07 Peter Parker

Chapter 7

PETER PARKER

ABOUT three hundred years before the birth of Christ, the Chinese built a great wall fifteen hundred miles along the northern borders of the Empire, as a barrier to the hordes of Tartars who constantly threatened to invade the country. This wall, twenty-five feet high and forty feet broad, crossing valleys and mountain ranges, is typical of its builders and of their descendants, who for thousands of years resented every suggestion of a welcome to the ideas of other nations. They were satisfied with what they had inherited from their ancestors, and they believed that they were superior to other peoples. Why should they change in any respect? And why should the Chinese not think well of themselves! For more than four thousand years their history has been in the making. Their civilization has kept the even tenor of its way, while the glory of Babylon, Egypt, Rome, and Greece has blazed brilliantly for a time only to be quenched by some rival. The Chinese of long ago were developing a literature long before our ancestors had ceased to live in caves. They were dressed in silks and satins and were selling such raiment to the Romans when our forebears were wearing the skins of wild beasts. The printing-press was in use in China many centuries before it was invented in Europe. Gunpowder was manufactured there first, and in the fourth century the mariner’s compass was produced. In the early part of the nineteenth century, the Chinese wall of conservatism and conceit was still standing and left no gates unlocked for the admission of anything new or foreign. There was no crevice in which a seed of modern life could lodge and germinate. To-day the wall is crumbling, and many gates are wide open for the admission of the new, the true, and the strange. In the days when foreigners were given scant welcome to China, the first medical missionary to that unfriendly country, Dr. Peter Parker, landed at Canton and immediately began to open the eyes of the blind and to cure the sick. In time, patients from every one of the eighteen provinces of China were treated in his hospital at Canton, and men of every rank received a new impression of the " foreign devils." The eyes of the Chinese were being opened in more ways than one. Men of influence came into personal touch with an unselfish fellow-man of a different race, whose disinterested service amazed them and caused them to ask in whose name and by what power he was living such a life. Thus it is said that Peter Parker, " with the point of his lancet" opened China. Certain it is that Dr. Parker was largely responsible for the opening of China to missionaries, and he must be counted among those who did much to foster friendship between the Orient and the Occident.

Sturdy old New England has produced many of the finest characters in American history. This was true not only for statesmen, men of letters, social reformers, and warriors, but for religious leaders as well. John Eliot preached his first sermon to the Indians in Newton, Massachusetts; David Brainerd, another apostle to the American Indians, was born and reared in Connecticut, and it is said that William Carey was led to give his life to the non-Christian world through reading the journal of David Brainerd. The first foreign missionary to sail from America, Adoniram Judson, was a son of Massachusetts. And in the quiet village of Framingham, Massachusetts, Peter Parker was born, June 18, 1804. The parents of Peter Parker were farmer folk in moderate circumstances. Religiously, they were strict members of the Orthodox church of Framingham. Both in and out of his home, Peter Parker was under austere religious influences, and the teaching which called attention particularly to the sterner aspects of Christianity helped to develop an almost morbid seriousness. Upon joining the church he took a serious view of his obligations. He began to ask himself what use he should make of his life. He thought of work among the Indians, since a college education seemed entirely beyond his reach, on account of the family’s circumstances. One day, however, a friend suggested means whereby he might secure educational advantages of which he had not dared to think. His father was alarmed at the suggestion. While he would have been glad to give Peter a good education, he did not believe it was possible for the family to spare the boy’s practical assistance, and he tried to dissuade him from his purpose. Peter generously assured his parents that he would not leave them unprovided for; and although the ministry appealed to him strongly, he urged the matter no more for some time. For these years of waiting his text was, " I will get me up upon the watchtower, and see what the Lord will say unto me."

Gradually the obstacles were removed. The father’s long illness exhausted his savings, and there were family debts to be paid. The situation called for every dollar that Peter could earn until he was twenty-one years of age. Happily, an arrangement was made in the winter of 1825-26 whereby the father’s estate was settled upon a son-in-law, on condition that the parents should be supported the remainder of their lives in a definitely prescribed way and the debts paid. This left Peter free to enter Wrentham Academy, about twenty-five miles from his home, with $115 secured from his father’s estate, and a recommendation from the pastor of his church to the principal of the academy. By the autumn of 1827 he was a student at Amherst College, where he really began his missionary work by visiting the poor in the almshouse and even convicts in prison. When the cholera appeared, he visited the sufferers and did all he could for their comfort.

Peter Parker spent his senior college year at Yale, where the amount of work which he managed to crowd into the days " verged closely on the marvelous." Poverty, sickness, disappointment, and hardship pressed him, but he allowed nothing to stand in the way of his purpose to excel. During his year at Yale, occurred the revival of religion in that institution, due largely to the personal efforts and influence of Peter Parker. The question of the use to be made of his own life was constantly with him, and before his senior year had ended he had decided to become a foreign missionary. He returned to New Haven the next year for theological studies, in time offering his services to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, preferably in China.

After taking both theological and medical courses at Yale, at the age of thirty, he was appointed a missionary by the American Board. In June he accepted the invitation of a Mr. Olyphant to sail with him, in his own ship, Morrison, to China. Of course there were people in those days who said it was a pity for a man with Dr. Parker’s training " to throw himself away on the heathen" but the choice had been made carefully and with deliberation.

He did not wait until he reached China in order to begin work. On the long voyage he held services for the passengers, he interested the sailors in getting up concerts for the benefit of missions, and he organized a Bible class, besides employing his medical skill for more than twenty persons on the ship.

After nearly five months at sea, Dr. Parker reached Canton, that great city whose teeming population and strong cross currents of life must have given him a good idea of the vastness of his missionary task. He tarried here two months just long enough to receive some strong impressions of the need of medical work before he sailed for Singapore, where he could secure larger freedom from interruption while studying the language. He also found time to do considerable medical work there also. A year later he was back at Canton, beginning his great work with the opening of the Ophthalmic Hospital in November, 1835. It was decided to offer treatment for diseases of the eye, since they were the most prevalent disorders in China and the most baffling to the native physicians. Very soon this class of diseases offered far more work than one man alone could perform. On the day the hospital was opened, one person only, a poor woman, applied for treatment. Three months later Dr. Parker was prescribing for a hundred or more every day; and they were from all classes, from penniless beggars to officials of the Imperial government. Some of the sufferers would rise at midnight in order to secure good places in line at the gateway; others would sleep on their mats spread near the doors, so as to be among those admitted first in the morning. The Chinese had never before heard of such wonderful cures. And as he employed his medical skill, he told his patients of the Great Physician who was the healer of their souls and the giver of eternal life. In China he exercised the same zeal in religious work that had distinguished him as a student in Yale. The prejudices of the Chinese were not easily overcome. The people considered the foreign doctor’s work miraculous, but they could not understand his unselfish service. His motives were questioned. What could be the object of a foreigner living among them and wearing himself out in efforts to heal their diseases? Surely, they argued, he had some personal ends to serve! But Dr. Parker continued his Christ-like labors until many came to believe in him, and in two years he was one of the best known foreigners in China. A few English, American, and Chinese business men, who had questioned the wisdom of medical missionary work, were converted to a belief in its extraordinary usefulness and subscribed generously for its support. All this counted, too, in favor of missionaries in general, who were continually hindered by China’s unfriendly attitude to new teachings of any kind. Did not the doctrines of Confucius antedate those of Jesus? Did not their history begin long before David ever wrote a psalm? Was it not impertinence for missionaries from an infant nation like America to presume to instruct China, with its four thousand years of recorded history? In 1838, at a largely attended public meeting in Canton, the Medical Missionary Society in China was founded. The chairman of the meeting was Dr. W. Jardine, the founder of a great mercantile house, Jardine, Matheson & Co., whose numerous ships are so well known in Chinese waters. In organizing the society, a leading part was taken by Dr. Parker, whose successful work for more than two years had been the inspiration of the movement. In 1841, the Chief Superintendent of British Trade said of the society, " The surgeon’s knife was better calculated to conciliate the Chinese than any weapon of war." The society continues to this day, now under the name of the Canton Medical Missionary Society, and claims the distinction of being the oldest organization of its kind in the world. The Ophthalmic Hospital continues under the name " Canton Hospital," and prides itself on being the oldest hospital in the Orient. It is striving to develop a strong medical college. Dr. Parker trained several young men to a point of large usefulness as physicians, despite his arduous labors with the blind and sick, his lack of assistance, and his simple equipment. In June, 1840, the hospital was closed on account of the blockade of Canton by the British, in the Opium War, which constitutes one of the sad chapters in the story of the treatment of Oriental peoples by white races. Whatever justification the British may have claimed for their course, the forcing on the Chinese people of opium grown in India has caused an incalculable weight of woe, physically and morally. Dr. Parker did all in his power to prevent a clash between Chinese and British, but in vain. Naturally, the feeling among the Chinese was bitter against all foreigners, who felt that they were in constant danger. The Imperial Commissioner of the Chinese Government had determined to put an instant stop to opium traffic. Concerning the Commissioner’s course, Dr. Parker wrote his sister, on March 25, 1839, the following letter which foreshadowed serious trouble:

" In this he is right, but his terms are arbitrary, and, in a sense, impossible. He has threatened the life and property of natives and foreigners alike, if the whole amount of opium is not given up. The merchants say it is not theirs and they cannot give it up, but they will cease themselves to have anything more to do with it. On Wednesday last he began his measures of intimidation. No more foreigners were allowed to leave Canton. Ships under dispatch were detained; hong merchants were degraded, chains put about their necks, and decapitation threatened. Last evening, at half-past six o’clock, or thereabouts, Captain Elliot, Her Majesty’s Chief Superintendent of British Trade, having heard that we were under restraint in Canton, and not knowing what we might be suffering, forced his way up from Macao, and in full uniform, with sword in hand, reached Canton, daring the mandarins who pursued him to fall upon him. He immediately hoisted the British flag, and called upon all Her Majesty’s subjects to stand by him. There is real danger; war itself may yet be waged between the two nations; but I hope not and pray not. Captain Elliot is willing to do all in his power to suppress the wicked traffic, but requires it should be done justly; and all the merchants have signed a pledge not to continue it." The hospital having been closed on account of the trouble over the importation of opium, and conditions making it impossible for him to resume his work at that time, Dr. Parker returned to America for a furlough. After seven years of hard work he needed a vacation that was to prove notable in several ways. He was warmly received in America, where large audiences heard with deep interest the story of his work in Canton. He did much to lead public men in Washington, including President Van Buren, to recognize the importance of establishing diplomatic relations with China. He organized groups of people in America to support the medical work. He journeyed to England and the continent of Europe to make friends for the same purpose. And in Washington he met the lady who was to become his wife. A few weeks after reaching America, Dr. Parker left New Haven for Washington, " to call the attention of the men in power to the relations of America to China." Immediately upon reaching the capital, he attended the levee of the Spanish minister where he met several foreign representatives, as well as Daniel Webster and other American statesmen. Next day he called upon President Van Buren. Daniel Webster requested him to submit in writing his views regarding the necessity for the appointment of a minister to China. His written statement pointed out that, in addition to the need for closer relations between China and America, there were other important ends which might be served. He believed that if a Minister Plenipotentiary were sent immediately, he might serve as a mediator between the English and the Chinese in the Opium War. But he was moved largely by the fear that, unless something were done at once, China, moved by the old anti-foreign spirit, intensified by difficulties with the British, might drive out all foreigners and refuse communication with the outside world, as Japan had done. That would have been a calamity for the Chinese themselves. That Japan’s isolation was not a myth, Dr. Parker had discovered, for several years earlier, when he and others attempted, in the good ship Morrison, to take back to their own country seven shipwrecked Japanese, they were completely foiled. At no port were they allowed to send off a skiff manned even with Japanese; and wherever the attempt was made, cannon on shore opened fire on the ship. Dr. Parker did not wish to have China follow the example of Japan. On that point he wrote to the Secretary of State:

" There is serious ground of apprehension that, if the subject is not seasonably attended to, all foreign intercourse will be cut off, and China will act after the policy of Japan.

" Even now this is the wish of one of the two great factions into which the Chinese Government is divided. The foreign residences in Canton have been enclosed by a row of palisades in the river, forming a semicircle, and extending some distance above and below them. The area in front is enclosed by a high fence, and gates extend across the streets, so that in five minutes, at any time, the foreigners may be made prisoners in their own houses.

" Privileges of going abroad upon the river and in the suburbs and neighboring villages for air and exercise, formerly enjoyed, are now prohibited. Though the commerce is desired, and thousands and tens of thousands of silk manufacturers and tea cultivators depend upon it, yet as the lesser of two evils, the government may, with one decisive stroke, cut off all foreign intercourse’

Dr. Parker came in closer communication with the law-makers. The second Sunday he was in Washington, upon the invitation of the chaplain to Congress, he preached in the Capitol to an audience composed largely of members of the Senate and House of Representatives. His text was Acts 14:26: "And thence they sailed to Antioch, from whence they had been committed to the grace of God for the work which they fulfilled. And when they were come, and had gathered the church together, they rehearsed all things that God had done with them, and that he had opened a door of faith unto the Gentiles."

Much of the sermon was devoted to a description of the work at the hospital where, in less than five years, about eight thousand Chinese patients had been received, besides Americans, English, French, Spanish and Portuguese, East Indians, Malays, and Japanese. He told of the organization of the Medical Missionary Society, and he drew illustrations from his personal experiences. To mention one: When the man, who had had cataracts for forty years and more, had been operated upon, stroking down his long, flowing beard, he remarked: ’ I have lived till my beard has become long and hoary, but never before have I seen or heard of one who does such things as are done in this hospital. Then an opportunity came to tell him the story of Jesus, and that but for Him I had not come to China. When I have visited patients at their houses, others in the neighborhood who had been cured have often met me, and told to multitudes what had been done for them. With minds thus favorably disposed, I have spoken to them of Christ and the gospel; and they go away to repeat to others what they have heard." This sermon must have been very different from the usual discourse before Congress.

While in Washington, trying to rouse interest in China and to enlist the attention of statesmen, he met Miss Harriet Webster, who was related to the families of Daniel Webster and Rufus Choate. Dr. Parker was a man of singularly attractive personality, and it is not surprising that, in a few weeks, he had completely won the heart of the lovely Miss Webster. Her beauty and her family connections had opened wide the door of Washington social circles in which she was very popular. Of his engagement Dr. Parker wrote to a friend, " I am more and more confirmed in the wisdom and happiness of my choice, and the obligation we are under to God. She is the desire of my heart." To his sisters he wrote of Miss Webster with a little more old-time formality:

" In the ardent and reciprocated affection of Miss Harriet C. Webster of Washington, I have the desire of my heart and one whom it will be my pleasure to introduce to you in time as your new and loving and beloved sister. Were I to express to you my opinion of her, you might think me biased in judgment; suffice it to say, then, in the language of others, that ’ she is the best young lady in the world ’ and that there is not another in Washington in whom there is more general interest felt." A little later he and Miss Webster were married. The union was a happy one, and Dr. Parker frequently expressed his gratitude for the blessings his wife had brought into his life. Nineteen days after the wedding Dr. Parker sailed alone for Europe, hoping to secure funds for medical work in China, leaving his wife in America, during his absence of four months. It seems that Mrs. Parker wished to spend some weeks with her widowed mother, who lived in Augusta, Maine, before leaving on the long voyage for the strange and distant country where they lived for nearly fifteen years before returning to the United States.

Dr. Parker’s visit to Europe was crowded with work for he was trying to rouse a real interest in Chinese missions. In England, Sir Henry Halford and Sir Risdon Bennett at once gave the subject hearty support. The Duke of Sussex, Princess Sophia, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Duke of Wellington, Sir Robert Peel, and other distinguished persons gave the work their commendation. Visits were made to France and Germany. The total amount subscribed by friends during his visit to Europe and America (he visited numerous cities here) was $6,702.64, of which $672.01 was expended in traveling, printing, and in the purchase of supplies for the hospital. The remainder was forwarded to China. Here was the work of a pioneer. The amount he received in money seems small indeed in comparison with the large amounts that are given to-day for medical missions, but at that time he was educating the people on a subject of which they knew little. In June, 1842, Dr. and Mrs. Parker sailed for China. The months since the return from Europe had been spent chiefly in Philadelphia and Washington. In the former city he attended lectures at the University of Pennsylvania; in Washington he continued his efforts to induce the government to send a minister to China. Interviews with another President (President Tyler) and Daniel Webster were memorable features of his activity; but he finally sailed from America without having secured the desired action by the government. However, this came a little later, and he was called on by the United States Government to have a large part in the execution of its plans. The arrival of the " foreign lady " at Canton was the occasion of considerable excitement. Government officials inquired as to her purpose; whether she was to remain permanently or merely to make a visit. The messenger appeared satisfied when informed that it was not Mrs. Parker’s purpose to venture into the streets for a time, but to remain very quiet, securing her exercise by walking inside the enclosure in the evening.

Hospital work was resumed in the old building, and the years immediately following were crowded with labors and anxieties. The Opium War had ended, but the Chinese still entertained bitter feelings toward the English, which occasionally included all foreigners. Nevertheless, the Chinese flocked to the hospital. From November 21, 1842, to December 31, 1843, more than 3,500 patients applied for treatment. At the same time, Dr. Parker was training Chinese young men in Western medicine and was preaching frequently. He had not lost his evangelistic zeal. The volume of work at the hospital continued large, year after year. He wrote, " As in former periods, so of late, persons of all conditions and ranks, from the beggar to the highest functionary under the Imperial government, have alike availed themselves of the hospital’s aid.’’ In the autumn of 1843, the United States Government decided to send a commissioner to China, to negotiate a treaty between the two countries. For this important post the Hon. Caleb Cushing, of Massachusetts, was chosen. Immediately upon reaching China, Mr. Gushing requested Dr. Parker’s assistance as Chinese Secretary to the Mission. Dr. Parker could hardly decline to give his help in a work for which he had done such earnest pleading at Washington; and perhaps no man in China could have done more to help win the Chinese, in the face of an indifference to foreign governments that amounted almost to scorn or insult. Of this important service, Dr. Parker says little in his journal. A treaty was made which was ratified by the Emperor on August 4, 1845. Dr. Parker labored on as a medical missionary while serving as Chinese Secretary to the Mission.

Late in 1844, Dr. Parker received notice of his appointment by the President of the United States as Secretary and Chinese Interpreter to the Legation in China. A United States Legation in China had been one of Dr. Parker’s dreams, and he had done much to secure a treaty making the Legation possible. He accepted the appointment, after inquiring whether it would be compatible with his missionary labors. The news of his appointment was welcomed by leading Chinese, among whom his influence was so great that a little later he was largely instrumental in quelling a riot in Canton, in which the lives and properties of both English and Americans were imperiled.

Upon the death, in 1847, of the Hon. Alexander H. Everett, Commissioner from the United States to the Chinese Empire, Dr. Parker was given entire charge of the Legation until a successor to Mr. Everett could be appointed. With all the affairs of the Legation depending on him, in addition to his duties at the hospital, and preaching often on Sunday, Dr. Parker was nearing a physical collapse. Soon he was ill with fever, but from this he rallied with the return of cool weather. In 1853, while on government service, he was shipwrecked and suffered from exposure. In January, 1855, he was again at Canton in charge of the Legation. But poor health compelled him to return to America with Mrs. Parker a few months later. Perfect rest at sea restored his health to such an extent that he reached America in fairly good physical condition.

Affairs in China appeared to grow more complicated month by month, and desiring the very best man who could be secured, President Franklin Pierce asked Dr. Parker to accept the appointment of commissioner and Minister Plenipotentiary to China, for the purpose of revising the treaty of 1844 which he had helped to make. Having recovered his health to such an extent that he felt he might safely return to China for a time, he accepted the appointment. His first official act was to strike a blow against the trade in Chinese coolies, many of whom were sold into slavery; and he secured religious liberty for all Chinese or others, who should peaceably teach or practice Christianity. The actual revision of the treaty, the great object of his return to China, was not accomplished until the year after he resigned as Commissioner, but the result was almost entirely due to Dr. Parker’s efforts.

Feeling that he had done everything in his power as Commissioner, he resigned that office and returned to America in August, 1857, where his life was crowded with activities of many kinds, and where numerous honors were conferred on him. His health had been so affected by a sunstroke in China that it was unwise to attempt missionary work again, although he was ever interested in the cause to which he had offered his life; and in his own country he found numerous opportunities for work and for helpful suggestions of far-reaching influence. On January 10, 1888, this great man finished his work on earth. He had rendered service such as is permitted to few men of any generation. The many fine hospitals in China to-day prove that his work was not in vain. He had served the King in serving men of a different race, and in sharing with them the revelation of God which he had found in Christ.

One writer has said, with true insight, that " we have not as yet fully comprehended the nature and the magnitude of the services Dr. Peter Parker rendered both to China and to the United States; while the triumphs won by him, and through his work by others, for the kingdom of Christ, only the cycles of eternity can reveal."