that exists, moral evil included, is a part of God, or else that everything that seems to exist, moral evil included, is only ideal, it is obvious that there is not much likelihood of the claims of Christianity being seriously considered. Where no disease is supposed to exist, the best remedy in the world will appear to be unnecessary. Hence we must be prepared to expect a considerable difference in point of susceptibility to Christian influences between the Greeks, Romans, and Teutons of ancient Europe, who, whatever their defects or vices, certainly had consciences, and a people like the Hindus, amongst whom the power of conscience has been reduced to a minimum. It is a happy circumstance that the educated Hindus of the present generation, being educated almost exclusively in the language and literature of Christian England, know in general little or nothing of the philosophies of their own country. In so far as the study of philosophy enters into the curriculum of their education, they study, not a dreamy philosophy founded on the dicta of sages, but a practical philosophy founded on observation and experience. Hence, except only in so far as positivism has of late made its appearance amongst them, we now generally find educated Hindus believing, or at least not denying, the existence of a personal God, creation, providence, a moral law, human responsibility, almost as if they were Christians, yet for the most part quite unconscious that the ideas they entertain are Christian ideas. It would be a sad aggravation of the evils of India if positivism should spread amongst the educated classes; but we hope and believe it will The tendency of all Hindus to idealism is so strong that blank materialism cannot permanently attract them.

not.

We do not class the existence of the religious community called the Brahma Samâj amongst obstacles to the progress of Christianity in India. On the contrary, we regard that community as an ally; an ally, it is true, up to a certain point only, but still up to that extent, and it is a very considerable extent, an ally. The Brahma Samâj movement originated in the contact of the newly awakened Hindu mind with the Christianity of the English mind, and is one of the most interesting indirect results of Indian missions. Already it has divided into two parties, the original, or Conservative Brahmas, who seem to have become alarmed at their own progress, and are supposed by many to be steadily gravitating back into Hinduism; and the Progressive Brahmas, headed by Keshab Chander Sen, who have altogether broken with tradition, and are endeavouring to lead their countrymen onwards to purer sentiments, as well as to a higher purpose of life. Professor Max

Müller

Müller declares that this movement appears to his mind the most momentous in this momentous century.' Without being able to go so far as this, we are quite prepared to welcome it with feelings of thankfulness and hope; with thankfulness that, though a purely national movement, it has gone so far already in a Christian direction; with hope that it will go further. The Professor seems to us somewhat unreasonably severe on the Christian missionaries in India for their attitude towards the Brahma Samaj. He admits that they do not deny the moral worth, the noble aspirations, the self-sacrificing zeal of those native reformers.' If so, it is not clear what more could be expected of them, so long as it is not expected that they should cease to be believers in Christianity. To them Christianity seems a better remedy for the evils of India than a religion founded on mere emotions and intuitions. It may be added, that others besides missionaries are of opinion, that as India is now politically united to England, and as it is dependent on England alone for its intellectual influences, it would be of the greatest possible advantage to it to be united to England also in the bonds of religious sympathy. The progress of India will be in proportion to its reception of English ideas; and it is one of the most deeply-rooted of those ideas that Christianity is the only religion compatible with modern civilisation. The papers that were read, and the discussion that took place, respecting the Brahma Samâj, at the Conference held by Indian missionaries two years ago at Allahabad, show that Christian missionaries could scarcely regard any non-Christian system of religion with greater respect, or treat it with more sympathy, than they do the Brahma Samâj, without ceasing to wish that all men should become, not only almost, but altogether,' what they are themselves.

The divisions and differences of opinion prevailing amongst Christians in India do not appear to us to impede the spread of Christianity in so considerable a degree as has sometimes been supposed. The Protestant missions of India, Burma, and Ceylon, are carried on,' the Blue-book states, by 35 missionary societies, in addition to local agencies; and now employ the services of 606 foreign missionaries, of whom 551 are ordained.' It might naturally be supposed that the spectacle of so divided a Christianity would deter, rather than attract, inquiring Hindus; and that any multiplication of the number of missionaries under such circumstances would be an increase of weakness, rather than of strength. Facts, however, are not in accordance with this supposition. Divisions do, it is true, exist, and it is a pity they do; but it is a consolation to know that, as a general rule, they

are

are not apparent to the Hindu. In this old Christian country the community of baptized believers, which ought to be in all things an example to new Christian communities in distant lands, is rent into hostile sects and parties, each of which too often thinks it serves God by ignoring God's gifts to its neighbours. The missionary spirit has done much to mitigate both the spirit of division and the spirit of exclusion; but partly from the resistance which relentless theories offer to charity, and partly from ignorance, the number of persons who care to know, and are able to appreciate, work done by communities different from their own, is not great. In India the missionary spirit has freer scope, and has generally brought about a more satisfactory state of things. India is so wide a country that he must be a person of very narrow ideas indeed whose mind is not found to be somewhat enlarged after he has resided there for some time. The religious divisions which originated in England, and which are kept up by influences emanating from England, have not, it is true, been healed in India; but the feelings out of which those divisions arose have generally been repressed, and care has generally been taken that they should have as few opportunities as possible of breaking out into action. The various missionary societies have generally selected as the sphere of their labours some extensive district, some province or state, in which Christianity was almost or entirely unknown; and in such unoccupied regions they have located their missionaries, in the hope that they would be exempt, both from the temptation to interfere with the labours of the missionaries of other societies, and from the danger of being themselves interfered with. This rule has so generally been acted upon, espe cially in rural districts, that in many parts of India Christianity exhibits but one phase. There are, it is true, exceptions; and we fear the number of such exceptions, as time goes on, seems likely to increase rather than diminish. But the arrangement we have mentioned is undoubtedly the general rule, and up to this time it may almost be said that the antagonism of rival sects and parties is unknown in the mission-field, and that though the religious divisions of Europe exist, they have been deprived of their sting.

Even in the greater cities of India, where no such arrange ment is any longer practicable, and where the missionaries of different societies carry on their work in somewhat of a promiscuous manner, it would be an error to suppose that they have hitherto placed any stumblingblock in the way of the conversion of the Hindus by the diversity of their teaching or their want of charity. In everything which, according to Hindu notions, con

stitutes

stitutes a religion, the religion of all Protestant missionaries appears to the Hindus to be one and the same. When they see that all missionaries appeal to the same sacred volume, translated into the vernacular; that they all worship the same God and preach salvation through the same Divine Saviour; that they are all free from the suspicion of image-worship; that they all perform divine worship in the vernacular language; when they find, also, that they are all alike, or as nearly alike as individual peculiarities will admit, in manner of life; that they live on terms of friendly intercourse with one another, profess to repudiate mutual proselytism, and evidently rejoice in one another's successes; they cannot but regard them as teachers of one and the same religion, bearing the united testimony of many independent witnesses to the truths which they teach in common. It is also to be remembered that Hinduism is peculiarly tolerant of diversities, that it may be said, indeed, to have a liking for diversities. It will be considered by some persons a more legitimate ground of consolation, that Hindus cannot become acquainted with any matter on which a really serious difference of opinion exists amongst Christians until after they have made up their minds to become Christians themselves. The only doctrines which are, or can be, preached to heathens and Muhammedans are those on which all Protestant Christians are agreed; and questions respecting disputed points necessarily lie over till those who are now outside the Church are admitted into it.

This representation has been remarkably confirmed by the testimony of the Indian Government itself. It says:

This large body of European and American missionaries, settled in India, bring their various moral influences to bear upon the country with the greater force, because they act together with a compactness which is but little understood. Though belonging to various denominations of Christians, yet from the nature of their work, their isolated position, and their long experience, they have been led to think rather of the numerous questions on which they agree, than of those on which they differ; and they co-operate heartily together. Localities are divided among them by friendly arrangements, and with few exceptions it is a fixed rule among them that they will not interfere with each other's converts and each other's spheres of duty. School-books, translations of the Scriptures and religious works, prepared by various missions, are used in common; and helps and improvements secured by one mission are freely placed at the command of all. The large body of missionaries resident in each of the presidency towns, form Missionary Conferences, hold periodic meetings, and act together on public matters. They have frequently addressed the Indian Government on important social questions Vol. 138.-No. 276. involving

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involving the welfare of the native community, and have suggested' valuable improvements in existing laws. During the past twenty years, on five occasions, general Conferences have been held for mutual consultation respecting their missionary work; and in January last, at the latest of these gatherings, at Allahabad, 121 missionaries met together, belonging to twenty different societies, and including several men of long experience who have been forty years in India.'

But let it be granted,' says Canon Lightfoot, that in the divisions between Christian and Christian we have a most serious impediment to our progress. Was there nothing corresponding to this in the first ages of the Church? We need only recall the names of Ebionites, Basilideans, Ophites, Valentinians, Marcionites, and numberless other heretical sects-differing from each other and from the Catholic Church incomparably more widely in creed than the Baptist differs from the Romanist-to dispel this illusion at once: Nos passi graviora. We have surmounted worse obstacles than these of to-day.'

The number of missionaries and the number of the societies with which they are connected being so great, it may reasonably be concluded that all the agencies at work will not appear to everyone equally wise and efficacious. Whilst the doctrines taught may substantially be the same, and whilst the objects aimed at may be almost identical, the plans pursued by those 600 missionaries from England, Germany, and America, may differ widely. As was apparent at the Allahabad Conference, some will advocate a variety of departments of work, placing English education in the front rank, as the work most suitable to a period of preparation; whilst others will advocate preaching alone. Possibly, also, amongst so large a body of men some will form too high, some too low, an estimate of the advantage of leavening the Hindu mind with European ideas; some may, perhaps, concede too much, some too little, to national customs and prejudices; some will devote too much of their time and labour to helping their people in their temporal affairs; whilst others will consider the teaching of religion their one work, and decline even to prove to the people that they are their friends by doing them a few acts of temporal good, such as they can appreciate. These differences, however, in so far as they really exist, are very inconsiderable after all, in comparison. with the many matters of the greatest possible moment in which the course they take is substantially the same, and do not derogate in any degree from their efficiency as a body. A party writer in this country, not long ago, stigmatised all Protestant missionaries, with few exceptions, as indolent and selfindulgent.' The most remarkable answer this accusation has received is that which has emanated from the Indian Govern

ment