the eve of a mighty crisis. Should not that eve be a holy vigil? What shall be its glorious morrow? The times passing over us are solemnly significant. These can be none other than the days of the voice of the seventh angel, when he begins to sound!' The "Already the effect is great. church revives. Her youth is renewed like the eagle's, in pristine strength and beauty,-like as it stirreth up its nest, so she in fond love strives with her offspring, and trains them to a noble flight, -like as it shakes from it a tattered plumage, and its wing becomes buoyant as before, so she casts aside her bigotry, and narrowness, and prejudice as 80 many moulted feathers, gazing on the sun, and soaring toward heaven!" ("Missions," &c., pages 5—9.) And, still continuing to unfold the true character of Christian Missions, he says, in language which no reader, we think, can easily peruse without experiencing a glow of sacred emotion,-without thanking God that in such a cause he is already engaged; or resolving, should he, unhappily, have hitherto neglected thus to consecrate his service unto the Lord his God," and to the promotion of the best interests of his fellow-creatures, that the delay shall exist no longer. "All, in short, is reasonable and intelligent in Missions. We can justify their motives and their aims. We dare expose their most secret affairs. They are matters of plain dealing. We shrink not from any opposition. Ours are the plans of policy and peace.' Our agents are men of prudence and observation, busied with all the details of life, instructers of the foolish, and teachers of babes.' Their settlements are schools for every useful craft and civilizing pupilage. Nothing is pursued but in subordination to their work. Yet natural history owes them much. Recondite philology is a memorial of their industry. And they have, at least, frequently sheltered with their hospitality, and assisted with their experience, the scientific traveller, who otherwise could never have perilled himself on those defenceless wastes. "Whatever reasons, therefore, may be offered, to explain the origin of Christian Missions, none really derogatory can be proved. We may try the most foolish suggestions; but, after all, even on their showing, this cause stands in co-ordinate rank with the highest inventions and deeds of men. "Was it chance? To this, as ordinarily understood, we may link the most glorious discoveries. A boy holds a tube to his eye from this incident Galileo seizes the idea, and constructs the powers, of the telescope. A tree floats from the west along the sea: from this drift Columbus infers the existence, and realizes the history, of America. An undigested experiment is made: Van Kleist is directed by it to form the Leyden jar. An apple drops from the bough: from this trivial occurrence Newton presses to the tendency of all bodies, and thrids the chain which binds the universe. In any of these exploits, can the chance do more than glorify the conclusion? Is not the discerner of such a clue the greater because of its insignificance ? "Was it enthusiasm? We may have learned to smile at the imputation; and the rather, because, when attached to any cause except that of a consistent zeal in religion, it raises no idea of blame. Does enthusiasm blight the creations of the poet? does it fetter the experiment of the philosopher? does it chill the taste of the artist ? does it wither the laurels of the brave? Little are we in danger of this ardour: if we be beside ourselves, it is to God.' If we should hold our peace, the stones would cry out.' We hear the command, Be zealous ;' but we find no caution against a too inflammable excess. "Was it not inspiration? A divine government must be supposed, in order to furnish history its key and solution. Impetus and illapse can alone explain countless thoughts and dictates of the human mind. Was it a purpose unworthy of the great Ruler, to raise a simultaneous sympathy in so many with the miseries of this world? Was it a purpose unworthy of Him, to consolidate a combination of benevolent energies, indissoluble in its bond, resistless in its advance, imperishable in its principle? Was it a purpose unworthy of Him, to summon men who seem to have received an anointing for their office? Can any supposition be so just, so credible, so philosophical, as to attribute these effects to Him from whom all holy desires, all good counsels, and all just works do proceed?" "We have scarcely approached the question. We have but supposed certain relations in which it may be placed. We have only pressed the manner in which, when most nakedly and unworthily regarded, its interests might be pleaded, and its reproaches redeemed. It has been with a constraint of negation and neutrality, that we have prepared our way. But even this reserve shuts us up to the important truth,-Missions are the identification of Christianity! "A beneficence, it may be further deduced, is thus obtained, which shall do more to wind itself into the human heart, more to penetrate the seats of human wretchedness, than was ever, before its too recent manifestation, imagined. There are no extremes or diversities of woe, but it prepares to meet and mitigate. It is such an expression of kindness, it is so unaccountable on any general law of sympathy, that it must, after the first doubt of its sincerity, open and melt every heart. Lovely and sacramental as the rainbow, it finds access and bears hope to each like as that arch of promise spans the most difficult steep, and dives into the profoundest chasm, connecting, embracing, and adorning all." ("Missions," &c., pages 23-26.) We quite agree with the Committee in their estimate of Mr. Macfarlane's "Jubilee of the World," and are thankful that it is given to the public. The Essay is a fine illustration of the noble spirit that has of late years been awakened in the Church of Scotland,-a spirit which, coincident as it is with the revival there of evangelical truth, as the only instrument by which the Christian ministry can really be what in words it professes to be, and accomplish the object for which it was instituted, namely, the salvation of men, furnishes additional proof of the identity of Missionary principles and feelings, and those which the Gospel implants and awakens. If it be necessary to point out the distinguishing characteristic of Mr. Macfarlane's work, we should say that it is strongly intellectual throughout. It is a piece of wellcompacted argumentation. And what makes it additionally valuable is, the conviction which it impresses, from first to last, on the mind of the reader, that the author is perfectly in earnest. Mr. Macfarlane advocates the Missionary cause, it is true; but he does not write like the merely professional Advocate, who, having received his brief, feels, indeed, the Advocate's interest in the case of his client, but is no otherwise concerned in his success. At the end of the disclosing the secret of his earnestvolume he might have written, as ness, "I believed, therefore have I spoken." The extract which we shall now lay before the reader, from Mr. Macfarlane's Essay, is somewhat long; but we feel that we are not employing merely a common form of expression, in saying, that we wish to enrich our pages by quoting the author's entire argument on a most important subject, together with one or two portions of his additional illustrations. Long after the interest in a monthly periodical, simply considered as such, shall have subsided, the passage we are now about to transfer to the Wesleyan-Methodist Magazine will be read, with equal pleasure and advantage, by the many who are accustomed to regard our Numbers as furnishing them with a theological library of permanent interest and value. Paragraphs so full of condensed significance as are those of Mr. Macfarlane, will bear repeated perusal. The author's argument, it will be seen, refers to the certain and mighty influence which the Christian religion exerts on the social well-being of nations. "Such indeed is the general persuasion of the favourable influence which the Christian religion is fitted to exert, that even those who have themselves failed to embrace it, are not unwilling to acknowledge its tendency to administer to the order and well-being of human society. They can admire the plants which grow up in a Christian soil, but they have no taste for the mode in which they are produced, and they would dispute the wisdom or the efficacy of the process, by which the Christian Missionary purposes to bring about a consummation which they can both appreciate and desire. seeing, that the actual adoption of Chris"Now, what prevents men from at once tian truth is essential to a heathen nation emerging out of a state of barbarism and moral degradation, is, that they overlook an obvious distinction, between the gene. ral influence of Christianity among a people where its authority is already established, and the first attempt to introduce its blessings where it has not been known before. Observant men look around them upon the state of society in Great Britain for example, and they see urbanity of manners, general intelligence, social dispositions, proficiency in science, or skill in the arts of life, exemplified and attained by many who are regardless of the authority, or who disown the truth, of the Bible. They are apt to conclude, therefore, that there is little connexion between genuine Christianity, and national refinement; or at least, that it might be possible to introduce the secondary and subordinate effects of the Christian religion, without reference to the peculiar system of doctrine it reveals. "But, who are they who thus manifest such qualities of the intellect, or of the heart? Were they not born in a Christian land? Were they not reared and nurtured among Christian institutions? Were they not at once brought into a state of society, whose tone, habits, and whole structure have for centuries been formed and matured upon Christian principles? Have they not lived and breathed, from their tenderest years, in a Christian atmosphere? They may dispute or disown their obligations as they please; they are really no less indebted to Christianity for their social, and moral, and partly too for their intel lectual, condition, than they are indebted for the continuance of their animal existence to the air they respire, and to the food that nourishes them. The most ferocious demagogue, who would madly subvert the constitution of his country, does nevertheless retain, if he overstep not the protection of the law, those civil immunities, the value of which he does not appreciate, and the blessings of which he deserves not to enjoy, because there is a stability and majesty in the institutions of a mighty empire, which he cannot shake, and which extend their happy influence to all who are born upon British soil. So, the unbeliever, or the atheist himself, who would overturn, if he could, the reign of the Messiah, enjoys advantages and facilities of knowledge and improvement, upon every subject that comes within the range of human inquiry, just because his lot has been cast, without his permission, within the hallowed circle of Christ's visible kingdom. It is demonstrable from the whole history of man, that, but for the religion that has come down from heaven, the proudest philosopher who contemns or disavows it, would have been a gross idolater; and we leave him to calculate, by a survey of the extent and condition of the heathen world, what his chances were of having been, in the strictest sense, a savage, or a slave. "How then are the qualities to be induced in the savage breast, which originally form such a state of society? By what means is an inroad to be made into the wilderness of Heathenism? How are the self-regulation and industry, how are the moral dispositions and habits, essential to the healthful condition of social life, to be transplanted into the sterile waste, causing the desert to rejoice and blossom as the rose? It is not enough to establish a British settlement, and to exhibit to the gaze of an untutored race the superior accommoda. tions and comforts of civilized life. If, along with such external refinements, there be not displayed somewhat of the evidence and power of living Christianity, going forth in efforts to enlighten and reclaim, nothing is accomplished at all. Or if, on the other hand, there be manifested, as too often happens, along with European manners, the prevalence of selfishness, rapacity, and vice, there is positive injury inflicted. The savage heart is alienated from the cultivation even of useful arts, associated as they are in his mind, with evil practices which he despises, or wicked designs which he fears. Or, if some of the customs of a higher state of society, or some of the powers which a more advanced stage of knowledge communicates, become engrafted upon a savage nature, its ferocity is only rendered more formidable, and its condition more degraded, than before. No greater damage has, in fact, been sustained by the Missionary cause, (the cause of humanity and good-will to the children of men,) than that which has arisen, from the professors of the true religion, with the acquirements and influence of civilized life, removed from the restraints of a Christian community, breaking out into shameless profligacy, and being identified in the minds of the Heathen, with avarice, licentiousness, profanity, and crime. "Apart, therefore, from the evidence of facts, which upon this subject are daily accumulating, it accords with the nature of the case to suppose, that before any considerable or decided progress is to be made in the way of social advancement among a rude and unenlightened people, a lodgment must first be effected of Christian feeling and principle in the beart. When this, in a few instances, "As soon, then, as the means of an intelligent communication can be attained, the Christian Missionary, seeking access to the confidence of the rudest barbarian, approaching his hut with the love of Christ in his heart, carrying in his right hand the message of salvation, and in his left the arts of industry, and the blessings of contentment and peace, stands in the very posture in which, by the grace of God, he may reasonably hope to accomplish both his first and his ulterior designs. He brings the true cure for barbarism, (that state into which our nature has relapsed by sin,) because he brings the means by which sin is forgiven, and its pollution washed away; and he brings the knowledge of the truth, which predisposes the bosom that entertains it, having ceased to do evil, to learn to do well.' Independently of his nobler and more spiritual purpose, therefore, he is acting upon the most enlightened and enlarged views in reference to the temporal condition of man. When he is prosecuting, with the greatest assiduity and success, his high endeavour to convert the soul to the faith of the Gospel, he is at the same time most assiduous and successful in propagating order, and comfort, and liberty, and peace, and gladness, among the families of men. "These views are amply confirmed and illustrated by the history of Missions. We need only turn to the scenes where, in modern times, Christianity has achieved some of her most signal triumphs, to be convinced that the belief and reception of Gospel truth is the mode by which the temporal condition of a savage race is alone to be elevated and improved." ("Jubilee of the World," pages 39-44.) After speaking of the "islands that stud the bosom of the vast Pacific Ocean," he goes on to say, "And how were these savage natures tamed? By what means did the ferocity of the lion give place to the gentleness of the lamb? Not until the leaven of Christianity began to work in their hearts, was one step of advancement made towards the amelioration of their rude and miserable state. For sixteen long and sorrowful years did the devoted and intelligent Missionaries labour and pray, at the same time endeavouring to introduce among the natives the improvements and comforts of civilized life. At first, as might have been expected, the islanders gazed, with the curiosity of savages, upon the operations of the saw and of the anvil. But, subsequently, the Christian settlers were insulted and plundered, and their gardens and plantations destroyed. When, however, the day of a merciful visitation had arrived; when the light of Christian knowledge shone into the hearts of some of these degraded idolaters; then the sun of civilization also rose upon Tahiti, and Eimeo, and other of those distant islands of the sea. "The public profession of Christianity, made by some of their Chiefs, encouraged those who had become favourably disposed towards the new religion openly to avow their adherence to it; and from that day up to the present time, these islands, by their progressive improvement in social comfort and in the arts of life, furnish remarkable evidence of what the religion of Christ can do for the temporal condition of man. Idolatry disappeared; human sacrifices ceased to be offered; infant murder awakened the horror of those who had formerly prac tised it. The neat, coral-washed cottages now peep out from the rich foliage, and occupy the sides of the sloping hills. The people, fast rising in the scale of nations, have a written language, and a printing-press which has put into circulation large portions of Scripture and several Christian books. A new system of civil government has been introduced; a written code of laws has been established; the appointment of Magistrates, Judges, and trial by jury has succeeded the anarchy and despotism that reigned before. 'An infant navy is rising on their shores, commercial intercourse is promoting industry and wealth, and a measure of domestic comfort, unknown to their ancestors, now pervades their dwellings.' According to the remark of one of the natives themselves, ' By the Gospel, savages have become brethren in Christ.' ("Jubilee of the World," pages 45, 46.) "In its progress throughout the world, Christianity will, no doubt, find the race of men whom it visits in very different states of knowledge and civilization. As, at its original promulgation, it met in its course the refined inhabitants of the Grecian Archipelago, and of the coasts of the Mediterranean sea, whose mythology was shaped into the forms of beauty, to the perception of which they were so exquisitely alive, and vital with the inspiration of poetry, awakened by the voice of freedom, and nurtured by their genial atmosphere and their bright sky; as well as met in its course the wandering Arab and the rude Scythian, delighting in rapine and blood: so now will it find mankind in every gradation of intellectual and external condition, from the metaphysical Brahmin to the torpid Musselman, and the savage aborigines of Australia. But, whatever be the stage of advancement in which Christianity really finds access to a people, whether in a ruder or more civilized state, it will and must modify and mould their moral and social condition into a conformity with its divine spirit. "Who, then, are the true benefactors of the human race? Who act upon the most rational and comprehensive views, even in reference to the present and outward condition of man? Are they not those whose benevolence, inspired and sustained by Christian principle, embraces a regard to the spiritual condition and ultimate destinies of the soul? whose plans are formed, and whose efforts are guided by the simple and intelligible maxim, that man then enjoys the highest earthly happiness, when he best answers the true end of his existence, which is, to glorify God with his body and spirit, which are God's?"" ("Jubilee of the World," pages 47,48.) We have devoted so much of our space to the Prize Essays, that we have scarcely room for any more quotations. We must not, however, pass by Mr. Noel's "Christian Missions to Heathen Nations," without expressing the high gratification which the perusal of it has occasioned. We are not only thankful to him for the volume, but thankful to God who put it in his heart to write it; and thus to exhibit, in their proper character, the principles and feelings of the true Minister of Jesus Christ, by whatsoever form of ecclesiastical discipline he may have been outwardly "called and sent into the Lord's vineyard," *—whether Independent, Presbyterian, or Episcopal. It would have been matter of sorrow with us,-not exultation,-if, at this commencement of almost a new era of Missionary operations, an era opened by the publication of these extended inquiries, the voice of the Anglican Church, through some of her Ministers, had understands both the Gospel which not been heard. Mr. Noel evidently is "the power of God unto salvation," and the true character of the fruit which its faithful ministration will produce. And as to that fruit, he not only knows what it is, but whence it is; nor does it seem to cost him any effort to refer to its undeniable existence in every part of the Mission field in which "the word of the kingdom," the only "good seed," has been faithfully sown. Brief as must be our extracts from Mr. Noel's volume, they will abundantly show the spirit of enlightened and fervent Christian piety in which it has been written. "Since it is the declared will of God, that the Gospel should be preached, since there is the most urgent need of it, and since it is perfectly practicable to introduce it to a large part of mankind; it follows that Christians in general are bound to aid in this work, whatever may be the issue. Could all past Missionary efforts be proved to have been fruitless, still the faith and patience of the church ought to glorify God; and it ought to fulfil its duty, with more prayer, and more activity, till the blessing should come. But God has not put the faith and patience of his people to so severe a test. As they needed the support of some success, God has granted them enough in plain and positive duty; in none, enough almost every case to make much effort a to sanction illiberality, or reward sloth. is nearly proportioned to faithful and Wherever we look, we find that success patient exertion. The few exceptions to this rule, if any can be found, might probably be traced, either to a want of common prudence in the means employed, or to a want of dependence upon the Holy Spirit, and to a neglect of * Article xxiii. of the Church of England. |