Letter I

MY DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS:--The general agent of the Massachusetts Sabbath School Union has requested me to write something which I have "seen, heard, or thought of" for the Treasury. He proposed that I should write in the form of letters, and address them to you. This I shall be very happy to do, so far as I have any leisure to write.

Some of you, perhaps, will remember what I used to tell you of the children, and men, and women, who had no Bibles, and who were ignorant of the true God, and of Jesus Christ the Savior of sinners. I can remember very well what some of the little children used to say, and how they used to look, when I talked to them about being a missionary, and of going far away from home, perhaps never to return. I did not then think of going so far off; indeed, I did not know where I should go; had some thoughts of going to Greece, or to Armenia. We do not always know what is best, but God does, for He knows all things, and will direct all things for his own glory; and if we love and obey him, He will make all things work together for our good.

I am very glad I came to China, and I wish a great many more missionaries would come here. Before I came among the heathen, I had no idea how much they are to be pitied, and how much they need the Bible. Now that I live among them, and see their poor dumb idols every day, I desire to tell you a great many things which, I hope, will make you more careful to improve your own privileges, and more anxious also that the same blessed privileges may be enjoyed by all other children every where.

China is a very ancient nation; and has, at the present time, a vast population,--probably twenty or thirty times as many people as there are in all the United States of America. If there are, then, three millions in the United States to be gathered into the Sabbath schools... there are here in China more than sixty millions, of the same age, who know not even that there are any Sabbath, or any Sabbath day, or any Holy Bible.

Since I have now commenced, I wish to write you several short letters; and this I will try to do, if God our heavenly Father gives me time and strength. Earnestly desiring that he will give you all good things, I remain,

Your true friends, E.C. BRIDGMAN.