Japan and distinguish it from the flat
coast of North China.
The day on which the Bishop landed was Thursday,
April 15, and two missionaries, Mr. Hutchinson and Mr.
Brandram, welcomed him on shore. After seeing the
1 See Introduction to Our Heritage in the Church, by Bishop Edward
Bickersteth, published (1898) in England after his death.
M
1 62 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
catechist's house and church in the city it was time for
service. ' I had asked to have a service in order that
special thanksgiving might be offered for our safe voyage.
We had Holy Communion, and I spoke a few words.'
The Bishop happened there also to meet some Chinese
native Christians from Fuchow, who were being sent as
missionaries to Corea ' a comparatively unvvorked country.
We had prayer for them, as they were starting that night.
These prayers were offered, one in Chinese, one in Japanese,
and one in English.'
But after a few hours the Bishop had to re-embark for
Kobe, where he was to spend the festival of Easter. He
writes :
The hills of Kobe were in sight when we went on deck
after tiffin, and you will imagine how interesting a sight
they were to me. By 3. 1 5 we were at anchor in the great
harbour ; the town lies on the north shore of the inland
sea. The hills behind it rise to a height of 2,000 feet and
the whole scene, except that the sea in front is shut in by
islands, reminds me of the Riviera.
On Monday in Holy Week he went on to Osaka, of
which he writes :
The chief feature of the town is its many-branching
river and system of canals, which have given it the name of
the Venice of the East ; but it is very unlike the Italian
city. It has no great buildings, and consists of rows
of wooden houses arranged with mathematical regularity
in squares and oblongs. However, it is none the less
interesting for this reason to the missionary, who thinks
chiefly of its teeming population.
It was here that the Bishop preached his first sermon
and took his first confirmation in Japan, of which he writes :
The services for the Holy Week had been arranged in
common between us and the Americans, so I went to four
out of the five different churches on different nights. On
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 163
Good Friday I addressed all the missionaries together on
' fellowship in the suffering of Christ ' from Phil, iii., and
yesterday I took a confirmation, sixteen being confirmed.
I learned the words and the blessing in Japanese, and Mr.
Evington translated for me two short addresses.
On Easter Monday the Bishop joined the mission
party in ' a very pleasant picnic on the hills. The scenery
is not unlike parts of Scotland or the Lakes ; not grand or
rugged, but richly wooded and picturesque. The magnifi-
cent flowering shrubs are unlike anything we have in
England.' Thence he visited Kyoto, ' formerly the ancient
capital of the country, still its religious centre, lying at the
foot of hills of which the lower slopes are covered with
great Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines.'
The conference of the Church Missionary Society took
place on May 3, when the missionaries of that society
and the other clergy of the Church of England presented
the Bishop with an address of welcome, in which, after
referring to ' the attitude of popular opinion towards
Christianity as a hopeful sign for the future success of the
work ' and assuring him of ' the loyal support and loving
co-operation of the clergy and congregations committed
to his charge,' they added these words :
And above all, we are happy that one has been called
in the providence of God to preside over us who has
already shown such earnest devotion in the cause of
missionary effort, a devotion, doubtless, inherited from a
father whose name will ever be remembered for untiring
zeal in promoting the extension of Christ's Kingdom
amongst the heathen.
This annual conference, the first of seven over which
the Bishop presided without a break, passed the following
important resolution, out of which much future organisation
was to grow :
M 2
164 P.ISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
That, taking into consideration the existence of three
Episcopal missions in this country, two of which are in
connection with the Church of England and one with the
Protestant Episcopal Church of America, and being con-
vinced that co-operation between these three societies, and
visible union among the native Christians connected with
them, is necessary to the establishment of a strong Epis-
copal Church and a necessary preliminary to any wider
union of Christians in Japan on a permanent and satis-
factory basis ; and further, noting that for some time past
united action has existed among the various sections of
non-Episcopal communities to the manifest increase of
their strength and influence, and that efforts are now being
made, specially by the native Christians, towards unity
amongst the different communities themselves the
annual conference of the C.M.S., now sitting in Osaka,
wishes to suggest to the Bishop and clergy of the
American Church and the clergy of the S.P.G. the
desirability of holding a general conference of the three
missions on this subject at an early date.
In writing to his father about this conference, the
Bishop recorded, his first impressions thus :
c\o Rev. A. C. Shaw, S.P.G. Mission, Tokyo :
May 14, 1886.
Our Conference (C.M.S.) went off very well. It was
harmonious throughout, and I trust has given a spur to
our missionary work : not that my clergy need stimulating
to do more work, as most of them are overworking already,
but that meeting and discussion and common prayer send
men back with greater heart to their labour. I hope next
year to have a Quiet Day to end up with.
Among many other matters we agreed to one resolu-
tion which may carry with it important consequences.
Mr. Fyson proposed a general conference of our Church
missions (C.M.S. and S.P.G.) and the American Church
Mission with a view to fuller co-operation. I yesterday
transmitted the invitation to Bishop Williams of the
American Church, who has accepted it. Union is very
much in the air in Japan. The Presbyterians have all
joined together, and the Congregationalists and they are
trying to amalgamate. . . . On the other hand, we and the
American Church are essentially one here we have the
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 165
same Prayer Book in Japanese and if we could only
work together should be a fairly strong body, though even
then small compared with the Nonconformist American
Missions. And we could certainly, if we had liberty
allowed us, offer a basis of wider union on some such lines
as those I mentioned at the Portsmouth Congress which
ought in time to draw in many of the separated
communities.
. . . There is the most curious difference between the
people of this country and India. Here foreigners can
only suggest and guide, in India they rule ; so that even by
missionaries, not to say Bishops, continual care has to be
taken not to offend Japanese susceptibilities. They have
not yet realised this in Salisbury Square, and send out
pages of regulations for native Churches. In the one case,
where a missionary unwisely took them in his hand and
said that this was the plan agreed upon for their organisa-
tion in England, the whole thing was promptly rejected
with the offer of monetary help which was attached to its
acceptance. Wiser men are bringing them to much the
same point by suggestion and guidance.
By the roth of the same month the Bishop had gone
up to Tokyo, not then or for some years wholly connected
with Osaka by railway. There he was welcomed by the
Rev. A. C. Shaw (now Archdeacon of South Tokyo) and the
Rev. A. Lloyd (formerly Dean of Peterhouse, Cambridge),
both connected with S.P.G. missions in that city. The
former of these had worked in Tokyo since 1873. At his
invitation the Bishop made his house his headquarters
while in Tokyo, for the next year and a- half. He writes
in his ' Journal ' :
The house of the former is in a quarter of the city
called Shiba, and I was most agreeably surprised at the
situation and character of the place. Though in the heart
of the city, there are a number of gardens and fir woods
about, and Mr. Shaw's house is on a hill which lifts it above
the masses of human habitations around. The city itself
is immense, stretching like London for miles and miles in
all directions. There are over a million inhabitants, and it
1 66 'BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
contains all the Government Offices and the University of
Japan.
In Tokyo the Bishop met for the first time Bishop
Williams, of the Episcopal Church of America. He had
been in the Far East, both in China and Japan, for nearly
thirty years, first as missionary and then as missionary
Bishop, having been consecrated in 1866. Here also he
called on Bishop Nicolai, the revered representative of the
Greek Church, and he thus describes his visit :
The Greek Bishop is a startling figure in long blue
cassock, many-coloured belt, long hair. We talked of many
things, including union of Churches. He has very large
buildings, and is erecting a great cathedral. Russians
take great interest in the mission, as it is their only one
outside Russian territory, though they have others on the
borders of China. He gave us copies of the Psalter &c.,
which he had recently translated. At my request he wrote
my name in Russian, and he said when we parted, ' We
must love in deed as well as word.' The object of the
mission is not wholly political ; it was largely got up by an
admiral who was wrecked on the coast of Japan, and sent
out this mission as a thankoffering for the kindness shown
him by the people.
When Bishop Nicolai returned the above call, a visit
was paid by both Bishops to the English Church.
A dear little building, very well appointed, built of red
brick and with a pretty garden round it. I asked him to say
the Lord's Prayer with us and to give the blessing. He
was very pleased, and explained that he only did not kneel,
because it is contrary to their Canon during the fifty days
from Easter to Pentecost
On May 18 Bishop Williams and Bishop Nicolai came
to dine with him, and he records in his ' Journal ' : ' Three
Bishops not known to have met before in Japan.'
On the 2ist he met the native Christians of the C.M.S.
Mission in Tokyo, and records :
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1886-1888 167
May 21, Evening. Dined with Mr. Williams of
C.M.S. Met native Christians of C.M.S. congregation
afterwards. Only one man of position among them a
Dr. Hada. Had agreed not to speak that evening, but as
they were anxious to hear something I talked to them a
little while. Referred to Bishop Poole, their need of a
pastor, the importance of their position in this capital city,
the old Jansenist motto : Unde ardet inde lucet the flame
and the light are of like origin. Love and usefulness go
together.
On May 22 the Bishop characteristically organised a
Quiet Day, of which he writes :
May 22nd. I held a Quiet Day for the S.P.G., C.M.S.,
and American Missions, and gave four addresses : (i) at
Holy Communion, on ' The Use of Quiet Days ; ' (2) after
Matins, on ' God and the Practice of His Presence ; '
(3) after the Litany, on ' Life in God ; ' and (4) after a
Metrical Litany, on ' Work for God.' No such Quiet Days
have been held before in Tokyo, and they seem to supply
a real want.
Thus at the outset of his work in Japan he emphasised
the same principles of the life and the work which we have
seen to have been the keynote of his work in Delhi.
On May 24 a second step was taken towards con-
federation at a meeting attended by English (S.P.G. and
C.M.S.) and American missionaries, and called, in accord-
ance with the resolution passed at the recent C.M.S.
conference at Osaka : ' To try and weld together into one
body the various scattered congregations of our respective
missions.' Bishop Williams presided, and it was decided
to hold a conference of delegates on July 8 and the
following days, each society sending their own representa-
tives.
At once Bishop Bickersteth set to work to draft Canons '
in order to submit a scheme to the forthcoming conference.
1 See chapter ix. , p. 320, and Appendix B, p. 476.
l68 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
No task could have been more congenial to him, and he
ransacked ancient and modern authorities. His short
diary as well as his careful memoranda show how he com-
pared primitive experience embodied in the decisions of
early Councils with the more recent Canons of the
American and New Zealand Churches, ever balancing one
against another the claims of early precedents and of
modern latter-day needs. He also referred the whole
matter to the Archbishop of Canterbury (Dr. Benson), then
as ever ready, Cyprian-like, to enter into a careful consider-
ation of such questions, and to place his own trained and
discriminating judgment at the service of those who were
called upon ' to build the walls of Jerusalem.'
For the convenience of those who may have occasion
to refer to the first beginnings of the Nippon Sei Kokwai, 1
its constitution and Canons, its principles and aims, I am
devoting Chapter IX. of this biography to an account in
detail of this important and permanent work of laying the
foundations, in which Bishop Bickersteth was surely sent
out by God to take a leading part.
I therefore will here only chronicle the holding of the
United Conference on July 8 at Tokyo. All the delegates
were present at the opening service, when Bishop Williams
was celebrant at the Holy Communion and Bishop Bicker-
steth preached the sermon, taking as his texts St. Matt.
xvi. 19 and St. John xx. 23.
He records in his ' Journal ' :
Tokyo, July 8, 1886. (The week of a conference repre-
sentative of missionaries, preparatory to a General Con-
ference in 1887.) All the delegates were present this
morning at our opening service. I preached and Bishop
Williams celebrated. I took a subject from St. Mat-
thew xvi. and St. John xx., ' The threefold power of the
Keys/ (a) The Keys, () Binding and loosing, i.e. Legisla-
1 I.e. The Holy Catholic Church of Japan.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 169
tion, (V) Absolution. I treated them as inherent in the
Christian Society, and exercised continually through its
ministry. The keys I took to be the key of knowledge,
and the key of admission to and exclusion from the
Christian Church. The whole seemed applicable to our
efforts to found a Christian Church in Japan.
The opening service was in the C.M.S. Mission Church
at Tsukiji, the foreign settlement of Tokyo. We met in
Bishop Williams's College for our meetings, which is near
the church. The conference lasted four days, with
sittings of about three hours twice daily. The proposed
Synod and the code of Canons, on which Bishop Williams
and I have been at work, were our chief subjects of discus-
sion. I speak of discussion, but the whole was most har-
monious, everybody, I think, trying to contribute rather
than to oppose, to ' build ' rather than to ' overthrow.'
Besides the two subjects I have mentioned, the revision
of the present Prayer Book, the formation of an indepen-
dent Japanese Missionary Society, education, various
social questions (very difficult here as in India), litera-
ture (this field has hitherto been left wholly to Non-
conformistSj we are now starting a monthly Church
Magazine, but this will not take the place of books), Quiet
Days, and the circulation among the missionaries of papers
of intercession like those of the Society of Watchers and
Workers, &c., all came under review.
The only drawback was the extreme heat, the thermo-
meter registering higher than had been known for about
fifteen years.
July ii. One object of this conference is to form
one native Church out of the various scattered congrega-
tions. This is rendered necessary here, even more than in
India, both because it is the demand of the Japanese
Christians themselves, and because such unions have been
accomplished by the various Nonconformist bodies ; also
because here, even more than in India, the actual work of
evangelisation is best done by the natives themselves
under an organisation in which they have a considerable
share of authority. We have had many delicate questions
to consider, but the conference has been most harmonious.
... If our plans can be carried through, I trust that by
God's grace they will give a great stimulus to Church
work, which is here mainly missionary work.
I/O BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
The following is the letter written jointly by Bishop
Williams and Bishop Bickersteth at the close of this
conference, addressed to the Bishops of the Anglican
Communion :
Tokyo, Japan : St. James' Day, 1886.
To t/ie Right Rev. the Bishops of the Anglican Communion.
Right Rev. and Dear Brethren, We have been re-
quested, by a conference of delegates of the three mis-
sionary societies, which are connected with the Anglican
Communion in our jurisdiction, to endeavour to set before
the Church in England and America the special needs
and claims of the great country in which our work lies.
The missionary fields of the Church are now so various,
and their needs for the most part so well known by
missionary publications, that a special appeal requires
justification. This justification we believe to be found in
the greatness and hopefulness of missionary work in
Japan, combined with the shortness of the time during
which it is likely that the present opportunity will be
continued to us.
It is scarcely more than thirty years since this country,
with its population of nearly forty million souls, was sealed
to all intercourse with the West, except through a single
Dutch trading company. During the interval it has
adopted, with startling rapidity, our civilisation and cus-
toms, assimilating very much of our most advanced learn-
ing and knowledge, and itself being admitted to a
recognised position among the nations of the world. The
result has been a great displacement from the faith of the
Japanese people in the religious systems which for a
thousand years have held undisputed sway among them.
Though Shintoism and Buddhism are still nominally the
religions of the great mass of the people, they have ceased
to have any beyond a speculative interest for the educated,
and have lost much of their hold even on the lower classes.
State recognition has recently been withdrawn from both
systems.
Meanwhile alike the treatment and popular estimate of
Christianity have no less completely changed. Instead of
being proscribed by public edict, it shares in the impartial
toleration which is now shown by the Japanese Govern-
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 I/I
ment of all religious faiths. Instead of being regarded
with feelings of mingled contempt and hatred, it is now
generally looked upon with interest and respect. Among
the upper classes this is in part due to the belief that it is
an essential element in the higher form of Western civilisa-
tion, which they have adopted as their model. But a more
spiritual motive often prevails. The work of the last two
years more especially seems to have left upon the minds
of many experienced missionaries, alike within and with-
out our Communion, the impression of a widespread desire
to know the truth.
Such a crisis in a nation's history seems to call for a
combination in the Church's missions of men of various
gifts and powers. We desire to call attention to three
lines of work which seem to us of special importance at
the present time.
1. A wide field is open to those who, taking advantage
of the new spirit of respectful inquiry, would give them-
selves to public preaching and lecturing alike in the towns
and country, a work with which might often be combined
the preparation of books fitted to commend the faith to
the Japanese mind.
2. The new system of education, which has been put
into operation throughout the Japanese Empire, affords
what we believe to be an unprecedented opportunity to the
educational missionary. Alike in government and private
schools, instruction in the English language is now
eagerly sought from the lips of those to whom English is
their native tongue. A fair salary is assigned in return for
a few hours' teaching on five days in the week. The
teachers in the private schools have the fullest consent of
those who engage them to bring to bear upon their pupils,
alike in and out of school hours, every moral and spiritual
influence. Such missionaries, if attached to the staff of a
society, would, in some cases, need to make little or no
demand upon its funds other than for occasional expenses.
Experience has already shown that large and even rapid
results may be expected from such work.
In connection with this we would notice that in the
capital and some other large cities instruction in English
is now desired scarcely less by the women than by the
men of Japan. Ready access is afforded to English-
speaking ladies who will undertake to provide it ; and
1/2 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
this, in many cases, with the hope rather than the fear, on
the part of the pupil, that the acquisition of the teacher's
language will be accompanied by instruction in her faith.
3. Colleges have been established for the education of
clergy and teachers, as well as Christian schools both for
boys and girls. A small beginning has also been made
in the work of training Japanese Christian women to act,
after the model of Apostolic days, as evangelists among
the many millions of their countrywomen who are as yet
unenlightened, and to help in the further instruction of
their sisters in the faith. All such training institutions
must for the present be carried on chiefly by foreign
missionaries. Their importance is emphasised by the
rapidity of the recent increase in the number of baptisms,
which has been larger during the past year than during
any year preceding since the foundation of the missions.
Such growth can only be healthful and permanent, if the
newly baptised can at once be placed under well instructed
as well as earnest pastors and teachers of their own
nationality and tongue.
With opportunities and needs such as these, we have
at present at work in connection with our communion only
twenty-one clergy, six laymen, and eight missionary ladies.
So small a staff is insufficient even for the work in hand,
and without its increase extension is impossible. Such
increase, to be effectual, should be immediate. Here the
hope all but reaches certainty, that it is the divine
purpose to grant to adequate efforts on the part of the
Church a new Christian nation. But in a special sense, to
the people of these islands, now is the day of salvation.
Their old religions are indeed disappearing ; but manifold
superstitions and infidelities wait to occupy the ground, if
it is not claimed by the faith of Christ.
On the other hand, the opinion held by many does not
seem unfounded that when the people of these islands
themselves shall have been gathered into the fold, mission-
aries sent forth by them might exercise as large an influence
on the nations of the neighbouring continent as was exer-
cised by missionaries from Great Britain in the early
middle ages on the nations of North Europe.
We appeal, then, with many prayers, for men and
women fitted alike by the Spirit of wisdom and the Spirit
of love to enter in at the great door and effectual which
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. l886-l888 1/3
has been opened to us. We venture to commend most
earnestly the facts which we have addressed to your con-
sideration, asking you to bring them, as opportunity may
offer, before the clergy, the missionary societies, and the
students in our universities, colleges, and theological
schools. Necessary support will, we cannot doubt, be
provided for efficient labourers. Earthly recompense it is
not in our power to offer them, and they will not seek
it. Rather they will feel that to be allowed to share, at the
crisis of its religious history, in bringing a great and noble
people to the knowledge of God, is, till the day of Christ,
its own all-sufficient reward.
We are, Right Reverend and dear Brethren,
Your faithful Servants in Christ,
(Signed} C. M. WILLIAMS,
Missionary Bishop of Yedo
EDWARD BICKERSTETH,
Missionary Bishop of the Church of England in Japan.
By the August of this year the Bishop had fully made
up his mind to place his University Mission in Tokyo.
He gave his reasons in a second letter to the Master of
Pembroke College (the Rev. C. E. Searle, D.D.), dated
August 14, 1866, from which the following extracts are
given :
My dear Master, . . . Since I wrote to you last
April, I have visited the principal mission stations of our
Church in Japan. One object of my journeys has been,
after consulting the missionary clergy in each place, to
decide on the city in which a special mission to the edu-
cated classes may at the present time be located with the
greatest advantage. I now feel no doubt that such a mission
should be placed in Tokyo, the capital of the Japanese
empire, from which I am now writing. Tokyo is the chief
centre alike of government and education. Young men
of high position and promise continually visit it, and go
forth from it again to all parts of these islands, so that
Christian influence exerted here is widely felt throughout
the whole land.
Two special circumstances have assisted me in coming
to this conclusion :
174 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
1. There is an active and promising mission of the
Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Tokyo,
which is only prevented from a far wider range of useful-
ness by want of men. The Society's missionaries will
offer a hearty and brotherly welcome to a new mission,
and put their experience at its disposal in its early
days.
2. An offer of educational work in a celebrated Japanese
school has recently been made to the Rev. A. Lloyd, of
which without further aid he is only able partially to take
advantage. . . .
I cannot but feel that this opening, at the present
time, may be accepted as a sign of God's guidance. The
primary difficulty of all mission work among educated
classes is to obtain entrance among them. This school
will afford the missionaries who teach in it an entrance
into a large circle of Tokyo society from the time they
arrive in the country, without laying on them the heavy
burden of general school management and financial pro-
vision ; and also without so engrossing their time as to
prevent the acquisition of the language. When once this
is attained, all the manifold operations of general mission
work will also be open to them.
I have ventured to ask for four men. One who was
present at our meeting in the old Library last February
has written offering to join me next year. Others are
considering the matter. It may be that the proposal
which has now been made to Mr. Lloyd will enable them
to come to an immediate decision. The greatness of
Japan's need is surely the measure of the Church's duty.
I may add that no brigher prospect, I believe, has ever
been set before the missionary than that which Japan
offers to-day.
1 am, my dear Master,
Yours very sincerely,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH,
Bishop.
The Bishop was now burning to be off on his first
missionary tour, and to see face to face the devoted mis-
sionaries, men and women, as well as the converts under
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 175
his charge, many of whom were isolated. During these
three months in the city of Tokyo which is by far the
largest city in Japan, its population being about 1,200,000
he had not only closely studied the problem of the
best way to bring the forces of Christianity to bear on
that great centre of thought, life, and influence ; but he had
also made plans for extensive missionary tours throughout
the whole length and breadth of the empire, all the missions
of the Church of England being at that time under his
sole supervision.
Japan is about 1,700 miles in length, and had in 1886
a population of 38,000,000, while the English missions
were dotted about at places as far distant as Nagasaki in
the extreme south (Kiushiu) and Sapporo in the far north
(Yezo).
At that time there was no territorial division in Japan
between the missions sent out by the sister Churches of
America and England. The missionaries from each
country, and the native converts gathered by their efforts,
were under the jurisdiction of their respective Bishops,
irrespective of locality. The first attempt at a delimita-
tion of dioceses took place in 1891, when an arrangement
made between Bishop Bickersteth and Bishop Hare of
South Dakota (then in temporary charge of the American
Mission) was submitted by them to the Archbishop
of Canterbury and the American House of Bishops.
The Archbishop approved the plan, and the House of
Bishops ' commended it to the favourable consideration of
the Bishop to be placed in charge of the missionary diocese
of Yedo.' But it was not until 1894 that this delimitation
(with important modifications) was ratified by the Japanese
Synod and in the Synod of 1 896 the six ' missionary
districts ' were formally recognised. During these years
many negotiations were necessary, and some questions
176 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
were raised of a difficult and delicate nature. But in this
place it only seems necessary to point out how for
Bishop Bickersteth the ruling principle throughout was
that expressed by himself in 1895 :
It is my earnest desire and prayer that the result of
our present organisation may be the wider extension and
progressive usefulness of the missions of both branches of
the Anglican Communion in Japan, and of the Church
which they have been allowed to found together.
Writing on October 23, 1886, the Bishop remarks : ' I
am reading Adams's " History of Japan," and find it hard
to believe that the country is the same that he describes in
the year 1860.' In 1886, however, internal communication
between the capital and even the important cities in the
main island (Hondo) was still deficient ; journeys were
precarious, and often only possible on foot. The network
of railways which the Bishop during his eleven years
episcopate saw spreading in all directions had not then
even connected the modern capital ' Tokyo with its
ancient rival Kyoto, and journeys had to be accom-
plished by jinricksha, or coasting steamer, or on foot,
often in perils, not indeed of robbers, but of heavy
rains, swollen rivers, and earthquakes. The Bishop's
ubiquitous energy during this and the two or three following
years, in which he visited and revisited every part of the
empire, led Sir Rutherford Alcock, when presiding in 1888
at a drawing-room meeting held at the London residence
of Sir Monier Monier- Williams in support of the mission,
to utter a timely caveat against such incessant travelling
as being impossible for a European to keep up in Japan.
However, the Bishop did not act on impulse, as will be
seen from the following letter in which he had sketched
out with precision the main outlines of the tour on which
he now started :
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 177
To his Father
c\o Rev. A. C. Shaw, Shiba, Tokyo :
June 28, 1886.
This will reach you about the time that I start on
my journey, so let me give you a sketch of my proposed
movements. About August 10 or 15 I leave Yokohama
by steamer for Hakodate in Yezo, the most northerly
island of the Japanese group. There I shall probably stay
a fortnight, and then go on to Sapporo, a town further up
the east coast, where there is an ' unattached ' Christian
congregation which perhaps may be brought to anchor by
our side.
From Sapporo I hope to get into the Ainu country,
the harmless but wholly untutored race, whose ways and
manners Miss Bird has described. By the last week of
September I ought to be back here again, but only to stay
a day to change summer for winter things and proceed to
Osaka, whence partly by the Inland Sea and partly by land
I am to make my way to the province of Iwami, on the west
coast. This will be another six weeks' work. Mr. Evington
of the C.M.S. is to be my companion. Thence to Nagasaki,
the inspection of which and its outstations will take me to
the middle of January ; then probably for a month or six
weeks to Kobe and the C.M.S. Conference at Osaka, and
then back here for Easter. 1
No doubt the Bishop's tall slim figure, and at times his
worn and emaciated appearance, hardly prepared people
for the inexhaustible energy which kept his work, physical,
mental, and spiritual, at high pressure. The shortest and
one of the best missionary speeches which it has been my
privilege to hear was made in the Library 2 at Lambeth
Palace by Admiral Sir Vesey Hamilton. The Admiral,
not without demur on his part, had consented to move a
1 N.B. These plans were (with slight modifications) carried out with
the addition of the first Synod of the Japanese Church at Osaka in February
1887.
2 The meeting was held on October 31, 1890, in support of the St. Andrew's
and St. Hilda's Missions, Tokyo, founded by Bishop Bickersteth, and by that
time in working order.
N
178 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
resolution at the meeting. He produced a profound
impression on the friends and supporters of the mission
gathered in the crowded library by his words :
Being in command of the Chinese squadron, I hap-
pened to be in Tokyo a few years ago when your
Bishop first arrived, and I remember hearing men say,
on seeing their new Bishop : ' Here is the round man in
the square hole.' I returned to Tokyo after a year or
two, and they said to me : ' Admiral, we were quite
wrong. No one works harder than our Bishop, and he
is the round man in the round hole ' Ladies and gentle-
men, you may safely go on in your support of any work
led by him.
On the eve of his departure from Tokyo, the Bishop
mentions in a letter his indebtedness to John Imai, ' a
young catechist who interprets for me nicely ; a particu-
larly pleasant young Japanese, strongly imbued with the
Christian tone and temper.'
The following extracts from the Bishop's 'Journal
Letters ' will give some idea of this first journey to the
northern island of Yezo :
First Tour in Yezo, 1886
Horobetsu, Aug. 26. A gloomy morning. We started on
horseback for New Mororan, a place about twelve miles off,
six miles along the shore, the same route we had come from
Old Mororan, and then for six miles along a mountain path
where only occasionally could we get out of a walking
pace. We arrived in about four hours ; the village, with
the exception of a house or two, is wholly Ainu, very pic-
turesque, nestled in a little bay of the sea. We took up
our quarters in a small Japanese inn, where shortly we
received a visit of ceremony from the Ainu chief, who
entered in his robe of state with absolutely imperturbable
face, and seated himself demurely opposite Mr. Batchelor ;
several followers did the same behind him, and then
he commenced a short harangue to the effect that he
was pleased to see us in his village. Mr. Batchelor
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 179
replied with equal solemnity, reminding him that we all
believed one God, and that the Ainu had a tradition that
all men of old were brothers. In this we agreed, and
hoped they would not consider us as aliens but friends.
All this was preceded and followed by the usual beard
stroking. An arrangement was then made that there
should be a meeting in the evening at the hut of the chief,
which is a good size, and a magic lantern shown which we
had brought with us. Truly I wish you could have been
present at that meeting. The wildness of the scene !
Possibly some of your Arab encampments across the
Jordan may have equalled it, but nothing I have seen in
India. The magnificent Ainu men with their great beards
and solemn countenances, the women got up in their best
bead necklaces, &c., all hideously disfigured to Western
eyes by the tatooing they think so beautiful, the crowd of
children, the bear skins hung about the rude hut, the hut
itself grim with soot, which, nevertheless, had formed a kind
of ebony polish over the roof beams, all lighted by the
fitful gleams of pieces of pine bark, and all the faces turned
in astonishment at the magic lantern pictures by help of
which they were being taught the first principles of the
Gospel. I cannot describe it for you, but you may be able
to throw these features of the scene together into some
sort of a picture.
August 28. Reading Bishop of Durham's ' Ignatius
and Polycarp ' truly a marvel of condensed learning and
shrewd combination and interpretation of scanty details,
throwing a flood of light on the darkest fifty years of the
Church's history.
August 29. I baptised two Ainu, and their adopted
Japanese child. Mr. Batchelor took all the service except
the words of the administration of the sacrament. They
are only the second and third of their race admitted to the
Church ; may they indeed be a first-fruits to Christ !
August 31. Left early in Japanese carriage (a springless
vehicle) for Sapporo ; route is dull in parts, and so was
the sky. I employ my time so far as the jolting permits
in reading Dr. Lightfoot and in making use of my com-
panions to learn some Japanese.
September i. I reached Sapporo at 4 P.M. Sapporo is
the capital of Yezo, a new city made by the Government,
about twenty miles from the Western Sea, in order to be
N 2
ISO BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
out of reach of Russian ironclads. It is flourishing, and
has now a population of about 10,000 or 12,000 people. I
am staying with Professor Brookes, of the Agricultural
College.
September 3. I repaid calls on Christians. I found
one with Liddon's ' Bampton Lectures,' and Kenan's ' Life
of Christ ' ; in another house I found four generations,
great grandmother to baby !
September 4. I saw in the museum a very interesting
collection of Ainu curiosities, poisoned arrow-heads, primi-
tive weaving looms, &c. Just outside the museum build-
ings are some holes in the ground, the remains of the
homes of a yet earlier race called Guru-pokguru ; of these
there are yet some remnants, in yet more northerly
islands.
September 5. 10 A.M. Morning service and Holy
Communion, fifty-eight communicants, the largest number
I have seen in Japan. At 3 P.M. I gave an address
to the college students on ' The Bible Revelation of the
Divine Character.' It lasted over an hour, but they were
very attentive, especially as they only know English
imperfectly.
September 8. I started at 6.30 from Mororan to cross
Volcano Bay in a little steamer ; when half way across
the captain said it was too rough to land on the further
side, and returned, so we had three hours' toss for nothing.
We returned ten miles to Horobetsu, meaning to round
the head of the bay on ponies, but were stopped by a
downpour of rain. This would have been a three days'
journey.
September 9. We started at 1.45 A.M. on ponies to
return to Mororan, a fine but very dark night, and four
hours' ride. I was thrown but not hurt ; my pony mistook
Mr. Batchelor's big dog for a bear, and bounded over a
ditch and into some rough underwood, when it stumbled
and got me over its head. We crossed Volcano Bay
safely and reached Hakodate after eight hours in a country
brake. I found letters requiring an immediate answer
and the mail starting next morning early, so I was up
until i A.M. writing, thus for the first time in my life, I
think, I travelled and worked for more than twenty-four
hours at a stretch.
September 10. Reading Pusey on Daniel.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 l8l
From September 16 till October I the Bishop was at
Tokyo actively engaged in promoting the establishment of
the Ladies' Institute, 1 a high-class school for girls the
superintendence of which was offered, by the eminent
Japanese who founded it, to English ladies, the choice
of the first Head Mistress and members of the staff being
left to the Bishop.
He sadly records :
No reading, except St. Ignatius's letter to St. Polycarp,
an old to a young Bishop in the second century, and a
tiny book by Archdeacon Norris on Pastoral Theology ;
some good points, but his advice not to read modern
commentaries on Scripture delusive.
On October I came his first tour on the West coast,
already alluded to, which is recorded in the following
entries in his ' Journal ' :
Tour on the West Coast, 1886
October 8. I left by the little coasting steamer with
Mr. Evington and Mr. Chapman, the former the Secretary
and the latter a young missionary of C.M.S. ; it was
delightfully smooth, or the little vessel crowded with
Japanese would not have been very pleasant The morning
lights were very lovely, and by nine o'clock we were again
on shore and had started for Fukuyama, a town a few miles
from the coast, where we were to stay a few days. This
we reached about mid-day, and spent the afternoon in
seeing the little company of Christians. Work was only
commenced there last year, and there are already signs of
a bountiful harvest if only the men were forthcqming to
gather it in.
October 10. I confirmed ten persons of all ages, from
22 to 70, in the back room of the Japanese inn, and after-
wards gave them their first Communion. In the afternoon
Mr. Evington baptised five persons.
October u and 12. A public preaching at night in
a large rough shed ; such places the Japanese are wonder-
1 See chapter vii. p. 215.
1 82 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
fully clever in rapidly adorning and fitting up ; the first
night about 120 persons, the second night about 200
persons present. I gave an address by interpretation on the
Christian's answer to these three questions : ' Whence is
man ? ' ' What is he ? ' and ' Whither going ? '
October 12. I walked some six miles to Era, a large
village where there are several Christians, one a farmer
who had seen better times struck me particularly by the
honesty of his countenance and, so far as expression is an
index of heart, happiness in his new faith.
We first called on the doctor, who is more or less
favourably disposed to Christianity, and then adjourned to
a house where the screens which divide Japanese rooms
had been taken down, making one large room of the whole
front part of the building. Here, both afternoon and
evening, a large congregation collected ; in the afternoon
I spoke by interpretation, and in the evening Mr. Evington
gave the principal address, the Japanese catechist who is
with us speaking both times. The heads of my sermon
addressed ' to those only who believe in a good God,' were :
A. All such may hold it as certain that God has
made known a true religion to man, and that we men
are so made as to be able to embrace it when made known
to us.
B. Are you or are you not satisfied with your new
faith ? Man's chief needs are (a) The knowledge of God ;
(#) Reconciliation with God ; (c) Union with God. How
far does Buddhism or Shintoism satisfy you in these
respects ?
C. The answer of Christianity to these needs, through
Christ the Word, Christ the Atoner, Christ Exalted, giving
the Holy Spirit
October u. I walked in to Fuchoo, a small town
with about 6,000 inhabitants, six miles from Era. I passed
on the way a new Buddhist college, beautifully situated on
a hill ; probably the spread of Christianity has stimulated
the effort. In the towns, among the upper classes,
Buddhism has no hope of a future, but the case is different
in the country.
October 17. I confirmed one man who, with several
others, had been baptised in the morning. His baptism,
owing to circumstances, has been delayed some months, so
Mr. Evington was anxious that it should not be put off
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 183
any longer. He is to act as leader of the little band of
Christians here until a regular catechist can be found.
St. Luke's Day. Holy Communion ; Mr. Evington, the
Catechist, Yama Shita, the man yesterday baptised and
confirmed, and myself, a little company. I had some
scruples both as to the confirmation of the man and so
soon receiving him to Holy Communion ; but, under the
circumstances, as there cannot be another celebration in
this district until March, it seemed right.
I visited the chief school of the town, only of the same
grade as our parochial schools, but teaches chemistry, &c. :
some 600 scholars, and though this is a fifth-rate country
town, all are taught after the newest Western methods.
What will be the result if Christianity is not able to give
heart to this vast extension of intellectual learning, sup-
ported by the whole force of a centralised government ?
In the afternoon the Christians asked us to tea in a tea-
house near the town, and in the evening I entertained
them in the lower room of an inn. Afterwards I talked to
them on bearing the cross in life as well as on their fore-
heads.
October 19. We left before daylight; the Christians
had assembled, and accompanied us to the foot of a beauti-
ful pass, through which our way lay. I had a jinriksha,
but it broke down when our journey was only one-third
accomplished. We slept at a little inn at the back of a
shop in a place called Kisha.
October 20. We left at 6.45, and walked ten miles
along the banks of the Gogawa ; the road crossed the
stream several times, but the bridges had been carried
away by a flood, and we had to make circuits round the
bend of the stream ; we reached Mizashi about mid-day,
a large town with 10,000 or 12,000 people, at the point of
a river where it becomes navigable ; there are no Christians
here at present.
After a short stay we took a large country boat with
two oarsmen, one of whom worked a sort of paddle in the
stern, and the other a large heavy oar in the prow ; we and
our luggage were in the middle of the boat on a little
platform to keep us from the water, which inevitably
splashes in while descending rapids.
On this river there are rapids about every mile, the
descent of some is very interesting ; the boat is guided by
1 84 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
the oarsman in front, who stands up and steers by the
strokes of the heavy blade of his oar, which he cleverly
balances on the side of the boat, now on this, now on the
other side of the prow. When the steeper rapids are
studded with rocks across the descent of the water, this
method of journeying is very exciting and interesting, and
but for the skill of the steersman, which seems never to fail,
would be dangerous. I thought of our descent of the St.
Lawrence Rapids in 1870, but then we had a steamer,
which would have had no chance in a shallow boiling river
like the Gogawa.
October 21. All day in the boat running between hills
from one to two thousand feet high, so no distant views.
This province is rightly called Iwa-mi, or rock view. In
the afternoon we stopped at a place called Kumamoto,
hoping to see a young man who, from this out-of-the-way
part of Japan, had made his way to Oxford ; he was, how-
ever, away. It appears that since his return he has been
lecturing against Christianity ; he is the son of a Buddhist
Priest. We slept at a place called Watavi, where there is
an earnest catechumen, who hopes to be baptised before long.
October 22. We reached Watadzu at the mouth of the
Gogawa ; the last part of the journey was exceedingly
beautiful, the river descending rapidly through lofty hills,
which block the view at the end of every reach. We stayed
in a small inn belonging to one of the Christians, and had
a service at night.
October 23. After arranging for a confirmation here
ten days later, we left at 6.45 A.M., and walked fourteen
miles to Hamada ; part of the journey is over sand by the
sea coast, which with a hot sun is tiring. At Hamada are
some six or seven Christians.
October 26. Confirmation of five candidates, followed
by a tea, to which I asked all the Christians. In the
evening a public preaching, at which some young pleaders
from the county court were present.
October 27. Holy Communion at 5 A.M., and all the
Christians present, about ten in number. We rode fourteen
miles to Matsuye, and walked on twelve more to Masuda.
We got into the dark, and were glad of the help of a lamp
brought to us by a Christian who came to meet us. He
and another man are the only Christians as yet in the
place.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. l886-l888 185
October 28. I found that there is a hopeful little
company of catechumens here, but in this out-of-the-way part
of Japan they are deterred by the opposition of their official
superiors. They are employed in the police, and their
chief happens to be a strong Buddhist. A widow woman
who teaches in a Government school has been chief mover
here.
October 28-31. I preached by interpretation every even-
ing. On the 3Oth Mr. Evington's sermon was interrupted
by the ' fire-bell.' It was not a serious affair, but in Japan
it is the custom for all people to troop to a fire to offer
their services, and not seldom actually to hinder the efforts
of the firemen.
All Saints' Day. I started on the return journey to
Hamada, and stopped at mid-day at a place called Misumi ;
I saw a police inspector who is an inquirer after ' The
Way ; ' his wife, who at first was bitterly opposed, now
seems more earnest from what I could hear than he.
November 6. By jinriksha some six miles to a large
inland sea, and then by boat 16 miles to Matsuye (16 miles,
8 men, 6 oars, 4 passengers, 3^ hours, price $s. !) Matsuye,
is the chief town of the two provinces of Iwami and
Idzumo, formerly, as its picturesque old castle bears
witness, the capital of a Daimio. Now it is the centre of
higher education in the district, and has a population of
about 25,000. The first Christians were baptised here in
the spring of this year, and number about seven persons.
November 15-19. I journeyed to Kobe, by lake, river,
jinriksha, and walking. I managed over twenty miles one
day, the longest walk I have taken since my Indian illness.
On the i /th we travelled for seventeen hours, and missed
our steamer in the evening by ten minutes, hearing it
whistle for departure just before we reached the port. In
consequence I had all the i8th in a little inn on the coast ;
a hurricane blew all day, and did a good deal of damage to
Kobe houses, and the little mission church here.
To his Father
November 27, 1886.
I finished the second volume of Lightfoot's ' Ignatius '
on a long river journey, and am now reading Hatch's
' Organisation of the Early Christian Churches.' It is an
extreme book, and I am not surprised he has had since to
1 86 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
put the pastoral epistles into the second century. I don't
see anything to be said for his view of Irenaeus having
given a new and revolutionary turn to Christian thought
in regard to a dogmatic faith and a visible Church
organisation at least, there is nothing in his writings to
suggest he thought himself saying anything new.
Christmas 1886 was spent at Nagasaki and is thus
recorded :
I could not have had pleasanter hosts and companions
than Archdeacon and Mrs. Maundrell and their chil-
dren. On December 28 the Christians asked me to a tea,
and I spoke to them of St. Francis Xavier, the seven-
teenth-century martyrs, and the beginning of modern
missions. On December 30 I met a Roman Catholic lady
who told me of the descendants of the Japanese Christians
for the 220 years of isolation retaining the use of Christian
names, which they always called ' soul names.'
Thus closed a year of incessant travelling, and on
January n, 1887, he wrote to his father :
From my consecration to the end of the year I held
twenty-two confirmations I think, altogether mostly in
private houses and hotels. Very, very different indeed to
the beautiful old English churches ; but I like to compare
this with what must have been the circumstances of the
early days.
In the first chapter of this biography I mentioned the
tenacious hold which Edward Bickersteth always kept
upon family interests at home, so that, although he was so
far distant and for so long a time, yet he never ceased to
be regarded as the eldest brother, whose opinion and advice
were to be looked for and would be certainly forthcoming.
The following extracts from letters to his fourth brother,
the Rev. H. V. Bickersteth (now Chaplain to the Bishop of
Exeter), then about to take Holy Orders, illustrate this
close touch with home :
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 187
Yokohama : June 2, 1886.
My dear Harry, I am thinking of you, probably
about concluding your Tripos Examination. How well I
remember my feelings about mine when it was over ! A
certain sense of relief at its not so much mattering whether
you forget a fact or two now as it did a fortnight since is
inevitable ; but the best of the Theological Tripos for the
candidate for Holy Orders is that all his work is in direct
preparation for the duties of his life. . . . Read books on
the Pastoral Life ; Gregory's ' De Cura Pastorali/ Walsham
How's ' Pastoral Work,' ' Bridges on the Ministry,' Liddon's
' Priest in the Inner Life,' in addition to the Pastoral
Epistles read devotionally, and our Lord's discourses to
the disciples, as in St. Matt. x. and St. John xx. and xxi.
I shall hope to pray for you constantly these months that
God the Holy Spirit may indeed prepare you. ACCIPE
Spiritum Sanctum, the form of words in ordination to
priesthood and episcopate, imply preparedness on the part
of the receiver as well as gift from the Great Giver, and
this is no less true of admission to the diaconate. ... A
longing for one of you out here, or for a while with you at
home, is sometimes very great ; but the work is theMaster's,
and I must not, and I trust do not, wish it otherwise or
elsewhere.
Your most affectionate Brother,
EDW. BlCKERSTETH, Bishop.
Again :
Tokyo : August 15, 1886.
I believe that you will never be other wise than most
thankful for your course of reading forthe Theological
Tripos ; it is invaluable for a clergyman's work, at least
it will prove so if you continue it. For after all Theology,
scientia Dei, is an endless and never fathomable subject, at
least not so long as it is Theologia Viatorum. I suppose
it will not be so, when the travellers have reached their
country.
Again :
Watazu : November 3, 1886.
I fear this will not reach you in time to convey,
although you will not need it, the assurance of all my love
and sympathy, and prayers on your ordination day. To-
1 88 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
day reminds me specially of the mother. 1 If, as I scarcely
doubt, in the patria cara they know the things of earth, at
least of the Church on earth, then it will be to her a great
joy that a third son is taking orders. . . . Before my
consecration, in the three days I got at Trinity Square, I
spent my time (and found it most helpful) in taking just
the service and the Pastoral Epistles with parts of the
Gospels, St. Matt, x., St. John x. and xxi., without any
other book or nearly so. ... I hope you have daily ser-
vice at your church. Try to keep up the daily saying of
the Office, if not I think nothing has been of more help
to me, especially reading the appointed lections of Holy
Scripture. The prayers, too, never fail, specially if you
take them, as is reasonable, as a framework into which
special petitions may be fitted.
On returning to Tokyo, January 15, 1887, the Bishop at
once set about preparing for the United Conference of the
Protestant Episcopal Church of America and the Church
of England, which was to precede the First Synod of the
Japanese Church, and which assembled at Osaka on
February 8. At the opening service he 2 preached from
the text St. John xvi. 13.
He wrote to his father the same day :
Osaka : February 8, 1887.
I have preached a long hour's sermon and sat four
hours in conference, so you will pardon it if this is
but a line. Yesterday I was making arrangements for
our three conferences ; 3 and finishing my sermon for
to-day. I preached on ' He shall guide you into all the
truth.' . . .
This afternoon we have had an interesting discussion
on union with other Christian bodies, and appointed a
committee to meet some of their leading men. But, alas !
these matters are easy as long as they are in the ' resolu-
tion stage.' Still I hope the expressed desire after better
1 His mother's birthday.
* For the argument of the sermon, see chapter ix. p. 305.
1 (i) United Conference of American and English Missionaries, (2) First
Synod of the Nippon Sei Kokwai, (3) C.M.S. Conference.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 1 89
things tends to bring it about a little more quickly than if
it were not felt and formulated. 1
By February 18 he was able to write after the three
important gatherings mentioned in the preceding letter :
' God has been very good to us, and guided us through.'
Also:
The united service on Sexagesima Sunday was most
interesting, solemn, and stirring. Bishop Williams could
remember the day when there was not a Christian in Japan
in connection with our communion, and now the church
was filled with adults, perhaps 220 : the children of neces-
sity had a separate service of their own.
From February 19 to March I the Bishop went to Kobe
to make the acquaintance of the people there, and his first
ordination followed his return to Osaka early in March.
In March, one year after leaving England, he wrote to
his father :
Osaka : March 4, 1887.
My dearest Father, It is half-past nine at night, and
I have to-day looked over two sets of examination papers,
given two long addresses to my three candidates, 2 and one
address to the missionaries of our and the American
Church here so I am afraid again this will be only a
scrap of a letter. Truly I have had a rush of work the
last two months.
I think I told you the result of our conferences. We
accepted the Articles &c., so that no present difficulty
might arise as to the Church of England basis, and
delayed the consideration of the more important Canons
for two years. The C.M.S. ought now to be satisfied.
Their Conference of Missionaries have passed a vote of
warm satisfaction unanimously, and the S.P.G. men also
are pleased ; so I hope the ship, which was a bit bested
1 See chapter ix. p. 313.
2 (i) Terasawa San, now priest -in-charge of Holy Trinity Church, Osaka,
(2) Terata San, now (1898) sent to Formosa by the Japanese Missionary
Society as a mission priest; (3) Nakanishi San (the 'old samurai'), now
deacon-in-charge of St. Peter's Church, Osaka.
190 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
by the waves, will now reach port. Already the whole
thing has given a wonderful push to all work. The
Japanese are delighted at having done the thing with us,
and no longer feel only dictated to though, indeed, there
was more feeling perhaps than fact about it. ...
You will be thinking of me at my first ordination. One
year to-day since I left England, a year and two days since
I left Exeter, and a month longer since my consecration. I
have already got to love my work, though truly there is an
' onus episcopatus,' one anxiety, even with a small body of
clergy, not going without another coming ; a continual
giving out, I scarcely ever hear a sermon ; and the con-
stant responsibility of more or less unaided decisions.
Only may the Good Lord pardon and accept the work of
this almost over-busy, over-anxious, yet unfailingly inter-
esting year.
To think that in another year I may be thinking of
starting to see you all, 'just a glance,' again !
Your most loving Son,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH, Bishop.
And again :
Kobe : March 9, 1887.
From Saturday, February 19, to Tuesday, March i, I
was here in Kobe, making the acquaintance of some of
the people.
From March I to March 8 I was at Osaka for the
examination and ordination. Another time I hope to be
able to direct these more completely ; this time, owing to
the conferences, I could only manage three addresses on
the Friday and Saturday on ' The Call, to the Ministry,'
'The Grace of Ministry,' 'The Pastor's Private Life.'
Evington translated them for me.
The ordination itself was, I hope, solemnly and im-
pressively conducted. The church was crowded. The
sermon was preached by Evington, whom, with Mr. Shaw
of Tokyo, I have made my examining chaplain. Of the
three candidates one was over sixty an old samurai, who
in former days can remember being told off to see that no
foreigner landed on the coast from a distressed man-of-
war that had put in at Osaka, and has lived to be
ordained ' deacon ' by an English Bishop. All three I was
satisfied with.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. l886-l888 IQI
On Tuesday 7th I came here, and expect to stay till
Monday fortnight about but with two breaks, one to a
little S.P.G. outstation to the west along the coast, and
the other to Tokushima, a large town in Shikoku, where
the C.M.S. has work.
I am giving Wednesday evening lectures on ' The
Means of Grace ' to a tiny band, and Sunday afternoon
sermons on ' The Prodigal Son ' that endless subject.
While at Osaka the distressing news reached him of
he death of Mrs. Maundrell, wife of the Archdeacon, and
he at once started for Nagasaki (350 miles distant) to
comfort his friend, then as always ready to pour out his
sympathy for any of his clergy in trouble. He arrived
too late for the funeral, but was able to conduct a me-
morial service with a celebration of Holy Communion.
He worked his way back to Tokyo for Easter, visiting
en route Tokushima, a place on the east coast of Shikoku,
a large island to the south-west of Osaka.
March 22. I reached Tokushima at 10 A.M. The
Church here is small and not very flourishing ; the
Christians who are resident in the place have not been
earnest, and there have been several defections. However,
with a new and energetic catechist things are beginning to
look brighter. In the afternoon I attended a ladies' sewing
class, which he and his wife had started ; to this some of
quite the upper classes in the city, the wives of the officials,
came. In one of them, Mrs. Uyeda, we took a special
interest, as she is a candidate for baptism ; her husband is
head of the revenue department. In the evening I gave
an address to some of the more educated men, whom the
catechist had got together in Japanese fashion for tea and
talk. I spoke of the changed view of Christianity in
Japan, and of Christian doctrine being the answer to man's
gropings and questionings.
March 24. A confirmation of eleven persons, and one
baptism. In the afternoon I asked all to a feast at a
picturesque tea house, on a hill near the town. One of the
Christians is a photographer, so he took our whole group.
Several of the Christians belonged to a village twenty
192 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
miles off, which we had not time to visit, so they had
come to Tokushima to visit us.
March 25. Seven A.M., Holy Communion ; I said
farewell to the Christians, telling them to make me come
again quickly by having a large number of candidates for
confirmation, whom I must come to confirm. I went in a
jinriksha to the coast, about ten miles, and took a sailing
boat to pass over to Awaji, an island N.E. of Shikoku.
On the way I went to see the celebrated whirlpool, and
got a magnificent view from a rocky island close to the
narrow channel where the waters are much agitated. I
saw two junks come through, one of them was completely
twisted round twice by the force of the waters, and then
hurried on her way at a tremendous pace ; there does not
seem to be any particular danger, the force of the water
carrying them clear of the rocks. The day was delightfully
fine, and we sailed into Fukura with a fair wind.
Good Friday, Tokyo. A quiet day, with a good con-
gregation in the morning. I preached on the Seven
Words, the first three in the morning and the last four at
night.
Easter Eve. Mr. Shaw carried me off forcibly to see
the cherry blossom in some Tokyo Gardens ; it was very
beautiful.
Easter Day. I preached on ' Behold I am alive for
evermore.' A crowded congregation ; 90 communicants,
Japanese and English, at the celebration of Holy Com-
munion in our little church.
The summer was occupied in various missionary
journeys, and after a short holiday at the hill station of
Karuizawa (August 1-13), the Bishop was free to make a
long planned visit to Korea.
Before leaving Tokyo on September 14 he attended
the first Local Council of the Nippon Sei Kokwai.
The Council (he wrote), according to our new orga-
nisation, contains representatives of all missions of the
Anglican communion in a particular district, as the bi-
ennial Synod gathers representatives from all Japan.
We did some practical work, besides a good deal of
talking.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 193
The visit which the Bishop was now about to pay to
Korea was the result of much previous correspondence
both with the Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop Scott of
North China, the latter of whom had agreed to meet him at
Seoul, the Korean capital. At that time Europe had heard
very little of Korea and cared less for this peninsula, which
was destined eight years later to become the theatre of the
war fought so vigorously by Japan and so feebly by China.
The Japanese Government were, however, well aware,
then as later, that Korean misgovernment was a standing
menace to the settled peace of the Far East, inasmuch as
its glaring injustice was an invitation to Russia to step
in, and even offered her a plausible excuse for putting her
neighbour's house to rights. Needless to say, the two
English Bishops were only remotely interested in the
political opportunities of the moment ; their hearts were
set on arranging for the seeds of the Gospel to be planted
among the Koreans, then so little known and now so
frequently visited by travellers, and so ably described by
the pen of Mrs. J. F. Bishop and others. As a necessary
preliminary, the Bishops were minded to see the land for
themselves, as it was fairly accessible both from North China
and Japan, and the result of their personal observations and
of their joint report to Lambeth was the Archbishop of
Canterbury's mission sent out in 1889 in connection with
the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, under
the devoted leadership of Bishop Corfe. Bishop Bicker-
steth left Tokyo on September 14, only to be driven
back by a violent storm, ' which the captain, though
the boldest of sailors, was unable to face.' However,
the next day the wind moderated, and a start was
made. On board the Bishop saw much of Professor
Shida (a Japanese pupil of Lord Kelvin's), ' a particularly
attractive man ; ' and he left Kobe on September 22 for
O
194 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Nagasaki, ' the inland sea as calm as an Italian lake : I
have never seen it more beautiful.' On September 27 he
left Nagasaki for Korea, touching at the Goto Islands and
at Tsushima. The rest of his experiences may be best
given in his own words.
September 29. I set foot on the soil of Korea for the
first time this morning. With the help of a Chinese
interpreter who speaks admirable English, I had no diffi-
culty in finding the house of one of the Chinese catechists
sent here by Archdeacon Wolf from Fuchow. You may
remember my meeting them last year at Nagasaki. They
were then on their way to this place. The interpreter was
unable to stay, but I carried on a conversation for some
time with them through their wives, who were trained at a
boarding school at Singapore. They are getting some
knowledge of Korean, and are welcomed at the houses of
the people in the neighbouring villages. Their immediate
work plainly must be to learn the language, and with this
object they should certainly, as soon as possible, get a
house among the Koreans. At present they are in a
Japanese settlement. It is a difficult isolated position
which they occupy, and they need the help of others' inter-
cessions. At times they feel dispirited and lonely. They
are the first missionaries of Korea, and by God's grace may
be the pioneers of a great work. I left them after prayer,
which I asked one of them to offer in Chinese, and the
blessing, which I gave, in English.
The Theological School at Tokyo begins work to-day.
September 30. We left Fusan at 8 A.M. ; steam
along the Korean coast all day, and pass Port Hamilton.
October I. Still making our way along the coast, a
curious sight on deck of Japanese and Koreans unable to
understand one another's speech, but communicating their
thoughts about us to one another by means of Chinese
o *
signs, which they traced with their fingers on the palms of
their hands.
The new Jubilee School at Yokohama opens to-day.
I trust it may be a centre of widespread influence for
good. The education of European and Eurasian boys is
often sadly neglected in the East.
October 2. I was greatly grieved at not reaching the
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. l886-l888 195
port of Chimulpo until Sunday morning. I had looked
forward to a quiet day with Bishop Scott Sunday
travelling I abhor, but there are times when the irregulari-
ties of steamers render it necessary. I was carried up to
Seoul, some twenty-eight miles by eight men, in a chair
which the Consul-General, my host, had kindly sent down
for me. The bare sandy hills, with often fantastic and
beautiful outlines, remind me somewhat of Ajmir and the
north of Rajputana.
The Consul-General gave me a warm welcome, and
the pleasure was great of meeting Bishop Scott, the first
Bishop of our Church whom I had met since I parted with
Bishop Copleston in Ceylon. We were soon engaged in
exchanging notes and experiences, and discussing plans for
work in this country.
The Consul's house is full, as two English officers from
Hongkong have travelled across the country here from
the east coast, and are his guests as 'well as ourselves.
The house, which is now the British Consulate-General's,
belonged formerly to a Korean Mandarin ; it stands well in
a compound of its own, just inside the city walls, and a
little above the general level of the city. The gain of this
they only can know who have walked about the streets of
Seoul. I will not attempt description. I thought when I
saw it that the Chinese town at Shanghai was the filthiest
place human beings live in on earth ; but Seoul is a grade
lower. The climate is superb, probably one of the finest
in the world. This may explain the comparative
immunity of the people from epidemics which everything
else would conduce to bring about.
Most of the houses are merely hovels of mud, but the
mandarins' are of wood, not unlike the better sort of houses
in Japan. Some of those which outwardly look most
dismal are, I am told, comfortable and even grand in their
way inside.
The costume of the men is very picturesque, and in
this respect they are great dandies, being far more precise
and particular than their Japanese neighbours. It is a
mystery how such spotless garments find their way into
and out of such beggarly houses. We had hoped for four
days together in the capital, but a telegram, as it turned
out unnecessarily, summoned us back to Chimulpo after I
had been there for forty-eight hours only. The Bishop of
o 2
196 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
North China had, however, arrived three days before me, so
that I think between us we obtained all necessary informa-
tion. We are embodying it in a report for the Archbishop,
It will be an ample repayment for the expenditure of time
and trouble, if the generosity of English Churchmen should
make it possible for a new missionary diocese to be
established, with Seoul, at some future day, for its cathedral
city.
Two points I may notice : (i) The Koreans as a nation
have no religion. They were Buddhists, and Buddhists'
monasteries are still to be found on the hills. But Con-
fucianism supplanted Buddhism, and now has itself but
little hold even on the upper classes. (2) The story of
the French mission, though there are some things about
it to cause regret, is evidence that the people thirst for
what they have not got, and are ready to listen to teachers
who command their respect, and, like the Japanese, to give
their lives for the faith.
We were fortunate in seeing one most remarkable
spectacle. Once in four years an examination is held for
a sort of literary degree. It was going on last Monday. I
was told that ten thousand students presented themselves.
The Consul-General kindly accompanied us to see what
we might, and with his help we were able to get into the
great yard where it was being conducted. A large number
of huge umbrellas had been stuck into the ground, under
which there were little groups of students, provided each
with an immense sheet of parchment paper, a rhyming
dictionary, and thin strips of paper, on which had been
written a subject for a poem. With the help of the
dictionary, the duty of each candidate was to produce a
poem of his own, to be submitted to the Examiner. When
we arrived some had finished their task ; others \vere still
in the throes of composition. The Examiner, a mandarin
of high rank, in court dress, was seated in a sort of hall,
fenced off from the candidates by a low paling. As each
completed his task he rolled up the parchment, and pro-
ceeded to fling it over the paling on to the ground inside.
Men inside the paling were busy engaged in picking up
the scrolls, unrolling them, rolling up a number of them
together into larger bundles, and stacking these beside
the examiner. As the scrolls came flying over the paling
more thickly, it was all they could do to gather them
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. l886-l888 197
together. Meanwhile no quiet was maintained, such as
might seem suitable for votaries of the Muses ; on the
contrary, a crowd of interested spectators, vendors of
sweetmeats, tea, and other refreshments, &c., &c., surged
up and down between the umbrellas. All thought, one
would have considered, must be at an end ; and the con-
trast was laughable as the remembrance suggested itself
of the Senate House at Cambridge and St. Mary's chimes !
One person, at least, was au fait at his work. The aged
examiner seemed to appraise the papers, which were pre-
sented to him one by one, at the rate of about twenty a
minute !
When we reached Chimulpo again late on Tuesday we
found that our steamer was not to start until Thursday
morning. This port is an increasing place, and mission-
aries at Seoul would do well to have work there also, if
possible.
October 6. Bishop Scott is returning with me to
Nagasaki. The sea is again as calm as a lake, and con-
ference on all manner and kinds of subjects is delightful as
we pace the deck.
In the autumn of that year the Rev. L. B. Cholmondeley
-arrived in Tokyo as the first member of St. Andrews Uni-
versity Mission, and took up his residence with the Bishop
at Shiba, a district of Tokyo ; and in December the Bishop
had the pleasure of welcoming to Tokyo the first members of
St. Hilda's Community Mission, who reached Yokohama
-early on Sunday, December 4, and after being met there
by the Bishop and Miss Hoar (of the Women's Mission
Association, S.P.G.) arrived at Tokyo in time for the mid-
day service and celebration of Holy Communion. On the
8th the Bishop admitted them as members of the Com-
munity Mission. 1
The Bishop at once took steps to build a permanent
house for the mission, as well as for the St. Andrews
University Mission for men. For this a sum of i,2OO/. was
required. He subscribed 3OO/. himself to meet a grant of
1 See chapter vii. p. 233
198 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
3OO/. from the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge,
and the balance was raised by the Guild of St. Paul in
England. 1
The time was now come for him to return to England
to take part in the third gathering of the Bishops of the
Anglican Communion. The Wednesday in Holy Week
1888 was spent as a Quiet Day for all the workers
in Tokyo, and on Maunday Thursday the Bishop
admitted John Toshimichi Imai to the diaconate, and
on the same day (March 29) he issued his first Pastoral
Letter ' to the Clergy and Layworkers ' on the eve
of his departure. After referring to the hope which
he entertained of collecting sufficient funds in England
to enable him to extend St. Andrew's and St. Hilda's
Missions, and of urging during the summer, in conjunction
with Bishop Scott of North China, the claims of Korea ' as
a new and interesting field of evangelistic labour,' he made
mention of the Tokyo Ladies' Institute, 'the superintendence
and instruction of which had been placed by its Japanese
promoters in the hands of members of the Church of
England, although it lay outside the course of the
operations of missionary societies.' He expressed regret
that the re-issue of the ' Shinko no Hata,' the literary
organ of the Nippon Sei Kokwai, had been prevented by
other work, but believed that much good would result
from the circulation among isolated Christians of brief
letters containing advice and sympathy, together with
information of what was passing in the mission with which
they had become connected.
In connection with the generous present by the S.P.C.K.
of a theological library, placed in St. Andrew's House,
Shiba, Tokyo (where the Bishop was now living with his
Chaplain, the Rev. L. B. Cholmondeley), he expressed ' his
1 See chapter vii. p. 241.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 199
sense of the importance of the prayerful, systematic, life-
long pursuit of Biblical and theological study. Growth in
knowledge was the one essential of efficiency in all ministry.
In their own field of labour more especially, unlike some
others, the progress of general culture had entirely outrun
the obedience of faith, and at the same time ecclesiasti-
cal questions of the gravest importance awaited considera-
tion. It followed that nowhere was there more needed
than among themselves that accuracy of teaching which
comes from fulness of knowledge, together with that
sobriety of judgment which commonly follows on sus-
tained and comprehensive study.'
In conclusion, the Bishop expressed very grateful
thanks for the kindness he had received during his first
two years in Japan, especially mentioning one (Arch-
deacon Shaw) whose house had been his home during the
greater part of that time.
The Bishop sailed on April 3, and reached England on
May 17, twelve days later than was expected, owing to
being detained in quarantine at San Francisco, at which
vexatious delay his eager spirit greatly chafed.
During the five months which the Bishop spent in
England, his forecast of incessant travelling and speaking
was fulfilled to the letter, but he had the satisfaction in
many parts of the country of making personal acquaintance
of members of the Guild of St. Paul, which was henceforth
established on a firm footing. 1 The roll of membership
rapidly rose to 1,000, and the Bishop accepted the offer of
two clergy (the Rev. F. Armine King and the Rev. F. E.
Freese) for St. Andrew's Mission, where the Rev. L. B.
Cholmondeley temporarily helped by the Rev. C. G.
1 The annual subscriptions rose from ng/. to 2557. , and the income for
the year, including donations and offertories, rose from 6437. in 1887, to
I,2I4/. in 1888.
2OO BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Gardner was already at work, and two more ladies
volunteered for St. Hilda's Mission and were accepted.
The chief speech delivered by the Bishop while in
England was made in St. James's Hall at the annual
meeting- of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel,
(July 10), which was timed that year to be held during the
session of the Lambeth Conference.
In that speech Bishop Bickersteth began by drawing a
parallel between the diffusion of the Greek language and
literature in the nearer East through the conquests of
Alexander the Great, and the diffusion of Anglo-Saxon
modes of writing and thinking in the further East, as the
two most important events in early and modern history.
The supremacy of England in India, and her possession of
a continuous line of important harbours along the southern
Asiatic coast stretching from Aden to Hongkong, together
with the re-opening of Japan to Western intercourse, and
the formation of colonies of merchants, chiefly English and
American, in China and Japan, had been the most powerful
causes contributing to that result. Japan was the latest of
the greater Oriental countries to come under the influence
of this return movement of the West towards the East, but
it had been probably affected by it more completely and
more unalterably than any other nation. One of the
greatest of Japanese statesmen had said to him last year :
' Other Eastern nations have cared chiefly to adopt from
you your guns and means of defence, we have honestly
tried also to understand your thought ; ' and further, those
who knew Japan best admitted that during the thirty-five
years which had elapsed since the re-opening of the
country she had made no backward step. Not only
had much that was pernicious and embarrassing been swept
away . . ., not only had all the latest inventions of natural,
political, and economic science . . . been widely adopted,
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886- 1 888 2OI
but also a system of graded education based on the village
school and culminating in the Tokyo University had made it
certain that the movement which vitally affected the upper
classes would permeate the whole people.
In answering the question what was the attitude of the
people towards religion, the Bishop repudiated the recent
suggestion of an English writer that the Japanese were
without the religious sentiment, though he admitted that
among the educated classes Shintoism, the ancient faith
brought originally from Manchuria Buddhism, received,
though in an altered form, from India and Confu-
cianism, imported from China, had ceased to command
credence, exercise authority, and guide life. In answer-
ing the further inquiry, what was the attitude of the
people towards Christianity, he thought it might best be
described as one of respectful hesitation. Most certainly
Christianity was respected, both as the faith of the
missionaries who resided in Japan and as the religion of
Western nations, and also a widespread feeling existed
that it might prove the cement and bond of the new
national life. But this favourable opinion was traversed
by the doubts generated through the wide circulation of
anti-Christian literature with its usual assumption that
Christianity was the foe of science, unnecessary as a basis
of morals, and already negatived by the wise men of the
West.
As regards the masses of the people, the Bishop had
heard of no instance where a missionary conversant with
the language and possessed of sympathy and tact had
resided among them and not gathered considerable
numbers into the fold of Christ. It was not beyond
the bounds of sober expectation that Japan might be
counted among the Christian nations within the lifetime of
those now living.
202 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
In conclusion, the Bishop urged that no work could be
grander than that before them, and that no communion
but their own was so fully fitted and furnished for its
accomplishment. By its past history, by its present posi-
tion, by its characteristic endowments, it only could be ' the
church of the reconciliation' * not only to the separated
fragments of Western Christendom, but also to countries
as far asunder as England and America from India, China,
and Japan.
In the Lambeth Conference itself the Bishop felt an
absorbing interest, the opening sermon of the Primate of
All England (Archbishop Benson), delivered in the Abbey
on July 3, greatly delighted him, not only as a weighty
utterance on the position of the Anglican communion, but
also as a luminous vindication of her inherited call to be a
missionary and evangelistic agency throughout the world.
I attended him as chaplain at that service, and can never
forget the radiant face with which he broke away from the
procession after it had passed down the nave, and said :
' Was it not a true encyclical ? It will strengthen missions
all over the world.'
The Bishop of Exeter took a house in Wimpole Street
during the whole month of the Lambeth Conference, and
here the son was his father's guest, and greatly enjoyed
meeting the many Bishops from all parts of the world who
were entertained there. Of his own part in the conference
little can be said, as it is well known that no report of
the discussions is allowed to reach the public beyond the
published encyclical. But my brother served on the
Committee for Authoritative Standards of Doctrine and
Worship, and also took an active part in some discussions,
1 This phrase had been used by Bishop Whipple of Minnesota in a sermon
preached by him before the members of the Lambeth Conference on July 3,
1888, in Lambeth Palace Chapel. See Lambeth Conferences, published by
S.P.C.K., p. 246.
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 2O3
specially on the questions of polygamy and of the observ-
ance of Sunday..
Some idea of the impression made by the young
missionary Bishop may be gathered from the following
letter written to him by Dr. Searle over a year later :
Pembr. Coll. Lodge, Cambridge :
December 30, 1889.
My dear Bishop, It is a curious connection of thought
that impels me to write to you on the occasion of the
death of the Bishop of Durham. It is, however, easy to
trace. That death will be felt to the remotest parts of
the world, and at once I got thinking how you would feel
it, for I know your admiration for him how, too, he had
sympathised with you in your first missionary enterprise
at Delhi, and how, too, last year he had opened his palace
and his heart to all the missionary Bishops. He had great
regard for you, and if I may tell you now that he is gone he
looked to see great things done by you in Japan. Speaking
of the Pan-Anglican meeting, he more than once said that
your part in it had been so useful that you had impressed
him by your largeness of heart and comprehensive spirit :
' he has grown so ' was, I recollect, the exact expression.
I venture to tell this to you-, my dear Bishop, as I know at
times you must need encouragement and feel inadequate
to your burden.
. . . Always affectionately yours,
C. E. SEARLE.
Bishop Bickersteth's own impressions of the conference
are recorded in the following letter to his old Diocesan,
Bishop French :
Lynton, North Devon : August 7, 1888.
My dear Bishop, I am getting a little rest here in a
house which my father has taken, and am thankful for it
after the fatigues of ten weeks' incessant speaking and
preaching.
... I hope you will think the conference has done
good work. I was in the minority on one or two resolu-
tions ... I did not agree with the first of the resolutions
204 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
on Sunday. Bengel and Lightfoot agree in thinking that
St. Paul's words in the Colossians are inconsistent with
the perpetual obligation in the Jewish sense of the law of
one day in seven, and this is what the resolution seems to
affirm . . . Still on the whole I do trust that God's work
will have been set forward a step, and a large step, both at
home and abroad ; and the tone which characterised all
the meetings from first to last of brotherly love and
mutual confidence was beyond anything that I had
anticipated, and suggestive of highest and fullest hope.
Ever your affectionate old chaplain and younger
brother in the ministry of Christ,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH, Bishop.
During the month of August, the Bishop of Exeter was
able to gather all his children and grandchildren at Lyn-
ton in Devon. The bachelor ' Uncle Bishop ' was always
greatly in demand on all expeditions, and readily responded
to all the pastimes of the children. One reminiscence
may be allowed. On August 6, during a birthday picnic
in the Valley of Rocks, a game of cricket was started, in
which the two Bishops joined, and were supported by the
late Bishop Smythies of Central Africa, then the guest of
the Rector of Lynton. On asking the age of the hero of
the day and being told he was just four, Bishop Smythies
said : ' And I, my child, am forty-four this very day,' and
gave him his blessing. It was during this month that the
Rev. Armine King visited Bishop Bickersteth at Lynton
after he had finally decided to join him in Japan, a
decision which was the beginning of a close and abiding
friendship, and greatly strengthened the Bishop's work in
the capital of Japan.
On October 25 the Bishop started for Japan via Canada,
accompanied by the Rev. Armine King, the two St.
Hilda's ladies, and a lady worker sent out by the Ladies'
Association S.P.G., having as fellow-travellers the late
Bishop of New Westminster and Mrs. Sillitoe. A member
A MISSIONARY BISHOP'S LIFE. 1 886-1 888 205
of the Guild of St. Paul wrote : ' I am glad our Bishop is
starting on Agincourt Day. As far as numbers go he is
fighting against far greater odds than the English were in
France.' But, although few, the returning missionaries
might have taken up the words, ' We few, we happy few,
we band of brothers.' l
The wrench of parting, however, was not easy, though
it gave promise of the fruitfulness which waits upon all
self-sacrifice, as will be seen from the following letter :
To his Father
Train near Shrewsbury : October 24, 1888.
My dearest Father, One line to reach you to-morrow
morning. It was very hard parting to-day, and yet as your
love was the measure of it I do not know that I could
wish it less hard ; and I believe that here or in Japan God
will let me meet you again. Still, except for my work, I
should, I am sure, never bring myself to leave our loving
circle, or rather circle of home circles, in England. The
wcrk and its end does just make it possible. Thank you,
dearest Father, and God give you His richest blessings for
all the love which you with Madre 2 have showered on me
these months. They have gone by like a day. It is difficult
to believe that what I so looked forward to is over ; but it
is a very bright and helpful memory. I do trust that I
may work in Japan as one should who has your example
and prayers to support him.
Your most affectionate Son,
EDWARD BICKERSTETH, Bishop.
1 Henry V. Act IV. Scene 3. 2 His step-mother.
206 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
CHAPTER VII
MISSIONARY METHODS, WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO
COMMUNITY MISSIONS
' We need not go further than the Acts and Epistles, with such help perhaps
as Professor Ramsay's great work gives in understanding Apostolic methods,
to see how well it is to have an ideal and to work with a plan from the begin-
ning.' Letter of Bishop EDWARD BICKERSTETH to Guild of St. Paul,
December 28, 1893.
IN this chapter a fuller account will be found of the two
Community missions of St. Andrew's and St. Hilda's at
Tokyo. The only reason for singling out these two mis-
sions for special and detailed mention is that they were
each of them founded by Bishop Bickersteth and each
bear strongly the impress of their founder. But he himself
would have been the first to deprecate any mention of
them to the virtual exclusion of other methods of missionary
work, such as had been maintained long before his arrival
in Japan by the devoted missionaries, men and women,
sent out from England through the agency of the S.P.G.
or C.M.S. and other societies, as well as by the Sister
Church of America.
The first missionary of the S.P.G., the Rev. A. C. Shaw
(now Archdeacon), who is so often mentioned in these
pages, arrived in Tokyo on September 25, 1873, an d the
first preaching station of the mission was opened by the
Rev. H. B. Wright in the earlier months of 1874 that is,
twelve or thirteen years before Bishop Bickersteth began
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 2O/
his special missions. The first convert, Andrew Shimada,
won to God through the labours of these men, was
baptised by Mr. Wright on St. Andrew's Day in 1874,
and is now working as a Deacon.
In 1875 Miss Hoar, of the Ladies' Association S.P.G.,
began ' her faithful and successful ' work l in Tokyo. She
was joined in 1886 by her cousin Miss Annie Hoar, and
the teaching and training of Japanese women, as well as
district visiting, were zealously carried on by them, until
owing to a breakdown in health they were obliged to
leave Japan in 1898.
The first missionary of the C.M.S. 2 in Japan was the
Rev. George Ensor, who had been assigned to China, but
owing to lack of funds he was sent to Japan, a special
donation of 4,ooo/. having been made to the society in
1867 to enable them to start a Japanese Mission. He
landed on January 23, 1869, just after the conclusion of
the Revolution for which the year 1868 will ever be
memorable in the annals of the Japanese. It was in No-
vember 1868 that the young Mikado had moved his Court
from Kioto to Yedo, and renamed that city Tokyo.
On January 5, 1869, he had first received a Foreign
Minister in public audience ; but evangelisation was still
carried on exposed to constant persecution, and it was
not till the end of 1872 that the notorious notice-boards
prohibiting Christianity were withdrawn. Mr. Ensor's
health failed and he had to return to England in that
very year ; but he had been already joined by the
Rev. H. Burnside, and ever since the C.M.S. has gone on
strengthening her mission agencies, until now not only in
Kiushiu and in the Hokkaido (where there are no other
English missionaries except those sent out by this society),
1 See S.P.G. Digest, p. 721.
- See History of the C.M.S. by Eugene Stock, vol. ii. ch. Ixv.
208 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
but also on the main island of Hondo, they are far the
strongest numerically of the missionaries which represent
the Church of England.
By such missionaries, both men and women, evange-
lisation and education in all its variety of methods has
been energetically carried on, and Bishop Bickersteth
threw himself into their work with strong and discrimi-
nating sympathy. At the Birmingham Church Congress
in 1893 he thus alluded to the manifoldness of the methods
by which the Gospel must be presented and preached :
The subject I understand to be assigned to me is
' Varieties of Method in the Evangelisation of the Heathen.'
The title is rightly chosen. In some real sense there are
no varieties in this work. St. Paul's words, ' We preach
Christ Jesus as the Lord ' sum up and identify everything
worth calling missionary work which has yet been done or
ever will be. In missions, oneness and sameness are
essential ; variety is only accidental.
Such varieties, then, as are to be spoken about are due
not to differences in the contents of the Gospel, but to the
fact that in the effort to bring the message of the faith to
bear on the hearts and consciences of men, all modern
missions alike make use of a large machinery of apparatus
and means educational, literary, institutional, medical
which does vary indefinitely in accordance with the resources
at the disposal of the particular mission, and the character
of that one of the world's all but countless peoples among
whom it is at work.
I do not say, or think, that we are wrong in developing
and using this great machinery. But I may be allowed to
notice in passing that the number of missionaries, men and
women, who put all use of means and machinery on one
side as not intended for them, and go forth in the expecta-
tion of winning souls simply by their words and lives by
words of which the love of God in Christ is the inspiration
and by lives lived in closest association with the lives of
the people among whom they dwell is too few. Some
such there have been in modern times Gordon, for instance,.
ihefagir missionary of the Punjab and their influence has
been incalculable and very salutary.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 2O9
But the mass of us work, and always will work, through
machinery. Hence arise variety, and complexity, and
manifoldness. I will employ the few moments at my
disposal in mentioning some of the forms which our work
takes in Japan.
I. First of all, then, we use public preaching, a form of
work which cannot be neglected without detriment not
only to the aggressive power of a mission, but to its inner
life. In Japan, however, this does not as a rule take place in
the open air, as in India police regulations and the people's
ideas on the matter stand in the way of this but in rooms
erected or hired for the purpose. This form of work is not
without results. At least it makes known among a large
number of persons, chiefly in that lower rank of society in
which the mass of any people must always be included,
that there is such a thing as Christianity. Sometimes it
has led directly to conversions. Recently in one or two
large towns in Japan, a plan has been tried which has been
called, by a name borrowed from you, a special mission.
With us the speciality consists in concentrating for several
weeks a number of evangelists who are commonly working
separately, in one great city, in widely advertising for some
time beforehand the meetings and addresses, and in asking
the prayers of all the Church missions in the empire for
that city during the time the mission is going on. Results
have been appreciable. The Buddhists, notwithstanding the
traditional teaching of their religion which prescribes uni-
versal toleration, have paid the ' mission ' the compliment of
noisy and violent opposition.
II. Work among tJie educated classes. The percentage
of the educated class in Japan is large. It was so formerly,
when Chinese methods prevailed. It is so now, when
European methods have largely taken their place. The
present educational system of Japan is widely extended.
It tends to become more thorough and less exotic than it
was when first introduced a few years ago. In range it
covers the whole field of knowledge from the subjects
taught in village schools to the curriculum of an English
University, theology only excepted. Theology cannot be
taught, because the educated Japanese mind is as yet in a
state of indecision and uncertainty in reference to the
whole subject of religion. The number of educated men
who believe in the old faiths is few, and the class tends to
210 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
become extinct. It seems especially the duty of English
and Americans, whose literature and science have been the
main agencies in bringing about the changes out of which
has emerged the modern Japan, to make sure that the
classes who have proved so receptive of their teaching in
other ways, should at least have the opportunity of learn-
ing what their faith is.
(a) The Community mission affords one way in which
this may be done. . . .
(b) Again, educated nations in a special degree require
an educated clergy. The missionary societies are, I believe,
conscious of this now, as they were not in former years
before Bishop French induced a new view on the subject
by founding his college at Lahore. In Japan now we have
three Divinity Schools supported by the Anglican Com-
munion ; one taught by the missionaries of the Church
Missionary Society, one by the clergy of a University
Mission which has been established in Tokyo, and one by
the able and excellent clergy of the American Church
Mission.
The last eight years has seen the ordination of twenty-
two Japanese, nearly all of them alumni of these schools.
Our hopes for the future are largely bound up with these
men and with those who will be added to their number.
At the best, no European will ever understand the language
or mind of the Oriental people as the sons of the soil do.
The present danger is that the rising generation, even of
young Christian men in Japan, should be so attracted to
the new careers and prospects which are open to them
under the modern circumstances of their country as to
neglect or even despise the ministry of the Church. There,
as in England, nothing but a sense of the value of the souls
of men, and of the privilege for Christ's sake of minister-
ing under His commission to those for whom He died, can
meet this risk.
(c) Again, in addition to schools founded and main-
tained by English societies the educational system in Japan
to which I have referred is glad from time to time to avail
itself of the services of English masters, and occasionally of
English mistresses. The vast educational departments of
India and Japan are among the phenomena of our day.
They are effecting a silent revolution in the East of which
the Church must needs take account. Any plan which
directs the forces which they control in right channels is
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 211
worthy of consideration. Among such plans I unhesi-
tatingly count the acceptance by sincere and consistent
Christian men and women of educational posts under the
Governments of these two lands. Let them count the cost
beforehand in Japan, probable loneliness, the uncertainty
of tenure, and the limitation (which must be loyally adhered
to) which obliges them not to teach doctrinal Christianity
during school hours. Still if, notwithstanding all these
disadvantages, they are prepared to throw themselves
enthusiastically on the one hand into the work of secular
education, and on the other into the opportunities, indirect
though they be, of making known the truth which these
posts afford, then I believe such educationalists are to be
counted among real and effective allies of the regular
missionary staff. . . . Some English Churchmen, I gather,
are suspicious of this mode of work, as if in it the claims
of the truth were subordinated to those of secular science.
This fear is groundless, provided the teacher is possessed
by a sincere and earnest desire for the salvation of those
under his charge.
III. Work among women. In Japan, as in India,
Christian work among women must largely be undertaken
by Christian women if it is to be done at all. They have a
field open to them than which they could not desire a fairer.
An English Churchwoman, whose qualifications are bright
and gentle manners, the knowledge which an average
education supplies, and that sympathy for Orientals which
will lead her to see their good points, and to wish to
Christianise not to Europeanise them to mention some
necessary points and to omit deeper qualifications still
may in Japan adopt almost any form of work which
she prefers with good hope of success. She may teach a
school, she may nurse the sick, she may visit the poor, she
may take charge of orphans, she may train Japanese
women-workers. If she has considerable means at her
disposal, and that indescribable quality which makes social
intercourse a spiritual power, she may make her drawing-
room a centre to which Japanese ladies will gladly resort
in order that they may come under the influence of her
words and spirit, and catch the reflection of her faith,
though it may be they know not where its fires are fed.
I have known this done in one almost ideal life l which
1 Mrs. Kirkes. See chapter viii. p. 298.
212 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
closed in Tokyo less than six months since, and invites
followers to-day from among the refined and wealthy and
devoted Church women of England.
IV. Lastly, and perhaps of highest importance, there
is the mission agency which the Church itself constitutes
I mean the native, indigenous Church so soon as it has
sufficient members to admit of organisation. Apostolic
precedent and modern experience may alike warn us that
there is serious loss in placing any long interval between
the first groups of baptisms and the rudimentary organisa-
tion of the wider Christian society. It is well to pass as
quickly as possible through the congregational stage.
And further, in Japan above all lands, if we can only
advance towards it slowly, we are bound from the beginning
to have an eye to the day, which may or may not be
distant, when the Church shall be wholly independent of
ourselves.
The few thousand Christians who are attached to our
missions are members of a nation numbering forty million
souls, a nation where patriotism is almost too universal
to be counted a virtue, and whose ideal it is to take its
place as an equal among the great civilised nations of the
world. Such a nation must of course have a Church of its
own. Even now, though an Indian Christian if a Church-
man not seldom counts himself a member of the Church of
England of the Church, that is, of the conquering race to
a Japanese the idea of belonging to the Church of a foreign
land would seem too ridiculous to be worth growing
indignant at. We have tried to meet this feeling, surely a
right and worthy feeling on the whole, to the utmost
extent that prudence, not to say the slow movement of
the complicated machinery by which our Anglican com-
munion does its work, have permitted us. We have to-day
a genuine native Church in Japan, with its own constitution
and Canons (drawn up in 1887, not 1603) and Synod and
vestries and missionary society, &c., all, it is true, in their
initial stage of working, still all mainly carried out by
Japanese themselves, and on I believe such primitive and
catholic lines as will only need expansion and develop-
ment, not change, till the day of independence is reached.
One thing at least has resulted from this venture : the
distinction between converts of United States and
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 213
Canadian and English Church Missions has fallen entirely
into the background. All alike belong, and lay stress
only on belonging, to this little Church of Japan.
It was always a delight to the Bishop to stay with his
missionaries whenever he could make time, and one of the
incidental advantages of the increased Episcopate in Japan,
to which he much looked forward, was further leisure for a
more minute acquaintance with the details of their work.
The recollections of Canon Tristram, of Durham, whose
daughter, Miss Louisa Tristram, has been for long one of
the foremost lady workers in the C.M.S. Mission at Osaka,
will be read with interest :
The College, Durham : February 13, 1899.
Dear Mr. Bickersteth, I have rarely enjoyed a visit
more than the few days I spent with the Bishop at Tokyo
in 1891. My missionary daughter, who was my companion,
was hospitably entertained at the beautifully situated St.
Hilda's Mission House. . . . We had many delightful talks
of an evening in the Bishop's own study, and he deeply
impressed me as having inherited all his dear father's
saintliness. There were a number of Japanese Divinity
students to whom I gave a lecture on the evidences one
evening. Shortly after our visit I had the pleasure of
acting as chaplain at a confirmation at Nagoya in a
mission room, simply an ordinary Japanese room fitted
up. I was always struck with the considerate way in
which your brother conducted his services in accordance
with the custom of the missionary of the place, never
adopting the eastward position or doing anything which
could suggest difference. He also quite adapted himself to
the habits of the country ; so at Nagoya, being in a house, he
had taken off his shoes and confirmed in his stocking feet.
I afterwards went round the island of Kiushiu, and as we
were returning again came across the Bishop at Fukuoka
in the north of the island, where I had the privilege of
taking part in the consecration of a beautiful little church
built by the C.M.S. native converts, and assisting after-
wards in the Holy Communion. It was indeed a day of
rare interest. We travelled back to Osaka together, where
214 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
again I was one of the clergy at the consecration of
another native church. The Bishop seemed very ill and
worn, in fact he had been working with a ceaseless energy
that would have tried an iron constitution. I never saw
him again till he brought his bride to dine with us in
Durham in 1893. I wish I could write anything worthy
of being quoted in your memoir, but after seven years my
recollections are not so distinct as they might be. I can
only say that he was one whom to know was to love and
reverence, though we might not see alike on many points.
Believe me ever sincerely yours,
H. B. TRISTRAM.
An important educational venture in which the Bishop
took much interest may here be mentioned. In the autumn
of 1886 Professor Toyama, of Tokyo, wrote a paper on the
higher education of Japanese ladies, with the result that it
was proposed to found an institute in the capital to pro-
mote the culture of women. The building, for which the
Japanese authorities promised to be responsible, was to
contain reading and lecture rooms, class rooms for about
one hundred day pupils, and a hostel for boarders, the
whole being under English superintendence and manage-
ment. It was this latter condition which brought this wholly
Japanese scheme before the Bishop. Through some
Scotch professors at the university he was brought into
contact with Count Ito (then Minister of Education, sub-
sequently Prime Minister of Japan) and others, and elected
a member of the committee of management. He was
then asked to seek for teachers in England, and consented
to do so after laying down this one stipulation that ' the
teachers should be free to exercise their personal influence
with their pupils as they might desire, no restriction being
put upon them in any way, and it being understood that
as religious people they would exercise religious influence.'
He was himself surprised at the readiness with which his
conditions were accepted, and wrote home that ' men
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 215
themselves agnostic and as keen as razors in intellect not
seldom admitted that religion is a great element even in
culture. Here, if the scheme advances, is an offer to put
under distinct Christian influence and instruction the
young wives and daughters of the highest class in the
capital, who share continually in the life which the enter-
prise of their husbands and fathers has so wonderfully
developed. I do not know that any nobler opportunity of
widespread influence and usefulness of the highest kind
has ever been offered to the Christian women in England.'
The Bishop's appeal, in which he was joined by the
Rev. A. C. (now Archdeacon) Shaw, met with a warm
response in England, and within fifteen months of the
receipt of this letter six ladies of exceptionally high
culture and training gave themselves for the work of the
Ladies' Institute, and under the leadership of Miss MacRae
(Head Mistress of the Church of England High School
for Girls, Baker Street) set sail for their distant field of
work on January 26, 1888. One and all had given up a
successful career in England for the sake of Japan. The
Bishop's letters bear frequent testimony to the interest
he took in their work, but its subsequent development
disappointed him. In his judgment the ladies did not
display sufficient patience in first securing influence
over their pupils, which influence in Japan, as in the
East generally, is proverbially strong, and then wait for
opportunities to turn it into directly religious channels.
In any case within a few years the Japanese authorities
took fright at the idea of direct proselytism, so far altering
the conditions as to materially restrain the liberty of
Christian influence exercised by the English successors of
these ladies.
It will thus be seen that in launching his scheme for
Community missions Bishop Bickersteth only designed to
2l6 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
add, if it were possible, one more method hitherto untried,
in order to supplement, not in any way to supplant, work
already in operation. If, therefore, the rest of this chapter
is devoted to the new work, it will not be supposed that
the other and older work is ignored.
It is proposed to establish, as soon as men and means
are available, an associated mission in Japan after the
manner of the University missions in India. The mission
will be carried on in immediate connection with the
Bishop, and if possible in the same city which shall be
chosen for his residence. In this case the missionaries
will reside in his house. The special object of the mission
will be to reach the educated classes, while at the same
time it is believed that it will form a useful centre for
general mission work. It is hoped that in time educated
Japanese Christians will be attached to the mission staff.
On the last day of 1885, a few weeks before his conse-
cration, this appeal had been made by the Bishop- elect.
The Bishops of Durham (Dr. Lightfoot), Exeter (Dr.
Bickersteth), and Salisbury (Dr. Wordsworth) at once
headed a subscription list in order to help to provide the
means, and in a few weeks nearly 3OO/. was collected. The
committee of the S.P.G. also unanimously recommended
that a grant be assigned at the next annual distribution of
funds in aid of the initial expenses of the mission. As to
men it will be remembered that three months later the
Bishop, when on his first voyage to Japan, had written to-
Dr. Searle (March 31, 1886) 'to claim the sympathy and
assistance of a body of University men ' in the work of
evangelising Japan and building up a native Church.
The first member of the University Mission thus pro-
jected was the Rev. L. B. Cholmondeley, formerly assistant
curate of Kenwyn, Truro. He sailed for Japan at the end
of March 1887, within a year of the Bishop's appeal to
Cambridge. Mr. Cholmondeley, however, belonged not to>
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 217
Cambridge, but to the sister University of Oxford, and it is
curious to note that all the first members of this mission
without exception were graduates of Oxford. Mr. Chol-
mondelcy was followed in the autumn of 1888 by the
Rev. F. Armine King (of Keble College, Oxford, formerly
curate of Tottenham), and in the spring of 1889 by the
Rev. F. E. Freese (Trinity College, Oxford, formerly curate
of St. George's, Stonehouse). The Rev. C. G. Gardner
(B.A. Oxford), who had gone out under S.P.G., joined St.
Andrew's Mission for a time in 1890, and the Rev. Her-
bert Moore (Keble College, Oxford, curate of St. Thomas's,
Liverpool) came out from England in the same year. In
1891 the Rev. L. F. Ryde (St. John's College, Oxford,
formerly curate of St. Andrew's, Great Yarmouth), and in
1894 the Rev. A. E. Webb (Brasenose College, Oxford,
formerly curate of Stockport) were added to the number.
The Bishop himself used often to tell the story that
as the result of a miserably attended meeting at Oxford
he received two or three offers of service, while enthusiastic
receptions afforded him at his own University, which at the
time seemed more encouraging, yet sent no members to
the Community mission of St. Andrew's at Tokyo. 1
A perusal of the early correspondence connected with
the foundation of these two organisations will give some
idea of the exact niche which the Bishop designed these
associated missions to occupy. They had to make, almost
to fight, their way to recognition, or at least to apprecia-
tion. In the second chapter, in describing the initiation
of the Cambridge Mission to Delhi, proof has been given
of the shyness with which Community missions were
regarded twenty years ago. A like spirit of caution is to
1 In the autumn of 1896 the Bishop had the pleasure of welcoming the
first recruit from his own University in the person of Mr. Basil Woodd
(Trinity College, Camb. ), who joined the mission as a layman.
2l8 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
be noticed in a speech delivered by Bishop Edward
Bickersteth at the annual meeting of the S.P.G. at St.
James's Hall in July 1888, when he was at home for the
Lambeth Conference.
The small independent mission to which I referred just
now is to be a Community mission, and I venture to
suggest that in the present circumstances of Church work
in the East the society should put prominently forward as
one of its main objects the formation of Community
missions both of men and women. No one can value
more highly than I do the exhibition before the heathen
of the purity, the blessedness, the love of the English
home. I should think it a loss if in any central station,
or at the head of some large institutions, there were not a
married missionary. But this being fully admitted, the
reason of the case, together with the teachings of history
and experience, prove that we cannot hope to do the work
to which God has manifestly now led us in eastern lands
if we continue to take the English parsonage as supplying
the normal type of the life of the foreign missionary. The
expense alone is prohibitory. On the other hand, there
are very few and all honour to them who can bear the
strain of solitary work in a heathen country. The Com-
munity mission (I venture to mention that I speak from
some experience in past years) supplies just what is needed.
Sympathy is its guiding thought, and union in devotion
and work its unfailing practice. Missions from Oxford
and Cambridge in Calcutta and Delhi, and from St. John's,
Cowley, in Bombay, have proved, if any doubted, that such
associated life and work in the East is neither impossible
nor unpractical.
It will be noticed that the prudential reason of in-
creased economy is given its full place in this apologia,
and indeed the average cost of each member being only
ioo/. a year justifies his argument; yet this financial
consideration weighed far less with the Bishop than his
belief that such a mission, consisting exclusively of gradu-
ates of the English Universities, would command the respect
of the educated classes, and especially of the University of
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 2 19
Tokyo, which sent its own sons all over the country. He
also believed that in the early Church history of any coun-
try it is most important to avoid defects which it might be
difficult to make good, and that a body of men working
under the immediate direction of the Bishop and on
Apostolic lines would be very careful in this respect. In
a word, he was convinced that from the singular opportu-
nity offered by the receptivity of Japan a mission of that
kind ought to have the greatest influence. In a city like
Tokyo, where men followed with keenest interest the battle
between Christianity and agnosticism, where arguments
might be answered at any moment by quotations from
Huxley or Herbert Spencer, it was surely wise to send
those who, as the Bishop expressed it, ' cannot have gradu-
ated too highly in the spiritual life ' and yet who have also
learnt from England's wisest and best how and when to use
the weapons of attack.
But it will be asked : What was the rule of life which
the members of the mission were expected to follow ?
One point from the first was decided, as stated by the
Bishop in a letter to Canon Stanton, dated from Okayama,
November 18, 1886. After mentioning four or five men
in England with whom he had been in correspondence,
he adds :
If you remember, the last day I was with you in Cam-
bridge we agreed that the plan adopted at Zanzibar should
be adopted by me too in the case of all men coming out to
serve directly under me that is, not in connection with any
Society. According to this plan, the Bishop is responsible
for all expenses except such as are strictly personal. For
these a small yearly sum is allowed to each missionary ; at
Zanzibar 2O/. or 25/., but here probably 40!. or 5O/. would
be necessary. But anyhow there could be nothing but a
' subsistence ' allowance not ' indigence ' in any sense, but
no surplus.
220 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
This plan has been always followed, but with regard
to a rule of life the Bishop desired to feel his way, not
from hesitation or uncertainty, but deliberately adopting
this policy as most likely to avoid the evils of a cut and
dried system. Even three years after the foundation of the
mission he wrote to his secretary sister :
Tell Canon Crowfoot (with my affectionate regards) we
have no formulated rules as yet at St. Andrew's. I prefer
their growing as St. Vincent de Paul taught. All are, of
course, under me. All attend Mattins, Sext, and Compline,
and generally Evensong. Holy Communion on Sundays,
Thursdays, and Saints' Days, &c. Each has his own work
to do college or mission district or classes as the case
may be. All live together. The idea (as at Delhi) is a
common life, to strengthen and help forward individual
work.
With regard to length of service the Bishop expressed
his views in a letter of November 17, 1887, m which he
wrote :
' You will remember that I could not take on
the staff of my special University Mission owing to his offer
being limited to three years.' This was the principle which
he wished to enforce, though at times the pressure of work
forced him into a suspension of this rule.
It was not till 1891 that the Rule of Life here given
was formally drawn up and printed.
The Rule of the Mission Brotherhood of St. A ndrew.
1. The name of the society shall be ' The Mission
Brotherhood of St. Andrew.'
2. The object of the mission is to seek the glory of
God in making known the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ
among the people of Japan, especially in Tokyo and
adjacent districts.
3. The members of the brotherhood shall be graduates
of Oxford and Cambridge holding Deacon's or Priest's
Orders in the Anglican communion.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 221
[It is understood that no one will be accepted as a
member of the brotherhood who is engaged to be married,
and that no member of the brotherhood will contract
any such engagement without offering to resign his posi-
tion.]
4. The central residence of the brotherhood is the
house of the Bishop St. Andrew's House, Shiba, Tokyo.
No member shall undertake any work which perma-
nently separates him from sharing in the corporate life of
the brotherhood.
5. Besides the members, clergy and laymen may be
admitted either as Resident or Non-Resident Associates.
6. The Bishop is Visitor, and no fundamental rule of
the brotherhood shall be changed without his consent.
7. One of the members shall be elected at a General
Chapter on the eve or festival of St. Andrew to act as
Head of the brotherhood for one year. He shall be
admitted to his office by the Bishop. His duties shall
include the general superintendence of the corporate life of
the brotherhood and the distribution of work, subject to
the approval of the Visitor.
Every member shall be admitted at a service in chapel
by the Bishop, or some one deputed by him.
8. Ordinary chapters, to which questions concerning
the rule and work of the brotherhood may be submitted,
may be held once a month, or more frequently at the dis-
cretion of the Head, who shall preside in the absence of the
Visitor. Resident Associates (of six months' standing)
have the right to attend.
9. One of the members or associate members shall be
appointed by the Head to act with him in the management
of the .funds and domestic affairs.
10. After every seven years' work in Japan every
member of the brotherhood shall be entitled, subject to
the exigencies of the work then in hand, to a furlough of
one year in England.
1 1. The ordinary week-day services will be as follows :
(the times of the services being subject to alteration)
Matins (Japanese), Holy Communion, Sext, Evensong,
Compline (Japanese).
[Each member shall have his own rule as to frequency
of Communion.]
a. All the brethren will endeavour to set apart some
222 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
time or times before Sext for daily meditation and inter-
cession.
b. A missionary Litany will be held on Friday.
c. A time or times will be set apart every week for the
united study of the Bible and of Christian doctrine.
d. A Retreat will be held once a year, and Quiet Days
observed in or about the Ember seasons.
1 2. Each member of the brotherhood is expected,
(i) to pursue some branch of theological study,
(ii) to prepare during his first three years of residency
in Japan for two examinations in the language.
Approved, EDW. BICKERSTETH, Bishop.
November 27, 1891.
Appendix to Rule explaining position of Associates.
a. All clergy accepted for St. Andrew's Mission shall
come out to Japan as members of the mission and
associates of the brotherhood.
b. An associate may, if he so desire, be admitted a
member of the brotherhood after six months in Japan.
c. Associates are expected to follow the Rule of the
brotherhood so far as it regulates the common life of the
House and the distribution of the work.
d. Resident associates of six months' standing have the
right to attend chapters, and to vote on all questions not
immediately affecting the corporate life of the brotherhood.
January 1892.
It seems worth while to record thus fully the origin
and rule of St. Andrew's House, inasmuch as experience
gained in the Church's active warfare ought to be made
available as a guide to those engaged in other parts of the
mission field.
Rightly as he believed wrongly as some thought the
Bishop steadily refused on principle to be connected with
or to found a brotherhood or sisterhood which would smother
individuality and submit itself to the iron yoke sometimes
assumed to be inseparable from such organisations. He
saw, or thought he saw, his way to a revival of Community
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 223
missions, both for men and women, which would combine
a sufficiently strong central rule with allowance for the
claims of individuality. This point is illustrated by a few
words in a letter written in Easter week 1889 :
I do not much think I should get on with his sort of
people. I like people with lots of naturalness, sympathy,
and love, making use of all Church privileges as God's
gifts to them, and I should fancy he is enamoured more of
ecclesiastical stilts, laces, strait waistcoats, and other
articles of that description.
Whatever may be the future of the missions which the
Bishop was allowed to found in Delhi and Tokyo, at least
one thing has been strikingly proved in the experience
vouchsafed to them, that men so associated can live
together in brotherly love, and by love can serve one
another and the Church of God. What the Rev. G. A.
Lefroy 1 once said of Delhi is, I believe, equally true of
St. Andrew's that its members have been singularly free
from jars and misunderstandings.
The Bishop dealt with the vexed question of vows in
the same spirit. He did not hold them to be essential
neither did he regard them as unwise or unlawful. His
mind can be gathered from the following extracts from
letters to his sister May :
January 4, 1890.
I fear I haven't time to write on vows. I feel gene-
rally :
A. That short dispensable vows should hardly be called
vows. So great a term is not needed for the thing.
B. That permanent, lifelong vows are right under
circumstances and acceptable to God. Why not ? I have
seen no reason. I should not be concerned to deny that
they are in a sense a confession of weakness, but we are
weak. Also I think they should be dispensable, either by
those who take them proprio motu or by the Church. . . .
1 Bishop Designate of Lahore (1899).
224 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
Again, a real vocation to win souls for God during
such length of life as God shall give sealed not by a vow
but by an inner intention ; to be set aside, if at all, not by
some public dispensation, but by God's Providence altering
circumstances and calling elsewhere is the true foundation
of a worker at St. Andrew's or St. Hilda's.
From the first he was anxious to preserve the due
balance between the work and the life. In a letter to
Canon Stanton (dated St. Andrew's House, February 21,
1888) he wrote :
So our numbers are going up. May our increase be
intensive as well as extensive, as dear old Dr. Kaye (of
Lincoln) used to say.
This was the impression made upon the more thought-
ful Japanese, one of them using the following simile : ' I
see that, like two wings of a bird, religion and intellectual
study must be kept up together.'
The members were from the first housed with the
Bishop, who, when in Tokyo, always resided at St.
Andrew's House until his marriage in 1893.
It is not possible here, owing to want of space, to do
more than refer very generally to their work, interesting
and important as it has been and is.
Three or four main objects have been kept in view from
the first :
1. To train the native ministry, by whom ultimately
Japan must be won for Christ.
2. To organise lectures and classes by means of which
Christ and His claims may be brought before the people.
3. To itinerate in or near Tokyo.
4. To open up other strong centres, as opportunities
offered and means allowed.
Writing to the Guild of St. Paul from Tokyo, July 5,
1 889, the Bishop reports :
i. A Divinity School is the first charge of St. Andrew's.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 22$
Of this school Mr. King is now principal. This position
gives him the opportunity, which I have no doubt will be
very well used, of influencing a large number of the future
clergy of the Japanese Church. Of course lectures are
frequent and on many subjects, but the aim of the school
is not merely to carry on a course of instruction, but to
create a tone and atmosphere, and maintain a life. To
the fulness of this life daily matins in St. Andrew's
Church, compline in my private chapel, walks with their
teachers, Sunday afternoons in the drawing room of
St. Andrew's House, private talks in this or that study, all
alike contribute.
2. By the side of the Theological School there ought
to be an institution for more general instruction. The
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge has recently
promised 25O/. to meet 4OO/., if this can be obtained from
other sources. Meanwhile a night school, which owes its
origination and its prosperity mainly to Mr. Cholmondeley,
partially fills the gap. Mr. Freese is now in charge of the
Church of the Holy Cross, Kyobashi.
3. Tokyo is the centre of a very populous country
district. As you know, it is also itself one of the great
cities of the world, whether estimated by population or
area. Alike in the city and country, active evangelisation
ought to be carried on from centres like St. Andrew's, the
Church of the Ascension, the Church of the Holy Cross,
&c., or villages like Shimo-fuku-da. Those who are to
carry on this evangelisation must not be hampered by
educational work.
Kyobashi, Ushigome, and Mita, three districts of the
great city of Tokyo, were placed under the care of St.
Andrew's Mission. Each has a small church and native
congregation supplemented by direct evangelistic work,
and in each full parochial life is maintained, together with
such agencies as dispensaries, preaching stations, and classes
for inquirers and catechumens.
It was not till the end of 1894 that the Bishop, writing
to Mr. Lefroy at Delhi, could report :
I have just established my first out-station of St.
Andrew's Mission, but no further off from the centre than
Q
226 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
one of the districts of Tokyo. A ' strong centre ' with
several such offshoots is what I am aiming at.
Writing the same year to the Guild of St. Paul the
Bishop could report progress with thankfulness chastened
by a sober realisation of the still inadequate forces at his
disposal.
With American Church Mission, S.P.G., C.M.S., St.
Andrew's, St. Hilda's (both of which are now in full
work), Mrs. Kirkes' house (itself a centre of manifold
influence for highest good among the upper classes, which
could be set moving by no other means, and no one else in
like manner, so far as I am aware), the Ladies' Institute
(where mistresses enter at Easter on the second period of
their very important work), the Mission of the Ladies'
Association of S.P.G., &c., Tokyo is now a centre where
all forms and methods of missionary endeavour are
represented. And yet how small a portion of its vast
population even know that we are here ! How much some
portions of the work which is going on need strengthening
and developing. May God send us more workers ! May
He give us who are here more self-denial, more faith, more
real love of Christ and the people. You will ask this for us.
Three years later (July 28, 1894), writing from
Hakone, the Bishop described as ' a really important step
in advance ' the arrangement by which the Rev. L. B.
Cholmondeley and his colleague (the Rev. W. F. Madeley)
went to reside in the district of Ushigome :
It will bring the mission into closer contact with the
people of an important district than has hitherto been
possible, and I do not doubt that, with God's blessing,
results will follow. Though work has been carried on in
Ushigome for many years, the number of Christians is as
yet very small, and for the most part they are, I fear,
individually weak in faith and knowledge. Japanese clergy
and catechists, without the support of European mission-
aries close at hand, have failed to correct this state of
affairs. It is one instance among many of the necessity of
close co-operation between foreign and native workers,
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 227
upon which I very often insist, if the Church's work is to be
well done during the present generation. Hereafter, as the
Japanese character strengthens and its many good elements
are developed under the influence of Christian grace and
teaching, whole districts may be handed over entirely to
native hands. But, unless in very rare cases, as yet this
cannot safely be done. If the European is all but helpless
without his Japanese colleague, on the other hand he
supplies the experience and knowledge and faculty of
perseverance, without which Japanese workers make but
slow progress.
But let us not mistake what this means. It means a
far larger number of European workers than if it were
wise to work on another principle. Out-stations must
be manned and yet the central mission not be depleted.
To confine our thoughts to our own missions. Four
European clergy, with their Japanese colleagues, are the
least that can carry on the work in Shiba. The present
staff at St. Andrew's Mission, after Mr. King's return in
the autumn, will exactly provide this minimum number.
But other furloughs will be due before very long. If, then,
Ushigome is to be maintained as well as .the central
mission at Shiba, some increase is very desirable. May
God send us the men of His choice !
But Ushigome is only one of half a dozen populous
districts in South Tokyo, in several of which branch
houses might well be at once established. With our
present staff this is of course impossible. But what a
vista is thus opened to us of possible extension as the
years go on ! We need not, indeed, as a guild look forward
to occupying the whole ground. Our two great societies
will in time, I hope, both extend their operations. 1 But I
am quite sure that a large part of the work must be done
by us if it is to be done at all through English Christians.
Let us be thankful that it is so. What more could we ask
than to be allowed a share in bringing the light of Christ's
Gospel and the fellowship of His Church to men and
1 The C.M.S. have responded to the Bishop's appeal, and have
strengthened their staff in the capital ; but the S. P. G. Mission, on the other
hand, has been gradually weakened in numbers until its sole ' foreign ' repre-
sentative in the present diocese of South Tokyo is Archdeacon Shaw, although
it is responsible for the income of the two Bishops of South Tokyo and Osaka.
The C. M.S. is responsible for the income of the two Bishops of Kiushiu and
Yezo.
Q 2
228 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
\vomen who otherwise must live on in the darkness and
isolation of heathenism ? Where could a nobler field be
found on which to concentrate all the energies of the
Church's service than such a centre of human activity and
interest as is the capital of Japan ? l
Before giving an account of the other Associated Mis-
sion founded by the Bishop that of St. Hilda for women
workers it will be well to give some description of the
women of Japan and of the openings for work among them.
On this point a paper 2 recently written in excellent
English by Miss Tsuda, a Japanese lady professor in the
Peeresses' and Normal Schools at Tokyo, gives us full and
accurate information. She reminds us that ' it is no easy
task to give a true estimate of the present condition of
women in Japan, and of the place they occupy, since every
year and month brings important changes.' But an
abstract of her sketch of the past and hopes for the future
will be read with interest.
Miss Tsuda asserts that the women of old Japan
always held a position unique in the East. History as far
back as it goes has given an honourable place to women.
Five Empresses have ruled in their own right. A woman
was the first historian. Artists of rare skill and scholarship
may be counted among the sex. The old ideas regarding
women were enlightened ones, and it is outside influences
which have tended to lower the old standard. The spread
1 It is sad to have to record that since the Bishop wrote these glowing
words in the justifiable expectation that the Church at home would not fail to
rise to so great an opportunity, only one graduate from England (a layman,
Mr. C. H. Basil Woodd, M.A., Trinity College, Cambridge) has joined St.
Andrew's Mission, and the only other recruit has been the Rev. W. C.
Gemmill, graduate of Trinity University, Toronto, who joined the mission as
a layman and has since been ordained to the diaconate and priesthood.
Published in the Japan Daily Mail (November 1898). I am indebted for
this summary to Mrs. Edward Bickersteth, a personal friend of Miss Tsuda.
This gifted Japanese Christian lady during the winter of 1898-9 visited
England, where she made many friends.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 22Q
of Buddhism, the introduction of Chinese literature, and,
above all, the strong influence of the Confucian scholars have
brought about this change, until in the sixteenth century
the Japanese woman had sunk down from her former
position of respect and equality. History has left us little
account of women for the four hundred years that followed.
The home was a sealed one hidden from outside gaze.
Here, in quiet and seclusion, the young girl grew up under
the strict doctrine of the Chinese sages. Implicitly
obedient to her parents in childhood, when married she
served her husband as her master, and in old age, leaning
on sons who took their father's place, she taught the same
doctrines to her daughters that she had held all her life,
mpressing on them her standard of duty and right, of
gentleness, sacrifice, and abnegation. Then the women of
old Japan had few educational advantages. They were
not, however, without some training, and, except in the
lowest classes, received instruction in the written language.
The daughters of the nobility were instructed in reading,
writing, poetry, Japanese history, and in some cases
Chinese. In addition, they learned music, the tea cere-
mony, etiquette, flower arrangement, and incense burning.
In the middle classes among the daughters of the retainers
(samurai] very much the same course of study with the
addition of more Chinese was pursued. A knowledge of
sewing and household work was indispensable, and often
composed the greater part of training. The daughters of
the lower classes (merchants, farmers, artisans) were far
less educated. In the cities they gained the bare rudi-
ments of reading and writing, but sometimes spent much
time on music and dancing. In the country the days
were too much filled with labour in the field or at the
loom to leave time for study of any sort. This
limited education was in keeping with the narrow life of
230 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
those days. The special attention paid to etiquette and
moral training, the keen sense of duty, loyalty, and honour
early instilled into the mind, tended to produce women
who, though not intellectually trained, were not without
moral responsibility and dignity mingled with gentleness
and sweetness of disposition. In the educational problems
of the day for women none is more perplexing than the
difficulty of keeping the beauty and refinement of the old
system with the broader and new ideas and the freedom of
thought and 'action which come from the culture of the
intellectual powers. Changes have come quickly since the
Revolution of 1 868. The first official step was the establish-
ment of public primary schools for boys and girls all over
Japan in 1869. In 1872 the Educational Department
established the Tokyo Girls' School, the first Government
school for girls. In 1874 it established the Higher Normal
School for girls. In 1886 was established, by H.I.H. the
Empress, the Peeresses' School for the daughters of the
nobility, the first girls' school for the higher classes. As
regards the social position of woman in Japan, it cannot be
denied that for many years the laws and government of
the day had little regard for her ; laws regarding her were
very few, simply because she was a factor not worth con-
sidering. Marriage and divorce have been left to custom
in lack of civil codes on such matters. Still, here too there
are signs of change in the right direction. In the two
principal religions of Japan, Shintoism and Buddhism,
women have had little part or influence, except as earnest
believers and devotees. Buddhism has always looked
down on woman. She has been regarded as full of sin
and impurity, and not allowed to visit holy places, as
she defiled' them. Shintoism gives a better position to
woman, but Shintoism has only a shadowy influence over
the people.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 231
Miss Tsuda, herself a Christian and Church-woman of
many years' standing, concludes her article thus :
Christianity has done, and is doing much, for the eleva-
tion of woman. It will do more. It will raise the Japan-
ese woman socially, will exalt her home, will purify the
social and moral evils that work against her, will give her
a higher code of morals, and an ideal of womanhood which
in the present age is unknown.
No wonder, then, that the Bishop was strongly con-
vinced of the necessity for strengthening and extending
the existing work among Japanese women, and to this end
he established St. Hilda's Mission. The progress and
development of this mission lay very near his heart.
Within six months of his arrival in Japan he wrote to
Canon Stanton from Kobe :
November 27, 1886.
One line by way of supplement to mine of last week.
I referred only, I think, to the University Mission which I
propose : but I hope also to have a new Ladies' Mission
in Tokyo. This will in time, I hope, draw workers from
the Bishop of Truro's very excellent sisterhood at Truro, 1
though as yet the number of sisters is too small for them to
undertake foreign work. The Bishop (Dr. Wilkinson) has,
however, suggested that any ladies coming for mission work
to Tokyo might with advantage spend a few weeks or
months at the Truro sisterhood before starting and this
I should like them to do, if possible. The Bishop has also
put me in communication with a very admirable worker
in his diocese, who proposes to undertake mission work
in Japan.
On March 12, 1887, he wrote to his old Diocesan,
Bishop French of Lahore :
My dear Bishop, Many months have run by since I
wrote to you. I meant to have been a better correspon-
dent. Almost the whole time has been spent in moving
from place to place and in short visitations. Japan is
1 Community of the Epiphany.
232 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
though it looks small in the map immense, double the
length of England, and many places difficult of access for
large parts of the year owing to snow in the passes, and
always requiring much time to be spent en route. The
faith is certainly making itself felt through God's good
Spirit throughout the land. Little congregations are being
gathered even in quite remote parts, and the people recog-
nise, as in the early days, that Christianity raises the moral
tone of its professors, and not seldom has turned them
markedly from lives of notorious wickedness to lives which
even heathen note to be holy and attractive. It is largely
by means of such witnesses that the Gospel is being made
known.
I have also spent much time in all the correspondence
and work that is necessary in the attempt to start several
new missions one a brotherhood, one an associated Ladies'
Mission which may develop into a sisterhood, and yet
another the charge of a Japanese Ladies' High School,
for which the University (of Tokyo) professors asked me to
obtain teachers. I hope all three of them may be at work
by the end of the year, or in a year's time but the Uni-
versity Mission cannot hope for anything like the Delhi staff.
The desire to establish a women's mission connected
with the honoured name of St. Hilda had first come to him
when at Delhi, for he felt strongly the truth of Bishop
Lightfoot's strictures on the Church's folly in trying to do
her work ' with only one arm,' as he phrased it. Writing
to Canon Stanton on November 2, 1887, Bishop Bickersteth
says :
Japan is an instance of the folly of trying to establish
large Anglican missions without a Bishop. It is quite
inconceivable that had there been a Bishop here ten years
ago they should have been allowed to go on without
any adequate effort to develop ladies' work, and thus have
been utterly distanced by the American Nonconformist
bodies. However, 1 cannot be thankful enough for the re-
sponse which has been made to my appeals in this respect.
The first two members of the new Associated Mission
arrived at Yokohama early on Sunday, December 4. 1887.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 233
The following day they were admitted by the Bishop to be
members of St. Hilda's Associated Mission. The Bishop
wrote :
In the words of admission I have tried to bring out the
idea of life. Buddhism is all about dying, and I have
referred to their life in Christ's life, leading to the eternal
life of those for whom they work.
The form of admission is as follows :
The Bishop shall give to the person to be admitted a
cross, saying, ' Receive and wear this cross in token that
thou wilt die daily to self and in newness of life serve the
Risen Christ, who gave His Life for men, that He might
bring many unto Life eternal.'
Here far more than in the case of St. Andrew's Mission
the Bishop had to buy his wisdom by experience. St.
Andrew's was avowedly formed on the same lines as the
Cambridge Mission at Delhi, but there was no precedent
for a Women's Associated Mission founded and worked on
the same lines.
Simple rules were framed from the first, but it was not
till March 1892 that the Bishop put his hand and seal to
the Rule (exterior and interior) of St. Hilda's Mission.
Of the Exterior Rule A it is sufficient to state that
Clause 2 provided that 'those approved as candidates
shall stay at the House of the Community of the Epiphany,
Truro, for six weeks.' In Clause 3 the Bishop again tried
to secure that ' deep should answer to deep,' as he had
done years before in arranging that prayer should be
offered at Cambridge and at Delhi as far as possible at
the same time. It provides that ' the Community of the
Epiphany shall be daily remembered in the prayers of the
members of the mission, and they likewise shall be prayed
for daily by the sisters.'
Of Exterior Rule B Clause 2 provides that ' a Bishop
234 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
or priest shall be chosen as warden, subject to the sanction
of the Bishop of the diocese and the patron of St. Paul's
Guild.'
Clause 4 that ' each new member shall be admitted
by a service in chapel, which shall not be held (except
under exceptional circumstances) until after a probation
of one year.'
Clause 5, that 'the members of the mission shall yearly
on St. Hilda's Day (November 17) elect one of their
number to be Member- in-Charge if approved for the office
by the Warden.'
Clause 7, that ' a chapter shall he held at least once in
two months at which all important matters affecting the
welfare and development of the mission shall be dis-
cussed.'
Clause 10, that 'services shall be held in the chapel of
the Mission House three times a day ; in the morning a
shortened form of Matins (in Japanese) shall be said ; at
midday Sext (in English), with special collects and heads
for intercession, with space for silent prayer ; in the evening
Compline (in Japanese) ; and also that the members shall,
as far as their work allows, attend the services in the
Church of St. Andrew, Shiba.'
Clause 11, that ' members shall not accept invitations
into society, but that they may receive visits from and pay
visits to their friends subject to the claims of the work.'
Clause 14, that 'silence shall be kept as far as possible
on the stairs and in the passages of the Mission House ;
also throughout the house before Matins and after
Compline.'
Clause 17 that (a) 'each member shall consider it a
point of duty to take sufficient exercise, relaxation, food,
and rest, and to avoid overwork, remembering that bodily
health is a gift of God, and essential to some forms of work
for Him.
(b) That ' each member is entitled, subject to the
exigencies of the work, after six [now altered to five]
years' work in the mission, to one year's furlough in
England.'
The object of the Interior Rule is stated to be 'to
glorify God by obeying His call and doing His will
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 235
in all things.' Its closing words, which are highly charac-
teristic of the founder, may be quoted :
In a life of rule and ordered service, be careful to main-
tain the freedom and gladness of the children of God,
through habitual remembrance of His presence and the
forgiveness of all your sins through the cross of Jesus
Christ.
It is plain that the mission thus organised was largely
dependent for its success on the care with which can-
didates were selected in England. The Bishop accordingly
was constant in stating and re-stating his ideal and his
suggestions for guidance in this selection. 1 I therefore
have put together from his letters to me some of the points
which he used to lay down.
Four characteristics are essential in all candidates for
St. Hilda's Mission.
1. Piety.
2. Sociability in the sense of being able to live happily
in a community.
3. Strong Church principle.
4. Refinement.
The absence of the first of these disqualifies for all
missions, and any of the four for St. Hilda's and like similar
Community missions. I have re-written the St. Hilda's
Rule, and have tried to make it more comprehensive, so
that anyone may understand by studying it what is our
practice (on confession &c.), and what kind of life I set
before them as an ideal. Would that I myself were nearer
what I ask them to aim at.
Again, ' One is almost tempted to say that without a
really strong, loving, religious head or mother, Community
missions cannot prosper.'
Again, in regard to the social position of the candi-
dates :
1 Candidates were interviewed by myself as Commissary, by Bishop
Wilkinson (now Bishop of St. Andrews), and then by the Mother Superior of
the Community of the Epiphany.
236 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
They should be taken from the gentle walks of life.
One reason is that the candidates you select are sure to draw
others from the same rank and avocations they have been in
themselves. Another that manners are a real missionary
poiver in Japan. A third is that we are aiming at (though
owing to failures it is only beginning) a life as well as a
mission in Japan, and for this people of different ranks do
not permanently or for any length of time coalesce. It
might be the higher thing if it were not so, and I can
imagine an argument that spiritual sympathies should
render it unnecessary, yet sisterhoods get out of the
difficulty by their second orders, and all somehow or other
recognise the principle, and, though I regret it in some
ways, I fear we must too. For permanent life and work
together people must, it seems, we being what we are,
have something of like training and hold views which are
not mutually exclusive. This holds good in a parish as
regards a vicar and his curates, though not of course in the
wider area of a Church.
Again :
The only hope of building up a Community mission of
women is to get people well agreed already, and also well
taught in the faith, and holding it on its Church as well
as on its evangelical side with some firmness. Of course I
do not mean that these conditions ensure peace and
progress, but where they are absent the hope is very small
indeed.
Again, with regard to one who had been described as
' pious and energetic, and beginning to feel that there may
be some solid truth in Church doctrine,' and who was
wishful to go to St. Hilda's, if not as a member, at least as
an associate, or even as a long-time visitor, he wrote :
A person in her position is not in a fit frame of mind
to work for God among the heathen. First of all, she
must decide whether the new lights of truth which are
beginning to break in upon her are ignes fatui or sun's
rays. Till she has done this, she will necessarily be so
unsettled in her own mind as to be wholly unfit to
contribute to the life of a community and to co-operate in
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 237
its work. Her critical faculties will be sure to be dominant,
when her sympathy should be the leading trait. For
mission work we need persons whose mind is made up on
the leading points alike for personal and corporate religion,
and the place for their decision is not Japan but England.
It is suggested that I might teach her Church doctrine,
but even if I had a moment to spare for such work St.
Hilda's would be the wrong place. Our workers ought to
have behind them if possible an even tenor of life, certainly
a matureness according to their years in their own
principles. And this is above all the case at St. Hilda's,
where we have no large body of workers into which to
engulf a stray person of a different type, and are only
beginning, owing to failures in the past, to generate a truly
healthy spiritual atmosphere and to build up a life. More-
over, a ' long-timed ' visitor or an associate should be more
not less in touch with the others than a member, because
she is less under rule, and therefore her words and ways
are more free to do mischief if they do not do good. The
' associate ' plan is not in order to get persons into the
community whose views would otherwise exclude them,
but for those who cannot presumably give their lives to
the work. I am revising the rule to make this more
clear.
The Bishop's general idea for a member of St. Hilda's
may be well gathered from the following extract from a
letter to his sister May, dated St. John's Day 1887 :
The people we have [for St. Hilda's] should be spiritu-
ally minded and prepared to take pains with their own
spiritual life, regarding the work as the outcome of life (not
vice -versa), formed in character or they cannot influence
others and in all ways refined in thought and manner.
If they are also able, and have some sparkle of originality
about them, it will probably help them to strike out new
paths for themselves. I do not mean the ' community
idea' to crush out the individual. If it does, the highest
work becomes impossible. Our duty here, utterly dis-
tanced as far as numbers are concerned by American
Nonconformity of all sorts and kinds, is to do what we can
by God's grace of the highest and best.
It will be gathered from these letters that offers for
238 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
St. Hilda's Mission were frequent, and so they were.
Writing (again to his sister May) on January 18, 1891,
the Bishop referred to this as follows :
Remember that an offer is less and less a criterion that
a person is fit. It is so easy now to get about the world ;
except for the distance from England, it is not harder or
less agreeable to live in Tokyo than in London. Work (it
is true) is in parts here hard and repulsive, but so it is in
' Darkest England ' ; so that, taking all together, offers are
likely to be frequent when maintenance is provided, and so
can only be entertained if we have fullest proof of physical,
mental, spiritual competence, besides the offer. The offer
by itself goes for little, though it seems hard to say so.
Also I feel more and more that the only persons who will
really do for us are ladies from refined and religious
homes.
With regard to confession l with a view to receiving
private absolution, the Bishop was often asked by candi-
dates to declare his views, and they may be clearly
gathered from the following extracts from his letters.
The letters you have sent give me a fairly full view of
the opinions of Miss - - (presumably those which she has
been taught) on confession.
I understand Miss to hold that, though not
essential to salvation, confession is a means of grace, and
that as such it should be pressed, though not enforced on
all, as the ordinary channel among Catholic Christians of
the forgiveness of sins. In this view there are several
serious mistakes. Confession is not, except in the most
indirect sense, a means of grace but a method of discipline,
and therefore, like other methods of discipline, not useful
for all. In this it differs from absolution, which is a
covenanted means of grace and for all whether given, as
commonly, in connection with the sacraments or apart
from them, whether pronounced publicly or privately. It
follows that the Christian who has received private abso-
lution possesses no greater privilege, though possibly as an
individual more comfort, than any other communicant.
1 For a fuller statement of his views on this subject see chapter xi. , pp. 430-433.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 239
And again, that whether a particular person should or
should not practise private confession must depend on
their own circumstances and needs.
I will not go further into the general question except to
add that were the view which Miss has been taught
correct, not only would Scripture language about forgive-
ness, the sacraments, &c., be beyond explanation, but the
whole Church would have been in error on this matter,
theoretically, till late in the middle ages, and practically
until the rise of the Jesuits.
I cannot, then, both for her own sake and that of the
mission, accept Miss - - as a member of St. Hilda's if I
rightly understand her view of confession and she continues
to hold it. It is true that I should not feel her holding
this view an obstacle to her working in this diocese or to
my supporting her, as I do many others in Japan who are
only partially in agreement with me. But at St. Hilda's
I act as warden as well as Bishop, and am responsible
for the teaching given in a special degree. I wish the
members to be, broadly speaking, prepared to accept my
teaching, and if I am right Miss - - would feel herself
precluded from doing so by conscientious convictions. I
shall greatly regret losing Miss - , as her letters show an
earnest and straightforward soul. She is also most right
in holding that in the mission field the whole truth should
be taught without prejudice. But in this instance she has
been led to add to the Catholic faith and practice points
which they do not contain. I hope she may feel at liberty
to reconsider the matter.
After reading the correspondence about Miss
twice over carefully, it did not seem to me that there was
any real choice left to me in the matter. As I understand
it, Miss - - still holds that confession is, not a practice
useful for some persons or some states and circumstances
of life, but the ordinary condition of attaining to full
spiritual life, and that as such it ought to be pressed by the
clergy on all persons alike who come under their charge.
But at the same time, as a 'self-sacrifice,' she proposes to
keep this view in the background if I accept her as a
member of St. Hilda's. Now I must say that, however
well meant, this arrangement would be wholly wanting in
240 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
moral honesty and is not one which I could possibly
sanction or agree to. If confession is for all persons alike
God's intended and prescribed way of obtaining forgiveness
and peace, then those who are convinced of this cannot put
such a truth on one side at pleasure. They are bound to
teach it everywhere and by all means as they may have
opportunity. Not to do so would be a sin against God
and a grievous wrong to others. The view may be, as it
is, neither Scriptural, primitive, nor catholic, but this would
not alter their obligation as long as they held it.
It will thus be seen that the mission was not on party
lines, and the Bishop was well aware no one more so
of the strength and weakness which such a fact implied.
In a letter to Mr. Lefroy, dated Karuizawa, August 19,
1895, he wrote :
I am grieved that Cambridge is not sending you more
men to Delhi. You certainly ought by this time to be
stronger in numbers. The actual work you have in hand
plainly demands it. I suppose that work which is not
laid down on clearly marked party lines suffers in com-
parison with work which follows them, or rather seems to
suffer, for with actual success or failure numbers certainly
have no necessary connection. But for the ' seeming to
suffer ' you will probably lay your count with Lightfoot's
saying, ' You will have done more for the world when you
leave it.' By degrees though, notwithstanding, I do hope
and trust you will reach to a dozen men.
St. Hilda's Mission slowly but surely strengthened
itself in the Lord, eight or ten English ladies joining
within the first few years. Isobe San l and Sakai San,
two Japanese ladies who came to be trained in evangelistic
work, were also admitted as members of the mission in
March 1892. Of this admission the Bishop wrote to his
father :
On Thursday I admitted two Japanese ladies as
members of St. Hilda's Mission. This is a new step out
1 Isobe San has since married the Rev. P. Yamada.
MISSIONARY METHODS AND COMMUNITY MISSIONS 241
here. They are not bound for life, but both hope to
remain in the work. I used the same service (only in
Japanese) as that with which the foreign members are
admitted.
The Bishop lost no time in providing for the proper
housing of the mission. He secured a large site, and
erected upon it a House for the workers and the High
School (Ladies). This House 1 has twice been added to,
and in the same compound stand the Training House for
Mission Women, the Embroidery School, the Orphanage,
and Orphanage School, while within a few minutes' walk
is a dispensary which contains four beds for urgent cases.
Some of these have been erected by the contributions of
St. Paul's Guild (aided by grants from the Society for
Promoting Christian Knowledge), and some are private
gifts, the present Mission Women's Home being a memorial
of Canon Thornton of Truro and one of his daughters,
and the Orphanage and Orphanage School having been
erected by the well-known lady traveller, Mrs. J. F.
Bishop, F.R.G.S., in memory of her husband, Dr. John
Bishop, whose name they bear.
In a letter to the Guild of St. Paul from Tokushima,
July 5, 1889, after referring to the growth of St. Hilda's
in detail, and specially to the projected Training Home
for Mission Women, the Bishop wrote :
Let me only say that the native mission woman seems
to me as necessary to the effectiveness of the foreign
missionary lady as the catechist to the work of the foreign
clergyman. This principle has only recently been under-
stood, or at least acted upon ; homes for the training of
such workers, who might be drawn surely from the higher
1 One of the members, writing in August 1889, says : ' I wish you could see
St. Hilda's House. It is beautifully situated and very spacious. I always say
we ought to be specially good workers, for we certainly have a specially beauti-
ful mission house, and special spiritual help in the care and prayers the
mission receives at home and in Japan itself.'
R
242 BISHOP EDWARD BICKERSTETH
as well as or better than from the lower ranks of Eastern
Society, are only just being established. 1 Our sister
mission from the American Church has one such home
at Osaka. The Church Missionary Society will establish
one, I hope, shortly. The difficulty at first is to get persons
to be trained, but this will be got over as congregations get
more numerous and stronger. With this training wi 
