Securing a Christian College to China: Samuel Robbins Brown

American missionaries have done much for higher education in non-Christian lands. Those who value so highly the life that is to come do not by any means undervalue the life that now is. What the missionaries in foreign fields have done in the way of uplifting and improving the people to whom they go, in efforts at civilizing and educating and wisely training those who had need in this line, would amply compensate for all the time and money expended by and for them. And yet this is in addition to, or as an incident of, their first and chief and indeed their supreme endeavor as Christian missionaries.

As illustrative of this higher educational work perfornled by Christian missionaries from America m the lands to which they have gone within the last century, there stand prominent before the world institutions of learning and of training that are recognized and honored by all. The American Protestant College in Beyroot; Jaffna College in Ceylon; Robert College in Constantinople; Oahu College in the Sandwich Islands; and many another like institution more or less important and influential, are an indication of the work that foreign missionaries have been and are doing for Christ and for the world. And in this line of labor Andrew P. Happer of Pennsylvania, a missionary of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions, is to be remembered and honored for his inspiring endeavors to secure a Christian college to China, into the foundations of which his life was laid.

Andrew P. Happer was graduated at Jefferson College j was a student of medicine in the University of Pennsylvania, and was a student of theology in the Western Theological Seminary. He was ordained by the Presbytery of Ohio; and in June, 1844, he sailed from New York with five other missionaries for Canton. But owing to the prejudice at that time against foreigners, he was unable to obtain a building or even to remain there. So for two yearS he was necessitated to remain at Macao, under Portuguese protection, “without Christian society, or sympathy, or friendship.” But Christ was with him, and he had work for Christ. While he was studying and perfecting himself in the language, he had in Macao a boarding-school for boys. When the Board of Missions secured a station in Canton, Dr. Happer entered the field there. He married a daughter of the Rev. Dyer Ball, of the American Board mission, and of this union four daughters and a son became faithful missionary co-workers with their parents.

Now, as in the days of Jesus, healing the sick is a means of enabling one in the East to gain the confidence of those in need, and thus to enable one to minister to the inner as well as the outer man. This has always been the case in China, and Dr. Happer’s thorough medical training gave him added power as a missionary. He said of this work when he had started a dispensary in Canton: “Patients came to me from all the surrounding country, as well as from this great city. Some have come a distance, three, four, and even five days’ journey, to seek here medical aid.” At the same time he had thirty boys in the boarding-school, and as many more in the day-school. He preached every other day and twice on Sunday, besides prescribing for from fifty to one hundred and fifty patients. When at the end of ten years of missionary labor he was privileged to baptize the first Christian convert in his field, he spoke of him gratefully as “a son begotten and beloved in the gospel — the first-fruits of my labors among the Chinese.” He had no thought of counting his labors in the Lord unfruitful; and they were not.

This was his first known convert, but it was by no means his last. Eight years later the first Presbyterian church was organized in Canton with seven members. Dr. Happer was its pastor, and all its members were his helpers. Into that church under his charge were gathered some five hundred converts. He sent off from it members to form nine other churches, and the number and influence of those won by him continued to increase. His training school enabled him to do an excellent work for the boys in it; and single boys in that school did a work for good that only the great day will ever disclose. Meantime he was at work as a member of the committee of missionary scholars on the revision of Culbertson and Bridgeman’s version of the Bible, in which all the missionary societies and Bible societies were interested.

But the project of a Chinese Christian college, to be founded and permanently endowed was on his mind and heart, and he longed to be of service in laying its foundation. His physical strength was, however, giving way. He sought its restoration by a visit to Japan; but he was necessitated to return to the United States. While unable to pursue direct missionary work in the foreign field, he could use his strength in winning funds and friends to the new college. Money was obtained and put into the hands of trustees in New York. Dr. Happer was chosen president of the new institution. Again he, with Mrs. Happer, returned to China to secure a site for the college and to complete its organization and details of management. But while doing excellent service in the line of his aspirations, it was evident that he had already expended his chief strength in and for the Chinese missionary field and the new Chinese Christian college. He was compelled to surrender his position and come to his Pennsylvania home to spend his closing earthly days.

It was during his later years, in the last two visits that he made to this country, that I had the privilege of meeting and knowing Dr. Happer. In the missionrooms in New York and Philadelphia, and in my own office, I was helped by his personality and his varied knowledge. He was interested in my special lines of Oriental studies, and was always ready to give me valued aid in them. And I was interested in and helped by his enthusiastic devotion to Christ, and to what Christ loves. He pleaded earnestly for the Chinese, and for the Christian college which he wa§ endeavoring to establish there; and he seemed surprised that God’s children who had means were not more ready to give for this good cause.

His keen and penetrating eye, his patriarchal face and bearing, and his wise and ready words, bore testimony to this long and faithful service in and for the mission field. The Presbyterian Board of Missions said truly of him, in looking back on his life work: “Dr. Happer has been widely known for his scholarly tendencies, by his broad views of the whole missionary problem, his thorough knowledge of China and its wants, his intellectual foresight along all the lines of progress, and his comprehensive grasp of the whole missionary interest, and this not only with respect to China, but the whole heathen world.” I am glad to have known the man.