missionary societies, and this has largely been done, the
older Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, manned by
“High” Churchmen, standing more aloof. In 1814 the Wesleyan
Missionary Society was formed, Methodist effort of this
kind having previously been left to the individual enterprise
of Dr Thomas Coke. Thus shorn of two chief bodies of supporters,
and Presbyterians in England being then comparatively
few, the London Missionary Society became in effect a Congregationalist
organization, though it has never departed from the
broad spirit of its founders. In Scotland Robert Haldane sold
his estate and devoted £25,000 to the cause; with others he would
have gone to India himself but for the prohibition of the East
India Company, one of whose directors said he would rather see
a band of devils in India than a band of missionaries. What
Carey did for England was largely done for Scotland by Alexander
Duff, who settled in Calcutta in 1830, and was a pioneer of
higher education in India. On the Continent the Basel Mission
(1815) grew out of a society founded in 1780 to discuss the general
condition of Christianity; “Father” Jänicke, a Bohemian
preacher in Berlin, founded a training school which supplied
many men to the Church Missionary Society and the London
Missionary Society; and Van der Kemp, who pioneered the
London Missionary Society work in South Africa, organized
in 1797 the Netherland Missionary Society, which turned its
attention chiefly to Dutch Colonial possessions.
In America as in England the sense of individual responsibility had been developed. In 1796 and 1797 respectively the New York and the Northern societies were formed for work among Indians by Presbyterians, Baptists and Reformed Dutch, acting in concert. News of the London Society stimulated interest in New England, and in 1806 Andover Seminary was founded as a missionary training college. In the same year Samuel J. Mills, Gordon Hall and James Richards, three students at Williams College, Massachusetts, formed themselves into a mission band which ultimately became the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (June 1810), an organization which, like the London Mission, originally undenominational and still catholic, has become practically Congregational. The first offshoot from it was the American Baptist Missionary Union in 1814.
The following chronological lists illustrate the growth of missionary societies in Britain and the United States:—
Great Britain and Ireland.
1691. Christian Faith Society for the West Indies.
1698. Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
1701. Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts.
1732. Moravian Missions.
1792. Baptist Missionary Society.
1795. London Missionary Society.
1796. Scottish Missionary Society.
1799. Church Missionary Society.
1799. Religious Tract Society.
1804. British and Foreign Bible Society.
1808. London Society for Promoting Christianity among the Jews.
1813. Wesleyan Missionary Society.
1817. General Baptist Missionary Society.
1823. Colonial and Continental Church Society.
1825. Church of Scotland Mission Boards.
National Bible Society of Scotland.
1831. Trinitarian Bible Society.
1832. Wesleyan Ladies’ Auxiliary for Female Education in Foreign Countries.
1835. United Secession (afterwards United Presbyterian) Foreign Missions.
1836. Colonial Missionary Society.
1840. Irish Presbyterian Missionary Society.
1840. Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Missionary Society.
1841. Colonial Bishoprics Fund.
1841. Edinburgh Medical Missionary Society.
1843. British Society for the Propagation of the Gospel among the Jews.
1843. Free Church of Scotland Missions.
1843. Primitive Methodist African and Colonial Missions.
Methodist New Connexion in England Foreign Missions.
1844. South American Missionary Society.
1847. Presbyterian Church in England Foreign Missions.
1858. Christian Vernacular Education Society for India.
1860. Central African Mission of the English Universities.
1862. China Inland Mission.
1865. Friends’ Foreign Mission Association.
1866. Delhi Female Medical Mission.
1867. Friends’ Mission in Syria and Palestine.
1876. Cambridge Mission to Delhi.
1880. Church of England Zenana Missionary Society.
1884. Presbyterian Mission to Korea.
1892. Student Volunteer Missionary Union.
United States of America.
1733. Corporation for the Propagation of the Gospel in New England.
1787. Society for Propagating the Gospel among the Indians at Boston.
1795. Friends’ Missionary Society.
1800. New York Missionary Society.
Connecticut Missionary Society for Indians.
1803. United States Mission to the Cherokees.
1806. Western Missionary Society for Indians.
1810. Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
1814. Baptist Missionary Union.
1819. Methodist Episcopal Church Missionary Society.
1833. Free-will Baptist Foreign Missionary Society in India.
1835. Foreign Missions of the Protestant Episcopal Church.
1837. Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church (North).
1837. Evangelical Lutheran Foreign Missionary Society.
1842. Seventh Day Baptist Missionary Society.
Strict Baptist Missionary Society.
1843. Baptist Free Missionary Society.
1845. Methodist Episcopal Church (South).
1845. Southern Baptist Convention.
1846. American Missionary Association.
1857. Board of Foreign Missions of (Dutch) Reformed Church.
1859. Board of Foreign Missions of United Presbyterian Church.
1862. Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church (South).
1878. Evangelical Association Missionary Society.
1886. Student Volunteer Missionary Union.
It is not possible to follow in detail the history of the hundred or more organized societies of some size that have thus come into being since the end of the 18th century, still less that of the three or four hundred smaller agencies.[1] It may be noted, however, that the enterprise has followed certain more or less clearly defined lines. These are described as follows by Dr E. M. Bliss, editor of the Encyclopaedia of Missions.
1. The Denominational.—The course of denominational work may be seen in the way in which the London Society and the American Board were gradually left to the Congregationalists, it being recognized that while fraternity was maintained, the widest results could only be obtained as appeal was made directly to the members of each separate denomination. To some extent a similar development is traceable in other lands. In Germany the Rhenish Society (1825) became independent of the Basel Mission, but like it and the Berlin Society founded by Neander and Tholuck has preserved a broad basis and includes both Lutheran and Reformed constituents. The North German or Bremen Society split into a strict Lutheran or Leipzig agency and the Hermannsburg Mission, which aimed at a more primitive and apostolic method. In Denmark, the Danish Missionary Society, founded by Pastor Bone Falck Ronne in 1821, worked through the Moravian and Basel societies until 1862, when it began independent work and concentrated on the Tamil population of South India. In Norway and Sweden missionary activity kept pace with the development of the national life; in the former country the Free Church, in the latter the State Church has been the most successful agency.
In Holland a religious revival in 1846 led to the foundation of several organizations which supplemented the work of the original Netherland Missionary Society. In France protestant missionary effort began after the overthrow of the empire, and in 1822 several isolated committees united to form the Société des Missions Evangéliques, better known as the Paris Evangelical Society. In Tahiti, Madagascar and other fields this society has largely taken over work begun by the London Society, whose operations were viewed with suspicion by the French government.
2. Collateral Aid.—Side by side with the founding of the great missionary societies, Bible and Tract societies sprang up. The dates are significant: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge (1698), Religious Tract and Book Society of Scotland (1793), Religious Tract Society in London (1799), British and Foreign Bible Society (1804), American Bible Society (1816), American Tract Society (1823). (See further Bible Societies.) Medical Missions have not been so much collateral organizations as departments of the work of the general societies, and the same is generally true of women’s missions. Both of these will be discussed in more detail.
3. Independent and Special Agencies.—The individual element that was so marked a feature in Carey’s generation has never vanished, in spite of the tendency to central control. J. Hudson Taylor in 1853 went to China as the agent of a number of folk in England who feared that missionary work was becoming too mechanical. His aim was to push inland and to work through native evangelists. Out
of his endeavours sprang a new organization, the China Inland- ↑ For complete directory see Statistical Atlas of Foreign Missions (1910).
