The consequence is that when we think of a Church capable of standing alone we are in doubt.

We do not feel certain that the converts could carry on their government; and some of us think a change in the form of Church government as serious a matter as the change from Paganism to Christianity: it is an excommunicating matter.
Inevitably then in an inquiry such as ours we must try to discover how far the people are advanced in the understanding of the organisation which they have been taught.

Until they are quite sound in this faith and fully trained in this system, whether it is a circuit or a presbytery or a democratic episcopacy, or a papacy, they cannot possibly stand alone.

Who would dare to suggest such a revolutionary idea! Why, they might adopt a native governmental system--something which they understood at once, quite easily, and then where should we be?
We know how to administer the system in which we were brought up: it is better that they should learn that.
Finally we make an inquiry concerning the power of the Christians to supply the material needs of their religious organisation.

We want to know to what extent they are really dependent on foreign funds, and to what extent they can stand alone financially.
It is tempting to imagine that we can discover this by a mere calculation of the total expenditure on all work carried on in the district and comparing this either with the number of Christians and their relative wealth or poverty, or simply with the contribution which they actually make, concluding that the difference between their contribution, or their estimated power to give, and the cost of the work carried on in the area is the difference between their power to supply their needs and their real needs.