r European and American civilization and
Christianity.

And so ever at the cry of the strong for help the gospel has had just
these three great prime factors to present for the solution of the
problems of every age: first, the home, with its priesthood of the
father and mother, the sanctuary of the house and the ministrations of
family life; secondly, the school; and thirdly, between the home and the
school, the church. When our Lord himself, from all possible sources,
made selection of the first among the many means he has chosen for the
redemption of this world, he chose a trained personality. As the medium
for the transmission of truth, no improvement, no change has been found
in all the progress of the gospel. By this trained personality--the
heart that has been led to live with Christ awhile, and then go forth in
his name and filled with his love to the hearts that have place for that
love and rootage for that life--this wonderful product of our Christian
civilization has everywhere been produced.

And I take it that in no one of the Christian agencies known to us are
these three methods so wonderfully unified, so inseparably united, as
the home and the church and the school are in the work of the American
Missionary Association. They are one and the same. They are
indissoluble. The long experience of this Association through this half
century of specialized work does fit it, as the report has said, to give
an almost commanding opinion in regard to the method of the work to be
pursued among these very distinct classes. From the field as well as
from the office, and from the experience of those longest at work, we
learn that the school finds its ultimate aim only in the church; that,
as a Christian agency, we are to work with the school only as a means to
the end of building up that body of Christ on the face of the earth
which is known by the name of his church. I do not see how the
separation to any extent of school and church work can fail to break the
unity of administration and hinder the progress of this gloriously
on-going work.

I have just one word to add in regard to the reflex influence of this
church work upon the home churches. My brethren, there has been a great
dearth in candidates for the ministry until very recently. It strikes me
that there is no such object-lesson in all our land, inviting men to
consecrate themselves to the noblest of purposes, as the heroic ministry
of this Association. It ne