3w'' VVl GOD GLORIFIED IN HIS SERVANTS. i < (I i7.« ' $} ; Fpr.v DISCOURSE COMMEMORATIVE OF THE LIFE AND LABORS OF TI1E REV. ADONIRAM JUDSON, D.D., Specially as a Ccanslatoc of tfje Scvlptuves. DELIVERED AX THE REQUEST OF THE BOARD OF MANAGERS OF THE AMERICAN AND FOREIGN BIBLE SOCIETY, IN TUE TABERNACLE BAPTIST CHURCH, SECOND AVENUE, NEW- YORK, ON SUNDAY EVENING, MAY 11, 1851. BY RUFUS BABCOCK. PUBLISHED BY DIRECTION OF THE BOARD, BY EDWARD H. FLETCHER, 141 NASSAU STREET. 185 1 . t CHRONOLOGICAL MEMORANDA OF DR JUDSON. Adoniram Judson was born at MaldeD, Massachusetts, 9th August, 1788. Graduated at Brown University 1807, and at Andover Theological Seminary 1810. Visited Eng- land with reference to missionary engagements early in 1811, and in September of that year was accepted as a missionary, by the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. Married to Miss Ann Hasseltine, of Bradford, Massachusetts, 5th February, 1812. Ordained at Salem, Massachusetts, the following day, and thence sailed for Cal- cutta on the 19th of that month. Arrived 18th June. Mr. and Mrs. Judson were baptized on a profession of their faith in Calcutta, Septem- ber, 1812. Sailed for the Isle of France in December. Thence, via Madras, they reached Rangoon in July, 1813. The first baptism in the Burman Empire was by the hands of Dr. Judson, 27th June, 1819. In the years 1824-’25-’26, a grievous imprisonment of more than twenty months was experienced by him. The 24th of October, 1826, Mrs. Ann H. Judson died at Amherst, in British Burmah. The printing of the first New Testament in Burmese was completed in 1832. The translation of the entire Bible into Burmese was completed by Dr. Judson, 31st Jan., 1 834. In April of the same year, he was married to Mrs. Sarah Hall Boardman, at Tavoy. She died, on her way to America, at St. Helena, and was buried there, September, 1845. Mr. Judson, with three motheiless children, arrived at Boston in October. Married to Miss Emily Chubbuck, June, 1846 ; sailed for Burmah in July, and arrived in December. In April, 1850, he embarked for the I“le of Bourbon for his health, and died the 12th of that month. Buried at sea, lat, 18° North, long. 93® East JOHN A. GRAY, PRINTER, *19 PULTON, COR, GOLD 8T. COMMEMORATIVE DISCOURSE. GAL. I. 24: ’•THEY GLORIFIED GOD IN ME." Noble was the sentiment, and intrepid its utterance by Massillon, at the funeral of the Grand Monarque, Louis XIV., whose remains had been carried into the royal chapel thronged with the princes and nobility of France; the sound of the dirge had ceased ; the orator arose amid all the pageantry of the fune- ral obsequies, and stretching forth his hand to the coffined dust, he lifted his eyes to heaven and exclaimed : “God only is great.” God only is essentially great ; and man’s greatness will be found to bear a very exact proportion to his relation to God. Man is great in goodness, as he assimilates to the Divine image, is filled with God, and delights in doing or suffering His will : great in evil, as he opposes God and seeks a fearful remove from Him. It is our relation to God then, in a peculiar, emphatic and most comprehensive sense, which marks the greatness of any of our race. Meeting this evening to commemorate one who was great in goodness, and good in greatness, let us, as his humility would dictate, ascribe to the true, the Divine source, the ex- cellences w T hich in him were developed. God’s special high en- 4 LIFE AFTD LABORS OF dowment, the position awarded by a mysterious, wonder-work- ing Providence, and specially the renovating, sanctifying, re- straining grace of God, made Adoniram Judson what we may well delight to contemplate, — what millions in this and other lands now admire, and what will be regarded in both hemis- pheres with livelier and more absorbing interest for generations to come. With a reverent, grateful, and self-oblivious spirit, let it be ours so to bear the torch-light of truth in these investigations, as shall most clearly indicate the divine revealings, so that we may glorify God in His servant. It cannot be needful to retrace, on this occasion, the minute outlines of his eventful life. Familiar as household words, in all our more intelligent circles, are those leading, prominent inci- dents, which interlink the boundaries of his earthly course. Enough of these will spring up spontaneously in our pathway to illustrate his endowment, his position, and the achievements which by the grace of God he wrought. In such a view as it is now proposed to take, the formal distinc- tions between nature, providence and grace are unnecessary ; for all these are only the different spheres in which God works, and in reality they are interfused with each other. What we call nature, when predicated of the endowment of a morally account- able being, has no little of the prescience and grace of the Al- mighty. His providence also is interpenetrated with grace, so that in whatever direction we turn our eyes, the devout contem- plation is filled with the view of Him who worketh all in all. In the allotments of our heavenly Father’s wisdom, Adoniram Judson had his birth and parental training in that wide-embra- cing link of the social sphere, the family of a New England min- ister in parochial charge. This is a somewhat anomalous posi- tion ; one which is well understood to give conventional equality, both with the highest and the humblest classes, in a society wdiere invidious distinctions of this kind the least prevail. This was not THE REV. ADONIRAM JtTDSON, D.D. 5 without its advantages to the subject of this sketch. It gave him “ ample space and verge enougli ” for the full development of all his powers. A vain, weak, precocious mind would be specially liable to injury from such a position ; but to one of tbe opposite character, it would be likely to minister certain advantages, in giving earlier, freer scope and exercise to powers which in less favorable situations might long have remained dormant. Forty or fifty years since it was more common than at present for the minister’s children, the sons more particularly, in some way to have secured for them the advantages of a liberal educa- tion; especially if parental partiality could discover in them (and nothing is easier or more natural) the germs of future eminence. This would prove either a blessing or a curse, both to the child and to the world, according as the judgment was correct or otherwise. Whatever incidental benefits may have resulted from it, no careful observer can questiou that it has been far from an unmixed good. These sons of Levi, one or more of them from a family, have been assigned to the clerical office, more out of re- gard to their parentage than to their talents or their graces, in many instances to the no small detriment of the cause of religion, and even to the sad disadvantage of the individual himself whom this allotment has placed in a false position. There is another aspect of this matter, however, which indi- cates its advantages less alloyed. The home influence, which is ever the earliest and the most powerful, was likely in such a family to give prominence to intellectual and moral worth, when weighed against mere material acquisitions. Whatever may have been the imperfections and the besetting sins of the ministry of our Puritan fathers, worldly-mindedness, seeking to secure wealth, has not been generally predominant. Nor is it easy to say how much all the tinge and shape of the future life have in numerous instances been given by these early im- pressions. Had young Judson passed the first dozen years of life beneath the roof of some decent, shrewd worldling, whose. 6 LIFE AND LABORS OF very soul was pervaded by the hallucination that gain is godli- ness, or the chief good, who can calculate the divergence of his orbit from the one in which he has moved '? The intensity and concentration of his forces, accompanied with keen, far-reaching discerment, might then have secured him a place among the millionaires of the commercial world. He might thus have vied with the Grays, the Girards, the Astors of our land. Or, had the kindlings of his early genius been fanned by the breath of polit- ical fame, his was a power adequate to scale its loftiest pinnacle. Had martial renown beckoned him to the field of her antagonism, to win a warrior’s glory, the quickness, vigor, and indomitable perseverance of his nature would have made him the peer of the great captains of the age. Other and happier inspirations imbued his childhood. The star most in the ascendant, through all this forming period of his life, would probably be intellectual eminence. For the days of chivalry had then passed. Monkisk austerities, the incense- burning and genuflexions, the rosaries and crucifixes, the cowls and palliums of mediaeval days, never had the prestige of honor- able renown among our Pilgrim sires. Protestantism was then and there working out its legitimate results of an intense mental excitement. The minister’s family, with all its associations, was the very place where this power was most certain to manifest itself. And in perfect harmony with this view, was the early intellectual distinction of Judson. How much natural scenery, together with the associations of the spot where the Pilgrims first settled, nearly two hundred years before, may also have contributed to form high, noble, romantic purposes in his youthful mind, it is not easy fully to estimate. Some of us know that forty years afterward, when Judson came back to his native land, and sat down in the home of his childhood, he fixed himself at a favorite window overlook- ing the harbor and the lighthouse of Plymouth. After gazing on these objects for a long time, with absorbing interest and THE KEY. ADONIUAM JUDSON, D.D. 7 manifest emotion, he exclaimed : “ This is the most natural scene I have looked on in all America.” While he was a little boy, scarcely higher than the table, the preceptor of his preparatory course of studies has assured me, that never did he witness with such joy, pride, wonder, the attainments of any other pupil. Impartial fidelity seems also to require the admission, that the usual infelicity of early intellec- tual eminence was distinctly noticeable in his youthful years. He entered the University with a somewhat overweening com- placency in his own powers ; with a conviction, which his whole collegiate course indeed justified, that if he willed it, the highest academic honors were within his reach ; that if he chose, all his competitors could easily be distanced. With such powers, and such increment to the intensity of their action by surrounding influences, heaping on fuel to the flames of an already scorching excitement, how great would have been his mercy to have fallen into the hands of instructors wise to discern the idiosyncrasy of his case, kind, faithful, capable, to undeceive the too sanguine and self-complacent estimate which he was coming habitually to place upon his own capacity. Let it not be forgotten that his college days were in the very height of the wild-fire delusion of infidelity, spread abroad by the French Revolution, the atheism of which had so widely permeated our own land, nor left even the institutions of learning, presided over though they were, in most instances, by the ministers of religion, unscathed b} r its blighting power. It was but a little earlier that President Dwight in Yale College had throttled the monster, theoretical and practical skepticism, and turned the tide in that noble institution, which for a time seemed about to be deluged by the vainglorious contemners of divine revelation. How price- less would have been the value of just such influences, in his col- lege course, on the subject of our present consideration. As it was, he left the halls of the University, bearing its highest honors, and bearing too a proud and almost contemptuous under- 8 LIFE AXD LABORS OF valuing of the gospel’s power to humble, to purify, and thus per- manently to exalt the human soul. Nor did the period of inter- mediate employment as an instructor of youth essentially modify his skeptical views, or seem to prepare the way for his future career. But the time of God’s special and merciful interposition was now approaching. He was setting forth on a proposed South- ern tour, or for a permanent residence there, perhaps to human appearances as unlikely a subject for the renewing grace of God els was Saul on his way to Damascus. But the Lord, whom he knew not and sought not, verified the marvellous sovereignity and condescension of His own promise: “I am found of them that sought me not.” Deeply interesting as would be the full development of that great change which here commenced, we have not room for it, and must await its appearance in the forthcoming biography. Could memory be safely trusted, we might — as from his own lips the casual hints have been heard — give some pencillings of the gar- nered recollections of that cherished period of his own history, in regard to which he may or may not have left more fully writ- ten memorials. How the tenderness of a mother’s tearful adieus combined with the recollections of a father’s long-undervalued prayers, and both were so plied by the energies of the Holy Spirit, that his infidel fortress began to seem insecure. Then it shook \* ith more ominous violence, foretokening the overthrow and ruin of those whom it had proffered to shelter. W hen he was fully aroused to examine its foundation, deemed so im- pregnable, they seem enshrouded in mist. He grasps for the pillars of support, but shadowy phantoms only mock his hope. Young man ! thy father’s prayer at that morning hour of parting, the silent tokens of thy mother’s holy yearnings of soul, return upon thee, meanwhile, with mightier and more subduing force. Thou canst not bid them away, tdl their benevolent embassy is accomplished. “I will know, will at least seek to know, whether Christ or THE REV. ADONIltAM JUDSON, P.D. 9 Belial have the right to control me,” was his mental if not au- dible resolve. But habitual, long-cherished infidelity does not readily relax its hold on the unrenewed heart. The Spirit was, as yet, but just opening his e3’es. He saw more and more clearly the weak- ness of that in which he had trusted, while the unsubdued and struggling heart was “Still of its own delusions weakly fond, And from forbidden pleasures loath to part. Though shriukiug oft beneath correction’s keenest smart.” A little increase of mental honesty and impartiality showed him how obvious was the disingenuousness of his course hitherto, in tailing for granted the falsity of the Christian system, while be studied, with enamored fondness and iteration, the vauntings, the sneers, and quibbles of a sciolist infidel malignity, set in array against it. Hence arose the determination to repair this injustice. “I will now treat this subject fairly. If there are valid arguments to prove the Bible true, I will thoroughly know them. And that I may prosecute this investigation under favor- able circumstances, I will betake me to the men set apart as guides for the educated in the development of the gospel system and its evidences.” What a neophyte was this, knocking for admission at the portals of the earliest of our Schools of the Prophets ! No won- der that the Reverend Doctors who guard the entrance demur on his admission. Will he not poison with these his confessed doubts the minds of weaker youth, whom they are striving to prepare for watchmen on Zion’s walls ? Will not that eager, un- tamed spirit, the flashes of whose eye betoken the pent-up fires within, cause them personal disquiet, making their seat more thorny than downy? Who can doubt that God guided their decision ? These teachers do not confer with selfish temporiz- ings. Their ease and timid cautiousness are put in abeyance. They know that the foundation on which they are building is of 2 10 LIFE AXD LABORS OF adamant- They can afford to struggle manfully for the mastery, to win such a trophy for Immanuel, and bring such spoils to their Master’s feet. We may not linger on those scenes of most absorbing interest, upon which angels no doubt looked down with intense concern ; where to the human view truth and falsehood, soul-liberty, with the life everlasting, or degradation and the woes of the second death, hung trembling in the scale. God’s hand held the bal- ance, and the right prevailed. Behold him now a new creature ! Old things have passed away — all is new. With the chief of earliest apostles to the Gentiles, he cries out, £i Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? ” To him, as to his prototype, it was soon revealed, “ Thou art a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before kings and nations ; and I will show thee how great things thou must suffer for my name’s sake.” To become a missionary to the heathen was, however, a very different matter then from what, in a great degree by his heroic fidelity, it has since become. It is no unworthy or needless episode in this commemorative discourse to consider what in- fluences they were which turned him, among the first, and as many believe decidedly the earliest of our countrymen to the great work of Asiatic Christian missions ; and what were the adverse influences with which he had to grapple, — the impedi- ments to remove, the hindrances to shake off, — in order to accept this mission work as the indicated sphere of duty, in which God had called him to engage. To our minds, in this day, the greater marvel may be, bow any disciple acknowledging the supreme authority of the Divine Saviour, and imbued with any share of the benevolence which He illustrated, can fail to feel the force of His last solemn injunc- tion, Go publish the glad tidings to every' creature. But as an historical fact, it is well known that a benumbing apathy long rested on the household of faith, and century after century, since THE REV. ADOXFUAM Jl'DSOX, D.D. 11 the Protestant Reformation, had passed away with very incon- siderable endeavors (frequently none at all) to carry abroad among heathen nations a knowledge of Christ crucified. The English Baptists, a score of years earlier than the period we are considering, had feebly but nobly commenced the work of modern Protestant missions ; and other branches of the Redeem- er’s followers in the same country had emulated their example, following or outstripping their career. But up to this time it seems to have been assumed that our voung country, pioneering the path of civilization in a rude wil- derness, and among wild barbarians, had work more than adequate to task all its energies, in laying the foundations of Christian institutions at home, and in endeavoring to bless the savage Indian with evangelical instruction. Very doubtful is it whether from any of his teachers, or of the venerable pastors most looked up to for counsel and influence, Judson had ever heard the intimation of any possible duty requiring Christian men of this country to cross the ocean in order to evangelize other lands. So far from this was the public sentiment, that it was then and years later very common for such men, even some of the most distinguished of their number, to ridicule the idea of evangelizing those who had not by a precedent civilization become fitted to appreciate and welcome Christianity. Moreover, the men who gave tone to the sentiments of the com- munity, the learned reviews, the political, literary, and reput- edly religious journals of respectability and power, joined their opposition, in no stinted measure or guarded terms, to the feeble attempts then being made to spread the gospel in India. The oracular Edinburgh Review, a little previously to the year we are now considering,* thus discourses on the motives of the missionaries in India, and the tendency of their labors : — “Upon this subject they are quite insane and ungovernable : they would deliberately, piously, and conscientiously expose our * In 1808. 12 LIFE AND LABORS OF whole Eastern empire to destruction, for the sake of converting half-a-dozen Brahmins, who, after stuffing themselves with rum and rice, and borrowing money from the missionaries, would run away and cover the gftspel and its professors with every species of impious ridicule and abuse. * * “Suppose we were to be driven out of India to-morrow, and to leave behind us twenty thousand converted Hindoos, it is most probable they would relaspe into heathenism ; but their original station in society could not be regained. The duty of making converts, therefore, among such a people, as it arises from the general duty of benevolence, is less strong than it would be in many other cases ; because, situated as we are, it is quite certain we shall expose them to a great deal of misery, and not quite certain that we shall do them any future good. * * * “Whoever has seen much of Hindoo Christians must have per- ceived, that the man who bears that name is very commonly nothing more than a drunken reprobate, who conceives himself at liberty to eat and drink any thing he pleases, and annexes hardly any other meaning to the name of Christianity. Such sort of converts swell the list of names, and gratify the puerile pride of a missionary. * * * “ Why are we to send out little detachments of maniacs, the lowest of the people, to spread over these fine regions of the world the most unjust and contemptible opinion of the gospel? The wise and rational part of the Christian ministry [ihe writer of this diatribe of misrepresentation and malignity being one of them] find they have enough to do at home, to combat with pas- sions unfavorable to human happiness, and to make men act up to their professions. But if a tinker is a devout man, he infalli- bly sets of!' for the East. Let any man read the Anabaptist Missions. [The papers drawn up by Dr. Carey, and published by Andrew Fuller and his associates, are here alluded to.] Can he do so without deeming such men pernicious and extrava- gant in their own country, and without feeling that they are benefiting us much more by their absence than the Hindoos by their advice ? * # * “ Shortly stated, then, our argument is this : We see not the slightest prospect of success ; we see much danger in making the attempt; and we doubt if the conversion of the Hindoos would ever be more than nominal. The instruments employed for these purposes are calculated to bring ridicule and disgrace upon the gospel ; and in the discretion of those at home, whom we consider as their patrons, we have not the smallest reliance.” These are but a specimen of the more decent outpourings of this dignified quarterly, little more than forty years ago. We TIIE REV. ADONIRAM jri'SOX, III). 13 will not pollute our pages nor pain your ears with the Billings- gate utterances of a coarser and less delicate character, from the same and kindred sources. Enough may here he seen to indicate the nature of the missionary enterprise, as it was then regarded. To this maligned object the attention of Judson was turned. He read and pondered Buchanan’s Star in the East. He felt, as a redeemed sinner should feel, the immensity of his personal obligation to his Divine Saviour, who had just plucked him as a brand from the burning. Incidentally, the acknowledgment has been drawn from him, that “one day as I retired to a grove in the rear of the Andover Seminary, for meditation and prayer, and the urgency of this great question was pressing on my soul, How shall I knmv the path of my duty ? the Saviour in unwonted and enrapturing loveliness revealed himself. 1 was willing, yea, ardently desirous to yield myself entirely to llis will. With constraining power His words came to my heart anew, Go TEACH AH, NATIONS.” Nor w as he disobedient to the heavenly mandate. His de- votement appears to have been considerate, prayerful, entire, and final. Neither was it to be expected that one so obviously born to lead would take such a step alone. Other hearts catch the holy fire, (some of them, indeed, having quite independently, and still earlier than his own, been impressed with this great theme,) and on the memorable 10th of June, 1810, a modest but remarkable document, written by his hand, and signed by him- self and three associates, gives to their fathers in the churches of Christ the first official oiler of themselves on the altar of Mis- sions to the Heathen. So had God directed, that this overture was addressed to the very body of men, of all others in our land, probaoly the best fitted at that time, by intelligence, piety, zeal, and influence, to take the initiative in such a work. Nor was it without a divine, benignant purpose, that while these ecclesiastical fathers of 14 LIFE A^D LABORS OF New-England were deliberating, Judson was sent to England to confer with the managers of the London Missionary Society, and on the way was detained some months a prisoner in France. He at length returns, and with four others is set apart by solemn ordination to such a work as young America had not before attempted. The impulse which this heroic act had given to missionary benevolence, the willing offerings which were cast into its treasury, the prayers breathed forth so warmly and widely for its success, have strengthened his own and his asso- ciates’ assurance that God’s favor was upon it ; and the little brig Caravan put forth from Salem harbor on that wintry day, bearing hearts of pious heroism as distinguished as those which one hundred and ninety-two years earlier had thronged the Speedwell, in the roadstead of Delf haven. Wonderful is that overruling providence of God which in a way so unexpected, by instrumentalities so unlikely, can gather fresh increment of renown to His great name, and spread bene- ficence so widely among His creatures, from sources to human • view the most unpromising. A numerous, extensively diffused Christian commuuity in this country, little distinguished at that day for the general prevalence of education, even in its ministry, without wealth, or the spirit of co-operation, or far-seeing re- ligious enterprise, it was now the good pleasure of our heavenly Father to allure to a participation of the great work of evan- gelizing the nations ; conferring on them incidentally, by this very effort, a richer blessing, even so far as their own augmenta- tion and improvement are concerned, than they could otherwise have realized. To secure this beneficent purpose, how simple and direct the process. The good Spirit of our God, which each day of that eventful voyage Judson was imploring for his guide, breathed into his mind the natural and the fit purpose adequate- ly to prepare himself, by thorough study of his Greek New Tes- tament, to meet ai d confute the ritual, distinguishing practice of those venerable men of God, the humble Serampore missionaries. THE EEV. ADONLRAM JT7DSOX, D.D. 15 How unforeseen was the result! Thus many a man who goes forth with the spirit of a conqueror, returns vanquished. The power of prejudice, the pride of consistency, the allurements of most endearing associations, — what are they all when weighed against God’s truth, by a heart shrinkingly susceptible to the sacredness of its power ! Again it must be said of him as of Paul, he conferred not with flesh and blood, but while regarding, as he then declared, the rupture of associations incident to his change of views as the most distressing event which had ever befallen him, he was notwithstanding promptly obedient to the heavenly vision. The evidence which passed before him on this subject may indeed fail to impress other minds equally. Enough for our present object that to him it seemed conclusive.* Without at all seeking either to magnify or undervalue the points of difference involved in this change, we should not pass from it without remarking that he who does not see in this transition of an humble, unportioned young man from the ranks of one company of Christ’s professed followers to another, with its cohering results, something higher, nobler, worthier, and of • more far-reaching relevancy to God’s cause, than the petty tri- umph or discomfiture of a narrow-minded sectarian partisan on either side, has yet to open his eyes more widely, if he would take in the divinely-assigned lesson w 7 hich is here taught of the wisdom and goodness of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will ! Ere Judson reaches India, war between the United States and Great Britain, with its myriad other evils, is throwing new im- pediments in his pathway. Wonderfully is he enabled to elude the purpose of the royal Governor and the Directors of the East India Company, who seemed bent on sending him back to this * The summary view of his reasons for the change of his views, his practice and his relations, he gave in a discourse on the Mode and Subjects of Baptism, delivered in the Lai Bazar Chapel, Calcutta, 27th September, 1812, published in frequent editions in India, in England, and in this country. 16 LIFE AND LABORS OF country. The Isle of France becomes a little Zoar to him for a few months. But his eye and his heart were long since turned toward darkened, degraded Burmah. Nor can the forbidding features of the character of her people, the perfidy and intoler- ance of her rulers, or the perils to himself and his companion which a residence among them involves, the one or all of them combined, deter him from making the experiment. What faith in God did this act evince ! Then for years see his quiet, earnest, persevering devotement to the mastery of a very difficult heathen language. Witness the struggle of attempting to repress the zeal which would have led him away from the faithful pursuit of this high and ultimately indispensable attainment, in order to attempt some impracticable and short-sighted benefit to these poor pagans around him, of a more immediate character. He struggles on, with infirm health, an enervating climate, with few or inadequate helpers, for four years. He begins to feel some confidence in his mastery of the language. A printer has arrived, and two small tracts which he had carefully prepared have been published. He is busy on the translation and print- ing of the first of the Evangelists, when his ears and heart are gladdened by the first earnest, spontaneous inquirer for the gospel salvation. What an hour was that when, silting by his teacher as usual, he says : — “A Burman of respectable appearance, and followed by a servant, came up the steps and sat down by me. I asked him the usual question, where he came from, to which he gave no explicit reply, but soon astonished me by asking, ‘How long time will it take to learn the religion of Jesus?’ I replied that such a question could not be answered. It God gave light and wisdom, the religion of Jesus was soon learned ; but without God, a man might study all his life long and make no proficiency. But how, continued I, came you to know any thing of Jesus? Have you been here before? ‘ No.’ ‘ Have you seen my writing eoncerning Jesus?’ ‘ I have seen two little books.’ ‘Who is Jesus ?’ ‘ He is the Son of God, who, pitying creatures, came the REV. ADONIRAM .TTTDSON, D.P. IT into the world and suffered death in their stead.’ ‘Who is God?’’ ‘He is a Being without beginning or end, — not subject to old age or death, but always is.’ I cannot tell how I felt at this moment. This was the first acknowledgment of an eternal God that I had ever heard from the lips of a Barman. I handed him a tract and catechism, both of which he instantly recognized, and read here and there, making occasional remarks to his fol- lower, such as, ‘This is the true God, — this is the right way/ etc. I now tried to tell him some things about God, and Christ, and himself ; but he did not listen with much attention, and seemed anxious only to get another book. I had already told him two or three times that I had finished no other book ; but that in two or three months I would give him a larger one, which I was now daily employed in translating. But he replied, ‘ Have you not a little of that book done, which you will graciously give me now?’ And I, beginning to think that God’s time is better than man’s, folded and gave him the first two half sheets, which contain the first five chapters of Matthew, on which he instantly rose, as if his business was all done, and, having received an invitation to come again, took his leave.” This first use of a portion of the translated Scriptures in Bm- man may fitly introduce a principal theme of this discourse, namely, the labors of Mr. Judson as a translator of the Bible into the language of an important and interesting nation, supposed to contain, at the time when he commenced this work, a population equal to that of the United States at the same period. The slightest consideration of this subject will evince the in- dispensableness of furnishing the Sacred Scriptures to such a people, in their vernacular tongue, by any Protestant enterprise for their evangelization. The Romish Church have always ex- onerated themselves from any such obligation in regard to those whom they professedly convert to their faith. Not allowing, or certainly not encouraging, the common people to peruse the Scriptures for themselves, it would not be expected of them to furnish translations. Hence, in the various missions established by the Catholics, even among nations advanced in civilization, and possessing ample literary facilities, no effort has been made 3 18 LIFE AND LABORS OF by Jesuit, or the more liberal Jansenist missionaries, to translate the inspired records of the Christian faith to be published abroad for the mass of the people. Their breviaries and missals, their liturgies and homilies, have been industriously circulated, show- ing how much more confidence they have “ in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth ” than in those inspired by the Spirit of God.* Protestants, on the contrary, regard the appeal of the whole body of the disciples to the Scriptures as a fundamental principle. It admitted, therefore, neither of doubt nor delay that the Bur- mans should have the lively oracles which declare to us God’s salvation faithfully translated into their own language. But what are the requisites for such a work? They are ob- viously two-fold : intellectual and moral. He who would suc- cessfully perform this great service for a whole nation, and for successive generations, if not enthusiastically claiming miracu- lous aid to fit him for it, must gird himself for the high endeavor with no ordinary amount of studious research. He must, as thoroughly as man ever did or can, master the exact meaning of every word and sentence of the Hebrew, Chaldee, and Greek Scriptures. Whatever can throw light on the sacred page, either from ancient or modern investigations, he must familiarly * As exemplifications of this deficiency of Catholic missions, and the disastrous result* ■which have followed, look at the 1 two striking illustrations which have been furnished in India and in China. The Romish mission at Goa was planted as early as the middle of the fourteenth century by Xavier himself, and was long reckoned one of the most flourishing which that Church could boast But they never gave the true Shaster to the common people. They contented themselves with introducing them to a round of semi-heathenish and idolatrous rites and forms, to the worship of images, relics, and reputedly sacred times and places baptized into a Christian name; while both the mind and heart were unfed with the Divine Word from heaven, which giveth life to the soul Let the miserable results be traced in that now waning and almost extinct mission, which once so greatly flourished. Similar have been the effects of a like defect at Macao. For nearly one hundred years there was apparent prosperity attending that mission of the Jesuits. But they dared to withhold the Bible from the people ; and they had not the enforcing power of royal mandates, (like their reliance in several of the European nations,) nnd hence no wonder they are rapidly declining, and never have accomplished much good. THE REV. ADONIRAM JUDSOX, D.D. 19 understand. Tlie Biblical researches of the noblest minds must be laid open to his view, yea, their results must be incorporated into and made a constituent of his own convictions. What powers of perception, analysis, comparison, and combination does all this process require ! so as without confusion or feeble- ness, neither betrayed by the desire of undue originality, nor blindly led by authority, nor swayed by prejudice, he may tena- ciously lay hold of the truth, by whomsoever disclosed, and interweave this with the results of his own mature and thorough investigations.* The difficulty of securing these varied attainments will be made more obvious by running the eye over the lists of even dis- tinguished men who in this department have attained but moder- ate success. It seems to be now generally conceded, even by learned Lutherans themselves, that the great reformers of their school were by no means eminent in the historical and gram- matical interpretation of the Holy Scriptures. For Luther, Melancthon, Musculus, or Bugenhagen, it will now be scarcely claimed that by a thorough knowledge of the original languages of the Bible, and of the antiquities, manners, customs, and geog- raphy of the ancient world, they adequately sought to give a connected development of the real sense in the mind of the sacred writers, in every instance. Calvin has perhaps done more and better as a Biblical interpreter than any one of the early reformers ; nor does there seem just ground for contesting the claim which Tholuck has ably maintained for him, that in his exegetical labors, on the New Testament at least, he evinces considerable doctrinal impartiality, with ingenious tact, various learning, and deep Christian piety. Yet even he betrays an un- lovely and indefensible solicitude to bring forward on all occa- sions, and without occasion, some of the fundamental and favor- * See some admirable common-sense vievre, from an experienced and able band, on the difficulty of correct translations, in Dr. George Campbell’s Preliminary Dissertations to his Translation of the four Gospels — Diss. X., part 1st. 20 LIFE AND LABORS OF ite views of his system, — thus lessening our respect for his candor. Nor were the leaders in the English or Scotch reformations, however distinguished some of them may have been for other excellences, ever greatly renowned for their attainments in Biblical interpretation. In one department, indeed, the English mind has always evinced its superiority, namely, in the power of a logical, common-sense deduction of the true sense, from regard to the scope of the passage under consideration. Now this excellence, when combined with adequate grammatical and historical investigation, in which the Germans have proved them- selves so successful, will furnish the perfection of fitness for a translator, so far as this portion of his qualifications are con- cerned. He must indeed, first and chief of all, be pervaded with pious reverence for God’s Word. This will secure the faithful application of whatever intellectual acquisitions are within his reach ; will keep the eye, and heart, and hand un- waveringly fixed on the great end to be accomplished. He who is thus imbued with a knowledge of and love for the Sacred Writings has the first indispensable requisite for a translator of them. Together with this, there should also be found such homo- geneousness, such harmony of spirit between the translator and the original text, as will enable him readily to enter into, and sympathize with, the various parts of its composite character. No one, for instance, would expect a mere mathematician to properly translate a fine poem ; nor, on the contrary, would the man of predominant imagination, manifesting itself in nice artis- tic beauty, be any more competent to do justice to a work of scientific details, with all their combinations and evolutions. Now the Bible, more than any other single book, presents us with a comprehensive variety of dissimilar characteristics. Here we find the simple narrative ; there the deep philosophy, or the sententious proverb. Now you are soaring on the wing of im- TIIE REV. ADONIRAM JUDSON, D.D. 21 passioned poetry ; and anon you are led to grapple with a pro- found argument, or feel the power of the most spirit-stirring eloquence. All this obviously demands, in any one man who should hope adequately to translate this holy book, such a com- bination of tastes and attainments as are very rarely found in any single individual. Hence the Germans, and the Dutch, and the English combined many laborers on their respective versions, in the hope, no doubt, that the deficiencies of one would be sup- plied by some of his associates, and so the great work of trans- lation and revision would be rendered as perfect as possible. And yet, in full view of all this difficulty, it does not seem utterly impossible for a man richly endowed, and who by long- continued, earnest study has become measurably assimilated to the varied character of this holy book, to approximate very closely to the ideal of this requisite, which the nature of the case seems absolutely to demand. Moreover, in case of a missionary to the heathen who under- takes a version of the Scriptures into their language, we shall at once perceive that no small additional difficulty will present itself in his own inadequate knowledge of the tongue into which he is required to translate. This was not experienced by Wick- liffe and Tvndale when they translated the Scriptures into Eng- lish ; or by Luther when he rendered them into German; or Calvin into French ; — for each of these translated into his mother tongue. But however difficult, it is an indispensable require- ment in a translator. He must fully understand the language, and, in order to this, the mental and moral constitution, history, philosophy, and habits of the people into whose tongue he is to make his version of the Sacred Writings. Obviously it is not enough that a tolerably correct knowledge of the mere vocabu- lary of that tongue be possessed by the translator. To guard his version against liability to the most frequent and glaring miscon- ceptions, he must know not only what senses a word or phrase will allow, under certain contingencies, but what will be its 22 LIFE A XL) LABORS OF danger of perversion in the particular case or connection he is now considering. But such knowledge cannot be secured by one who is not very thoroughly conversant with the mental and moral habits of a people, as well as with those forms of expres- sion which are but their manifestation. The missionary’s mastery of a language so utterly unlike either to his own vernacular or the whole family of its cognate tongues, is a work of vastly greater difficulty than those can con- ceive who have had no experience in such a case to guide them. Mr. Judson, after several years of most earnest and exhausting toil devoted to the acquisition of Burman, said of his success that it did not equal what a three months’ study of French had for- merl} T yielded him in the knowledge of that language. Having to begin without elementary books, or even teachers well qualified to render the requisite aid, his was the Herculean task of climb- ing the steep and lofty acclivity without a ladder, — of feeling out the tortuous paths of the labyrinth without the guiding thread. For be it remembered, no such superficial knowledge of the language as the purposes of ordinary intercourse, for trade, for the gratification of pleasure or curiosity, demand, will in any degree satisfy him who feels adequately impressed with the responsibility of giving to a great nation a correct trans- cript of God’s Word, by which their eternal destiny is to be affected. For all these reasons, we see the beneficent wisdom of that divine arrangement which makes such a scholar and such a man O the instrument of conferring this priceless boon upon the millions of Burmah. Just consider the facilities he has enjoyed for more than one third of a century, in mingling freely with all classes of the people, from the palaces of their princes to the dungeons of their prisoners ; in their dwellings, their market-places, their secular and sacred assemblies, no less than by the diligent pe- rusal, yea, the earnest and persevering study and collation of their not meagre manuscripts, their books of palm-leaf, and THE KEY. ADOXIRAM JUDSOX, U.D. 23 whatever form of transient or more permanent record their literature has assumed. Most of his long missionary life Dr. Judson has been enabled to be an indefatigable student. He has given some seven or eight hours a day to faithful, earnest study, and learned so to regulate his diet, his exercise, and the alternations of his employment, as to secure to himself the utmost possible amount of mental vigor.* The result of all this has been a very wonderful and most per- fect mastery of the difficult Burman language. Years ago, when his knowledge of it was of course far less exact and comprehen- sive than it has since become, the brother of the present King of Burmah admitted to the Rev. Dr. Malcom that no man in the empire so well understood their language in all its capabilities as our missionary. How unlike in this respect was his fitness for the work of a translator to that of those who are obliged to rely chiefly on the help of their pundits, or professedly learned na- tives, whose real knowledge of either English or their own tongue has so frequently proved to be wretchedly inadequate. “A translator must be able readily to think in the language into which his version is to be made,” was Judson’s own testimony. His exhortation to junior missionaries, who seemed to have a talent for philology, often was, “Read the palm-leaf — read the palm-leaf.” [The native books are generally w-ritten on pre- pared palm-leaves.] Nor were Dr. Judson’s Biblical attainments less eminent. Having early formed the habit of great exactness and thorough- * Rev. Dr. Malcom says : “ His care of his health Teas remarkable. It was a sacred and conscientious tiling with him ; not for the sake of comfort, for he constantly sacri- ficed comfort and love of ease for the sake of health. It was the unity of object so conspicuous in him. He wanted to husband all his powers and keep them in order. No man ever feared death less than he. It was his sovereign remedy for sorrow to think of death. But he valued life, and he used it as a steward. He never exposed himself to the sun, or to the night air. He would not cross his yard at mid-day without a great umbrella. I often sat with him in the evening, shut up closely by mats at the windows, enduring the discomfort sooner than risk the unwholesome but pleasant breeze.” 24 LIFE AND LABORS OF ness in his investigation of the meaning of divine revelation, and having a passionate fondness for studies of this character, he availed himself of the helps which the best exegetical writers, English and American, but especially those of Germany, have furnished. Undazzled by their lofty pretensions, and unseduced by their daring innovations, he yet employed their aid to the ut- most, wherever it could avail either in fixing the sacred text of Scripture, or in ascertaining its meaning.* In this respect it is doubtful whether his superior, if indeed his equal, is to be found in the whole compass of missionary translators of God’s Word. Some of the eminent Biblical scholars in our country were sur- prised, in their personal intercourse with him, to find that he had fully kept up with the rapid progress of that important depart- ment of sacred science, for the last thirty or forty years. Nor were his varied endowments and attainments less strik- ingly adapted to fit him for success in all parts and aspects of this great endeavor. A few of these can barely be mentioned here without any amplification. While yet a recent graduate from the University, and employed as an instructor of youth in one of the academies of his native State, he prepared and pub- lished a grammar of the English language. Who can tell how much the preparation of this his earliest offering to the press served to turn his attention to the forms and relations of words, in which department he afterward was to act so distinguished a part ? His style of writing in English may well be reckoned a model of clearness, terseness, vigor; the very qualities most needful in his great enterprise. He had just little enough expe- rience of religious polemics, to sharpen without souring his spirit. The few of his poetical contributions which have been allowed to see the light, prove conclusively how much of the spirit of the sacred bards of the Bible glowed in his soul, fitting him admi- rably to enter into their conceptions. He was indeed very re- * The liberality with which the Mission Board furnished to his order all the best works in this department, without regard to expense, is worthy of all commendation. 25 the REV. ADONIKAM JUDSON, D.I). markable for devotional feeling. Intensely was lie imbued with the spirituality of the pietists of the school of Fen6lon. Many of them, without Judson’s logical and mathematical mind, went to excess. He never did. Symmetry of mental constitution and of attainment was one of his noticeable characteristics ; but his devotional eminence was still prominent, and admirably litled him to catch the true spirit of a thousand passages, to which otherwise he could not have done justice. What John Foster somewhere denominates the intense severity of conviction that he had one thing to do, impelled him to give himself to this work of translation with such concentration of his mental and moral forces, as scarcely admitted respite. It will excite no wonder that one thus convinced of his obligation would feel constrained, by diligent and prayerful study, to make himself as thoroughly acquainted as possible with the meaning of the inspired originals of the Holy Scriptures ; and then to give that meaning with the utmost possible exactness and clearness, in the translation which he prepared. No possibility of com- promise would in such a case be deemed admissible; for the mandate resting on him from the Divine Author of this Book was, “He that hath my word, let him speak [declare] my word faithfully.” There is an obvious distinction in this respect between the obligation of a translator of Scripture, and an author who pre- pares any moral or religious treatise of his own for publication. In the latter case it may be allowable and even praiseworthy in frequent instances, to prepare a tract or other document, which the writer may desire to have approved and sustained by those entertaining on some subjects diverse, or even opposing views.* He would be at liberty to select such a subject for his union * Dr. Judson showed most convincingly his willingness to co-operate in such union endeavors. Of forty or fifty tracts and small volumes, published by the American Tract Society in the Burman language, more than one half are believed to have been prepared by him. 4 26 LIFE AXD LABORS OF treatise as would not involve these controverted points ; or so to guard his statements as would render them unobjectionable. But no such discretionary power is vested in a Bible translator. Sitlin" down to this work, he takes on him an infinite obligation to set forth unequivocally the meaning of the words which the Holy Spirit employed in communicating the will of God to the human family. This has been the conviction of all the best and worthiest translators of the S:riptures into the languages of the heathen. It was therefore no new thing which Judson did, or at least no new principle, no innovating and unwarranted expe- riment on which he acted, in giving to the best of his ability the unveiled meaning of all God’s Word to the Burmans in their own tongue. If mightier appliances were brought to bear on him than on most other translators, to induce him to compromise a little, he honored his allegiance to a Divine Master, by steadily resisting them.* Look r.ow at this noble man of God, girding himself for this great labor of his life. Not wealth or fame are the impelling con- viction, but a far stronger and more sacred urgency, that he must give all the revelation of God to those who have long been silting in the region and shadow of death. Weeks and months, and even years of this sequestered toil are his, often uncheered by any sympathizing companion, until, seventeen years after he had handed those half-sheets, containing five chapters of his earliest effort at translating the Gospel of Matthew, to that Butman in- quirer above noticed, at the end of the first month of the year, late at night, he bows down by the side of this little table,! on which his translation had been elaborated, and taking in his hand the last sheet of the completed Bible, the ink scarcely * To sustain him and other translators in similar circumstances, it became requisite — after the American Bible Society refused them farther aid — to originate the American and Foreign Rible Society, on whose operations, especially in foreign lands, the blessing of God has been so largely bestoved. •|- Which was standing in the pulpit when the discourse was delivered. THE ItEV. ADOS IE AM JUDSOX, D.D. dry upon it, he lifted up his soul in thankfulness to Clod, who had enabled him to fulfil the great purpose of his life, in finishing a work so important to the millions of the Burmese. What a spectacle was that ! The humble missionary praying for Divine forgiveness of everv fault and imperfection cleaving to his work; and then imploring God’s blessing on His own Word, thus ren- dered intelligible to those who hitherto had worshipped dumb idols, instead of their Creator — Preserver — Redeemer! If there be moral sublimity in the emotions awakened by the composition of any work of mere human toil, genius, and perse- verance, like Gibbon’s great History, the completion of which he seems to have regarded, not unnaturally, with peculiar and deep emotion, how much more worthy of such intense and devout fervor the completion of this work, which for ages will probably remain the authoritative guide-book of God himself for a whole nation! Who can fully estimate the extensive, powerful, and salutary influence of one volume, like the Bible, to be read with rever- ence, and quoted with frequency by a whole people ; by the youth in their schools, by all classes in their families; b} r the man of taste for its refining and elevating effects; by the logician as an exercise of keenest dialectics; by the poet, the orator, the historian, as furnishing models for them all; but especially by men, women, and children, when their souls are most melted and impressible, in all the varied experiences of joy and sorrow, of hope and fear, through the whole pilgrimage of life! Nor did our beloved missionary regard this work as complete when he had finished the first revision of his laboriously prepared translation. Again and again does he pass over the whole, in critical, earnest review. Of the third of those revisions alone, he declared that not less, but frequently much more time and care had been expended on it than on the original version. Thus did he proceed, even to the end of his useful life, gathering from every accessible source, from the experience and observation of 28 LIFE AND LABORS OF liis missionary brethren, from the remarks of heathen converts, and even from objectors, whatever might serve to give clearer expression to the Divine will, or more perfectly guard against all possible misconception. He seems to have acted on the con- viction, that so long as any thing remained to give greater per- fection, finish, and unmistakable intelligibleness to this version, it was his duty to labor on it for the attainment of these high ends.* Nor was it an obscure indication of the Divine purpose con- cerning his labors of this description, that Providence directed his employment for the later years of his life in the important sphere of lexicography, which, more than any other, would so admirably serve to fit him for the finishing work of his translation and revision of the Scriptures. Of these labors for giving as complete and full a dictionary as possible, both English-Burman and Burman-English, it is understood that the former, as the more immediately important to every missionary, is completed ; and the latter was so far advanced at the time of his death, that his accurate, laborious assistant, the llcv. Mr. Stevens, will find no difficulty in completing it, on the model, and according to the views of its distinguished projector. Thus were the great ends of that long, eventful, toilsome life, the objects for which, once and again, he had expressed a desire and a hope to be a little longer spared, at length measurably consummated. * The importance of the utmost pains taking to render the Burman version of the Scriptures as perfect as possible, will be more obvious when it is considered that it will be not only a kind of model and standard for the versions which may be soon required in surrounding nations, but also, it will greatly facilitate the work of translators into the languages of the Peguans, Sliyans, Sinkphoos, and numerous other tribes, whose tongues seem to indicate a close affinity with the Borman. The aid which Mason has derived from it, in the version of the Bible into the Karen language, just now completed, he has often and gratefully acknowledged. Dr. Malcom says: “ In no part of my trip did I find missionaries expressing themselves in terms of satisfaction with their respective versions of the Sacred Scriptures, but in Burmab. Dr. Judson always held himself open to the observations of his fellow-missionaries, and by that means secured a vast amount of admirable criticism from such men as Wade, Jones, Mason, and others.’’ THE REV. ADONIRAM Jl'DSON, D.D. ‘29 We should, however, be doing great injustice to the memory and the labors of this honored servant of Christ, were we so to exhibit his surpassing qualifications and persevering toils as a translator of the Bible, as to cast into entire shade his services as a devoted missionary of the Cross; a laborious, successiul preacher of the gospel ; a guide and helper unequalled to the native evangelists, and the affectionate, revered pastor of a loving flock of converts from heathenism. A glance at him, in each of these departments, must suffice the present purpose.* Nearly three years before he had completed the translation of the whole Bible, lie lelt impelled, by a kind of sacred afflatus of the Holy Spirit, to take his life in his hand and go to Prome, one of the ancient and reputedly sacred seats of Boodhism, and for many weeks continuously devote himself to evangelical labors beneath the towering pagoda of the celebrated god, Slnvay Lan dau. Part of his own graphic description is in these words: — “There is no portion of my missionary life that I review with less dissatisfaction than my sojourn in Prome. This city was founded several hundred years before the Christian era. Through how manv ages have the successive generations of its dark inhabi- tants lived and died without the slightest knowledge of the great Eternal, and the only way of salvation which He has provided ! At length, in the year 1S30, it was ordered that a missionary of the Cross should sit down in the heart of the city, and from day to day, for above three months, should pour forth divine truth in language which, if not eloquent and acceptable, was at least intelligible to all ranks. What a wonderful phenomenon must this have been to celestial beings who gaze upon the works and dispensations of God in this lower world ! “It was necessary, to the accomplishment of the Divine pur- poses, that after so many centuries of darkness, there should be just * Other features of excellence are passed by with regret. The versatility of his powers was eminently noticeable. That one who had so buried himself in his devotion to Burman studies should still be able, in a moment, to mingle with the court circles of Sir Archi- bald Campbell’s embassy, and by bis exact and various knowledge of all theWntricacies of diplomacy should win such admiration and confidence from these fastidious men, how strikingly does it illustrate the rich variety of God’s endowment of this His servant 1 30 LIFE AND LABORS OF such an exhibition of light as has been made. Thousands have heard of God, who never, nor their ancestors, heard before. Frequently in passing through the streets, and in taking my seal in the zayats, I have felt such a solemnity and awe on my spirits, as almost prevented me from opening my lips, to communicate the momentous message with which I was charged. How the preacher has preached, and how the hearers have heard, the day of judgment will show. Blessed be God, there are some whose faces I expect to see at the right hand of the great Judge. Many also there are, who have become so far enlightened, that I am sure they never can bow the knee to Shwa} r Lan dau, without a distressing conviction that they are in the wrong way. Farewell to thee, Prome ! Willingly would I have spent my last breath in thee and for thee. But thy sons ask me not to stay, and I must preach the gospel to other cities also, for therefore am I sent. Read the five hundred tracts that I have left with thee. Pray to the God and Saviour that I have told thee of. And if hereafter thou call me, though in the lowest whisper, and it reach me in the very extremities of the empire, I will joyfully listen and come back to thee.” With what intenseness and exclusiveness of devotement to the great work of preaching the gospel to the heathen he was imbued from the very outset, we may learn from his own words, when he was about to revisit his native country. He is explaining- why he should not be expected or solicited to perform the usual work, too largely demanded, often, of returned missionaries: —