mission. In 1816, they were joined by another labourer, and twe years after by two more. A printer was added to the establishment in 1821. The same year the number was again diminished by the death of one of the missionaries, and the return of another to America. One of those who remained, with the printer, was recently, and we believe is still stationed at Bombay, and the other two at different places, within about twenty miles of that city. From their schools and tracts, the effect of which, from the gradual nature of their operation, cannot yet be tested by the experiment, they hope for more success than they have experienced from what they account the great instrument, their preaching. In 1818, they reported to their employers, ' we can relate to you no work of saving grace among the people with whom we labour, nor do we know that any special success has recently attended the means of Christian instruction at other missionary stations in India;' and again at the close of the same year, we regret that we cannot send you the joyful tidings of wandering souls gathered into the fold of Christ through our ministry.' Mr. Gravee writes in 1819; surely every thing we have done, or can do, seems like throwing straws to turn the current of the ocean.' In 1820, the prudential committee in their annual report say, 'it is still the great trial of these devoted servants of the Lord, to spend their strength in a field, on which there is scarcely rain or dew from on high.' In 1821, they quote thus from a letter of one of their agents; 'out of the tens of millions around us and the some thousands of those millions, whom we have invited to the great salvation, we know not of a single one inquiring what he must do to be saved;' and again in 1822, speaking of Mr. Newell, one of their first missionaries, then lately deceased, they say; though not permitted to see with his mortal eyes the seed of the word springing up and bringing forth fruit, he had for years enjoyed the privilege of sowing it, in a soil long desolate and barren, unvisited by showers from heaven, and uncheered by beams from the sun of Righteousness.' Nor have prospects brightened during the present year. In a letter received in March last, one of the missionaries says; the Lord sees fit to lay upon us his chastising rod, and still to withhold the influences of the spirit from the poor pagans, among whom we are placed.'

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The numbers of nominal converts to Christianity which we have stated are by no means to be taken as a fair representation of the rea! success of the several missions. To persuade a Hindoo to be baptized is a far different thing from converting him. Dr. Buchanan gives but an unfavourable account of the Catholicks, who exceed all the rest of the nominal Indian Christians together.

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Of the priests,' he declares, it may truly be said, that they are in general better acquainted with the Veda or Brama than with the Gospel of Christ. In some places the doctrines of both are blended. At Aughoor, situated between Tritchinoply and Madura,' he witnessed (in October 1806) the tower of Juggernaut employed to solemnize a Christian festival.'-Of the Christians under the care of the Danish mission who were visited in the Tinavelly district in 1806, Brown, quoting the Missionary Transactions, says, (ii. 436.) they were extremely ignorant and could be considered as Christians only in name. In one place, none of the congregation could answer the simple question, what must you do to be saved. In another town, about three hundred people desired Mr. Ringeltaube to baptize them, but when asked the reason, they could not tell. For the good of my soul,' the best instructed of them replied, but here their knowledge ended. On another occasion, a person gave the following answer, Formerly, I paid ten panchukeram to government; this year the collector demands twelve; therefore I desire to become a Christian.' Again it is said of the same gentleman; As Mr. Ringeltaube was still imperfectly acquainted with the language, he was not able to examine the qualifications of the candidates for baptism, and therefore he devolved this important office on two of the catechists, who accordingly baptized between two and three hundred of them. It certainly seems a little strange, that he should have adopted so loose a system with regard to a people, who, by his own account, were so grossly ignorant of the principles of Christianity, and so destitute of every principle of true religion. He appears, indeed, to have reckon, ed it enough if the candidates for baptism were able to repeat the Creed, the Lord's Prayer, and the words concerning the institution of the two Sacraments.' And again; 'In November 1810, the number whom he had baptized amounted to four hundred and twenty-two; but we fear that most of them have little or nothing of Christianity about them. The chief object which many of them appear to have had in view, in becoming Christians was an expectation that they would then be exempted from the publick burdens. Nor are even the Baptist converts wholly to be depended on. The Baptist Missionaries,' says Brown (ii. 170.) quoting the Periodical Accounts, found it extremely difficult to form a just estimate of the professions of such as became inquirers about the Gospel. Among the Hindoos, the hope of being employed in some work, or recommended to some other person, or even of getting only a few cowries, is sufficient to induce a man in easy circumstances to carry on a deception of this kind for a year or two together, with the utmost servility

imaginable;' and of one of the native missionaries it is said on the same authority, the number of persons, whom he baptized, was very considerable; but we cannot help expressing our fears lest he, as well as some others, particularly of those raised up in India, should admit the natives to baptism on too slight evidences of their Christianity.'

Whatever difference of opinion in short may exist respecting the cause, we suppose no one will question the fact, that missionary efforts have made no extensive impression upon the vast population of Hindostan. This cannot be wholly ascribed to want of pecuniary_means. There is no charity so popular as foreign missions. Four years ago, the aggregate amount of receipts of four English societies in one year was more than half a million of dollars, and the single American society of which we have spoken has not uncommonly received $4000; in some instances 5000, 6000, and 7000; and, in one, more than 8000 in a month, besides a great uncomputed amount of other property. Nor is the failure to be ascribed to incompetency in the agents. Few men have lived better qualified for such an enterprize,―we were about to say for any great enterprize,-than some of the Catholic, Lutheran and Baptist missionaries in Asia. Of our countrymen we cannot indeed say the same; because, without meaning any disrespect to them, we must confess ourselves not aware that they have given evidence of peculiar fitness for an office, which will find uses for every high trait of moral and intellectual character, and every accomplishment of education. And their own reports betray their singular deficiency in that discreet regard to places, persons, and occasions, which so distinguished the great missionary Paul, and to reject which is to make sure of marring one's endeavours. Our daily custom,' they say, 'of addressing the people wherever we find them, we consider our most important business; more important than that of teaching youth, or circulating books. Their inference one would expect would have been, that they ought to gain the good will, confidence, and favourable hearing of as many as pos sible, and then avail themselves, with as much kindness and address as zeal, of opportunities to declare and recommend their message. But it is no way to obtain either good-will, respect, or attention, to place one's self in such situations as one of them describes in the following extracts. In five or six places, where a few individuals were together, I attempted in vain to address them with the words of life. In another place they were stran gers who had probably heard of me. I had scarcely finished an affectionate salutation, when without answering a word, they all arose and departed. I met with very few during the day whe

altended with any considerable interest. The weaver too told me to day that he had made up his mind to know no other god, than those he had known before. I warned him according to my ability as a solemn close to what I had said previously, while a female of the family deridingly said 'talk no more, he will cry.' I warned them and the spectators as much as I could, amid their noise, which they seemed greatly to increase, hoping to drown my voice, and induce me to withdraw.' If an occurrence of such a nature had been reported to us, we should have supposed that it was an unfortunate accident, occasioned by a zeal which for the moment prevented a proper self-government; and that the missionaries would take care to compensate for the injury it must have done, by a more courteous and judicious course in future. But when, from its appearance in a formal report without any such intimation, we are led to suppose that it was not inconsistent with their deliberately adopted modus operandi, it certainly seems to us to betray the want of a very important qualification for their work.

But the cause of the disappointment of missionary endeavours we conceive to lie deeper than in any want of support for the undertaking, or of abilities in the agents. And we feel deeply concerned to trace it. We have no sympathy with any who should speak lightly of foreign missions. The conversion of the whole world to the truth as it is in Jesus we see to be the noblest object of Christian benevolence, and there is no anticipation which has equal power over our imaginations and our hearts. When a band of missionaries leave the country of their birth and attachments for that of their unpromising labours, we' suppose our feelings are as awake to the interest of the occasion, as those of many who have more flattering hopes of their success. But our predominant feeling is that of regret that they do not carry a purer Gospel.

We apprehend that there exists an insurmountable obstacle to the success of missionary operations in India, in the character of the systems which have been offered to supplant the old idolatry. The Catholics have succeeded much better than the orthodox protestants; but the obstacles to the success of both are similar, and the orthodox protestants therefore we apprehend will fail as the Catholics failed before them. The Hindoo religion is a religion of mystery and imagination. When overthrown, it will not be by another faith of the same character, but by a faith founded upon evidence, and not opposed to reason. Pure and not orthodox Christianity is the system which will evangelize India. Much piety no doubt exists in Christian countries along with an impure faith, but it is not on the extension of an

impure faith that divine providence will most propitiously smile, and that which cannot be defended upon sound principles of evidence is incapable of gaining the assent of men when strong interests oppose it. There is moreover an intrinsick difficulty in offering a Hindoo any reason for rejecting the 330,000,000 Gods of his own mythology, and acknowledging the three (as far as he can see) of the christian. Between the worship of one God, and of more than one, the difference is specifick, and he can perceive it. But he cannot perceive the force of an argument against polytheism, from one who urges upon him the faith of a God in three persons. Again; he is as firm a believer, he will say, in fatalism, as any one who would enforce on him the Calvinistic tenet of the divine irrespective decrees. This idea of fatality' says Winslow, speaking of the belief of the Hindoos in that doctrine, "extends to a future life. When asked, 'do you hope to go to Heaven,' one will answer if God hath written it in my fate, I shall go to Heaven; if not, I shall go to hell.' This is orthodoxy, if the Westminster divines have expounded it aright; and with a Hindoo who should answer thus, what would remain to be learned respecting the doctrine of predestination?

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It is one of the weighty reasons why we wish and pray that the various systems of orthodoxy may be supplanted by a purer faith, that they present the great obstacle to the diffusion of Christianity over the world. A Hindoo has a ready answer,— we do not say a sound one, though we think it, for on this opinions differ, but he has a ready and plausible answer to the orthodox missionaries; the answer, viz. that their own system is not free from such objections as they urge to his. They charge him with being a polytheist. You too, he replies, worship three Gods, for aught you can make me understand. These are, they rejoin, the same essence in three persons. A similar view, he returns, of the unity of the Godhead in different manifestations is taken by wise men of my own nation, but I find it is a feeble preservative against polytheism, for the multitude do not understand such distinctions. They charge him with doing away the sense of accountableness by entertaining the belief that his fate in eternity was fixed before he was born. I find the same doctrine, he will say, in your tracts and sermons, and there it is called election and reprobation.-How vain and mischievous, they will proceed, to suppose that washing in the Ganges, or any thing else external to the man, will be a substitute with the Deity for moral purity. And yet, he will say, do you not yourselves maintain that the sacrifice of your second God,-the only means of saving any from the wrath of the first-saved them, independently of any reforming influence on their own minds, by discharging the debt which their sins had contracted?