Provision for spiritual instruction; absence of public; failure of private; state of natives, and facilities for conversion; causes of failure; mode of proceeding suggested; government interference towards this object; the most necessary means; ecclesiastical establishment; Hindoo and Mahommedan endowments; education; deficiencies of present system; nature of, recommended; schools and colleges; languages; political result of education; the press, condition of, causes of its defects; measures recommended in regard to; post-office; overland communication, and connection with Mediterranean countries; colonisation; difficulties of settlers; suggested promotion and facilities; proposed encouragement of immigration of Southern Christians; amalgamation with the natives, and gradual transformation of the masses; material improvements; agriculture and machinery; cotton; other products; tea; suggested mode of agricultural speculation; necessity of laws for protection of capital; public works; railways; reasons for preferring Bombay to Calcutta line for main route; question of interposition of companies; roads and bridges; caravanserais; tolls; Indus harbour; canals of irrigation.

Provision for the diffusion of spiritual instruction.

HAVING first provided the requisite funds, we may seriously undertake the great subjects which the title of this chapter will suggest. The parliamentary committees have announced, as one of the heads of their investigation of Indian affairs, the "ecclesiastical provision for the diffusion of spiritual instruction." The provision of chaplains for the ordinary services of European regiments and large European stations can hardly be called a diffusion of spiritual instruction, and Government has most assuredly made no provision for any such diffusion among the natives. On the contrary, for a very long period it regarded and treated

Absence of public.

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Christianity as a most dangerous innovation, and has now admitted it to the common rights of religious freedom only under a very strict negation of all government support or countenance of any kind, direct or indirect. The question should, therefore, rather have been whether it is expedient to make any provision for the diffusion of spiritual instruction or no.

Failure of

private.

Private efforts have been made to that end; but, at least as regards the great provinces of Bengal and Hindostan, I have said, and I repeat it, that these efforts have failed-that no material religious impression on the population either has been made, or is now being made. I may add that, while the numbers of native Christians are few, we do not see, generally speaking, among those few that exalted zeal which, among the primitive Christians, was the means under God of the success of a small band, the first converts of great nations.

Various reasons have been assigned for this failure. Some say that our great want is "more bishops;" some that education must precede Christianity; some that it is owing to the hardness of the hearts of the Hindoos. I by no means think that an unlimited number of bishops would mend the matter. You must get your flocks first, and then appoint your chief shepherds. I also very much doubt the assertion that Christianity depends on education. I believe that the natives of India have already quite sufficient intelligence to understand the essential doctrines of the most pure and simple of religions, and that such education as we can give them for many a long year will not bring them a bit nearer to really useful and sincere conversion. I have no hesitation in saying that it is infinitely better that a man should remain a Hindoo, than that, in a transition stage of education, he should divest himself of all religion.

Present ethical state of the natives, and facilities for conversion.

When, by a very high education and great elevation of his character, you render him capable of appreciating a very perfect philosophy and very intricate historical proofs, his education may be brought to bear; but till then, you can appeal to the hearts of civilized intelligent men upon first principles, which all can understand and acknowledge, without teaching them the English language, English literature, or English ecclesiastical niceties; and it is on this ground that I am discussing religion as a separate question from that of education. In regard to the present state of the natives, it seems to me that practically they have wonderfully little superstition-that their idolatry is not more active than that of the Greeks and Romans. Their state is one which tends very much to rationalism. During the last few centuries they have been particularly prone to religious innovation; they are, like the Greeks, ready to listen to anything new, and I really think that they afford a particularly favourable field for religious improvement. The success of Nanak, and the wide spread of his doctrines in various forms (doubtless now much corrupted from their original purity), is alone, to my mind, a convincing proof that if a prophet were to arise, and to set about the task with sufficient energy, discretion, knowledge, and singleness of purpose, he might effect wonders.

In truth, I believe the religious state of the inhabitants of India (the Mahommedans excepted) to be really very like that of the Roman Empire at the time of the introduction of Christianity. There is the same nominal belief in an effete mythology, and the same tendency to overstrained systems of philosophy and natural religion, the refuge of acute minds seeking rest and finding none. I therefore believe that Christianity

might succeed in India by the same means through which, under Divine direction, it succeeded in the Roman Empire. We shall create no impression by the paraphernalia of established churches, and the assertion of theological dogmas. The natives have already their established religions and established theologies; but if we find men fitted for the task-willing to give up everything that pertains to the world-to become what would be called in the East "Faqueers," and to devote themselves to preaching among the natives in native fashion, pure and simple, the great doctrines of the fear of God, peace and goodwill among men, and the inefficacy of all other and formal religion-I see not why, preaching a doctrine better and more easily intelligible than that of Nanak, they should not succeed better than Nanak, should not first create a sect, and then by means of that sect convert the population. The situation of the natives of the East is to a certain extent less favourable to proselytism than that of the Roman Empire, inasmuch as the eastern religions have already some infusion of good and rational principles, and their condition may, perhaps, be considered as intermediate between that of the Romans and that of the Jews. But not only have Nanak and other natives shown the possibility of the success of reformed doctrines, but the Jesuits at one time bid fair to convert both India and China, and, if their career had not been stopped by political events, would probably have finally succeeded. I am convinced, then, that there is an excellent field for the spread of Christianity.

I attribute the failure of missionary efforts, first, to the want of sufficient qualifications in the missionaries; second, to their attempting

Causes of

failure.

too much, insisting upon more than they can in the first instance make clear-in fact, appealing to the head with

insufficient means, rather than to the heart on simple and sufficient first principles; third, to the want of any social facilities for receiving converts, such as are necessary when other conditions are not fully fulfilled.

If our missionaries and our converts were professed "Faqueers," and solely devoted to great principles like the primitive Christians, they would not stand in need of social aid; but if you do not demand an entire sacrifice of the world, you cannot disregard social considerations. Converts of the present day may be less subjected to physical persecution; but social persecution, which is still more powerful, they must submit to in its utmost rigour. The grand difficulty, then, is to get a beginning a respectable Christian population as the nucleus to which future converts may be added. At present they become either outcasts or stipendiaries, and we can hardly expect a native without some compensation to leave all and follow a missionary who receives a fixed salary, lives in a good house, and preaches to the Hindoos a theology which seems to unenlightened men little less complicated than their own.

Mode of proceeding sug

gested.

I should say that, when qualified men are found to devote themselves to the work, they must commence as reformers, as it were, of the native religions. They must say, So far we agree with you-your God is our God, your natural religion is our natural religion; but beyond this you have lapsed into many absurdities. Here is a simple and beneficial reformed doctrine, which we ask you to accept on the ground of its divine wisdom, its advantage to all mankind, and its accordance with the natural reason of the heart. But they must not at first go beyond this. They must not insist on the Old Testament and the ecclesiastical histories, or on the doctrines of particular churches. They must be content with those