only for a period of a few months."

Now it happens

that the Serampore missionaries have exercised "his arduous profession," not for a few months only, but for many years; and so far are they from being of his opi nion that the Gospel will not prevail among the Hindoos, that their conviction of its finally prevailing, becomes stronger and stronger every day.

Further, although our Author has "remarked among brahmuns nothing but pride, self-conceit,duplicity, lying, and every kind of unnatural and anti-Christian vice,” the Serampore missionaries have seen more than one among these brahmuns, of whom they have no more reason to doubt that they are now joining with "Cornelius" above in singing, "Thou art worthy; for thou hast redeemed us by thy blood;" than they have of most European Christian friends with whom they have walked to the house of God in company.-Now for his metaphor, (p. 92.) How many" interposing clouds" has our Author seen "prevent the sun from dispelling darkness?" By this metaphor he has enabled every one of these "well-wishers to Christianity" who reside in Britain, to judge of the truth of his position. "Ye well-wishers to Christianity in the metropolis of Britain! as sure as you are involved in total darkness every day in which any interposing cloud intercepts the sun's rays, in other words, as certain as ye live in total darkness even at noon-day, nearly the whole year round; so certainly will the passions and prejudices of the Hindoos prevent the Sun of Righteousness ever rising upon them, with healing beneath his wings!"

The reply to the weak soliloquy from p. 92 to 97, which our Author puts into the mouth of well-wishers to the cause of Christianity, has been fully answered already. If in no country has the Christian religion had to encounter the stupendous obstacles to be met with in

India; if in none has it had to oppose a system of cunning and priest-craft so deep-laid and so well calculated to baffle all the attempts of that divine religion to gain a solid footing; and above all, if "in no country had it to encounter any difficulty resembling that baneful division of the people into castes, which has always proved and will for ever prove an insurmountable bar to its progress;" this would furnish precisely the reason why the Almighty Saviour "who was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil," should exert his power in India above all other countries. On this indeed is suspended the proof of his being the Almighty Saviour; since, should he triumph every where else, Satan may still boast that he had at least foiled him in India! But if all power in heaven and earth be in his hands, and he must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet, nothing can prevent his putting brahmanism under his feet, but his not being Omniscient, and hence ignorant of the state of things in India; or Almighty, and hence unable to change the hearts of Hindoos; which blasphemy against the omniscient and omnipotent Saviour, we presume our Author is not prepared to utter.

But it is scarcely necessary to remind our readers again, that our Author speaks entirely without book. On this subject he knows nothing: he never gave the Hindoos the Holy Scriptures; and hence he has never had the least experience of their effect on the minds of the heathen. Now the Serampore missionaries have had repeated experience of this;—and the result is directly the reverse of our Author's declaration. He has however omitted one obstacle far greater than all he has mentioned; and this is, the love of iniquity in the heart. Where this has been overcome, caste and every other hindrance have been as the cords which bound Sampson; the new-born

soul has burst them with perfect ease.

The son has of

course refused to worship his father's idol; but this has been the case with every genuine convert in every nation even from the beginning. But if he has separated himself from his father's idol god, he has not lost his filial affection, nor his tender concern for his father's highest happiness. We have already stated, that unless some persecuting relative interfere, the wife, instead of divorcing herself from her beloved spouse, because he has embraced Christianity, much more commonly throws away the log as well as he; and of those who do not, few are so foolish as to leave an affectionate husband for that inanimate thing. Rather they gladly live with him 'till, their own minds being enlightened, they joyfully renounce the dead idol for a living Saviour.

As for an unmarried young man's being doomed to pass the rest of his life in a forced state of celibacy, it exists only in our Author's brain. We have never seen an instance of it in these twenty-four years. But we will acknowledge that a person who becomes a Christian in any country, must be willing to part with kindred, friends, goods, possessions, and all that he holds dear, yea and his own life also for Christ, or he is not worthy of him. Still this is peculiar to no country:-and where this mind is found, the gracious Saviour's declaration to Peter when he said, "Lord we have left all and followed thee," is generally verified; "There is no man who hath left house or land, &c. for my sake, but shall receive in this life a hundred-fold, and in the world to come life everlasting." Nothing therefore is needed to bring a Hindoo to Christ, but the Holy Scriptures accompanied by that Almighty power, which purifies the soul by enabling them to obey them from the heart, The former of these our Author with his predecessors, steadily re

fused to give the Hindoos, and of the latter he himself declares that he never saw an instance. We will however point him to far greater difficulties in embracing Christ than have yet been experienced in India. He will find them described Rev. xiii. "And he had power to cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast, should be KILLED-and that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name." Whether this was imaginary like the terrors of caste, so that among nearly a thousand baptized the Serampore missionaries have never seen one killed through caste, let the rivers of Protestant blood shed in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, bear witness;-but whether this has prevented the progress of the Sacred Scriptures, let him lift up his eyes on Europe and say. Let him then recollect that the same Saviour is equally mighty to save the Hindoos; for he is "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever;" and that in his own time this he will surely do; for he has declared, "that he will famish all the gods of the earth."

That our Author and his predecessors who so obstinately refused to give the word of God to the Hindoos, should never have seen one Brahmun embrace their Anti-Christianity, is no wonder. Had they been the means of imparting real piety, however, to a pariah, a horsekeeper, or even a helpless beggar, they might have rejoiced in this throughout eternity. The Serampore missionaries have never yet had the pleasure of baptizing a horsekeeper, nor to their knowledge a pariah, nor strictly speaking, a helpless Hindoo beggar. Religious ones they have baptized, but then their language to them has been, "If any man will not work, neither shall he eat." But had they baptized such, and they had

proved men of real piety, they should have esteemed them their joy and crown in the day of final account. To satisfy our Author, they will however tell him the proportion of the different castes among those natives, which now form the Native Christian community at Serampore. To Serampore they confine themselves, omitting not only those in Beerbhoom, Dinagepore, Jessore, Chittagong, &c. &c. but even those in Calcutta, because they wish to speak with perfect precision. In these they include all who have been baptized, together with their wives, children, or surviving widows, whether they be now in actual communion or not; as they have all renounced idolatry, and act on the general principles of Christianity respecting food, marriages, &c. &c. The whole of these, including men, women, and children now at Serampore are, One Hundred and I ifty-seven perThe Brahmun families contain twenty individuals; the Rajpoots or Kshutriyas, eight; those of the Writer caste, twenty-eight persons; the other Shoodra families include sixty-four, the Mussulman families include twenty-five, the Portuguese, seven; and a Cochin Jewish family, five. Thus of the Hindoo Christian Natives at Serampore, fifty-six, far more than one-third, are of the Brahmun, Kshutriya and Writer castes, the highest among the Hindoos.

sons.

Our Author's intimating (p. 103,) that the Brahmuns are proof against the power of Divine Grace, is somewhat singular. A brahmun no doubt is by nature and even by practice, "selfish, indolent, and proud;" possibly “he thinks himself the only perfect being on earth-and that all his fellow-creatures are created to live under his bondage;" but were our Author to examine his own heart, might he not find nearly the same feelings constantly rising there? The brahmun only expresses in his conduct,

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