The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1838-07-17 00:00:00

PROGRESS OF CHRISTIANITY IN INDIA.

The following is an extract from a letter recently received
from the Bishop of Calcutta :
" The mild paternal sway of the British sceptre has now
for 20 years extended to what may be termed the sovereignty
of Hindostan. A profound peace, resembling in some mea-
sure that which prepared for the first advent of our Lord in
the flesh, has hushed India into tranquillity, since the termi-
nation of the Burmese war, for eight or ten years. Improve-
ments in domestic policy, jurisprudence, the use of the native
languages, the more equal collection of the revenue, offices
open to native talent; education, commerce, intercourse
with home; taste for western manners, government, and
literature; discoveries in the arts, &c. have been pushed on
with an unexampled celerity. Lord Glenelg's new charter
of 1834 threw open the floodgates for India's civilisation and
illumination. 'l:he establishment of steam vessels on our
fine and majestic Ganges has been multiplying the internal
facilities for commerce and mutual communication through
every part. of India, whilst the commencement of a regular
mail despatch from Bombay to England, by the same won-
derful mechanical discovery, is bringing on rapidly, as we
trust, the time of eastern knowledge, inquiry, and obedience
to the faith of Christ.
" 2. For, contemporaneous with these external aids for the
elevation of our prostrate millions of Hindoos, are the exer-
tions of your society, and those of the propagation of the
Gospel, of the British and Foreign Bible Society, for the
circulation of the Holy Scriptures, of the Church Missionary
Society, and . others, to impregnate. all secular efforts in
learning. with divine truth, and sanctify the education of
youth with the knowledge of the Christian redemption.
need not observe to the venerable society that the outburst
of mere curiosity in a heathen and Mahommedan people,
their mere grasp after human science, their attainments in
the arts and learning and wisdom of this world, if that is all,
will only resemble the eruption of a volcano, to bury in ruins
the fair fields which stretch around. _ _ . . _ .

"3. Knowledge, as introductory to Christianity, I hail
with joy; but it divorced from it, with extreme alarm and
suspicion.
"4. These thoughts are naturally suggested by two para-
graphs of your letters, of March 20th and August 10th, of
this last summer. in the one you favour me with an account
of the unanimous resolution of the general meeting in June
to present a memorial against the continuance of the pilgrim
tax in India , the other, in which you are good enough to
pass a vote for the support of our mission schools near Cal-
cutta, and propose certain inquiries to me connected with
the subject.
"5. The connection of the British protestant authorities
with the patronage of the basest and most degrading system
of idolatry and pollution which the lost Spirit of darkness
ever, perhaps, imposed on a fallen world—a system which has
contrived an entire new code of religious usages, and re-
wards and punishments, without any one consistent refer-
ence to moral good or evil—a code, minute, inquisitorial, all-
pervasive, in which the anti-social principle of caste con-
demns one-halt of the human race to be perpetual slaves and
menials, and depresses nine-tenths of both sexes into an irre-
vocable and grinding exclti;ion from hope—a system founded
in an ignorance of the God who made, and the Saviour who
redeemed, mankind, and going on its course by means of op-
• pression, cruelty, and lust; the support of such a system by
the greatest and freest of the Christian nations of Europe is
an anomaly of the most deplorable and glaring character.
I scorn to advert to mere argarnent after the incomparable
despatch ascribed to Lord Glenelg, of February, 1833. It is
a case which requires no argument. Let the fact of British
governors, councillors, commissioners, magistrates, counte-
nancing, by voluntary measures, the misery, and barbarism,
and premature exaggerated ruin of their prostrate subjects,
be established (and I believe they cannot be denied,) and the
duty of a Christian people to protest against the national
guilt of such a conduct speaks for itself.
"5. lam not master of the subject in all its details. lam
not aware of the particular objections to an immediate aboti-
tiou of the pilgrim tax which are raised here, as I suppose
they are, by the subordinate local authorities. These mat-
ters are as much secrets, and very properly so, in India as at
home. I proceed on these two broad, and plain, and irrefra-
gable points. The countenance of idolatry, with its attend-
ant horrors, in a Christian state, is, per se, immoral and sin-
ful. The delay in executing the positive orders from home
embodied in the despatch of February, 183.3, if such delay
was not inevitable, augments the sin.
" 6. It would be wrong in me, perhaps, altogether to con-
ceal what I hear in conversation with gentlemen who have
lived many years in the vicinity of Poree and the temple of
Juggernaut, and on whose veracity no doubt can for a
moment be cast. They inform me that of 150,000 pilgrims
who resort annually to the spot, nearly one-third perish from
various causes, and never return to their homes.
" They inform me that the bands of pilgrim hunters, as
they are termed, swarm all over India, even to the most dis-
tant provinces, to collect and drive in before them the de-
luded pilgrims.
"They state that, almost every year, the pilgrims of the
adjoining provinces are lessening, especially the men ; and
that the supply is now very much from the more remote
places, and chiefly of women.
"They tell me that one practice, which does not appear in
any public documents, and which may, therefore, not be ge-
nerally known, is of the most atrocious injustice—the com-
pulsory assemblage of 2,000 poor wretches each year to drag
the idol car. If this one oppressive act were discontinued,
many gentlemen think the whole system of Juggernaut, like
the ancient Dagon before the ark, would instantly fall.
"7. I have been both at Juggernaut and Allababad, the
sacred junction, as it is accounted, of the Ganges and the
Jumna, and my mind retains a vivid impression of the grief
and compassion and horror 1 felt for my sad fellow-creatures
crushed under the griffin yoke of "the god of the world.'
Nor could I believe scarcely, nor can I now, that the petty
sophisms of human cowardice and political expediency could
chill the glowing benevolence which would strike off the
chain and set the captive free."

UNIVERSITY AND CLERICAL INTELLIGENCE

CAMBRIDGE, JULY 13.—0 n Saturday the 30th ult.. Vim.
Samuel Parish, B.A. of St. Peter's College, in this Univer-
sity, was elected a 8.A.,
Fellow of that society; and
the Rev. Thos. Ludlam, M.A., was, on the same day, elected
a Fellow on the Foundation of Mr. Gisborne.
NEW CHURCH.—The first stone of the new church, at
Tonge, near Middleton, was laid on Wednesday, July 4th.
It. is expected to be finished in a few months, as the workmen
are getting very. fast forward with the building. The style
of architecture is the Gothic.

SOUTHPORT.—On Sunday week, two sermons were preached
in Christ, Southport; in the morning, by the Rev. J. Hordan,
and in the evening, by the Rev. C. Hesketh, Rector of North
Meols; after which, upwards of £3O were collected for the
Infant and Sunday schools connected with the church.
OLDHAM CHURCH.—On Sunday week, sermons were de-
livered at Oldham Church, by the Rev. John Handforth,
curate of Ashton-under-Lyne, on the occasion of the annual
collections for the organist and choir. A number of vocalists
of ability assisted in the services. The contributions amounted
to the handsome sum of £42 10s.

CHESTER COUNTY GAOL.—The Rev. W. G. Eaton, chap-
lain to the Chester infirmary, has been elected chaplain to
the county gaol, at a salary of £l3O per annum.

TOKENS OE RESPECT TO THE CURATES OF ASHTON-LIN DER-
LYNE.—The teachers in the girls' school belonging to the
parish church of Ashton-under-Lyne, have recently presented
the Rev. J. Handforth and the Rev G. W. Bower, each with
an elegantly bound Bible, as tokens of their respect and es-
teem for their diligent and attentive pastors.—Manchester
Cowl ier.

- -
TRIBUTE OF RESPECT.—On Wednesday last, ,the congre-
gation of St. Matthew's invited the Rev. C. Hall, assistant
minister, on his leaving that church, to a sumptuous dinner,
provided by Mr. Craig, Gartside.street, at which William
Tebbutt, Esq., the senior churchwarden, presided. The com-
pany afterwards adjourned to the Sunday school of that
church, where in the presence of the ladies and teachers of
the school, they presented the reverend gentleman with a
purse of money, and a superb gold watch and appendages, in-
scribed—Presented to the Rev. Carter Hall, A. 111., by the
congregation of St. Matthew's Church, Manchester, together
with a purse of gold, July, 1838." Also a bible and prayer
book, splendidly bound and inscribed—" Presented to the
Rev. Carter Halt, A.M., by the teachers of St. Matthew's
Sunday school, as a token of their esteem, and an humble ac-
knowledgment of his affection towards them, July 1838."
After which the rev. gentleman delivered a feeling and im-
pressive address, particularly to the teachers of the school.
During its delivery scarcely a dry eye could be observed in
the crowded room. The total value amounts to more than
£7O. We understand the rev. gentleman, at the invitation
of the congregation of St. Mark's, Cheethain-hill, has ac-
cepted the office of evening lecturer at that chapel.—Man-
cheater Courier.