A 
 
 Is " 
 
 VINDICATION 
 
 *’ OF THE 
 
 CHURCH OF SCOTLAND’S INDIA MISSIONS 
 
 BEING 
 
 THE SUBSTANCE OF AN ADDRESS, 
 
 DELIVERED 
 
 BEFORE THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE CHURCH, 
 
 ON WEDNESDAY, MAY 24, 1837. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. ALEXANDER DUFF, D.D., 
 
 THE assembly’s FIRST MISSIONARY TO INDIA. . 
 
 rUBLTSHET) AT THE SPECIAL REQUEST OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY. 
 
 Tenth Thousand. 
 
 EDINBURGH : 
 
 PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY 
 
 .JOHN JOHNSTONE, 2, HUNTER SQUARE, 
 
 AND SOLD BY J. NISKET AND CO., LONDON. 
 
 MDCCCXXXVII. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 I. Thk following Address, being published at the special request 
 of the General Assembly, now appears as nearly as possible in the 
 form in which it was originally delivered. Under two or three heads 
 only, have a few additional sentences been inserted, in order to render 
 the meaning less liable to misapprehension. 
 
 II. In the course of a single Address, on a subject so vast and all- 
 comprehensive, it was not possible, ever and anon, to step aside, for 
 the purpose of pointing out all the exceptions from a general rule — 
 or all the modifications, real or conceivable, of 2, general principle. 
 On this account, it was my original intention to append to the Address 
 a series of annotations, partly illustrative and partly confirmatory. 
 But the length, to which I now find the Address, when printed, has 
 extended, seems to forbid the realization of this intention. 
 
 I must, therefore, throw myself on the candour and indulgence of 
 the Christian reader. Conscious as I am of cherishing no desire, 
 save that of promoting God’s glory, by the conversion of lost souls : 
 — and entertaining, as I do, a brotherly affection towards all that love 
 the Lord Jesus in spirit and in truth : — I shall be rejoiced to receive 
 the friendly remarks or suggestions of any minister or member of 
 any congregation of professing Christians in this land, relative to 
 any of the topics introduced into the present Address. 
 
 Any communication, directed to the care of the Publisher, will be 
 sure to reach me. > 
 
 III. People in this country, are ever apt to conceive of India, as if 
 it were a mere Asiatic province of limited territorial extent, like some 
 section of the Island of Great Britain. It is necessary, therefore, con- 
 stantly to remind them that, in extent, India more resembles Europe 
 than Britain : — and how much moi'e than any mere section of the 
 latter ? Consequently, though the Brahmanical system, as elsewhere 
 remarked, “ may be said to preserve, through the wide extent of its 
 baneful domination, a sort of universal identity in fundamental prin- 
 ciples, yet in tlie practical development of these principles, it may ex- 
 hibit modifications that are endlessly or even capriciously diversified. 
 So that what may be strictly and literally true of the mental habitudes, 
 the social and religious practices, of the people of one city or province, 
 
iv 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 may require some qualification when predicated of the inhabitants of 
 another.” From oveilooking this essential circumstance, the state- 
 ments of Missionaries situated in different parts of India, have some- 
 times been pronounced, erroneous, exaggerated, distorted, or, even 
 contradictory. Whereas the truth may be, that each may all the 
 while be conveying a scrupulously exact Report of his own individual 
 findings, and local experience. 
 
 Would it be reasonable, for instance, on the part of a Hindu, to 
 call in question the accuracy of any part of an account of the state 
 of Christianity and Christian society in Edinburgh ; — on the ground 
 of its difiering considerably from the report given to him by one 
 man from Copenhagen ; another, from Lisbon ; and another, from 
 Cape Matapan, in Greece ? And yet, this, in principle, is but the 
 counterpart of the mode in which a native of Britain is sometimes 
 led to set aside, the apparently conflicting reports of individuals, 
 that happen to have been located, in different and distant parts of 
 the widely scattered provinces of India. 
 
 Besides, it ought to be borne in mind, that different individuals 
 may see the same objects with different eyes. From this cause also, 
 the reports of different observers may considerably vary, and yet one 
 and all of them may be honest, conscientious men. 
 
 Look, for instance, at the reports of different individuals relative 
 to the practical difficulties to be encountered in attempting to 
 evangelize such a country as India.. While some have represented 
 them as absolutely insuperable, have not others been disposed to 
 run into the opposite extreme of unduly lessening their real magni- 
 tude ? And yet who can doubt that the advocates of both extremes 
 have often been honourable men, though both must be allowed to be 
 equally wide of the truth ? 
 
 If one man, from a certain peculiarity of mind, may see things, as 
 through a telescope, unduly magnified ; while another man, from 
 some other peculiarity of mind, may see the same things, as through 
 an inverted telescope, unduly diminished ; — will not the report (d 
 the latter be as unaccordant with the reality as that of the former 
 
 To imagine a mole-hill to be a mountain is no doubt a great mis- 
 take. But to imagine a mountain to be merely a mole-hill is surely 
 a mistake equally great. To see things less than the reality seems 
 just as deceptive as to see them larger than the reality. 
 
 Difficulties undulv magnified may scare the timorous, but will 
 never daunt the courage of the brave. Difficulties, unduly dimi- 
 nished, may allure the timid and leave them floundering amid unex- 
 pected shoals and quicksands — while the brave may be deceived by 
 the appearance of imaginary triumphs. 
 
 The grand thing is, as in all other cases, to endeavour to avoid 
 either extreme. On a subject of this nature, however, no two men 
 can scarcely be found so .similarly circumstanced, in respect to mental 
 powers, habits of reflection, and opportunities of observation, as to 
 form precisely the same cstiiiaate. It is not possible, therefore, to fix 
 any standard to which all opi vvlons can be brought for admeasurement. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 V 
 
 IV. It did not fall in with the object of the following address 
 specially to advert to the important cause of female education in the 
 Presidency of Bengal. The author, however, may here be per- 
 mitted to transcribe a few brief notices, written some time ago, at 
 the request of a friend, and published in the Appendix to an adr 
 mirable sermon of the Hon. and Bev. Baptist Noel, preached in 
 behalf of the Society in London for promoting Female Education in 
 China, India, and the East. , 
 
 1. While the education of males, more or less diverse in character 
 and limited in extent, prevails pretty generally among the better 
 classes throughout Eastern India, the education of females, from 
 the operation of various causes, is not only almost universally ne- 
 glected, but neglected designedly and systematically, as in itself 
 not less mean and disreputable, than repugnant to the immemorial 
 usages, social and religious, of the people. 
 
 2. In such an unpropitious state of things, immediate, rapid, 
 wide-spread success in any scheme of female education, liowever 
 skilfully devised, or vigorously prosecuted, is not to be anticipated. 
 From the unnatural constitution of Hindu society, the education of 
 females, in a national point of view, cannot possibly precede, cannot 
 even be contemporaneous, with the education of males. The educa- 
 tion of the former, on any great national scale, must, from the very 
 nature of their position, which those only who have been in India 
 can at all adequately, comprehend, follow in the w'ake of the en- 
 lightened education of the latter. In a word, a generation of educated 
 males, i. e,, educated after the European model, must be the pre- 
 cursor of a generation of educated females. 
 
 3. Must we then, it may be asked, in the meanwhile sit still, and 
 desist from the attempt to achieve anything in the department of 
 female education ? No, by no means. Though great things cannot, 
 at this moment, be undertaken, still something may be done, and 
 tve are never to “ despise the day of small things.” 
 
 Already have British example, British intercourse, and British 
 philanthropy, ])artially broken downf in many places, the three thou- 
 sand years’ accumulated force of native prejudice ; and female 
 schools, for elementary e<lucation, have, in consequence, sprung up 
 in different and distant parts of India. Mrs Wilson of Calcutta has, 
 in this respect, done all that devoted piety and superior ability could 
 have attempted ; or rather, all that the adverse state of hereditary 
 native feeling could have brooked. Her day-school has, for some 
 years past, been attended by upwards of 200 female children, chiefly, 
 however, of the lower and poorer castes. But, from the immaturity 
 of their mind, the contracted period of their attendance, and the 
 all hut impossibility of tracing them after their removal from 
 school, and re-immersion into all the abominations of the vilest 
 idolatry “ beneath the circuit of the sun,” little, very little, in 
 the way of permanent beneficial result can, in the present state of 
 things, be expected to result from the operations of such a seminary. 
 
VI 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 The Orphan School, on the other hand, (though necessarily very li- 
 mited in its range,) on account of the entire separation of the 
 children from the votaries of heathenism, and the prolonged period 
 of their attendance, promises to be productive of the happiest per- 
 manent effects. 
 
 4. After all, the great hope of female education in India, must 
 arise from the present decidedly cheering prospects of male edu- 
 cation. 
 
 Every genuine native Christian must, as a matter of course, be 
 desirous of training up his children, male and female, in the “ nur- 
 ture and admonition of the Lord;” and though the number of this 
 description in Eastern India is as yet exceedingly scanty, there is 
 every reason to hope that, through the Divine blessing, fresh acces- 
 sions will be yearly made to it. 
 
 But, apart altogether from the consideration of the growing class 
 of native Christians, there is another and far more rapidly increasing 
 one, that must annually swell the aggregate of those friendly to 
 female improvement ; I allude to the multiform class that aims at 
 the acquisition of European literature and science, through the 
 medium of the English language. From various concunent causes, 
 which it is needless for me here to detail, thousands of native youth 
 have now begun to flock to Government and Missionary Institutions, 
 there to enter on the career of English education ; and, if the future 
 keep pace proportionately with the past, these thousands will ere 
 long be multiplied ten-fold, and ultimately a hundred-fold. 
 
 Now, it may safely be laid down as an undoubted axiom, that 
 every individual who receives a thorough English education, whether 
 he become a convert to Christianity or not, will, with it, imbibe 
 much of the English spirit, — i. e., become intellectually Anglicised ; 
 and hence, will inevitably enrol himseif in the catalogue of those 
 who assert the right of females to be emancipated from the bondage 
 of ignorance. This is not a legitimate inference only, it is a state- 
 ment of the results of past experience. 
 
 As an illustration of this relnark, I may here state, that, about 
 six years ago, I happened to be present at a debating society, com- 
 posed of forty or fifty young men, who had acquired, or were then 
 acquiring, an English education at the Government Hindu College. 
 The subject of debate w'as, — “ Whether females ought to be edu- 
 cated ? ” 
 
 Several of the senior members spoke with great fluency, and all, 
 without one exception, pled the propi iety of female instruction. One 
 young man, with almost heroic fearlessness, asked, “ Is it alleged by 
 any that female education is prohibited, if not by the letter, at least 
 by the spirit of some of our Shasters? if so, and if any of the Shas» 
 ters be really found to advance any thing so contrary to reason, I, 
 for one, will trample them under my feet.” And this declaration was 
 rapturously hailed by the plaudits of his associates. 
 
 Another, a youth of about fourteen or fifteen, towards the end of 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 Vll 
 
 the discussion, rose up, remarking, tliat lie had “ listened with great 
 delight to the arguments of the other gentlemen, but that one had 
 escaped them, which he would now beg leave to advance. He would 
 prove, by geometry, that females ought to be educated.” All were 
 instantly on the tiptoe of expectation, to hear what this geometrical 
 argument might prove. It turned out to be a somewhat vague and 
 fanciful application of one of the axioms of Euclid, and hence desig- 
 nated a geometrical argument. The occasion, however, and the 
 time, and the place, — the speaker’s caste and garb, and youthful 
 countenance, beaming with dawning intelligence, — the dreary retro- 
 sjiect of ages of ancestorial female degradation, and the budding 
 prospects of futurity, — all, all tended to invest the argument with an 
 ominous significance tiiat does not inherently belong to it. It was, 
 in substance, as follows : — 
 
 “ Is it conceded that men ought to be educated? Undoubtedly 
 it is. And why is the concession made in their favour? Why not 
 as well educate these cocoa trees ? (pointing to those around the 
 house.) Oh, we are told the reason is, that men have got souls, 
 or minds, and these trees have not. And w'hy is it that men’s having 
 souls should lead to their being educated ? Because these souls are 
 found, from experience, to be susceptible of growth, and, conse- 
 quently, of cultivation ; and, if susceptible of cultivation, ought they 
 not to be cultivated ? Assuredly they ought, else they must be 
 waste and useless, and not fulfilling the design of their being. It is 
 allowed, then, on all hands, that men’s souls or minds ought to be 
 cultivated — in other words, that men ought to be educated. 
 
 “ Well, and have not females got souls or minds? Many of our 
 Mussulman countrymen think not. But our Pandits, (learned men,) 
 in all their folly, have never appealed to the Shasters for any such 
 absurdity as this. So, then, it is quite orthodox for us to believe 
 and assert that females have got souls — and if so, these must, like 
 the souls of men, be capable of growth, capable of being cultivated. 
 And if, because men have got souls capable of cultivation, it is 
 granted tliat these ought to be cultivated ; when it is acknowledged 
 that females have got souls capable of cultivation, ought these not*to 
 be cultivated too ? Surely they ouglit ; because, ‘ things that are 
 equal to tlie same thing, are equal to one another.’ Hence I con- 
 clude, that females ought to be educated.” 
 
 It must not, however, be inferred, that all those who in theory 
 thus advocate the cause of female education, are in circumstances to 
 carry out the theory immediately into practice. Over the present 
 generation, little or no control can be exercised by the greater part 
 of them. But, as time rolls on, they become the heads of families 
 themselves, and then will they be prepared, in many instances at 
 least, to give practical eft’ect to their better judgment. 
 
 At the same time, it must be borne in mind, that view^s of selfish, 
 worldly expediency in manhood, may interpose to arrest the flowing 
 current of many a generous determination in youth. But as the 
 
vni 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 numbei’ augments, a new society will be graduaHy forming, that will 
 eventually burst through all the fetters of a degrading, domineering, 
 superstition. In the intermediate transition state, the cause of fe- 
 male enlightenment will be espoused, in theory, by a constantly in- 
 creasing number ; and by another increasing, though smaller irum- 
 ber, it will be realised in practice too ; till the halcyon period arrives, 
 when universal theory shall run parallel with universal practice. 
 
 God grant that the period may be hastened, and that a richer 
 effusion of bis grace may descend on all who prize the privilege of 
 being fellow-workers with him, in bringing in the everlasting king- 
 dom. 
 
 V. In the following Address, the votaries of the Brahmaiiical su- 
 perstition are chiefly referred to, — because these constitute the vast 
 majority of the people of Hindustan. It must not, however, be 
 forgotten, that there is a very large Mabammadan population — of 
 many millions — interspersed throughout all the provinces. The pro- 
 portion of Hindus and Mahammadans varies exceedingly in differ- 
 ent districts ; — the latter being, in some places, in the ratio of a tenth, 
 or a twentieth, or even less — and in others, greatly preponderant in 
 numbers over the former. On this subject, Mr Adam, lately em- 
 ployed by Government as a commissioner to ascertain the state of 
 native education, has furnished some very original and interesting 
 details. 
 
 And, besides both these classes, there are numerous aboriginal 
 tribes thinly scattered over the almost impenetrable forests of the 
 interior, and the almost inaccessable mountain ranges on the frontiers, 
 that have never acknowledged the supremacy of Brahma, or bowed 
 beneath the sword of the false Prophet. Numerically, however, 
 these tribes constitute but an atom of the dense mass of the popula- 
 tion of Hindustan. 
 
 VI. It will be observed also, that the original station of Calcutta 
 is chiefly referred to in the subsequent pages. When the former 
 statement appeared, this happened to be the only Missionary station 
 then occupied by the General Assembly of our Church. And in 
 vindicating that statement from certain misconceptions that had 
 arisen respecting some of its parts, I was compelled, by the nature 
 of the case, to refer, in a great measure, to that scene of action, of 
 which it professed to furnish a specific account. 
 
 With what zeal, and ability, and judgment, and prayerfulness, the 
 Calcutta Mission has been carried on for the last two or three years, 
 under the unwearied superintendence of Mr Mackay, and Mr 
 Ewart, has abundantly appearetl from the reports of the Commit- 
 tee. May the Lord reward them by the richest effusions of his 
 Holy Spirit on their labours of love ! Ere long their hands will be 
 strengthened by the addition of a fellow'-labourer of congenial spirit. 
 Mr McDonald, — who lias, in the style of primitive devotedness, re- 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 IX 
 
 linqulshed a pastoral charge in the land of his fathers, for the sake 
 of enjoying the honour and the privilege of “preaching the un- 
 searchable riches of Christ to the Gentiles,” — will in a few months 
 set sail for Calcutta. 
 
 In order to obviate any misapprehension which may possibly have 
 arisen, from any cause, in the mind of any individual, at home or 
 abroad, I must here put on record the delightful circumstance, — 
 viz., that, among the Assembly’s Missionaries in Calcutta, not only 
 has the most perfect unanimity prevailed as to the grand general 
 principles on which the Mission has hitherto been conducted, but 
 also the most perfect unanimity as to the minutest details connected 
 with the practical development of these principles. And, in this 
 perfect unanimity, the Missionaries in Calcutta have partaken merely 
 in common with the Assembly’s acting Committee in Edinburgh. 
 
 Under Mr Anderson, the Madras station promises to become a 
 fruitful vineyard. 
 
 Of the varied and indefatigable labours of Dr Wilson at Bombay, 
 and Mr Mitchell at Poonal), it is impossible to speak, without the 
 warmest feelings of gratitude towards God. May He be pleased 
 in mercy, long to spare such labourers to be a blessing to the mil- 
 lions of Western India! From Calcutta, on the East; Madras, on 
 the South ; and Bombay, on the West ; — may such branches of the 
 “ vine of the Lord’s own planting,” shoot forth, as shall one day 
 unite, and interweave their foliage over the plains of central Hin- 
 dustan ! 
 
 VII. One important subject not even alluded to, in what follows, is 
 that of providing suitahle accommodation for carrying on the dif- 
 ferent departments of Missionary operation in Calcutta. From a 
 statement drawn up by the author about two years ago, he begs to 
 submit to the reader the following quotation : — 
 
 “ At present there is no adequate accommodation provided for the 
 use of the Mission in Calcutta. If Lectures are to be delivered on 
 Christian Evidence and Doctrine, &c., there is no Lecture-room ; 
 neither is there any room for School Library, School-book Deposi- 
 tory, Apparatus, &c. For these purposes the Missionaries have 
 hitherto been obliged to devote a part of their own dwelling-houses. 
 For the use of the Institution, as at present conducted, a large native 
 house has been hired, every corner of which is more than occupied. 
 But, though it is the best that could be had, the situation has been 
 found decidedly unhealthy, and the apartments, from their small size, 
 excessively incommodious. Partly from the situation of the house, 
 and partly from the small size of the rooms, these at times become 
 heated to a degree that is dreadfully oppressive to the pupils, and 
 altogether killing to the teachers. During the height of the hot sea- 
 son the thermometer has been found to rise daily to 105 and 106 
 degrees, and that too in a half-tainted atmosphere ; whereas, in a 
 larger and more airy building, the temperature might be reduced 
 
X 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 several degrees, and tliat in a purer atmosphere. Besides, the great 
 number and the scattered position of the present apartments render 
 twofold greater the labour and exhaustion of vigilant superintendence 
 than would otherwise be necessary. 
 
 “ Need the Committee say more? To avoid the liazard and ex- 
 pense of a failure, neither they nor the Missionaries did at the outset 
 ask for buildings of any description. They chose rather to survey 
 the field, and ascertain its capabilities. This having been done, the 
 experiment of cultivating it was immediately tried. And as the 
 result of nearly five years of prayerful labour and patient waiting 
 upon their God, they have now with grateful hearts to report, 
 that through the favour of Him from whom all blessings flow, the 
 experiment has succeeded beyond all expectation. During this 
 period God has been pleased in an especial manner to further their 
 designs for the emancipation of the Hindu mind. Being able, there- 
 fore, with gratitude to God, to point to a triumphant success, — to 
 several conversions, — to numbers of educated natives that are ready 
 to attend lectures and discourses oir the Christian Faith, — to six 
 hundred youths under literary, scientific, and religious instruction, 
 many of whom promise fair to exercise a prodigious influence on the 
 destinies of India,“and to hundreds more, who have been actually 
 pressing for admission, and actually excluded, for want of space to 
 hold them, — they simply crave for the means of providing plain but 
 suitable accommodation in the form of Class-rooms, Lecture-rooms, 
 &c., in order to enable them more vigorously to prosecute operations 
 so happily begun, and so exuberant w'ith the prospect of glorious 
 results. Will the people of Scotland, then, refuse the necessary 
 means ? The Committee cannot persuade themselves that in such 
 circumstances a refusal is possible. They propose accordingly, to 
 open a separate special subscription, to be designated “ The Building 
 Fund.” And they urgently recommend the subject to the favourable 
 attention of the friends of Missiobs generally, and the members of the 
 Church of Scotland in particular. 
 
 “ It is calculated that the purchase of ground and the erection of 
 buildings of the plainest possible description, and yet sufficiently 
 ample for carrying on the preparatory and higher courses of instruc- 
 tion on so very large and extended a scale, cannot, in a place like 
 Calcutta, cost much less than five or six thousand pounds. Still, 
 considering the real magnitude of the object to be accomplished, it 
 is presumed it would be difficult to name a more profitable outlet 
 for the benevolence of those, who long and pray for the establishment 
 of Messiah’s kingdom over the hideous and gigantic systems of Pan- 
 theism and Idolatry in Hindustan.” 
 
 VIII. Another special object may here he introduced to the notice 
 of the Christian public of this land. 
 
 The great hope of India’s amelioration, consists in the success of 
 the attempt to raise up a race of duly qualified native labourers — 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 XI 
 
 who shall become teachers and preachers of the everlasting Gospel to 
 their own benighted countrymen. In order effectually to accom- 
 plish this great end, those who enter a Christian Institution, like that 
 of the General Assembly, as boys, must remain there till they attain 
 to years of maturity. But how is such an extension of the period of 
 attendance to be secured ? Sometimes, the parents or friends are both 
 able and willing to support a young man, during the whole course of 
 his instruction, however prolonged. But it not uufrequently hap- 
 pens, that, in the case of young men of the greatest promise, parents, 
 from poverty, are unable, — or, from different causes, unwilling, after 
 a very limited time, to supply the necessary support. What then is 
 to be done in cases of this description ? Are young men of talent 
 and ingenuous disposition, who long with the most intense anxiety, 
 to treasure up all the stores of our knowledge, human and divine, 
 that they may become “ burning and shining lights” in the midst of 
 a “ darkness that may be felt ; ” — are such young men to be frus- 
 trated in their hopes, and, after two or three years of promise, to be 
 tossed back again into the “ horrible pit and miry clay” of idolatry 
 and superstition ? Surely tlsis is a disastrous issue which the 
 Cliristian people of this land would labour to prevent, if they could. 
 But it is in the power of tliousands to prevent it, if they will. 
 
 All that is required is, that the Missionaries, who superintend the 
 Central Institution, sliould have at their disposal, a number of per- 
 manent scholarships, of from five, to ten, or twelve pounds a-year. 
 The prospect of such a scholarship, as a reward after a few year’s 
 diligent attendance in the Institution, would operate as a stimulus on 
 many a talented and promising young man, — by holding out to him 
 the assured hope of being able to prosecute his studies to a com- 
 pletion — and of thus becoming qualified, through the blessing of 
 God, to act as a mighty instrument in arousing thousands from the 
 slumber of ages. 
 
 Sums of from £250, to £500, would found, in perpetuity, scho- 
 larships of different grades — and thus prove the means, under God, 
 of securing a succession of highly enlightened men, that might other- 
 wise be entirely lost to themselves and to their country. 
 
 Already have two philanthropic ladies, whose names I am not as 
 yet privileged to announce, resolved to devote the munificent sum of 
 one thousand pounds to the purpose of establishing two or more 
 sucli scholarships. May their noble example be speedily followed by 
 others, who may thus raise to themselves, in the onward lapse of ages, 
 a series of living monuments, more lasting and precious far, than the 
 loftiest piles of “ marble or of brass ! ” 
 
 XI. There is one other subject to which, in conclusion, I would 
 crave the earnest attention of the Christian people of this land. 
 
 Has not our Lord and Saviour left us ^ model oi prayer? And 
 is it not a memorable circumstance that, out of the six petitions 
 which constitute that prayer, there are two, and these the first in 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 xii 
 
 order, specially devoted to that great cause which led him to endure 
 “ the agony and bloody sweat ? ” How comes it, then, that ministers, 
 in the public services of the sanctuary ; and private Christians in their 
 closet and family devotional exercises, so often confine all reference 
 to the extension of the Redeemer’s kingdom, to one or two brief 
 formal sentences at the conclusion of their prayers — and so often 
 omit a specific reference to the subject altogether 9 
 
 Surely, this is not as it ought to be. Let us hope that the time 
 is not far distant when no minister in the pulpit, and no member of 
 a congregation in the closet, or at the family altar, shall ever forget 
 in solemn earnestness to offer up the petition recommended and en- 
 forced by the divine Redeemer himself: — “ Thy kingdom come : thy 
 will be done on earth as it is done in heaven.” And if the heaven- 
 ordained practice of praying for the speedy diffusion of Gospel light 
 throughout the world were to become regular and universal, would it 
 not ultimately incite thousands to corresponding efforts, in order to 
 realise the glorious object habitually prayed for ? And would not the 
 general union of prayer and effort, in extending the conquests of the 
 cross and bringing in the everlasting kingdom, cause the windows of 
 heaven to be opened, and the streams of grace to descend, like rain 
 upon the new mown grass, or showers that water the spring ? 
 
 EniNBunGH, 1th June 1837* 
 
VINDICATION 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CFIURCH OF SCOTLAND’S INDIAN MISSIONS, &c. 
 
 Moderator, 
 
 When, for the first time in my life, I had the 
 honour of addi’essing this Venerable House, my task was 
 chiefly expository. And when now, in all human pro- 
 bability, for the last time in my life, the same privilege is 
 conferred, my task will be found chiefly vindicatory. 
 
 To the exposition given on the former occasion of the 
 principles on which the original Mission of the Church of 
 Scotland had been conducted in Calcutta, this House was 
 pleased to affix the high stamp of its approbation. And 
 is it too much to say, after the fertile experience of the last 
 two years, that to the verdict and appeal of this House, 
 the intelligence of the people of Scotland has most approv- 
 ingly responded ? 
 
 Owing to the multiplied opportunities already presented 
 to me, in different parts of the country, for expounding at 
 large the present state and contemplated objects of the 
 Mission, it is wholly unnecessary on the present occasion 
 to enter into minute details. But it were worse than for- 
 getful, did I not thus publicly declare, that these favourable 
 opportunities were nowhere limi^d by any unwillingness 
 on the part of Ministers and members of this Church, 
 either in their Presbyterial or individual capacity — were 
 nowhere limited, save by the physical incapacities ‘of the 
 visiting agent. Farther, it were worse than ungrateful, 
 
14 
 
 did I not as publicly declare, that all these opportunities 
 were signalised throughout by personal acts of kindness 
 on the part of Ministers and members of this Church — 
 acts of kindness so varied and undeserved — that I shall 
 never find an adequate expression for them, save in the 
 breathings of a grateful heart at a throne of grace. And, 
 last of all, it were worse than obtuseness — it were moral 
 blindness — did I not observe that these opportunities were 
 not only opened up everywdiere with amazing facility, but 
 everywhere called forth such manifestations of what may 
 be reckoned latent piety, and hitherto unthought of bene- 
 volence, as to proved beyond all debate, that this Church 
 is yet fraught with prodigious rallying powers — that it is no 
 longer a dream or ^ vision on the part of her devoted 
 friends, that by the breath of the Almighty’s presence, she 
 is yet to arise in renovated beauty, — and that, like the 
 mighty Nazarite, snapping the bands designed to dwarf her 
 stature and paralyse her power, — converting apparent weak- 
 nesses into enduring monuments of unequalled strength, — 
 she is yet destinfjd to stand forth before an awakened world, 
 more pure, more stately, more majestic, more indomitable 
 than ever. 
 
 To return to my own more immediate theme. — It may 
 be known to many members of this House, that, while the 
 exposition formerly submitted to it has been cordially ap- 
 proved of by many of the wisest and most enlightened 
 Christian minds in the land, various objections have arisen 
 in different quarters to some of its statements. But is there 
 aught strange in this ? What great cause has ever been 
 advanced in the world, without calling forth a host of anta- 
 gonisms ? In the present case, however, the alleged objec- 
 tions are scarcely entitled to the name — since they are, 
 every one of them, 7nisco7iceptions, and 7wt reasonable objec- 
 tions at all. I might, therefore, at once summarily dismiss 
 them — prepared as I am to demonstrate, if need be, that 
 they are all based either on palpable 7iiisapprche7isio/is of 
 some of my facts, or palpable 7nis{/ite7p7-etattoiis of some 
 portions of my language. Indeed, such is my own im- 
 pression of their utter groundlessness, that my conviction 
 is unalterable, that the greater part, if not all, of them, 
 ought to be allowed to pass by unheeded and unnoticed — 
 dancing their little hour, like bubbles, on the stream of 
 great principles — and then evanish — leaving the stream to 
 flow on, unaffected by their presence ! 
 
15 
 
 And if now I proceed rapidly to notice a few of the 
 more prominent , ones, it will be, not so much to refute 
 what scarcely needs any refutation, as to employ these as 
 so many occasions for fastening more deeply than ever, 
 certain leading fundamental principles in the minds of all, 
 and more particularly of the people of Scotland. 
 
 And since this House, under God, ought ever to be 
 one of the great fountain-heads of unchanging principle 
 in the delegated administration of the Christian economy 
 on earth ; — and since, besides, the eyes not only of the 
 British Churches, but of the Protestant Churches through- 
 out the world are at this moment intensely directed to- 
 wards its proceedings ; — it is a matter of mightiest import 
 that the announcement of great principles, involved in the 
 successful prosecution of the missionary enterprize, should 
 go forth attested by the seal of its approbation and 
 authority. 
 
 I. First of all, it is with extreme regret I have heard it 
 alleged that the missionary labours of other churches and 
 societies have been disparaged, or unduly undervalued in 
 my former statement. 
 
 But what is the ground of this allegation ? It is entirely 
 of a negative character. It consists simply and solely in 
 the omission of a forma! specific reference to such labours. 
 Now, I at once acknowledge that there may be cases where 
 an omission may be tantamount to a disparagement. But 
 I did not think before, neither am I persuaded now, that 
 the case in question was one of these. How stands the 
 matter ? The General Assembly of this Church select and 
 send forth an accredited agent, on a special mission to 
 India. After a few years, this agent, in consequence of an 
 afflictive visitation of Providence, over which he had no 
 control, is necessitated to return, for a season, to his native 
 land. What, in such circumstances, let me ask, — what 
 more natural, than for this Assembly to call upon him 
 to render an account of his stewardship ? What more 
 natural than to summon him, to lay before them a specific 
 statement of the manner in which he had endeavoured to 
 carry into execution that commission, with which they 
 had been pleased to intrust him ? This, accordingly, 
 was what actually took place. And when the task as- 
 signed to me was so very distinct and clearly defined, 
 would it not have been wholly irrelevant to have digressed 
 
16 
 
 into special notices of the missionary proceedings of other 
 churches and societies? It was, therefore, the marked 
 peculiarUy of the object proposed to me, and that alone, 
 which led to the omission in question. 
 
 Far from wishing, directly or indirectly, slightingly' to 
 overlook the missionary efforts of other denominations of 
 Christians, God is my witness, that I have heretofore greatly 
 rejoiced in these efforts, — and that, in common with mv 
 brethren, X have, both in public and in private, offered up 
 fervent prayer and supplications to Almighty God for their 
 increasing prosperity. Often have I gloried in the blessed 
 fruit which they hate already been privileged to reap in 
 many a dry and parched land. And may I not add, that 
 there is not a single member of this great Assembly that is 
 not ready, in deep sincerity' of soul, to ascribe praise and 
 glory to God the Father, for all the real success which may 
 have attended the ' labours of any Christian church or 
 society in extending the Redeemer’s kingdom over the 
 world ? 
 
 II. It has also been alleged that, in my former statement, 
 I expressed myself with disrespect towards my' predeces- 
 sors and fellow-labourers in the missionary field. 
 
 Never, certainly, was any allegation more unfounded. 
 The rare endowments, original and acquired, of many of 
 the missionary body', both living and dead, and the un- 
 rivalled services which they have rendered, at once to the 
 cause of Christianity and of Literature, have now become 
 matters of history', and are far beyond my' feeble unworthy 
 praise. Of such men, accordingly, have I often spoken in 
 terms of unbounded admiration. And, whatever my own 
 private opinion may be, as to the intellectual and literary 
 qualifications of many who have gone forth to the mission- 
 ary field, I would hereby challenge the thousands and the 
 tens of thousands who have now heard me address them in 
 public, both in Scotland and in England, to refer, if they' 
 can, to a single instance wherein I have disrespectfully 
 alluded to any one of them. On the contrary, I would 
 again appeal, with equal confidence, to thousands and tens 
 of thousands in this land, whether I have not often volun- 
 teered to dilate, in glowing terms, on the zeal, and devoted- 
 ness, and sterling moral worth, of all of every denomination, 
 with whom I happened to be familiarly acquainted, in and 
 around the metropolis of British India ? 
 
17 
 
 On what, then, it may well be asked, can the charge of 
 disparagement be possibly founded? — Solely on a singular 
 misunderstanding of a passage in the original statement, 
 to this effect : — “ While the office of the Missionary is held 
 up as the highest walk of Christian philanthropy, it must 
 still be asked, How comes it that our great men, our giants 
 in theology, have left it to be occupied by babes and strip- 
 lings ? ” 
 
 Who may not perceive, at half a glance, the totally 
 opposite bearing and meaning of these words, whenview'ed 
 in connection with the context, from what the charge of 
 disparagement seems to imply ? 
 
 Often, in the course of my numerous journeyings at 
 home, have I been accosted, by men of note, somewhat 
 after this manner : — “ Oh, the office of a Missionary is, 
 beyond all question, the highest, noblest, and most honour- 
 able in the Church of Christ, — it is the very office of 
 the Apostles themselves ! I wonder much at the scarcity 
 of duly qualified labourers. Are there none of our students 
 of divinity, none of our unprovided preachers of the Gospel, 
 coming forward as candidates?” Wearied by such frequent 
 protestations of supreme regard for an office in theory, 
 while yet in practice it is in general so lightly esteemed, I 
 have sometimes been constrained abruptly to respond ; — 
 “ Oh, if you really do reckon the office of a Missionary 
 to be so very high, and noble, and honourable, above all 
 others, why don’t you set the example, by becoming 
 a candidate for it yourself? Rest assured, that one 
 such decisive act, in proof of the sincerity of profession, 
 would far more essentially benefit the great cause of 
 missions, than hundreds of your eloquent sermons in the 
 pulpit, and thousands of your flaming speeches on the 
 platform !” 
 
 Now, it was entirely in reference to the apparent incon- 
 sistency, between the professions and the practice of such 
 men, that that sentence w'as uttered, which has been so 
 strangely misconstrued into the language of disrespect to- 
 wards the missionary body. If any such disrespect had 
 been at all intended, then, had the language in which it 
 was conveyed a special directness of bearing towards my- 
 self. For, surrounded as I was at the moment of its utter- 
 ance, by the Cookes’ and the Mearns’, the Burns’ and the 
 Gordons, and many more of the giant brood of our Scottish 
 divines, I did, in deep and unfeigned humility, feel that, 
 
18 
 
 in their pi'esence, I was nothing more, even after the 
 toils and fatigues of a foreign service, than a very 
 “babe and stripling” in theological experience and at- 
 tainments. 
 
 And, after all, is it not a mere matter of fact, that, com- 
 pared with those learned doctors, and other men of re- 
 nown, who have their own, no doubt most satisfactory, 
 reasons for remaining at home, they have, in general, been 
 but “ babes and striplings” that have hitherto been equipped 
 and sent forth to the missionary warfare, — babes and ^rip- 
 lings in intellectual and theological acquirements, — babes 
 and striplings in experience of the functions of the minis- 
 terial office? Talk of Swartz, and Vanderkemp, and Mor- 
 rison, and Ward, and Carey! Were not even these bright 
 stars, in the missionary galaxy, comparatively dim and lustre- 
 less when they Jirst arose in the horizon of heathen lauds? 
 And if, afterwards, they shone with a brilliancy that has 
 since dazzled the Christian Church, how does that disprove 
 the fact of the comparative obscurity of their earlier appear- 
 ance in the missionary field? — how does that invalidate 
 our view of the conduct of those veterans who, in their day 
 and generation, preferred the downy repose and luxurious 
 indulgences of home, to the dear-bought glory of death or 
 victory, on the battle-field of an extending Christendom? 
 Oh I until the day come, when that service, which holy 
 apostles did sui’ely account, beyond compare, the most 
 god-like in which the heirs of glory can be engaged, shall 
 attract to itself our most redoubted champions in the Chris- 
 tian warfare, — we have no more right to exult in the high 
 nobility of our pedigree from the heroes of the Covenant, 
 than the modern cowards of Missolonghi, or the crouch- 
 ing slaves of the Archipelago, to boast of their noble descent 
 from the heroes of Marathon or Thermopylae I 
 
 III. It has been alleged that, from my account of the 
 proverbial subtilty of the Hindu mind, one would imagine 
 that I considered the whole of the Hindu population to 
 be transcendental philosophers. 
 
 Now, it so happens, in point of fact, that I actually 
 asserted something the direct contrary of tliis. In express 
 terms I stated, that these “ transcendental philosophers ” 
 belonged exclusively to the Brahmanical caste. And in 
 order to render, as I fondly imagined, all misconception 
 utterly impossible, I remarked with emphasis, respecting 
 
10 
 
 “ the mass of people,” that “ these were miserably ignorant, 
 — as ignorant and brutish as the stocks and stones around 
 them.” 
 
 What, therefore, I reaUij did state before, I now reiterate 
 again, and will do so to the end of my life, — that, belonging 
 to the Bralunaiucal caste, there are learned men, distinguished 
 for their lor/ical and )netaph?/sical suhtilties, — and that these, 
 in number more or less, are everywhere found interspersed 
 throughout the native community. In the north of Ben- 
 gal ihere exists, what perhaps cannot be easily paralleled 
 in all the world besides, — that is, a small town almost 
 entirely consisting of clusters of schools, or colleges of 
 Brahmans, exclusively engaged in the study of their own 
 logical and metaphysical Shasters. 
 
 Now, what was the practical inference deduced from this 
 undisputed and indisputable fact ? It was this — that it would 
 be very desirable for missionaries in general, and absolutely 
 necessary for, at least, some of them to be prepared to suc- 
 cessfully contend with this race of subtile dialecticians. 
 What exact proportion these may bear to the general 
 population, no one can tell ; — and so far as the practical 
 inference now stated is concerned, the determination of this 
 point is a matter of comparatively little moment. The grand 
 object to be kept in view is, that, almost everywhere, one or 
 more of these metaphysicians by profession, are really to 
 be met with — and that they are of the exalted order of 
 Brahmans, before whom the mass -of the people “ bow 
 down as before the gods — for limbs or fragments they are 
 verily believed to be of the supreme Deity.” Now, I ap- 
 peal, whether, without the aid of the divine prerogatives 
 of a Brahman, one metaphysical Hume has not effectually- 
 succeeded in convulsing the whole world of systematic 
 Christian theologists? — and whether he has not supplied 
 a file which, from our own Campbell down to our own 
 Chalmers, has, for more than half a century, exercised 
 some of the sharpest wits in Christendom? And, if this be 
 so, in a case where neither credit nor reverence could have 
 been enjoyed, beyond what simple intellect commanded, 
 what may it not be in a country like India, where the me- 
 taphysician may claim for himself the reverence of a god, 
 and challenge for his metaphysics an infallible authority ? — 
 After this, may I not again ask in triumph, whether some 
 at least of the army of the faithful ought not to be specially 
 panoplied, in order to encounter these subtile sons of 
 
 B 
 
20 
 
 Brahma, — and cause their peculiar weapons to recoil on 
 their own heads ? 
 
 IV. It has been alleged that some of my former state- 
 ments went to prove, that all the millions of India must 
 become good English scholars, before they can be expected 
 to embrace the Christian faith. 
 
 This is one of those misapprehensions for which it is 
 difficult to imagine even a plausible reason ; — -seeing that 
 it is in direct contradiction to the express language formerly 
 employed. But, without trespassing on the time of this 
 House, with any recapitulation of what was then advanced, 
 allow me at ojjce to furnish an additional illustration of our 
 design. 
 
 There are many here present who are thoroughly conver- 
 sant with the past and present condition of the Highlands 
 of Scotland. In their presence, then, I ask, — By what 
 process have the Highlands been Christianized and civil- 
 ized? Has it been by a violent attempt to extirpate, tlie 
 language of Ossian, that sang the tales of other years, with 
 the view of substituting universally another and a better 
 in its place ? No : that were impossible ; — since, violently 
 to extirpate the language, would just be, violently to exter- 
 vninate the people. Has it been by an exclusive attempt 
 to transfuse into that lanffuape all the vast stores of modern 
 knowledge ? No : that, too, were impracticable. Copious 
 to overflowing, the Gaelic must be allowed to be, in descrip- 
 tive imagery and resistless as the mountain torrent, in its 
 vocabulary of impassioned address. But let any man, 
 who really understands the subject, conceive to himself the 
 project of translating into Gaelic such a woi'k as the “ En- 
 cyclopaedia Britannica,” and he will soon be compelled to 
 assent to the existence of the impracticability now referred 
 to. What, then, was to be done? Precisely what sound 
 judgment might suggest, and the necessity of the case seemed 
 to demand. A middle course has been happily adopted 
 and pursued. Are the people to be taught the elements of 
 sound knowledge ? — and is the Gos[)el to be preached to 
 them in strains familiar and effective ? Then, of necessity, 
 must there be raised up a superior race of teachers and of 
 preachers. And whence are these to be procured ? — from 
 a foreign land? — from among men, speaking a strange 
 tongue? No: but from among the people themselves. 
 And how, under the disadvantages now described, has this 
 
21 
 
 desirable object been accomplished ? How have any of 
 the natives of the Hij^hlands been raised to pre-eminence in 
 learning above their fellows ? By an expedient the most 
 natural and successful. The English language is, at pre- 
 sent, the great storehouse of all knowledge. Well, this 
 being so, what has been the conduct of Highland parents? 
 It has been that of wisdom and sound undei'standing. They 
 have just sent their children to English schools, to acquire 
 the rudiments of useful knowledge. And all those, whose 
 circumstances could afford it, have followed up this ele- 
 mentary instruction, by sending them to our English aca- 
 demies and English colleges. In this course, the sons of 
 the north have no doubt to contend, more particularly at 
 the outset, with vast difficulties, from which the sons of the 
 south are wholly exempt, — and in the struggle to surmount 
 which, the latter can manifest little sympathy. They have, 
 in fact, to master an entirely foreign language; and cause 
 to be transferred into it, those modes and habits of thought 
 which, from earliest infancy, had been cast in a far different 
 mould. On this subject I speak from painful experience, 
 because the Gaelic is my mother tongue. But, agreeably 
 to the proverb, diligence and perseverance will ever over- 
 come all difficulties, not absolutely insuperable. Accord- 
 ingly', is it not a simple statement of fact, that the sons of the 
 north are everywhere found in our English schools, acade- 
 mies, and colleges, successfully grappling with the obstacles 
 that impede their progress? Yea, are they not often found 
 triumphantly bearing away the palm of superior scholarship 
 from their southern compeers ? And, after having enriched 
 their own minds with the treasures of universal knowledge, 
 in literature, science, and theology, through the medium 
 of the English language, do we not find them return to 
 their own romantic valleys and everlasting hills; richly 
 laden with the stores which they have accumulated on a 
 foreign territory ? — Do we not find them vigorously and 
 patriotically engage, in transmuting the more appropriate 
 portions of these varied stores into materials, bearing the 
 stamp and superscription of their own mother tongue ? 
 — Do we not find them in this way succeed, through the 
 blessing of heaven, in diffusing the odours of sweetest in- 
 cense, enkindled at the shrines of learning, or sanctified 
 at the altars of piety, among the thousands and tens of 
 thousands of an awakened, and gladdened, and edified 
 people ? 
 
00 
 
 Now, this very process, which has been so eminently 
 blessed to the Highlands of Scotland — this very process, 
 which has converted these regions of thickest Popish dark- 
 ness into a domain, enlightened by the cloudless rays of the 
 Sun of Righteousness — this very process, which has trans- 
 formed the Highlands, from being a mere hunting-field 
 of “ savage clans and roving barbarians,” into a nursery 
 of plants of renown that shall bloom and blossom in the 
 climes of immortality ; — this very process and none other, 
 are we now labouring with all our might, through God’s 
 blessing, to apply to the regeneration of the universal mind 
 of India. 
 
 While, therefore, as explained on a former occasion, it 
 is confessed that “ the weraacw/ar languages alone are avail- 
 able for imparting elementary instruction to the mass of the 
 people of Hindustan, it is insisted on as a fact, that these 
 languages do not at present alford an adequate medium for 
 communicating a knowledge of the higher departments of 
 literature, science, and theology. Consequently, for the 
 present, the English language must be viewed as the medium 
 of acquisition to the thoroughly educated few ; and the i-e)-- 
 nacular dialects to the ordinarily educated many. The 
 former constitutes the channel of contribidion to the reservoirs 
 of those minds that are to be cultivated, so as to dissemi- 
 nate all knowledge; the latter will form the channels of 
 distribution to those who must be satisfied with the mere 
 elements of knowledge. The former unseals the inexhausti- 
 ble fountain of all knowledge ; the latter must serve as ducts 
 to diffuse its vivifying waters over the wastes of a thirsty 
 land. In a word, the English language is the lever, ichich, 
 as the grand instrument of conveying the entire range of know- 
 ledge, secidar and sacred, seems destined, in the unfolding 
 dispensations of Providence, to move all Hindustan * 
 
 V. It has been strangely alleged that, from the represen- 
 tation formerly given, one would suppose that our scheme 
 was, to infidelize the Hindus first, and Christianize them 
 afterwards. 
 
 Without waiting to expose so very idle a misconception, 
 I shall simply advance a few statements, calculated to res- 
 cue this important subject from that strange confusion of 
 
 * See former Exposition of the Churcli of Scotland's India IMission. Second Edi- 
 tion, p. 30, 31. 
 
ideas which is so apt to gain currency among the unreflect- 
 ing and unintelligent. 
 
 My first statement is, that there is a yearly in- 
 creasing demand for English education, more especially in 
 the provinces of Gangetic India. 
 
 Of the truth of this statement, many indisputable proofs 
 might be given. The Committee of Public Instruction, 
 in their official report to Government, expressly declare, 
 that “ the study of English, to which many circumstances 
 induce the natives to give the preference, and with it the 
 knowledge of the learning of the West, is daily spreading.” 
 This, thoush of a general nature, is an authoritative testi- 
 mony. But there is one practical test of the existing state 
 and direction of the current of native feeling, in reference 
 to education, which seems peculiarly decisive. There has 
 been, for many years past, in Calcutta, a School-Book 
 Society, partly supported by private contribution, and 
 partly by the munificence of Government. The books of 
 this society, remarks Mr Trevelyan, one of the Secretaries 
 of Government, are sold to any body who chooses to pur- 
 chase ; and the proportions, in which they are disposed of, 
 shew the relative demand that exists for the different kinds 
 of learnino;. The statement of the sales which have been 
 made during the last two years, extracted from the Society’s 
 recently published report, is as follows : — 
 
 English, 
 
 31,649 books. 
 
 Anglo-Asiatic, 
 
 . 4,525 
 
 5,754 
 
 >> 
 
 Bengali, 
 
 35 
 
 Hindui, 
 
 . 4,171 
 
 33 
 
 Hindustani, (or Urdu,) . 
 
 3,384 
 
 33 
 
 Uriya, 
 
 834 
 
 53 
 
 Persian, 
 
 1,454 
 
 53 
 
 Arabic, 
 
 36 
 
 33 
 
 Sanskrit, 
 
 16 
 
 33 
 
 This enumeration is altogether exclusive of the many 
 valuable English publications that constantly issue from 
 the Serampore press ; as well as of those sold at different 
 private establishments in Calcutta. Can any proof appear 
 more decisive of the growing taste of the natives for the 
 English language ? From the School-Book Society’s De- 
 pository, there issue in the two learned languages of India 
 only 52 works ! — Arabic, 36 ; and Sanskrit, (believed to 
 be the very language of the gods,) 16 ! — While, in the 
 
24 
 
 English language, there is a sale of 31,649 ! — Who, after 
 this, can pretend to doubt the accuracy of the averment 
 respecting the rapidly increasing demand among the natives 
 of Eastern India for the English language, and that im- 
 proved literature and science of which it is the key ? 
 
 My second statement is, that the British Government 
 in India not only encourages the native taste for English 
 education, but also provides to a large extent the means of 
 obtaining it. 
 
 When I last addressed this House, I specially adverted 
 to Lord W. Bentinck’s resolution to supersede the Persian, 
 in the political department of the public service, and ulti- 
 mately in every other, by the substitution of English. I 
 adverted, at the same time, to several striking facts, illus- 
 trative of the effect of this resolution in stimulating num- 
 bers of the higher classes of natives to the study of the 
 English language. Little did I know that, at the very time 
 of my addressing this House, there was, midway on its pas- 
 sage from India to England, an edict which more than 
 confirmed all that had ever been advanced on the subject 
 — an edict that promises to constitute a new era in the his- 
 tory of India. 
 
 Up to the 7th March 1835, the great object of the Go- 
 vernment schemes of education had been, to initiate the 
 natives into a knowledge of their own literature, science, 
 and relig'ion, through the medium of their own learned 
 languages. By the Government enactment* of that date, 
 this object was totally changed. It was therein decreed by 
 the Governor-General in Council, that “ the great object 
 of the British Government ought to be the promotion of 
 European literature and science among the natives of In- 
 dia ; and that all the funds appropriated for the purposes 
 of education, would be best employed on English education 
 alone.” 
 
 This enactment has already been followed up with such 
 rapid effect by the Committee of Public Instruction, that, 
 within the last two years, the Government English Institu- 
 tions in the Presidency of Bengal have been more than 
 doubled. The number of purely Government Institutions 
 is now heentg-seoen ; and the revenue for their sujtport 
 exceeds £25,000 per annum. All of these, except four 
 
 • See tile nature and tendency of this cimctiiient expounded at l.iruc in a 
 |.j.iiiplilet just published hy the author, eiititkd, “ New i'.ra of tlie i'ji ,lisli 
 J.an^uaji'e and Eiislisli Literature in India.” Printed and jiublislied by J. 
 Johnstone, Edinburgh ; and sold by J. Ni.sbet, Bcineis Sliert, Loudon. 
 
Mahammaclan and Sanskrit Colleges, are devoted to Eng- 
 lish education — and the funds, at present appropriated to 
 these four, will gradually become available for the purposes 
 of instruction in English literature and science. 
 
 Some of the first established of the English seminaries, 
 such as the Hindu Colleges of Calcutta and Delhi, have 
 already risen to the status of Collegiate Institutions. And 
 all the rest have been carefully planted in large central 
 towns, with the express design of raising them, by degrees, 
 into Colleges, with a Principal, and Professors of English 
 composition and literature, of mathematics and natural 
 philosophy, &c., in each. From these central institutions, 
 as from so many radiating points, it is also intended that 
 branch-schools shall gradually emanate — so as ultimately 
 to pervade, with elementary instruction, every disti'ict anti 
 village in the land. 
 
 As an exemplification at once of the growing demand 
 for English, and of the liberal manner in which Govern- 
 ment is prepared to meet it, I shall here refer to what took 
 place about a twelvemonth ago, in the town of Hugh, about 
 30 miles north of Calcutta. 
 
 On the authority of the Government functionary, al- 
 ready named, I have to state that, when, last year, the new 
 English seminary was opened in that town, English stu- 
 tlents flocked to it in such numbers, as to render the or- 
 ganization of them into classes a matter of difficulty, — and 
 tliat there are now, about 1,400 native boys, learning English 
 onJg; about 200, learning Arabic and Persian only; and up- 
 wards of a hundred, who are learning both English and 
 Arabic or Persian. To this it is expressly added, that 
 “ notwithstanding this unprecedented concourse, the ap- 
 plications for English instruction are still extremely numer- 
 ous ; and there seems to be no limit to the number of 
 scholars, except the number of masters whom the (Govern 
 ment) Education Committee is able to provide.” In another 
 place, the same competent authority positively declares, 
 that, “in the numerous (English) seminaries under the 
 Education Committee, there is no want of scholars — and 
 that the difficulty is to provide masters enough to teach 
 the numbers who are anxious to receive instruction.” 
 
 3r/, My thud statement is, that, in order still farther to 
 extend and perpetuate the thirst for English litei'ature 
 and science, the Government Committee in Calcutta have 
 recently determined to provitle the more advanced of their 
 
2 (> 
 
 English institutions with libraries of books in every depart- 
 ment of knowledge. 
 
 o 
 
 This determination to provide the different institutions 
 with libraries of English books is a truly noble one, and 
 worthy of all commendation. In regard, however, to the 
 jyructlcal execution of this grand design, a sense of duty 
 compels me to make a few passing strictures. I had lately 
 occasion, in another place, to refer to the same subject, 
 and shall here simply' repeat what was then advanced. 
 
 Had the libraries, ordered from England about a year ago, 
 and now in all probability landed in Calcutta, “ consisted 
 of the choicest standard works in English literatui’e and 
 science, — so far all well. However much a Christian might 
 regret the absence of all publications that unfold the ennob- 
 ling doctrines and morals of Christianity, he would find 
 some consolation in the circumstance that true literature 
 and science had been substituted instead of a literature 
 and science abounding with demonstrable errors. He 
 would have to complain of an act of omission, and not of 
 commission. But it is with pain and sorrow^ I have to ob- 
 serve, that while the libraries in question contain some of 
 the very best books in the English language, they also 
 contain some of the most useless, and some too of the 
 very worst. There are, for the younger pupils, several 
 excellent works : — but why ransack the dust-covered book- 
 shop of some antiquated librarian for copies of Cinderella, 
 Puss in Boots, Jack the Giant-Killer, Tom Thumb, Little 
 lied Riding Hood, the Devil on two Sticks, &c. ? Could this 
 age of “ the inarch of intellect ” provide no better food for 
 the newly-awakening minds of Hindu youth ? But all 
 these, you will say, are simply trash and trumpery : — that 
 is all; — as they may be said to be comparatively harmless. 
 Well, for adults, many most admirable wmrks are provided. 
 But there is a strange medley. If, for instance, under the 
 general designation of “ History and Biography,” there 
 are copies of the Bible ; placed side by side are copies of 
 Sale’s translation of the Koran. If, under the head of 
 “ Poetry,” there ai'e copies of Miltons works, in 6 vols. ; 
 there are also copies of the entire w'orks of Byron, in 17 
 vols. If, under the head of “ Metaphysics and Moral Philo- 
 sophy,’’ there are copies of Bacons Essays ; there arc also 
 copies of Hume's Essays, in which the very foundations of 
 Christianity are sapped and undermined. But why need 
 I emimerale more ? Enough has been advanced to entitle 
 
27 
 
 me to ask, Why this strange intermixture of light and 
 darkness, truth and error ? Why supply the newly eman- 
 cipated intellects of Indian youth with poison simultane- 
 ously with wholesome food ? As if India had not already 
 enough of wild and fantastic absurdities in the speculations 
 of its Pantheistic metaphysicians, or enough of prurient 
 licentiousness in the revolting legends embodied in the 
 Ramayan, and Maha Bharat, and other Sanskrit legends, 
 that outrage decency and common sense ; — why inundate, 
 from the West, its rising institutions with the anti-Christian 
 sophisms and crudities of Hume and Bentham, or the moral 
 pestilence of Fielding and Byron ? And w'hy send forth all 
 these productions, good, bad, and indifferent, in the name 
 and by the authority of the British Governor-General of 
 India — as if all were alike precious — and all alike bore the 
 high stamp of his approbation ?” '* 
 
 ■ith, My fourth statement is. That a thorough English 
 education, apart from religious instruction altogether, is 
 entirely subversive of Hinduism. 
 
 The rationale of this I formerly explained at length, and 
 shall not, on that account, again revert to it. The litera- 
 ture and science of the Hindus being incorporated with 
 their religion, if you destroy the former, which abounds 
 with palpable errors, by the introduction of the true litera- 
 ture and science of Europe, the foundations of the latter 
 must be overthrown. Should this appear to any one, 
 merely in the light of a plausible theory, let him ponder 
 well the following unsuspicious testimonies from natives 
 themselves, and say if they are not absolutely decisive of 
 the question. 
 
 The once Brahman, but now Christian editor of the 
 Inquirer newspaper, who himself received his English edu- 
 cation at the Government Hindu College, where no religion 
 is taught, thus strongly testifies : — “ The Hindu College, 
 under the patronage of Government, has^ as indeed it 
 must have, destroged many a native’s belief in Hinduism. 
 How could a boy continue to worship the sun, when he 
 understood that this luminary was not a dcvatah, (a divi- 
 hut a mass of inanimate matter? How could he be- 
 lieve in the injunctions of such Shasters as taught him 
 lessons contrary to the principles inculcated by his lecturer 
 in natural philosophy ? The consequence was, that the 
 
 Sec ail Aildfcss, recently delivered in lilxcter Hull, London, at the anniversary 
 cl the Cliurch ot Scotlajurs Forei^ijii Missions. 
 
castle of Hinduism was battered down. Xn Missioiiari/ ci'f^r 
 taufjht us (meaning himself, the editor,) to forsake the reli- 
 r/iou of our fathers ; it was Government that did us this ser~ 
 Vice. 
 
 Again, the native editor of the Reformer, another English 
 newspaper, and the organ of the educated Hindus in Cal- 
 cutta, contrasting the results of ordinary missionary labour 
 with those realised by the Hindu College, thus emphatically 
 asks “ Has it (the college) not been the fountain of a new 
 race of men amongst us ? Have oil the efforts of the Mis- 
 sionaries given a tithe of that shock to the superstitions of the 
 people tvhich has been given hg the Hindu College 9 This at 
 once shews that the means they pursue to overturn the 
 ancient reign of Idolatry is not calculated to insure suc- 
 cess, and ought to be abandoned for another which pro- 
 mises better success.” 
 
 Whatever share prejudice, ignorance, or dislike, might 
 have in leading the native editor to form so low an esti- 
 mate of the fruit of onlinary missiomirg exertion, must not 
 scepticism itself concede, that his testimony is conclusive 
 as to the efficient power of a thorough English education 
 in overturning the supei’stitions and idolatries of India ? 
 
 5th, Here I might pause, — satisfied w'ith having called the 
 attention of the Christian public of this land to the all- 
 important subjects now summarily detailed, at so early 
 a stage of the progi’ess of events, that shall one day 
 terminate in a mighty crisis in the history of India, — but it 
 may be well, briefly to sum up the four preceding state- 
 ments. 
 
 There is now, more especially in Eastern India, a yearly 
 increasing demand for English education ; and there is a 
 strong disposition, on the part of the British Government, 
 to encourage this demand, as well as largely to provide the 
 means of supplying it, by the establishing of numerous 
 English institutions, and the founding of English libraries. 
 But a thorough English education must, everywhere, prove 
 destructive of the systems of Hinduism. Hence, as the Go- 
 vernment schemes of education systematically exclude re- 
 ligion, the necessary effect of their operation must be, eveiy- 
 where to subvert the idolatries and superstitions of the 
 people, and then cast them adrift on the w'ide ocean of 
 infidelity. 
 
 It is worse than idle to evade this conclusion, by mei'el^’ 
 pointing to the present limited results of such a system. Why 
 
are these results, at present, so limited ? Simply because the 
 sphere of operation of those plans, that inevitably lead to 
 them, is as yetsocontracted. Anditis justbecausethissphere 
 is as yet so circumscribed; it is just because the processes 
 of change ar« as yet only coming into action, at the am- 
 iiienceinent n transition siaiQ', it is just because, on that 
 very account, it is, as yet, quite possible, through God’s 
 blessing, to overtake a movement that will be ever progres- 
 sive in a sphere ever widening ; — that I feel so intensely 
 anxious to rouse and direct the attention of British Chris- 
 tians to the present extraordinary state of things in India. 
 
 The Hindu College of Calcutta, from having reached 
 maturity, has already given a tremendous shock to the 
 systems of Hinduism. And, as “ like causes will, in similar 
 circumstances, produce like effects,” are we not constrained 
 to admit that the other institutions, similar to the Hindu 
 College of Calcutta, planted in various central stations 
 throughout India, will, in the course of tinie, produce iden- 
 tical results ? I say, “in the course of time,” with emphasis, 
 because I would not be the author, or the victim, of Utopian 
 visions. The vast importance of the subject must plead my 
 apology for repeating liere, what 1 have asserted elsewhere, 
 vifc., that I do “ not anticipate sudden, instantaneous, uni- 
 versal changes. But I do look forward, with confidence, to 
 a qrecd idtimate revolution in the social and religious struc- 
 ture of Hindu society, — I do regard the Government 
 enactment, already referred to, as laying the foundation of 
 a train of causes which may, for a while, operate so insen- 
 sibly as to pass unnoticed by careless or casual observers, 
 but not the less surely, as regards the great and momentous 
 issue. Like the laws which silently, but with resistless 
 power, regulate the movements of the material universe, 
 the present educationary operations, which are of the na- 
 ture and force of moral laws, will proceed onwards till they 
 terminate in effecting a decisive change in the national 
 mind of India.” 
 
 But, let it never be forgotten, that, as the Government 
 schemes of education uniformly exclude religious instruc- 
 tion, this may only be a change from a stagnant superstition 
 to a rampant infidelity. 
 
 What then is to be done ? Are the Christians of Great 
 Britain to stand idly aloof, and view the onward march of 
 the spirit of innovation in the East, as unconcerned and 
 indifferent spectators. Forbid it, gracious Heaven ! What 
 
30 
 
 then is to be done ?\ Why, if we are faithful to our trust, 
 and wise in time, we may. through the blessing of God, be 
 honoured in converting the education plans of the Indian 
 Government into auxiliaries, that may lend their aid in pre- 
 paring the way for the spread of the everlasting Gospel ! 
 
 Wherever a Government Seminary is founded, which 
 shall have the effect of demolishing idolatry and supersti- 
 tion, and thereby clearing away a huge mass of rubbish ; 
 there, let us be prepared to plant a Christian institution, 
 that shall, through the blessing of Heaven, be the in- 
 strument of rearing the beauteous superstructure of Chris- 
 tianity on the ruins of all false philosophy and false reli- 
 gion. Wherever a Government library is established, 
 that shall have the effect of creating an insatiable thirst 
 for knowledge; there, let us be forward in establishing 
 our depositories of Bibles and other religious publications, 
 that may satui'ate the expanding minds of Indian youth, 
 with the life-giving principles of eternal truth. 
 
 And who can tell whether, in this way, by “ redeeming 
 the time” — by s&\zmgX\ie present golden opportunitg — we may 
 not be privileged to behold, all the Government schemes of 
 educational improvement in India, overruled by a gracious 
 superintending Providence, for the ultimate introduction of 
 Messiah’s reign ? 
 
 VI. From having formerly said so much on the power 
 of useful knowledge in destroying the systems of Hinduism, 
 it has been strangely concluded by some, that our object 
 has been to reform the natives of India, by means of 
 “knowledge without religion.” 
 
 Need I say that no conclusion could possibly be more un- 
 founded? 
 
 It is, indeed, most true that, for reasons which have more 
 than satisfied many of the wisest and most devoted Chris- 
 tians in this land, I have, with uniform and persevering 
 earnestness, advocated the universal diffusion of sound 
 knowledge in India. Not contented with seeing such 
 knowledge ooze out in scanty drippings, I have toiled and 
 laboured, in conjunction with others, to pour it out in 
 copious streams that may, one day, cover the whole land 
 with the swelling tide of reason and intelligence. 
 
 This, however, happens to be only one-half ol any state- 
 ment that I have ever, anywhere, made on the subject. 
 And what right has any one, in reason or in justice, 
 
31 
 
 to fasten on one-half a statement, and deal with that half, 
 as if it were the whole ? 
 
 Strongly and sincerely as I have pled for the diffusion of 
 sound general knowledge in India; — have I not, on every 
 occasion, insisted as strongly on the cotemporaneous diffu- 
 sion of religious tridh ? Have I not even laboured to de- 
 monstrate that, for the best interests of man in time and 
 eternity, the former should ever be. based on the latter — per- 
 vaded with the spirit of it throughout — and made to termi- 
 nate in its exaltation and supremacy? Have I not ever con- 
 tended for the holy and inseparable alliance of both ? — for 
 the reciprocal inter-blendingoftheir different, thoughnotun- 
 congenial, influences? And if one or other must have the 
 precedency, either as respects priority of time or dignity 
 of position, in the mighty work of regenerating a corrupt 
 world ; — in the name of all that is reverend and just, let 
 that be selected for the honour, which, by inherent supe- 
 riority and excellence of nature, is pre-eminently entitled 
 to it. 
 
 Without “ useful knowledge ” man might not live so 
 comfortably in time ; without “ divine knowledge ” eternity 
 must be lost. How then, could the Missionaries of the 
 Church of Scotland — the Missionaries of a Church, first 
 loosened from Popery by the Wisharts and Hamiltons, sub- 
 sequently established by the Knoxes and Melvilles, and on- 
 wards perpetuated by the Rutherfords and Halyburtons ; 
 — how could we dare to sacrifice, at the shrine of a spurious 
 liberality, that highest and sublimest knowledge, whose 
 ennobling truths many of these worthies so heroically died 
 to testify ? — Or, if we dared thus to act the part of degene- 
 rate childr^, how could we abide the piercing glance of 
 rebuke which they would cast upon us, if recalled from 
 the realms of day, to witness our treacherous cowardice ? 
 .\nd how might we not feel, even now, as if their very ashes 
 would speak out of the tomb, and their blood from under the 
 altar cry out against us ! 
 
 Such, indeed, and so strong, are my own convictions of 
 the vast importance of useful knowledge in the great work 
 of reforming India, that — were this Venerable House to for- 
 bid the diffusion of it in connection with its own Mission — 
 I for one, would feel myself, however reluctantly, constrain- 
 ed at once to relinquish the honourable position which it has 
 been pleased to assign to me. But such, and so over- 
 whelming, are n>y convictions of the immeasurably supe- 
 
32 
 
 rior importance, of that higher knowledge, which unseals 
 the fountain of Immanuel’s love, that, — sooner than con- 
 sent wilfully to withhold it for an hour from the famish- 
 ing millions of India, or of any other land, in deference to 
 the noxious theories of certain propagandists of the present 
 day, — I would lay down my head upon the block, or com^ 
 mit this body to the flames ! 
 
 I feel assured, however, that, so far as this House is con- 
 cerned, it will never fall into either of these extremes. 
 Notwithstanding the charges of religious bigotry that have 
 been so profusely heaped upon it, this House, like its noble 
 reforming ancestry, has been, is now, and, I trust, ever 
 will be, the consistent, the enlightened advocate of all really 
 useful knowledge throughout the wide domain of families, 
 schools, and colleges, whether in this, or in other lands. 
 And, notwithstanding the charges of secular convergency 
 that have been as abundantly levelled at it, this House, like 
 its noble reforming ancestry, has been, is now, and, I trust, 
 ever will be, the intrepid, the unbending advocate of a 
 thorough Bible instruction, as an essential ingredient in all 
 sound education, w'hether on the banks of the Forth, or on 
 the banks of the Ganges. Yea, may I not be permitted with 
 emphasis to add, that, sooner than consent to surrender 
 this vital principle, which is one of the main pillars in the 
 palladium of the Protestantism of these realms, this House is 
 prepared, as in times of old, to submit to dissolution by 
 the strong arm of violence? — and its members, like their 
 Fathers of the Covenant, prepared once more to betake 
 themselves to the dens and caves of the earth — to wander 
 by the lonely shore or over the desert heath, — to climb the 
 mountain-steep for refuge, or secretly assemble to worship 
 in “ some deep deli by rocks o’ercanopied ? ” 
 
 Let it, then, ever be our distinguishing glory to arbitrate 
 between the advocates of untenable extremes. Let us, on 
 the one hand, disowm the bigotry of an unwise pietism, by 
 resolving to patronise to the utmost, as in times past, the 
 cause of sound literature and science — lest, by our negli- 
 gence, in this respect, we help to revive the fatal dogma of 
 the dark ages, that what is philosophical!}' true, may yet 
 be allow’ed to be theologically false. And let us, on the 
 other hand, denounce the bigotry of infidelity, or religious 
 indifference, by resolving to uphold the paramount import- 
 ance of the sacred oracles, in the great w'ork of Christianiz- 
 ing and civilizing a guilty w'orld. 
 
33 
 
 Let ns, thus hail trile literature and true science as our 
 very best auxiliaries — whether in Scotland, or in India, or in 
 any other quarter of the habitable globe. But, in receiv- 
 ing these, as friendly allies, into our sacred territory, let us 
 resolutely determine, that they shall never, never, be allow- 
 ed to usurp the throne, and wield a tyrant’s sceptre over it. 
 
 VII. It has been alleged that, in the former statement, 
 there seemed to be something like a denial of what has 
 been well styled by Owen and others, the “ self-evidencing 
 power” of the Bible. 
 
 If this were the proper time for a theological discussion, 
 I think I might hold myself pledged to prove, to the satis- 
 faction of all reasonable minds, that this is one of the most 
 groundless of charges. 1 did indeed speak, as I must ever 
 do, not only of the number, but of the peculiarity of those 
 difficulties and obstacles that impede the dissemination of 
 divine truth, in a country like India. Many of these are 
 of such a nature, that they admit of being removed by an 
 ordinary application of ordinary means. Are we not, 
 therefore, bound, as creatures endowed with reason and 
 judgment, to employ these means — looking all the while to 
 Heaven for the blessing, which alone can insure success ? 
 And how can the prayerful employment of such means be 
 said, in any legitimate sense, to interfei'e with the self-evi- 
 dencing power of the Word of God ? 
 
 Look at the Saviour of mankind at the tomb of Lazarus. 
 Could he not, by one word of his mouth, have caused the 
 great stone to be removed from the mouth of the sepul- 
 chre ? Beyond all doubt he could. But the removal of 
 the stone was within reach of the power of the assembled 
 multitude. Accordingly, did he not command them to re- 
 move it? There was that, however, which the assembled 
 multitude could not achieve. Neither their voice, nor the 
 united voice of all the myriads of mankind since the time 
 that Adam fell, could restore life unto him who lay putri- 
 fying in the grave. The voice of the Son of God alone 
 could have given efficacy to the command : — “ Lazarus, 
 come forth.” — By this word of power alone could the iron 
 fetters of the tomb have been burst asunder. 
 
 So, in India. If there are any obstacles that seem, in 
 particular cases, to interpose between the souls of men, and 
 the direct application of any of the means of grace ; — ought 
 we not, humbly and prayerfully, to apply ourselves to the 
 
S4 
 
 removal of these obstacles ? And if so, how can our at- 
 tempting to remove them, be said to impugn the glorious 
 truth, that “ the Word of God” is fraught with a self- 
 evidencing power, and is the alone efficacious instrument in 
 awakening and regenerating a guilty and polluted soul ? 
 
 I rejoice in believing, as in publicly declaring, that “ the 
 Word of God” has lost nought of that tremendous power 
 by which it pierceth to “ the dividing asunder of soul and 
 spirit, joints and marrow” — nor the sword of the spirit, 
 aught of its keen and etherial temper — and that, when the 
 Spirit of God powerfully worketh through the instrument- 
 ality of “ the Word of God,” every shred of opposition 
 must be dissipated, even though “principalities and domi- 
 nions” should league with the powers of earth in the fruit- 
 less effort to resist. I rejoice in believing, that, unlike many 
 of the gorgeous, but short-lived, forms of error, divine truth 
 — as revealed in the Bible — is still destined to shine before 
 an astonished world, in its beauty and strength ; — that it 
 will scatter to the winds of heaven all the doubts and fears 
 and irresolution of man ; — that it will infuse that spirit of 
 divine heroism, which, even in the view of excruciating- 
 torments, can resent, with holy scorn, every wretched and 
 cowardly compromise ; — that it will finally stalk over the 
 grave of its opponent error — and, if required, in fulfilment 
 of the purposes of an all-wise Providence, once more cause 
 the blood of martyrs to become “ the seed of the Church” 
 — and, in its glorious triumphs, run parallel with eternity. 
 
 All this, and much more, I rejoice in believing, so far as 
 concerns the capabilities of that Wox-d, which is emphati- 
 cally termed, “ the Sword of the Spirit,” — and the possi- 
 bilities within the range of a gracious Providence. And 
 yet I see not how all this can abstract one “jot or tittle” 
 from the piety, the wisdom, the propriety on our part, of 
 attempting to imitate the Omniscient God himselt, by de- 
 voutly endeavouring to adapt all our means, to the accom- 
 plishment of all our ends. 
 
 VIII. It has been alleged that, in the former statement, 
 there was not a sufficiently explicit reference to the indis- 
 pensable agency of the Holy Spirit, in the great work of 
 evangelizing a lost world. 
 
 My own impression was, and still is, that the distinct 
 recognition of this indispensable agency did pervade the 
 whole of the address, formerly delivered before this Assent- 
 
35 
 
 bly. And had I, for one moment, even suspected that I 
 had not adequately acknowledged what, with my whole 
 heart and soul, I believe, — that is, our entire and unquali- 
 fied dependence on the influence of the Holy Spirit, for a 
 saving efficacy on all the means of grace — our entire and 
 unqualified dependence on the influence of the Holy Spirit, 
 for the rise, progress, and final consummation of true reli- 
 gion in the soul of man, — I could not have given sleep to 
 my eyes, nor slumber to my eyelids, till I had silenced the 
 upbraidings of conscience by the freest, fullest, and most 
 unreserved acknowledgments, which language would enable 
 me to express. And now, if I only knew how to represent 
 the strength of my own convictions on this most vital sub- 
 ject, in terms proportionally strong, or in ternfs less liable 
 to misapprehension than those previously employed, most 
 cheerfully would I do it. I believe, that there is a spiritual 
 deadness in the soul, which will yield to no power^ save the 
 life-giving energy of the Spirit of God. I believe, that there 
 is a depth of depravity in the soul, which can never be re- 
 moved, except by the sanctifying influence of the Holy 
 Spirit. I believe, that there is a thick darkness in the soul, 
 which no mere human expedient can ever dispel — and that 
 the omnipotence of the Divine Spirit alone, can enkindle it 
 with the splendours of heavenly light. 
 
 IX. It has been alleged that disparagement was formerly 
 cast on “ the preaching of the Gospel” to the natives of 
 India. 
 
 So far is this allegation from being well-founded, that I 
 ask any man, whether friend or foe, carefully to peruse the 
 former statement, and then say, whether it be not in posi- 
 tive contradiction to many of its most explicit passages.* 
 
 But, if the charge of disparaging the divine ordinance of 
 “ preaching” in itself, be not only untenable, but prepos- 
 terously unfounded — it is still objected that I appear to have 
 “ poured contempt” on the preaching of Europeans to the 
 natives of India, through the medium of their own lan- 
 guage. 
 
 • See second edition, ]). 2G-28, wliere there is an elaborate attempt to prove 
 the necessity of remkrin^ the administration of the ordinance o/'“ preaching ” more 
 adequate, e^cient, a/ul perfect, than it has ever yet heen in' India — 'as well as the 
 necessity of multiplying the number of duly qualified lyreuchers'' a hundred, oi 
 even a thousand-fold." 
 
 C 
 
36 
 
 Nothing that has ever issued from m}' lips, on this sub- 
 ject, can be fairly alleged to merit the strong appellation of 
 “ pouring contempt.” If, indeed, the adduction of evi- 
 dence from the analogy of past history, and the known 
 capabilities of the human mind and its external organs, to 
 prove, what most reflecting persons would be disposed to 
 reckon a mere truism, viz., the comparative superiority of 
 natives over foreigners, both being alike quailed, in respect 
 to natural and spiritual endowments, when addressing their 
 own countrymen in their own language ; — if this be designated, 
 however unjustly, the “ pouring of contempt ” on the 
 foreigner’s exhibition as compared with that of the dfdg 
 qucdijied native — I cannot help it. This is merely the 
 statement of a plain historical fact. And the general fact 
 being an uncontrovertible one, I must, — for the sake of 
 truth, for the sake of India, for the sake of a benighted 
 world, — persevere, in openly and fearlessly proclaiming it. 
 And, if the whole “ head and front of my offending ” in this 
 matter has been, that I have jAainlg spoken out what the 
 consciences and experience of hundreds must pronounce 
 to be true, whether they openly avow it or not; — may I 
 not, for the sake of advancing the real prosperity of mis- 
 sions throughout the world, be permitted to rejoice in the 
 liberty of speech that has been given me ? — Cheerfully 
 willing, to bear my own lull share of the disgrace, if dis- 
 grace it really be, of not )n’etending to rival, far less out- 
 rival the learned natives of India, or of any other land, 
 either in a perfect knowledge of the peculiarities of idiom, 
 or a perfect enunciation of (dl the peculiarities ot sound, 
 which may characterize their varied dialects and languages ! 
 — Cheerfully willing, to submit to the discredit, if discredit 
 it really be, of not pretending to rival, far less out-rival, the 
 natives of India, or of any other country, in the physical 
 capability of withstanding tlie influence ot climate, or in a 
 perfect acquaintance with all the manners, customs, feelings, 
 sentiments, habits of thought, and prejudices that may dis- 
 tinguish its varied tribes and families ! 
 
 And here, I must protest against the validity ot one very 
 common mode of impeaching the accuracy ot the general rule, 
 as at present announced. It is based on one ot the grossest 
 of fallacies, — even that which converts a splendid exception 
 from a general I’ule, into a sjilcndid example of a general rule. 
 To illustrate what I mean. ’Fliat females nve not equal to 
 
37 
 
 men in military courage, is surely the general rule. Now, 
 how can this be said to be disproved, by pointing to such 
 a dazzling example as that of the celebrated Maid of Oi*- 
 leans, whose feats of heroism outshone, in brilliancy, the 
 entire martial prowess of France ? So, in like manner, if 
 the general rule be, as I have represented it, that foreigners 
 are not on a level with duly qualified natives, in the style, 
 manner, and effect of their address, — how can this rule be 
 said to be invalidated, by quoting one or more examples 
 from past or present times, in which a learned foreigner 
 may have rivalled, or even out-rivalled, a learned native? 
 
 Moreover, if this be the general rule, as to the subject 
 now under review, may 1 not ask : — Is it wise to make it 
 the general rule to fight against it? Rather, is it not the 
 dictate of wisdom, is it not the demand of duty, so to adjust 
 our plans as to have the general rule on our side ? — ready 
 to rejoice, at the same time, at the appearance of any 
 splendid exception, which an overruling Providence may 
 cause to be manifested, for the benefit of any tribe, or peo- 
 ple, or nation ? 
 
 And what is this but, in other words, to describe one 
 grand leading department in the great Missionary enter- 
 prise of this Church ? Believing the field to be “ the world,” 
 we have gone forth on a voyage of mercy and benevolence, 
 — and shall not reckon our task accomplished till we have 
 circumnavigated the globe. For reasons, potent and ma- 
 nifold, we made the metropolis of British India, the first 
 point of disembarkation. Do you, then, wish to see the 
 millions of India, awakened, regenerated, saved? And is it 
 worse than chimerical to attempt to reach and reclaim all 
 of these millions, by the direct bmuediate exertions of a mere 
 handful of foreign agents, — labouring under countless dis- 
 advantages ? Well, to meet the fearful exigency, and, as 
 speedily as possible, consummate the glorious end, have 
 we not resolved, in humble dependence on divine grace, to 
 rear up “ a school of prophets,” or religious teachers, who 
 shall diffuse the light and life of Christian knowledge, 
 throughout the length and breadth of the land ? And rest 
 we never shall, till, through the divine blessing, we behold 
 arising, a band of native labourers, who, mightily endowed 
 with the acquisitions of sound knowledge, and, above all, 
 with the gifts and graces of the Holy Spirit, shall become 
 preachers of the everlasting Gospel to the perishing mil- 
 lions of their own countrymen, — thespiritual Reformers, — 
 
38 
 
 aye, and I will add, — the Luthers, and the Calvins, and 
 the Knoxes of Hindustan I * 
 
 X. It has sometimes been impatiently asked, — What, 
 after all, have you done towards the attainment of the pro- 
 posed objects ? — And the question is usually followed up, by 
 a significant reference to the alleged meao-reness of the 
 
 ^ ® • O O 
 
 Committee’s reports. 
 
 I do not appear here, this day, as the advocate of the 
 Committee. Should the occasion require it, they are far 
 more able to defend their own proceedings, than I am. But 
 I do feel it to be incumbent on me this day, in the spon- 
 taneous and independent exercise of my own judgment, 
 publicly to declare, that the expectations of many amongst 
 us are worse than unreasonable. 
 
 These, first of all, look at the numerous monthly and 
 quarterly papers, and voluminous annual reports of the 
 great Societies in England. And then, turning round, they 
 ask with an air of affected surprise. Why does not your 
 Committee furnish similar papers and reports? — Why! — 
 iust because you loithhold the means of enabliny them to do so. 
 
 * Let it not be sui)posed tliat I look for the immediate appearance of sveh a race 
 of men in India. No. But I do look for their apix;arancc ultimately. And in 
 order to prepare and hasten the state of things that shall ?iurse and rear sucli men, 
 I would now, the more dilijjently, employ all tho^e ([uickeninp; means which God, in 
 times past, has been pleased to bless. God, in mercy to India, 7nay raise up such 
 men sooner than the most sanguine amongst us can anticipate. But, judging from 
 the experience of past ages, I should not hesitate to say, that such men can scarcely 
 be expected to arise during tlie present, iterhaps not even during the next, genera- 
 tion. There must be a be'^imvt!^ 72mv. Young men, instructed and trained in our 
 Christian Institutions, will, of necessity, shoot very far a-hcad of their i)rcdecessors. 
 — But the children of these educated natives will possess such paodigious advantages 
 over their fathers, that they, in their turn, may rise to still greater eminence, — both 
 in staldlity of character and reach of attainments. For it must be borne in mind, 
 that there is an educatim (f habit acquired, from constant intercourse in an advanced 
 state of society, which no mere eommwiicatiou of knmvted^e can ever bestow. For 
 the pretent, therefore, from the infantile state of improvement in India, the judgment, 
 and energy, and mature experience of enlightened Luropeans are indisihiiisably 
 necessary for superintendence and control, — and tliis necessity may continue for one 
 or more generations yet to come.' But, are we, on this account, to conclude that 
 the necessity must continue for ever? Because, in times past, the natives of India, 
 owing to the multiform disadvantages under which they laboured, have been inef- 
 fective, without the watchful guidance of Ilurojieans ; are we, therefore, to conclude 
 that they must continue to be so, in all time coming? Because, owing tothc.se 
 disadvantages, they have been enabled to achieve little or nothing, c.ieept in the 
 leading strings of Europeans ; arc wc, thei'tfore. to conclude that they must abide in 
 a state of pupilage and imbecility for ever ? No. Such a conclusion were not only 
 unwarranted, but in direct contrariety to many of the lessons of jiiist history. M'c 
 m.iy rest assured that the very same means, which have raised the desccmlants of the 
 ancient Britons into such itre-eminence above their savage aiicestoi's, will, if vigor- 
 ously applied, ultimately raise the sons of India into corrcsiwnding pre-eminence 
 above their father.s. Ours, then, be the task, — the noble task, — of beginning now, 
 and putting into oi)cration those means that shall ultimately uplift the natives of 
 India, to the stature of perfect men, in social, intellectual, and spiritual attainments 1 
 Then will they be independent of the marshdliug shill of JEuropeans. 
 
39 
 
 Think of the doings of the respected body of Wesleyan 
 Methodists. In numbers, fewer; in wealth, vastly inferior to 
 the Church of Scotland ; — how much, think you, do they 
 contribute annually to the cause ol their foreign missions 
 — Upwards of £76,000 ! — While the Church of Scotland 
 seems to reckon it a mighty matter to contribute £5000 ! 
 In the City of Edinburgh, the Wesleyan body is almost 
 unnoticed and unknown, — and yet, they raise upwards of 
 £500 for sending the light of the Gospel to heathen lands ! 
 — a sum nearly equal to that raised by the National Church 
 of Scotland, in its own metropolis, for the support 01 its 
 own mission to the regions of pagan darkness ! 
 
 Notwithstanding all our recent improvement on the 
 score of liberality, as compared with former years, I would 
 ask, in the presence of the assembled representatives of this 
 National Church, whether such a statement is not enough 
 to put us all to shame ? — and whether it is not true, that, 
 far from having unsealed, we have not as yet disturbed the 
 very margin of the fountain-heads of Christian benevolence 
 in this land ?* 
 
 And if the people of Scotland withhold the means, how 
 can they reasonably expect to hear of extensive labours and 
 mighty results? The Church of England, and Wesleyan, 
 and London, and Baptist Missionary Societies, with their 
 princely revenues, are able to establish numei’ous stations in 
 almost all parts of the world, and maintain hundreds of Mis- 
 sionaries. The bare enumeration of all their stations, and 
 missionaries, and churches, and schools, would form a 
 document of considerable bulk. I put it, then, to the com- 
 mon sense of all present, whether it be reasonable to expect 
 our Committee, with their limited means, and handful of 
 labourers, to rival these great societies in the voluminous- 
 ness of their reports ? — and whether such expectation be 
 not akin to the exaction of the tyranny that commanded 
 “ brick to be made without straw?’’ Only supply your Com- 
 mittee with the necessary means, and, through God’s bless- 
 
 • J.ct not this conclusion he evaded by referring: to tlie ciTorts lately made in the 
 cause of “ Chuich Extension” in ScoUand. 'I'hesc have been great, when compared 
 with the total negligence of former years ; — but the neeessities of the case demand 
 that they should be greater still 1 Have not the Methodists liad their cause of Church 
 Extension too ? Have they not had to build all their own Churches, maintain all 
 their own ministers, establish and support all their own schools? And yet, in aikli- 
 lion to all this at home — the aggregate of which vastly surpasses what the jicopie of 
 Scotland have ever yet done in the cause of Church and School Extension — the 
 iMethodists contribute upwards of ,-€70,000 annually for the propagation of the Gosjh;! 
 abroad 
 
40 
 
 ing, they will be enabled amply to repay you with a re- 
 dundancy of reports, abounding with the richest variety of 
 interesting details. 
 
 I cannot, therefore, allow the notion to be entertained for 
 a single moment, that the Reports of your Committee, so far 
 as the hare statement of facts is concerned, do not keep pace 
 with the effoi’ts of your benevolence. Your Missionaries 
 in India, fearful, perhaps to excess, of raising expectations 
 that may never be realised, often suppi’ess many a narrative, 
 glowing with promise, but stopping short of the announce- 
 ment of actual fruit. And, even in their report of the ap- 
 pearance of actual fruit, they have never been disposed to 
 make the most of the results announced. Facts, the most 
 important, illustrative of the operation of great principles, 
 are often put forth in naked brevity. Facts, which might 
 furnish the text of many a lecture, are often embodied in as 
 many words or short sentences, as, in the hands of some, 
 would call forth the lengthened commentary of whole 
 pages. 
 
 Besides, in o]’der rightly to estimate what has been done, 
 people ought to be able to estimate aright the vast dispro- 
 portion between the agency employed, and the almost 
 overwhelming difficulties to be at first surmounted. But 
 who that has not been in India — or, who that has been 
 there, but has not travailed in pain for the regeneration of 
 her children — can form an adequate estimate of the nature 
 and number of those antagonist prejudices and supersti- 
 tions which, in durability and magnitude, seem to rival the 
 munitions of rocks ? 
 
 To confront this terrible array in the midst of hostile 
 millions, what was the opposing agency employed ? For 
 nearly two years the National Church of Scotland equipped 
 and maintained in the field only one labourer ! What a 
 spectacle in the eye of the Christian world ! Can imagina- 
 tion itself conceive a situation more pitiable and seeming- 
 ly more helpless? Is it not enough to remind one of Hall’s 
 celebrated remark respecting the lonely willow tree, that 
 reared its drooping head, in the midst of a naked desolated 
 common ? — That it looked like nature hanging out a signal 
 of distress ! 
 
 Think of a whole National Church sending forth, to the 
 distance of ten thousand miles, one raw and inexperienced 
 labourer, to stand solitary and alone amid the boundless 
 arid wastes of heathenism ! — and say, if it did not look 
 
41 
 
 more like the Church hanging out a sig'ual of distress, than 
 bravely unfurling her banners for the spiritual conquest of 
 the nations ! 
 
 At length an additional fellow-labourer did arrive. And 
 though a third has since followed; and ere long a fourth 
 is to leave the British shores ; — still, in point ot fact, the 
 original ground at Calcutta, has never yet been occupied by 
 more than two at one time! 
 
 Now, when we compare the fruits already reaped by 
 your fii’St Missionaries, with those at first reaped by others 
 in the very same field — instead of lamenting that more has 
 not been done, the throne of grace ought to be approached 
 by all our churches, with the voice of praise and thanksgiv- 
 ing to the Father of Spirits, for the favour and countenance 
 vouchsafed towards his feeble unworthy seiwants. 
 
 On the authority of Mr Townley, one of the first and 
 ablest of the Missionaries of the London Society, I assert 
 that, in the province of Bengal, the first agents of three 
 great Societies —the Church of England, the London, and 
 the Baptist — laboured in pain and weariness for seven long 
 years, ere they were privileged to admit a single convert 
 into the bosom of the Christian Church ! But, long before 
 the expiry of half that period, through God’s blessing on 
 the labours of your Missionaries, several educated natives 
 of respectable families, and one of them a Brahman of the 
 highest caste, were led to bend the knee at the name of 
 Jesus — to adopt the badge of discipleship at the sacred 
 font of baptism — to sit down with British Christians, in 
 sweet fellowship at a communion-table, and there partake 
 of the emblems of the Lord’s broken body and shed blood. 
 
 And what though, fi'om peculiar circumstances over 
 which we had no control, one and another of those, who 
 received the first impulse towards Christianity from your 
 Missionaries, may have been admitted into the communion 
 of a branch of the Christian Church different from our 
 own, — shall we not rejoice, if they have been rescued as 
 brands from the burning, and their names written in the 
 Lamb’s book of life, even though they should be unre- 
 gistered in the Missionary Records of this chui'ch ? Yes, 
 verily, we have rejoiced, and shall still rejoice, with exceed- 
 ing great joy. And, in the name of this Venerable House, 
 let me disown and denounce the worse than anti-Christian 
 bigotry, that would rather not see immortal souls saved at 
 all, than not see them saved as the proselytes of a sect. 
 
42 
 
 At the time your mission was established at Calcutta, 
 the minds of numbers of the most promising of the edu- 
 cated natives, from the operation of the Government sys- 
 tem of education without religion, were either turned, or 
 rapidly turning, into the channels of infidelity. Was it 
 nothing to have succeeded, through God’s blessing, in 
 arresting a torrent that threatened ultimately to inundate 
 the land with the horrors of irreligious anarchy ? — Nothing, 
 to have x’endered the very name of Atheism a term of 
 loathing and reproach, instead of being, as it was, the 
 rallying watchword of a wild and reckless liberalism ? — 
 Nothing, to have aroused hundreds to read, search, medi- 
 tate, and inquire into the evidences and doctrines of the 
 Christian faith ? — Nothing, to have infused a wholesome 
 leaven into the corrupt mass that has been fermenting ever 
 since, and will go on spreading till India become the 
 Lord’s ? — Nothing, to have been instrumental, through 
 God’s blessing, in leading some of the very ringleaders in 
 this nascent conspiracy against the Lord and his Anointed, 
 to fall down as humble penitents at the foot of the cross ? 
 
 Was all this nothing ? Aftd yet not a tithe of the details 
 connected with these happy results can ever appear in the 
 reports of your Committee. 
 
 Again, was it nothing to have succeeded, through the 
 divine blessing, in establishing, within so very limited a 
 pei'iod, a large Christian institution, — which, for the num- 
 ber and respectability of its pupils, the efficiency of their 
 intellectual discipline and moral training, and the nature 
 and extent of their combined acquirements, literary, scien- 
 tific, and theological, has been pronounced by impartial 
 judges to be without a rival, from the lofty Himalaya to 
 Cape Comorin ? — An institution, which the highest and 
 most competent authority in the land, the Governor- 
 General of British India, publicly declared to have produced 
 “ unparalleled I'esults ! ” 
 
 Besides its direct and immediate results in destroying, 
 in the minds of hundreds, the combined powers of igno- 
 rance and prejudice, idolatry and superstition, and substi- 
 tuting the ennobling principles of true literature, science, 
 and Christian theology instead — look at the number of 
 problems, fraught with the most momentous bearings 
 on the future destinies of India, which it has helped 
 triumphantly to solve ! 
 
 Was it nothing, for example, by means of the unrivalled 
 
43 
 
 success with which God had been pleased to crown h, to have 
 demolished the bugbear ot’alleged impracticability, as regards 
 the attendance of respectable natives, for a series of years, 
 on a Christian Institution — and to have confounded the so- 
 phistical reasonings of hollow expediency, on the score ot 
 non-interference with the religious prejudices of the na- 
 tives ? — Nothing, to have paralysed the arm of opposition 
 — to have satisfied scepticism itself — and to have converted 
 the suspicions of craven cowardice into unbounded confi- 
 dence ? — Nothing, to have given a higher tone to the sen- 
 timents of many of the most influential British residents, 
 on the essential constituents of sound education — to have 
 infused a new and better spirit into some of the older sys- 
 tems — to have generated the desire of remodelling some 
 that were beginning to become effete ? — Nothing, to 
 have given such an accelerative impetus to the cause ot 
 native instruction, that scores of seminaries have already 
 been established, that otherwise would never have seen 
 the light of day* — and finally, to have provided many of 
 these new seminaries, with duly qualified native teachers, 
 that have received an intellectual, moral, and religious 
 training in your central Institution? 
 
 And if, as a learned gentleman opposite, j- and zealous 
 friend of every Christian enterprise, lately remarked, with 
 admirable point and truth: — If “the schoolmaster be the 
 school — in other words, if the minds of the pupils, laith- 
 fully reflecting their master’s image, must ever be cast in 
 the form and mould of his opinions : — Who can estimate — 
 who can sufficiently magnify the amount of wholesome 
 influence which the Assembly’s Missionai\v Institution, 
 viewed as a grand Normal Seminary for the training of 
 teachers, is likely to exert on the future destinies of India ? 
 
 Last of all, — Was it nothing, in the metropolis of such an 
 
 • “ Ifow iitaneroiis,'’ i-ciiiarks Mr Trevelyan, in an address to tlic friends of 
 Education in India, on tlie inlluencc of example, “ how mimeriAts arc the instances 
 in u iiich visitors to the General Assembly’s celebrated Academy liave caught the 
 .s|)irit of tlic plan, and been induced, on their return to their respective districts, to 
 form the nucleus of similar institutions! ” 
 
 Besides these, there are now, as recorded in the Committee’s Reports, several 
 Branch-Schools in immediate connection with the Central Institution, Calcutta. 
 'I’he lar;jest and most a<lvanced of these is the Seminary at Taki, about lifty miles' 
 1! of Calcutta. The distins'uishinp; circumstance connected xvith this seminary is, 
 that it is supixntcd chiefly by the Xemiiuiars of the (ilace — who contribute be- 
 tween twn ami three Innidird jmimls armually towards its maintenance. — May not 
 the enlie,htened liberality of these Hindu proprietors, Kalinath Roy Chaudri, and 
 Baykontonath Roy Chaudri — put to shame many a Christian proprietor in this laud ? 
 f Mr Colquhoun of Kellermout. 
 
44 
 
 empire as that of British India, in consequence of the 
 peaceable fruits of righteousness which your institution has 
 produced, to have succeeded in convincing certain timid 
 alarmists jn high places, that, as Christianity has never 
 taught rulers to oppress, so will it never teach subjects to 
 rebel ? — And to have given a visibility of demonstration to 
 the aphorism of the ancient apologist, that then only is a 
 government most sure that it exceeds in friends, when it 
 most surely knows that it exceeds in Christians ? 
 
 In the name of reason and common sense, I ask. Was 
 all this nothing, as regards the ultimate regeneration of 
 the people of India? And yet not a tithe of the details 
 connected with these happy results can ever appear in the 
 reports of your Committee. 
 
 What shall I say more ? — for time would fail me, were I 
 to attempt even to allude to all the topics, included in this 
 comprehensive theme. The very noblest department of 
 all, — viz., that of training a duly qualified body of native 
 labourers, who, as preachers of the everlasting Gospel, 
 shall one day cause its ghid sound to be heard among the mil- 
 lions of their benighted countrymen, — I pass by unnoticed, 
 because, though rapidly approaching maturity, it is one 
 which, from the very nature of the case, could not hitherto 
 have been brought into actual operation. 
 
 Altogether, our missionary undertaking is, as yet, only 
 in its embryo state. It is the unexpanded germ of a mighty 
 system of emanative influence, the full development of 
 which, in all its out-shootings and wide-spreadings through- 
 out the land, the living race of men may never witness. 
 But, through God’s blessing, it shall live, — it shall live, 
 and aye be flourishing; and thus tell posterity not merely 
 of the benevolence, but of the suitableness, of the original 
 design, — a design, which simply consists in transporting to 
 the plains of Hindustan, and vigorously applying for its 
 reformation, that very system of “ teaching and preaching” 
 combined, which, in the hands of our own Knoxes and 
 Melvilles, once rendered Scotland an intellectual, moral, 
 and religious garden, among the nations of the earth. 
 
 Seeing, then, that there are so many efficacious vivifying 
 agencies already at work, and so many more to be soon 
 brouoht into action — of whose direct and immediate effects 
 
 O 
 
 we can furnish no statement — though they shall not, on that 
 account, the less surely tell on the generations that are to 
 follow, — I earnestly deprecate all over-sanguine expecta- 
 
45 
 
 tions of immediate great i-esults. Ought we not, on this 
 head, to take warning from the lessons of a past experi- 
 ence ? Had the glowing anticipations of many of the ori- 
 ginal founders of missions been realised, would we, at this 
 day, have been everywhere surrounded by a wilderness of 
 heathenism, almost as impeneti'able as ever? No: we 
 should now have been called on simply to gather in the 
 ffleanines, after a oeneral vintage of conversion throughout 
 the world. That we may not, therefore, be plentifully 
 sowing the wind of confounded expectations, only after- 
 wards plentifully to reap the whirlwind of disappointment, 
 I crave for patience, I crave for time. 
 
 It is not the mere practicability of present plans, but the 
 possibility and desireableness of future achievements, that 
 we regard as the guiding pole-star of our exertions. We 
 desire to benefit, not the existbuf generation alone, but all 
 the generations of a coming posterity. Scorning the pomp 
 and glitter of romantic incident, and ephemeral applause, 
 we labour to lay the foundations of a combined system of 
 intellectual and religious culture, so deep and broad, that 
 it shall advance into futurity, with an annually augmenting 
 increment of force, till the final consummation of all things. 
 
 Our object, therefore, is not local or partial, individual 
 or temporary. It is vast and all-comprehensive. It is no- 
 thing less than intellectually and spiritually to reform the 
 universal mind of India : — And not merely so, but to em- 
 body the essential spirit of the reformation in improved 
 Institutions, that shall perpetuate its blessings to latest ages. 
 
 But, has it ever been heard of, that a great and perma- 
 nent reformation, in any land, has been the work of a day, 
 or a year, or even a single age ? — Never, never. A great 
 reformation is not merely the pregnant cause of innumer- 
 able happy effects : — It is itself but the aggi'egate effect of 
 innumerable predisposing causes, that may have been accu- 
 mulating for centuries, ere they became ripe for explosion. 
 Viewed in this respect, the Reformation of Luther has been 
 well compared to the rapids of a river, in its precipitous 
 passage from some mountain range, to the level plains 
 below. 
 
 Now, for India we not only contemplate a religious re- 
 formation, as effective as that of Luther in Europe, but 
 a reformation still more pervasive, and more thoroughly 
 national. 
 
 As yet, however, we are only defiling among the wild, 
 
46 
 
 I upland, and mountain ranges of Hinduism, — with its 
 bleak wastes of fable — its arid knolls of prejudice — its 
 ^ } frowning crags of superstition— -its towering eminences 
 j of idolatry. But, already, blessed be God, after the long 
 dark night of forty centuries, has the Sun of Righteousness 
 1 begun to gild the Eastern horizon. Already, are his earliest 
 beams seen reflected from the frozen summits. Already, are 
 ^ there droppings of truth on many a rocky hea^rt. Already, 
 
 I are there under-currents of inquiry, that shall one day 
 emerge, from the hidden recesses of individual minds. 
 
 ' Already, are there evangelical founts, that send forth their 
 j little rills of saving knowledge. Ah’eady, are the clouds 
 fast gathering, surcharged with the waters of salvation, 
 
 I and ready to pour down their copious showers. And soon 
 ' may the swollen brooks unite into rivers, and rivers into 
 a mighty stream of quickening influences. For some years 
 I more, the mighty stream itself may continue to flow on, 
 I through comparatively barren and unanimated solitudes. 
 
 ’ At length, impatient of restraint, it must burst its accus- 
 tomed boundaries — and, dashing headlong, in the foam 
 and thunder of a cataract of reformation, — it will 
 1 gently glide into the peaceful under-vale of time. There, 
 it shall roll on in its majestic course, — overspreading its 
 1 banks with the verdure of righteousness, — and pouring 
 
 the fertility of paradise into its pastures of gospel grace, — 
 
 f ' till it finally disappear, and is lost, in the shoreless ocean of 
 eternity ! 
 
 Persuaded, as I feel, that such is our present position 
 among the incipient processes that shall, in due time, unite 
 and issue in so glorious a consummation, I, for one, am 
 cheerfully willing to toil on, for years, in feeding, if it be 
 but one, of the little rills of awakening influence, — though I 
 should never live to behold their confluence into the 
 mighty stream of sequences, with its rushing cataract, and 
 waving harvest, gladdening its after-course. And, as re- 
 gards the ultimate realization of the magnificent prospect, 
 I would, even on a dying pillow, from a whole generation 
 of doubters, confidently appeal to posterity. 
 
 XI. Once more I would crave tlie kind indulgence of this 
 House, while I proceed briefly to notice one other objection 
 urged not against any statement of mine, but against the 
 scheme of Missions generally. It is an objection than which 
 none more insidious or plausible has ever been advanced, 
 
47 
 
 and than which none operates more widely or fatally in the com- 
 munications of private intercourse. Entitled, for this reason alone, 
 to at least a cursory notice, it is doubly so at the present time, on 
 account of its having been lately ushered into notoriety with con- 
 siderable pomp and circumstance, by one of our gi'eat organs of 
 public oj-'inion. The writer, though at a distance, cannot contem- 
 plate, without emotion, the great destitution of the means of gi-ace 
 in this nortliern division of the island. It would seem as if, in 
 the full glow of j)hilauthropic zeal, he could shed tears of com- 
 miseration over the spiritual ignorance and heathenism of our 
 neglected and outcast population. And he thus, hi substance, at 
 once appeals to our piety and our patriotism : — “ How can ye, 
 the members of the Church of Scotland, think of sending either 
 men or money to Hindustan, to convert the heathen there, that 
 are aliens in blood, language, and religion ; — when ye have so 
 many practical heathens, related to you by ties of kindred and 
 of language, at home, at your very door ? And how, by so 
 doing, can ye forget the admonitory exhortation of the holy 
 Apostle, ‘ He that provideth not for his own, hath denied the 
 faith, and is worse than an inhdel ? ’ ” 
 
 First of all, I might retort on this class of objectors, on the 
 score of their own gross inconsistencies. But waiving, for the 
 present, the subject of inconsistency altogether, and cheerfully 
 conceding the lawfulness of applying analogically the Apostle’s 
 apliorism, respecting the supply of temporal necessities, to parallel 
 cases of spiritual destitution, I here take my stand, and declare, 
 that, as employed by the objector, it is at once misquoted and 
 misapplied. And why ? For the best of all reasons, that it 
 has been quoted and applied for the express purpose of sub- 
 stantiating an egregiously unsound and unscriptural position. 
 
 The position, in few words, is this : “ That so long as we 
 have ‘ practical heathens ’ or unbelievers at home, we ought 
 not to send either men or money to convert the heathen abroad ; ” 
 — and, in support of this position, the aphorism of the Apostle 
 is quoted and applied. 
 
 \st. Now, this position I denounce, in the Jirst place, as un- 
 sound and unscriptural, because it is in direct opposition to the 
 whole proceedings and example of the holy Apostle himself, 
 during a life of labour, to which nothing similar or second is 
 recorded in the biographies of all ages. 
 
 The Apostle himself, we know, gloried in proclaiming the 
 unsearchable riches of Christ, not only to the Jews, but also to 
 the Gentiles, who were “ aliens from tlie commonwealth of 
 Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise.”^ Yea, ami 
 
48 
 
 in so doing, he often seemed to glory, if possible, still more 
 than in preaching to his own countrymen, whose were the fa- 
 thers, and of whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who 
 is “ God over all blessed for ever.” Figure then to yourselves, 
 the inspired Apostle, standing amid the barren wilds of Scythia, 
 addressing a group of fierce roving barbarians, persuading them 
 bv the terrors of the law, and the ardours of that love which 
 many waters could not quench, nor the floods of great waters 
 drown, to repent of their sins, and arise and return to that 
 heavenly Father, who, though he winked at the times of their 
 past ignorance, now wills all men to be saved, and come to a 
 knowledge of the truth ; and is ready to welcome every return- 
 ing penitent as a child, and order him to be clothed with the 
 spotless robes of the Redeemer’s righteousness. All eyes are 
 rivetted, all hearts arrested. Some are filled with alarm by the 
 upbraidings of an awakened conscience, and the anticipations of 
 a coming judgment ; and others are melted into tenderness at 
 the yearnings of Divine compassion that stream from Calvary’s 
 cross. 
 
 But, hark ! suddenly a voice, in the name of Philanthropy, 
 breaks in upon the moving scene. It is directed to the holy 
 Apostle: — “Why, oh! why, have you come hither Are 
 there not thousands, and tens of thousands of the seed of Abra- 
 ham — your own kinsmen according to the flesh, who, as yet, re- 
 fuse to embrace Jesus of Nazareth as their long expected Messiah, 
 and who, by so refusing, fill up the measure of impending 
 vengeance. Why, then, oh I why have you thus forsaken your 
 own unbelieviiifT brethren in Judea and Jerusalem, and come 
 hither to the uttermost ends of the earth, to seek out and con- 
 vert these rude barbarians, who are aliens in blood, language, 
 and religion ?” “ Avaunt I” — replies the holy A|)ostle, with a 
 
 vehement earnestness of truth, which, like the touch of Ithuriel’s 
 spear, unmasks the reptile that daringly assumed the goodly 
 form of Philanthropj' — “Avaunt! I know thy voice. Is Christ 
 the Saviour of the Jews only ? Is he not also of the Gentiles ? 
 Yes, of tlie Gentiles also. I, therefore, as the disciple of the 
 Lord Jesus, feel myself to be debtor both to the (ilreeks and 
 to the Barbarians — to the wise aud the unwise. And in this 
 I supremely glory, that iu Christ .lesus, the Saviour of the 
 world, there is neither .lew nor Greek, Barbarian, Scythian, 
 bond nor free, male nor female. In Him all arc one, and there 
 is no difference.” 
 
 '2d, In the second place, I might proceed at large to show, that 
 the objector’s position is grossly unsound and unscriptural, 
 
49 
 
 because it is in direct contradiction to the parting command of 
 our Lord and Saviour — in direct contradiction to the entire 
 spirit and design of the Christian economy. 
 
 This being the case, I would, with all the emphasis of an over- 
 whelming conviction, assert and maintain, that it is our duty, as a 
 constituted Church of Christ, to do more, tenfold more, than we 
 have ever yet done, towards sending the glad tidings of salvation, 
 not only to India, but, as speedily as possible, to all the unenlight- 
 ened nations of the earth. And this I would assert and maintain, 
 for the special reason, among others, that, by such faithful com- 
 pliance with the divine command, and such harmonious con- 
 currence with the spirit of Christianity, we might draw down a 
 larger measure of the divine blessing on our own heads — and 
 thus be the better enabled, more effectually to provide for the 
 spiritual neeessities of “ our own’ people at home — as well as 
 arrest the execution of the divine decree that may speedily come 
 forth, to remove our candlestick altogether, on account of a too 
 long neglected and unfaithful stewardship. 
 
 Consider Christianity in its essential spirit. Is it not, like 
 the principle of life, communicative ? — and, like the principle 
 of light, diffusive ? If, then, we attempt to do violence to 
 this — its essential spirit — by resolving that, so far as we are 
 concerned, it shall not be communicated as spiritual life, nor 
 diffused as spiritual light, among the benighted and famishing 
 nations, — how can we expect the fulness of the divine blessing, 
 even on those labours that are exclusively designed to promote 
 its benign inlluence, within our own narrow sphere at home ? 
 
 Again, consider the Saviour’s parting command, “ Go ye 
 into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature.” 
 Is it not unambiguous in its language, and peremptory in its 
 authority? Taken in immediate connection with the annexed 
 jtromise, “ Lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the 
 world,’ ’ — is it not clear as day, that there is not a command in 
 the Decalogue more absolutely obligatory on the world at large, 
 than this is on the Christian Church P If, therefore, any 
 Church of Christ should presume to -neglect or despise this 
 solemn injunction ol‘ its Divine Head and Redeemer, how can 
 it expect the fulness of his blessing, even in carrying on the 
 great work of reclaiming sinners and edifying saints within its 
 own circumscribed boundary at home ? 
 
 Lvery Christian Church has thus a double duty to perform, 
 —one, towards its own people, properly so called ; and another, 
 towards the icorld at large. If, therefore, while any Church 
 labours to fulfil its bounden duty towards the former, it, at the 
 
50 
 
 same time, neglects almost, or altogether, the fulfilment of an 
 equally bounden duty towards the latter : — If, while the one is 
 done, the other is left entirely, or in a great measure, undone : — 
 If, wliile the one half of the debt is cancelled, the other half is 
 left wholly, or in part, undischarged : — How can such a Church, 
 without self-evident delusion, pray to that God, whose ap- 
 pointed ordinance respecting the universal promulgation of his 
 ow'n eternal word, it practically disregards, for continued health 
 and felicity within its own more immediate pale ? 
 
 The very law or condition of the existence of Christianity in 
 a state of purity and vigour, is that of constant internal increase : 
 and the law or condition of internal increase is that of perpetual 
 circulation and unrestricted communication outward. In a 
 word, the very law or condition of its continued existence and 
 prosperity, whether in the case of individuals, congregations, 
 or national Churches, is that of increase hij means of free dis- 
 tribution. And you may as well attempt to counteract this 
 law, immutably impressed upon it by its Divine Author, and 
 yet expect to retain it amongst you in its state of pristine ex- 
 cellence, as attempt to suspend the influence of that “stupen- 
 dous energy” which causes the periodical revolution of all 
 worlds, and yet expect to retain the earth we dwell upon, in its 
 previous condition of harmony and beauty. 
 
 Analogies, though they may somewhat aid the conception, 
 do but;very imperfectly represent this knv. Christianity is, in 
 the Bible, compared to an expanding tree, that is at length to 
 embrace all nations in its all -covering shade : — attempt to lay a 
 violent arrest on the tree in its growth, and it soon droops, 
 withers, and decays. It is compared to a fountain that ever 
 overflow's, and is never exhausted : — attempt to lay a violent 
 arrest on the salient waters of the fountain, and these will soon 
 force an opening elsewhere, and leave the original reservoir 
 dry. It is compared to a shining light, that shineth more and 
 more unto the perfect day : — attempt to lay a violent arrest on 
 the portion of light admitted into your dwelling, and in the 
 very act of so doing, it becomes extinguished. Thus has it 
 been, literally and absolutely, with Christianity under all its 
 dispensations, from the beginning of time; — for, in its substance, 
 Christianity is, “ as old as the creation.” The law of existence, 
 immutably impressed on it by the Almighty, being that of in- 
 ternal increase — and the law' of internal increase being that of 
 communicativeness : — the instant you attempt to lay a violent 
 arrest on its free communication outward : — in other words, the 
 instant vou attempt to monojmJizc all its blessings, as if exchi- 
 
51 
 
 sively intended lor yourselvee, instead of regarding them, agree- 
 ably to Heaven’s grand design, as a sacred deposit, committed 
 to your trust, for the benefit of a lost and perishing world ; — 
 that instant, it ceases internally to increase, — and the instant it 
 ceases internally to increase, it begins to shrink and shrivel ; it 
 “ decayeth and waxeth old, and is ready to vanish away.” 
 
 What an affecting and overpowering motive does this suggest 
 to the making the work of missions, /. e., the divine work of 
 disseminating abroad the blessings of the everlasting Gospel, 
 not a subject of secondary or subordinate interest, but a subject 
 of prime and paramount importance, that ought ever to engross 
 a full share of the best energies of every Christian Church ! 
 
 3(/, In the third place, though the aphorism of the Apostle has 
 been quoted, and applied by the objector in support of a false 
 position, that is no reason why we should not proceed to apply it 
 in support of a true one. The objector has plainly admitted, 
 at least his reasoning has no meaning at all without the ad- 
 mission, that Christians, in general, are bound to provide for 
 the spiritual necessities of “ their own.” For this most 
 important admissiooj I w’ould thank the objector from the very 
 bottom of my heart, seeing it supplies me with a new and re- 
 sistless argument in advocating the special claims of India. 
 
 Whatever may be alleged of other heathen lands ; if it can be 
 shown of India, in particular, that it is now “ our own,” will it 
 not follow, as an inevitable consequence, from the objector’s 
 reasoning, that we are specially bound to provide for its spiritual 
 necessities, and that too, under the impending anathema, that 
 if we do not, we thereby “ deny the faith, and are worse than 
 infidels.” And if that Christian government which, right or 
 wrong, may have made India “ our own,” should fail in its high 
 duty in this respect; will it not devolve upon us as a Christian 
 people, and more especially as members of a Christian Church, 
 incorporated with that very Government, to come forth and dis- 
 charge our share of the obligation ? 
 
 The only question for determination then is — Whether India, 
 in any legitimate sense of the expression, can be really called 
 “our own?” — For, if so, the question of duty in providing for 
 its spiritual necessities is already peremptorily decided by the 
 objector in the affirmative. 
 
 Before an audience like the present, it is only necessary to 
 glance at a few leading particulars. I ask then — Is India, or is 
 it not, “our own ?” In the language of Cowper — “ Is India 
 free ? or, do we grind her still?” — Ah ! never has any country, 
 through such a long succession of ages, been so terribly scourged 
 
 D 
 
52 
 
 as India. Dearly has it paid for its diamond and golden mines — 
 its pearly and coral strands. Look at the unparalleled series of 
 Tartar and Mahammadan invasions. Talk of the volcano, with 
 its sulphureous streams ; talk of the earthquake, with its train of 
 chaotic ruins ; talk of the hurricane, with its desolating ravages ; 
 — all the yolcanoes, earthquakes, and hurricanes, recorded since 
 the world began, were but partial and merciful visitations com- 
 pared with the fiery, crashing, whirlwind eruptions of barbaric 
 hordes into the fertile plains of Hindustan ! Look at the oft- 
 repeated massacre of hundreds of thousands of unoffending 
 citizens in cold blood ! Look at their mangled bodies literally 
 piled into mountains ; and their severed sculls into pyramids ! 
 Look at the onward march of the savage conquerors. Before 
 them, all is as “ the garden of the Lord ” — teeming with plenty, 
 smiling with beauty, and exuberant with the varied bounties of 
 a gracious Providence. Behind them, all is as a desert, naked 
 and leafless, peeled and stripped bare — one vast and profound 
 solitude, where, erewhile, was crowded all that is beauteous in 
 form and pleasant to the sight — one wide and universal sepulchre, 
 where, erewhile, resounded the hum and the bustle of busy men 
 — and the wailings of widowed mothers and fatherless children, 
 where, erewhile, the voices and the notes of happy myriads 
 rolled along in sportive echoings ! 
 
 Ah ! blessed be God, from such terrific desolations India is 
 now at length happily delivered. By a long train of vicissitudes, 
 unexampled in the annals of time, a small island of the ocean, 
 at the distance of a hemisphere, — an island, whose inhabitants 
 were but naked, prowling savages, at a time when India was the 
 very cradle of civilization, legislation, and philosophy, has now 
 succeeded to the imperial sway of a dominion more extensive 
 and consolidated far, than that of the mighty Akbar, or magni- 
 ficent Aurengzebe ! For, which of India’s thrones have we not 
 now cast down ? Which of its sceptres have we not broken ? 
 Which of its treasuries have we not drained ? Which of its 
 territories have we not appropriated ? What first breathings of 
 impatience under the restraints of our foreign yoke are we not 
 ready to resent as rebellion ? Wliat incipient dispositions to 
 transfer allegiance to the lineal representatives of ancient native 
 monarchs, are we not prepared to quash, and capitally punish 
 as high treason against the Majesty of Britain ? 
 
 Are we not, then, at once the conquerors and sovereign rulers 
 of India? Is not India, therefore, in a peculiar sense “our 
 own?” Are not its people, in the highest and strongest sense 
 of the expression, “our own” people? — “our own” fellow- 
 
subjects — subjects ol’ the crown of Christian Protestant Britain, 
 as much as the natives of the Hebrides, or the Catholics of 
 Ireland ? Are we not, therefore, bound by every obligation, 
 human and divine, to provide for the spiritual necessities of 
 India’s children — the spiritual necessities of famishing millions, 
 whom, contrary to their own will, we have compelled, by force 
 of arms, to become “ our own ” adopted children ^ Yea, are 
 we not doubly bound to impart to them the treasures of useful 
 knowledge and of gospel grace, as the only adequate equivalent in 
 our power, in reparation of the wrongs, grievous and innumerable, 
 which in times past they have sustained at our hands ? As far 
 as good intentions are concerned, ours may now be truly charac- 
 terised as a paternal Government, that seems sincerely desirous 
 to redress every injury and staunch every bleeding wound. But 
 who can obliterate the long black catalogue, of treachery and 
 plunder, devastation and death, that swells the revolting narrative 
 of many of our earlier conquests ? Ah ! there have been deeds 
 perpetrated by the sons of Britain on the plains of Hindustan — 
 deeds, that in number cannot be reckoned up in order — deeds 
 of unutterable infamy — deeds that are engraven in characters 
 of blood in the ineffaceable pages of history, — ay, and registered, 
 as an eternal memorial against us, in the book of God’s re- 
 membrance ! And shall we withold the only adequate boon 
 which it is in our power to confer, by way of recompense, on 
 poor, ransacked, pillaged, ravaged, unhappy India? Ah ! if we 
 do, methinks the spirits of thousands, untimely slain, will rise up 
 in judgment to condemn us. Methinks, a long eternity of retri- 
 butive vengeance will seal the merited condemnation. But let 
 us now, if ye will, resolve to shroud the misdeeds of our fathers 
 in the mantle of oblivion. And, over the plains which they 
 have drenched with the blood of the victims of a mercenary 
 policy — and along the shores which they have strewn with the 
 wrecks of a griping avarice, — let us, their descendants and 
 kinsmen, resolve to rear the temples of Zion ; — those precious 
 monuments of piety and benevolence, which, in real glory, out- 
 strip the regal pyramid, and, in the duration of their effects, 
 outlast the fabric of the material universe ! 
 
 XII. Though much yet remains unsaid of what was origin- 
 ally intended, the failure of time and strength compels me to 
 hasten, however abruptly, to a conclusion. 
 
 And, in doing so, bear with me when I give vent to the 
 overpowering emotions of my own heart, by exclaiming in the 
 hearing of this great Assembly ; — Oh, that as a Protestant na- 
 
54 
 
 tion, and a Protestant Church, we were made to know, at least 
 in this the day of our merciful visitation, our high and godlike 
 destiny, as the Zion and Jerusalem of these latter times, whence 
 gladsome light and liberty might emanate to the remotest ends 
 of the earth I The men of Athens, Pagans though they were, 
 could, with one simultaneous voice, unite in the patriotic shout 
 Let us march against Philip : let us fight for our liberties : 
 let us conquer or die.” And is it not high time that we, as a 
 Christian people, should join in raising a far loftier note ? — A 
 note, that might be sublimely responded to by prophets, and 
 apostles, and the whole noble army of martyrs that now encom- 
 pass us around, as intensely interested spectators, bending from 
 their heavenly thrones ? And where, oh, tell me, where can 
 this loftier note be first raised more worthily than in this very 
 Assembly — .the representative Assembly of a Church founded 
 by a race of heroes, whose dauntless spirit, amid cruel sufferings 
 and death, amply proved that on them the mantle of prophets, 
 and apostles, and martyrs had largely fallen ? In order to real- 
 ise so blessed a consummation, would to God that all petty 
 jealousies and ungodly rivalries were for ever annihilated from 
 amongst us I Would to God that all unholy oppositions of 
 partisanship were for ever banished from our shores ! — opposi- 
 tions about questions, many of which, compared with the 
 conversion of a world of lost sinners towards God, aie so 
 contemptibly insignificant, that for a whole nation to be agitated 
 by them into turbulence and fury, does indeed,—- 
 
 “ Resemble ocean into tempest wrought, 
 
 To waft a feather or to drown a iiy 1 ” 
 
 Oh, then, that the middle walls of partition, which at present 
 sever the bleeding Churches of Christendom into so many hos- 
 tile sections, that frown defiance from each others battlements, 
 were riven asunder ! Oh, that all that profess the faith of 
 Jesus, of whatever name or denomination among men, were 
 melted down by the lightning of Divine love, and fused into 
 one homogeneous mass, actuated by one spirit, and raising the 
 one universal shout : — Let us march against the common enemy 
 of man : let us fight for the spiritual liberties of a world : in 
 the cause of the Redeemer, let us conquer or die. 
 
 Will this be branded as wild enthusiasm by the cold calculating 
 spirits of a boastful intellectual age ? With righteous indignation 
 I must repel the charge. Is it lawful for the British patriot’s 
 breast to throb when he hears the orator exclaim, amid the 
 deafening plaudits of a senate, “ where the standard of Eng- 
 land is planted, there, foreign dominion shall not come ? ” And 
 
is it not u higher and holier enthusiasm in the patriot citizen of 
 Zion to exult, when he hears a voice from heaven’s canopy pro- 
 claim — where the standard of the Cross is planted, there, Sa- 
 tan’s dominion shall not come ? Is it lawful for the British 
 patriot’s heart to vibrate with an undefinable thrill of ecstatic 
 joy, when he listens to the poet’s song of the meteor flag of 
 England, which, — 
 
 “ Has braved a thousand yeare 
 
 The battle and the breeze ? ” 
 
 And is it not a higher and holier enthusiasm in the patriot citi- 
 zen of Zion to exult, when he bears aloft the flag of the ever- 
 lasting covenant, which, for six thousand years, has withstood 
 more than the shock of a thousand navies, manned by human 
 and hellish foes ? — which still shall brave “ the battle and the 
 breeze” of conflicting moral elements — which shall survive the 
 funeral obsequies of sin, and death, and the grave, — and finally 
 wave, in triumph, over the citadels of the nations, when all their 
 pomp and grandeur are swallowed up and lost, amid the over- 
 powering glories of Messiah’s reign ? 
 
 With visions so bright spreading out before us, in the pro- 
 phetic page, shall we not arise and shake off all earthly dalli- 
 ance and delay ? Shall we not arise and put on the whole 
 armour of God ? — Ours is no ordinary warfare ; ours, no ordi- 
 nary struggle. — Oh ! let us then arise and go forth to the con- 
 test, cheered by the songs of divine chivalry, and animated by 
 the certain prospect of the victor’s crown. Let us go forth in 
 the spirit of ancient warriors, who fought the good fight, and 
 are now inheriting the promises. Let us go forth in the name 
 of Jehovah, Lord of Hosts. Let his standard be triumphantly 
 planted. Let truth and righteousness, salvation and peace, be 
 emblazoned on all our banners. Then shall we be unconquer- 
 ed, and pronounced unconquerable. And then, through our 
 conquest shall the Church of Scotland be hailed as a blessing 
 by the perishing millions of Hindustan— become a praise and a 
 glory in the whole earth — and cause the chorus of the redeemed 
 swell the louder, when, riding on the chariot of triumph and 
 attired in the royal robes of victory, they enter the mansions 
 of eternal joy ! 
 
 THE END. 
 
TJlis Day is Published, Demy 8vo., Price 8d., 
 
 NEW ERA OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND 
 ENGLISH LITERATURE IN INDIA; or, an Exposition of 
 the Late Governor-General of India’s Last Act, relative to the 
 Promotion of European Literature and Science, through the 
 medium of the English Language, amongst the Natives of tliat 
 Populous and Extensive Province of the British Empire- 
 By the Rev. Alexaijder Dufe, D.D., 
 
 Of the General Assembly’s Mission, Calcutta. 
 
 Also, Demy 8vo., Price 6d., 
 
 SPEECH Delivered in Exeter Hall, on Wednesday, May 3, 
 1837, at the Anniversary of the Church of Scotland’s Foreign 
 Missions. By the Rev. Alexander Duff, D.D. Published 
 by Request. 
 
 “ A strain of impassioned eloquence, to which it is not possible for any Report 
 to do justice.” — T/ie Record, 
 
 Dy the same Author, 
 
 THE MUTUAL DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES 
 OF PASTOR AND PEOPLE. A SERMON Preached on 
 Sabbath, Sept. 4, 1836, in the South Parish Church, Aberdeen, 
 on occasion of the introduction of Rev. W. K. Tweedie to the 
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 Is., stitched. 
 
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 of India .” — Scottish Guar^an. 
 
 EXTRACT of a LETTER respecting the Wreck of the 
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 Duff, D.D., one of the Passengers in that Ship. 8vo., 6d. 
 
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