The Task Still Incomplete
A BRIEF survey of the conquests of the Bible over the world's languages must fill us with wonder and praise. Yet, while we thank God for so splendid an achievement, we dare not forget how much still remains undone. The enterprises and triumphs of the missionary create many new and imperious claims upon the Bible society. Each fresh tribe evangelized, each new country opened up to the gospel, appeals for fresh translations to be printed and spread abroad. Thus, some part of the New Testament has already been published in over one hundred of the languages of Africa, but this list must go on enlarging year by year. Within the borders of the Indian empire alone, no version of the Scriptures exists as yet in a hundred and eight languages, in use by no fewer than seventy-four million souls. In the islands of Polynesia and Malaysia, and on the upper waters of the Amazon, there are hundreds of languages and dialects in which the Scriptures have never yet spoken; and though many of these are local, and probably evanescent, yet scores of them remain in which the gospel must still learn to speak. And still beyond the utmost frontier of the Bible conquests lies unconquered Tibet.—Bible Society Record.