an." Is it any wonder then that such should "always entertain a secret bent towards their former superstitions?" What could have made them free from their power, but the "truth," the Sacred Scriptures? And these have been withheld from them even to this day!

This melancholy fact accounts indeed for all our Author says respecting the poor Hindoos. As he has never given them the Scriptures, he can say no more respecting their effects, than a physician can say respecting the effect of the only specific remedy for a deadly disease, which he has ever withheld ! He can describe merely the convulsions of the patient, heightened by the poisonous ingredients administered instead of the specific remedy. Such is precisely our Author's saying (p. 64,) that "to make true Christians among the Natives, it would be necessary before all things to erase from the code of the Christian religion the great leading precept of charity." Is he ignorant that Christ can so create the heart anew, as to implant this sacred principle in the mind? What does he say to, 1 Peter i. 22? "Ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit, unto unfeigned love of the brethren." But he knows that the "truth," the word of God, the Holy Scriptures, have never been given them by himself or his predecessors, that they should obey it through the Spirit. Who renewed those Ephesian heathens who once "lived in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another?" Was it not He, whose word he has withheld from these poor heathens? And does he complain that they do not bring forth its fruits? How could they unless he had given it them? His describing the vices of the Hindoos, then, is precisely a medical man's describing the rigors and paroxysms of that disease, the only remedy for which he has inflexibly withheld.

The Serampore missionaries feel that every thing with them is in its infancy. They consider the Sovereign Remedy as having done little yet, compared with what it may effect in the next generation. Yet in the most

bigotted part of India, which had baffled all the attempts of "the French Jesuits, the Italian Capuchins, and the Portuguese Augutinians," the word of God has already produced effects which our Author says, have not been seen with him after three centuries of labor. Were he at Serampore, he might see, not merely "the lowborn pariah renouncing the childish distinction between the right and left hand;"-it has never been heard of in the native Christian church there. He might see the highest families of the Brahmun and the Writer caste, sitting down at the Lord's Table, and taking the sacred cup, not only with the pariah, if there be any such in the church, but either before or after the Mussulman, and the Mleecha believer in Christ, without giving the most distant hint that this is to them an act of degradation. Were any such hint to be given indeed by the highest of these Writer or Brahmun families, it would instantly be noticed as contrary to the Christian temper. Having heard twenty-four years ago, that on the Coast the high castes received the Eucharist first, the lower castes receiving it afterwards, and seeing no warrant in scripture for such respect of persons, the Serampore missionaries determined that they would never baptize a brahmun even of the highest family, unless he were quite willing to go to heaven in company with the lowest shoodra who loved the Lord Jesus; nor retain any one in Christian communion after baptism, who was unwilling to commemorate the dying love of his Redeemer in company and on an equality with the Pariah, the Mussulman, and even the Mleech a or European, follower of his Lord.

But adds our Author, (p. 64,) "Try to prevail upon parents in opposition to the established customs, to permit a young widow their daughter, who, on account of her youth, is exposed to dishonor both herself and family, to marry again;-your lectures, your instructions, your expostulations on such subjects will be of no avail." Poor man! how little he knows of the power of the Gospel! Were he at Serampore, he would see that there is no lecture, no expostulation needed on this head! that the instruction given by the divine word has been already imbibed. Young widows are constantly thus married again with the full approbation of their parents and elder brothers, some of whom are living at this moment, whose chaste and affectionate conduct as wives and mothers, would do honor to Christianity in any nation. Such are the fruits of giving to the Hindoos the Scriptures, not in the fourth century of the mission, but in the eighth year of its first century : and this too, our Author being witness, in the most bigotted and prejudiced part of India.

After our Author has so fully described the conduct of himself and his predecessors towards the Hindoos, scarcely any thing can be more dull and common place than his observations on them whether heathen, or professedly Christian. What wonder if even among the latter, "the practical virtues of Christianity should be unknown?" Without the word of God the means in the hands of the Divine Spirit, of their hearts being purified, whence should they have derived “the practical virtues of Christianity?" It follows almost of course that all their religious exercises should be "a mere routine, without any inward or practical spirit of religion." And that the heathens around them should be "the slaves of education and custom" (see p. 66) is perfectly natural.

Of course they will think the ideas of their forefathers the best, till better be set before them: and when the Sacred Scriptures are withheld from them, the fountain of all just ideas of virtue, what better ideas have ever been set before them? Yet after three centuries the Sacred Scriptures remain yet to be given them. Since then our Author has never made the trial, how can he speak of its effects? What the Hindoos and their own religion are in themselves, is already well known. That "it speaks only to the sense, and allures its votaries by all kinds of sensual gratification in this life, and in that which is to come," has been long known; and that all these they should feel so insipid, that they can be “ stirred up by nothing but monstrosities," is quite matter of

course.

66

But that these Jesuit "twice-born," instead of giving them the Holy Scriptures, should have left them to their old processions, with their tum-tums, and trumpets, and torches, and fire works; and "the statue of the saint placed on a car, charged with garlands and flowers, instead of Jugunnat'ha and his brother, the congregation dancing or playing with small sticks or with naked swords, playing the fool with each other or shouting without the least sign of respect or devotion”—this is shocking. Nor is it scarcely less so that our Author, under the semblance of disapproving it, should insinuate as he does, (p. 71,) that these processions receive encouragement from "our holy books" that afford "instances of solemn processions performed in the streets among the chosen people, which on the whole, according to our modern ideas of decorum, would appear to us no less objectionable than those of the Hindoo Christians." We here beg to ask him, was this bringing back the ark an annual festival? Was it not an extra

ordinary national act intended to celebrate the return of their Almighty Sovereign, the symbol of whose presence the Ark was, and of which, for their transgressions. they had been so long deprived? And in this case was it any wonder when their Deliverer had thus condescended to return propitious, that among the millions then collected, there should be shouting? Was it strange

that, the "man after God's own heart," just ascending the throne after a seven years' struggle with envy and malice, in contemplating the happy consequences of God's thus returning to defend and exalt his people Israel amidst the surrounding nations, should be overwhelmed with joy? Would it have been any wonder if it had overpowered his reason?

But who "played the fool" in thus bringing back the ark? Did he who then "first delivered to them this Psalm"-"Seek the Lord and his strength; seek his face continually-For all the gods of the people are idols, but Jehovah made the heavens?" What national deliverance do these Hindoo Christians intend to celebrate by this procession? Do they intend to honor as their Almighty Deliverer the saint whose statue they set on the car? Is not our Author ashamed of that ignorance of scripture and that want of reverence for the "Holy books," which so glaringly appear in this comparison? Is it difficult to trace the source of his hatred to the translations of the Scriptures either bad or good? And, is it matter of surprize to any one duly acquainted with things, that these poor heathens, thus debarred the Scriptures, should, as our Author says, (p. 73,)“ ask for baptism from interested motives," if they seek it at all? What is there beside interest to allure them when they are denied the Scriptures, "able to make them wise unto salvation?" The wonder would be, to see them ask