every kind of picture-card and preach a pure gospel.—H. P. Beach, "Volunteer Student Movement," 1906.
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See Religious Infractions of Propriety.
Propriety a Matter of Religion—See Religious Infractions of Propriety. Propriety and Taste Violated—See Missionaries' Mistakes. Propriety, Lack of—See Accommodation. PROPRIETY, OBSERVING RULES OF Leaving the home (in China), you go out into the street, and what is there that first offends your friends—those whom you have come to help? Very possibly it is your dress. You do not have enough of it often-*times. One function of garments is to conceal the form, and many modes of dress do not conceal but simply reveal it. While we are to remember this, going to the other extreme and walking the streets in bathrobe coats is also questionable. Anything approaching decolleté would weaken a woman's influence, even if she appeared thus only on a state occasion. Over against this lack of dress is too much dress, which is quite as offensive. I saw the other day a photograph of Governor Tuan, one of the two commissioners who have just been visiting the United States. He sat in his yamen surrounded by some missionaries and other foreigners living in the governor's province. It was a very beautiful picture, but one of the missionaries in the group, who was stylishly drest, had a cane—a dapper little pipe-stem cane in China! To Governor Tuan there could be no rational explanation of that sort of thing. If it had been a staff and the missionary had been lame, it would have been appropriate. But he was not lame, no beggars were allowed in the governor's yaman, there were no dogs to bite him, and why in the world should this man bring a cane? It was just as if native Australians were being received by President Roosevelt and had brought with them boomerangs. Boomerangs have their place, but not in the White House; and to swing a cane causes trouble for China missionaries. Glasses are a necessity, but the missionary to the Chinese unconsciously offends high officials by his glasses, especially if he does not remove them when greeting the official. Many, even of the older missionaries, do not know such a fact as that.—H. P. Beach, "Student Volunteer Movement," 1906.
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Prosperity and Temperance—See Prohibition. PROSPERITY AS AN ADVERTISEMENT The United States Immigration Commission informs the American Congress that savings of immigrants to the amount of $275,000,000 are annually sent abroad to be used in foreign countries, and the commission says in its report: "The sum is sent abroad for the purpose of supporting families in foreign countries, for bringing other immigrants to the United States, for the payment of debts or for savings and investment in the countries from which the immigrants come." More than 2,300,000 persons throughout the United States are doing an unregulated banking business, handling yearly hundreds of millions of dollars, their customers being found wholly among immigrant laborers who for the most part do not speak English. The money actually sent abroad is thus distributed according to countries: Italy, $85,000,000; Austria-Hungary, $75,000,000; Russia, including Finland, $25,000,000; Great Britain, $25,000,000; Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, $25,000,000; Germany, $15,000,000; Greece, $5,000,000; the Balkan States, $5,000,000; Japan, $5,000,000; China, $5,000,000; all other countries, $5,000,000. Even reducing the amount estimated as being too large, there must be an immense outflow of money from the United States in the direction indicated, and it helps explain why there is an excess of commodity exports, averaging $400,000,000 annually, over imports, to settle the invisible indebtedness of the country abroad. The great outflow of cash sent home by immigrants serves one useful purpose: it advertises the general prosperity of the great republic, and so helps keep up the volume of emigration from Europe. A growing country requires people as well as capital. It has been estimated that every able-*bodied immigrant is worth to the country $5,000; the Northern republic is receiving nearly a million immigrants annually, and allowing that a fifth part are workers of sound physique the gain to the United States is $1,000,000,000, gold, value a year.—Mexican Herald.
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