This book examines the career of Rufus Anderson, the central figure in the formation and implementation of missionary ideology in the middle decades of the nineteenth century. Corresponding Secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions from 1832 to 1866, Anderson effectively set the terms of debate on missionary policy on both sides of the Atlantic and indeed long after his death. In telling his story, Harris also speaks to basic questions in nineteenth-century American history and in the relationship between American culture and the cultures of what later came to be known as the third world.

A history of the early decades of the American foreign missions movement, including the relationship between missionaries and commercial activities.