Incipient progress of Christian ideas-Con tempt of idols and brahmins. This is not a solitary proof that the leaven is working among the people. Those brethren and Venkappa were conversing on this subject last week, and said with much delight that there are very many persons in every direction, who, through the influence of the gospel made known by your Teloogoo mission, have left off the worship of idols and boldly speak to their neighbors in defence of the Christian religion, as the true religion of the one true God; yet not as though they had themselves become Christians, for this would at once subject them literally to "the loss of all things." Faith on the Son of God, with a consent to receive him as one's portion, to obey and follow him, is alone sufficient to cause such a step, and this can come only by the operation of the Holy Spirit. Indeed, I believe there are hundreds and hundreds in this region whose faith in the idols and brahmins is absolutely destroyed, and thousands whose faith is greatly weakened, by the power of the gospel. this is not conversion to God, salvation from sin, but it is something; something, too, that is encouraging to the hearts of your and other missionaries, who have witnessed for years the state of these heathen, and become acquainted with the iron bondage-no, iron chains may be broken-stronger than iron, deathbondage, I would say-of brahminical priesteraft, under which these people have lain as dead for more than a thousand years. A Hindoo eclectic. A man from Orissa called, yesterday, a second time, having called three days before, and had much conversation. He is roving about, professedly seeking deliverance from sin and its evils. His first conversation was like that of one Two days ago a few workmen on the boarding-school building remarked that a great change has come over the multitude of soodras, in their views and their treatment of the brahmins, within ten years past, since the mission was commenced in Nellore. "Formerly," said they, "when a brahmin came to our house to beg," [a daily practice with tens of thousands of that self-styled divine race,] “every man, woman and child would rise, make their reverential salutation, and stand as long as he remained, with folded hands and bodies crouching, trembling as though their lives depended on his good will. The head man of the family would reverently present the re-doctrines, and so to strike out for himself quired rice or other articles of food. But a sort of independent course to heaven. now we care no more for them than for Prevalence of such views, and the causes of it. any other beggar, and pay them no atI have been thus particular about this tention when they come, except that man's case, because it exemplifies what I some of the females go out and give believe to be the mental attitude of vast them a li le handful of rice. So with numbers among the Teloogoo people other soodras in great numbers." about this and other mission stations. To True, me there appear to be three leading causes operating, to produce just this state of mind among the more sober and reflecting portion of this people, viz. :— 1. A constitutional tendency of mind to mysticism. 2. The mystic character, yet unsatisfying nature, of all the religions of the Hindoos, not excepting their gross idolatry. ers. mate fruit of his labors in the evident diminution of the power of gross error and superstition over the minds of large numbers in the heathen community; in the reviving of susceptibility to the power of truth and righteousness, which had for ages lain as if extinct; in the awakening of very many, it may be, to a sense of emptiness, a longing after substantial food for the soul; and even, to some ex 3. The fewness of Christian teach- tent, and in the case of a few isolated Of the first it may be remarked, that it is founded, if not wholly, to a very great degree, on the sentiment of veneration. This is a quality of mind greatly favoring an exalted Christian character, when rightly developed as to its object and mode of exercise. The "High and Lofty One" is a suitable object of veneration; and that greatest of all mysteries yet plainest of all facts, "God manifest in the flesh," for the salvation of sinners, is sufficient to occupy with ever-increasing delight and satisfaction the most mystical or wonder-loving mind. Of the second, I remark, that whatever sober truths there may exist at the foundation of the Hindooisms, the religions as now held by the people, learned or unlearned, are made up of fable and myth-fable lying at the foundation of gross idolatries, and myth at the foundation of all the systems which the more philosophic, thinking classes adopt; both of which are adapted to feed the vanity or pride of the human mind, but not to awaken or nourish pure and worthy affections, nor to satisfy sincere desires after truth and holiness. In such a state is the poor deceived soul of the thinking Hindoo when the Christian missionary finds him. And now appears the Influence of the extreme paucity of Christian Teachers. After years of toil, much of which, from the nature of circumstances, has been in combating general errors and gross wickedness, and in communicating general truths of the glorious gospel of God, the lone missionary sees a legiti individuals, in the conviction of sin and conversion to God. But, except in the last mentioned cases, the influence of the extreme fewness of Christian laborers most painfully appears. Not because hundreds of towns and villages have remained unvisited, or that thousands of human beings, not having seen the missionary or heard of Jesus, continue in the same ignorance of God and salvation by Jesus Christ in which their forefathers lived and died, and, dying, received the reward of iniquity, the portion of idolators. Such would be the fact had no Christian ever come among them. But I mean a real result of missionary influence the influence of the one, or at most, the two, on whom has been laid the responsibility, to whom has been committed the duty, of demolishing idolatry, superstition and all wickedness, and setting up the kingdom of righteousness instead thereof. Their sound has indeed gone into the regions of heathenism around. Again and again have the glad tidings of salvation been proclaimed in the ears of thousands at the very doors of idol temples, in the very presence of their so called gods. The folly and wickedness of idolatry and of the religious customs of the people have been clearly set forth and denounced. Priests and philosophers have been confounded. Even ignorance and scurrility have been made ashamed, or converted into understanding friendliness. Hundreds on hundreds of fine, intelligent lads have been sent forth from the schools, with their minds clearly convinced that "idols are nothing" but "the work of men's hands," not the proper objects of worship or fear-lads with no small stock of bible knowledge stored in their memories and understandings. A great change has come over the people for good, so far as it extends-less bitter hatred of the Christian teacher, a more ready comprehension of the truths presented by preaching or in books; readers, capable of profiting by the Scriptures and tracts circulated, at least doubled. But here is brought to view a fact, the direct result of fewness of laborers, that which has been already represented in the case of the man from Orissa, judging of him in the most charitable manner. The soul seeks aliment. Each sect of Hindooism pretends to furnish it, but fails. Your missionary comes with the very thing required, and offers it. His communications are heard once or twice A in the long space of a year, by halfthinking, half-dreaming, unstable, unsatisfied, mystery-loving, and withal, it may be, vain or proud spirits. They are partially understood, grasped at by those feeling "an aching void." part is found unpalatable. This is rejected; the rest, more or less misapprehended, is hastily mixed up with some principles of Vedantism, (the ancient Hindoo theism,) and so much of mysticism as will answer the purpose of the party concerned. Thus new systems, new theories,-part light and part darkness-are in the course of formation everywhere, either in individual minds or in little circles, where three or four or a dozen incline to associate, or meet from time to time to talk and act together. But this change of religion is not from idols to God; it is mostly from idols to themselves. Jesus Christ may be admitted as one of the party, subjected, however, to the dictum of each or any of the rest. For example: the man from Orissa said that Jesus Christ was separate from the body that hung on the cross; that body was only illusion. And again, that Jesus Christ is the wisdom or knowledge of God and divine things the pious per son is in possession of, when he meditates with love on God. As though the "mystery of godliness" were not suffi ciently deep. No, I will not charge these poor, dark souls thus. The fewness of Christian teachers necessarily leaves them in just this most painful condition, it seems to me a thousand times more painful than that of absolute, sensual idolatry. This last is like the dying process of one already become insensible. There is death, but no fear, no struggle, no pain. The other is like the dying agonies, the violent throes of one resuscitated from the state of insensibility to the use of his mental and physical powers, in order to suffer death by slow violence. But the end, alas! the end, is the same in both instances-DEATH! But if Christians will, they may, by the surely secured blessing of God, remedy this fearful state of things, which is growing out of their past failure to send or come in numbers commensurate with the work required to be done. Let it be supposed that twenty faithful missionaries and their wives, with a tolerable command of the language, had been stationed in Nellore and its immediate vicinity, acting in concert and as helpers of each other for the last ten years. Would the spirit of prophecy be needed to predict the result within the next five or ten years? I speak as a man, and a believer in the last command of our ascended Redeemer. Did he bid his followers go and disciple all nations, to mock their labors, their sorrows and their sufferings in efforts to accomplish the task? If any Christian has read the words of encouragement preceding and following the command, "All power is given unto me," "Lo, I am with you alway," let the intimation never escape his lips, let the unbelief never occupy his heart, that God arbitrarily withholds his spirit and blessing from converting the people where this command has been obeyed in a suitable manner, and to the extent the nature of things clearly requires. These closing lines severely rebuke the writer. He pleads verily guilty and resolves to reform. May God awaken others, equally concerned as regards the Teloogoo mission, to a sense of their responsibility and duty, some to give themselves to "come over and help us," others, under God, to prepare their way and send them. MAULMAIN BURMAN MISSION. LETTER FROM MR. STEVENS, Preaching-Eager reception of tracts. Under date of Aug. 16 Mr. Stevens informs us, that since Mr. Wade took the pastoral charge of the Burman church, he has been occupied on week days as formerly, pastoral duties excepted. On the Sabbath, in consequence of the feeble state of Mr. Stilson's health, he has conducted the Sabbath school in the Burman chapel; and in the afternoons has regularly gone out preaching at Sabbath school stations, in private houses and kyoungs, distributing tracts, and conversing with all whom he could engage to listen to the truths of the gospel. With respect to these excursions, Mr. Stevens reports: I have uniformly met with an encouraging reception. Tracts have been received, not only with readiness but in many cases with avidity, so much so as to awaken a fear that they are sought | from sinister motives. Yet I have discovered no evidence to that effect. There was in every case a profession of desire to read and a general appearance of sincerity in that profession; and in no case has a tract been given without promises being freely made that it should be read. In many cases, too, the names of particular tracts were mentioned, and their contents referred to, in such a manner as clearly showed that they had been read, and the same or others were asked for by name. A part of Mr. Stevens' time has been spent in conversing with callers at the house, among whom have been a number of priests. "Some of these, from Burmah Proper especially," Mr. S. remarks, "have manifested a knowledge of the doctrines of Christianity which has surprised me. Some from the region of Bassein have borne honorable testimony to the Christian character of the Karens of that province." Mr. S. gives us, also, an incident, as related by a priest who had within a few months arrived from that section of the country, showing one way in which, when good men die, Their works live after them. Before he assumed the yellow cloth, the priest said, he saw one day a younger brother of his coming home with a book in his hand. He asked him where he got it. "From the teacher of the white books," he said. He took it and began to read aloud. It was "The Way to Heaven," prepared by br. Comstock. While reading it, a Karen chanced to come along, who, after listening attentively for a while, begged him to go to his village, saying that the Karens there would like much to hear that book. He was inclined to go, and on reaching the man's house the whole village came together and he read to them. They listened with deep attention till he came to a passage where Jesus Christ is spoken of as dying on the cross for sinners. and Here, he said, they began to weep, the tears trickled down their cheeks. They were not satisfied with a single hearing; they urged him to repeat his visits; which he did, going from place to place among them, reading that book, and receiving a number of presents for his pains. Here, thought I, is br. Comstock speaking, though dead, and preaching to Karens by means of an idolatrous Burman. The priest showed no marks of a salutary impression made on his own heart by the reading of the tract, although he was evidently familiar with its contents. Nor does it appear that he was actuated by any other motive in reading to the Karens than that of" making a gain of them." But "whether in pretence or in truth, Christ is preached; and therein we do rejoice, yea, and will rejoice." MISCELLANY. MADAGASCAR. The recent death of the Rev. Joseph J. Freeman, late Home Secretary of the London Missionary Society, together with the renewal, within a year, of sanguinary persecution of the Christians of Madagascar, for whose benefit nine years of Mr. Freeman's valuable life were spent as a missionary, naturally suggests a retrospect of that mission: The readers of the Magazine have had in its pages occasional notices of the cruel trials of the Malagasse Christians. While we cannot attempt the repetition of minute details, enough may be represented in the limits of this sketch to give a distinct view of what must be regarded as one of the most interesting passages in missionary history. The mission in Madagascar was commenced in 1818 by the London Missionary Society. Six years before, as Mr. Milne was on his passage to join Morrison in China, his active mind was attracted to Madagascar, and he made particular inquiries, and sent home suggestions respecting the occupation of that field. The people of the island, a brave, independent race, tenacious of their privileges, but with many amiable traits of character, had been divided into numerous petty sovereignties; the greater part of these were now consolidated into one kingdom, under Radama, a monarch of unusual capacity and good sense, and manifesting a sincere and intelligent desire for the welfare of his people. On the arrival of the missionaries they were received with kindness, and the explanation they gave of their object and of the means they used for its attainment was satisfactory to his mind. He made, through the Governor of Mauritius, a treaty of friendship with England and stipulated for the suppression of the slave trade. He caused a number of youth to be sent to England for education, and artisans were invited to settle in Madagascar, to impart to the people the arts of civilized life. The fullest encouragement was given to the mission, which prospered in all its departments till it was suddenly deprived of protection by his death, in 1828. At that time the translation of the New Testament had been effected, and that of the Old Testament was completed within a few years after. There were ninety-three schools-having 4000 pupils, and a higher seminary for children of rank that were instructed in Greek and Latin. An interest in the truths of the Christian religion had been extensively diffused, and some gave evidence that they had embraced them with their whole hearts. Mr. Freeman became a member of the mission in 1826. He was a man of solid rather than showy qualities, manifesting a steady diligence, impelled by more than ordinary religious energy and guided by a sound discretion.. He entered the ministry in 1816, was so far disabled by the state of his health, two years after, as to contemplate a secular calling, but shortly resumed pastoral. labors, in which he was successfully engaged for six years. During this period his interest in the missionary enterprise, which had from the first been strong, was increased, and it was known that he felt prepared to engage personally in the service if the path of duty was made plain. The mission in Madagascar was in a state that manifestly required the care of an able and experienced minister, and the Missionary Society fixed upon him as a suitable person to undertake the arduous duty. He was appointed in 1826, and immediately entered his field of labor. In preaching, translating the Scriptures, preparing elementary books and superintending the schools, he did very much to strengthen the foundations of the mission and prepare it for the rude shocks that impended. |