The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1844-01-09 00:00:00

CHURCH IVIISSIONAKY SOCIETY.

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respectably attended. Among the clergymen on the plat-
form we noticed the following :—Revs. R. Davies, F.
Barker, J. Jones, H. Carpenter, H. Hampton, W. W.
Ewbank, W. Hughes, F. Parry, A. R. Lloyd, J. Cor-
deaux, W. Butler, B. Morgan, W. Falloon, S. Fenton,
T. Harris, T. Harris El enllys, J. Crowder, T. Nolan, G.
Gibbon, Reay (curate to Mr. Butler), T. Dwyer, E.
Jones, B. A. Marshall, Badhana, T. Jones, D. Ander-
son, Irwin, W. Wignall, of Chorley, F. Ould, Edward
Clark, of Middleivich, Dr. Tattershall, H. Higgins, and
Maples,
R. A. Payne, T. 0.
C. Cotesworth, John
Cragg ; and amongst the laity, we noticed the follow-
ing gentlemen .—T. B. Horsfall, John Howard, Richard
F i d
Esquires. About half-past six o'clock, upon the motion
bf the Rev. Mr. CARPENTER, seconded by Mr. HOWARD,
the chair was taken by CHARLES INMAN, Esq.
The Rev. Mr. EWBANK having opened the meeting with
Cooper,E da
er
nb ory T.
T Brown,
oawn Forsyth,gn,h Samuel
nan mHolmes, and Thomas Branch,
1"' W.
uel
Keeling,
prayer,
The CHAIRMAN said it had been thought desirable to
call the present, which was a sort of intermediate meet-
ing, to receive from their clerical friends information of
w
invarious parts of the world. He
felt not to tell them anything, at this
hattha wast
stage of its proceedings, of the nature and objects of the
Church Missionary Society—a society which bad been
for the last 40 years labouring and prospering, increasing
year by year, and sending forth more and more labourers
into the vineyard of the Lord. He should, therefere,
content himself with calling upon the Christian public
to help the society forward by all the means in their
power, and not to be weary in well doing, and with
he going
needed on
expressing a
fervent hope that the society would go on
increasing until the whole world should know the truth
of God, and submit to His will. (Applause.)
The Rev. Mr. EWBANK then addressed the meeting,
and in the course of his speech alluded more in detail to
the special objects of the meeting. He said their simple
and undivided desire that evening was to bear statements
prepared with considerable care and attention, from se-
veral of his clerical brethren, with respect to
the missionary operations in connection with the
society. It was, in truth, an extra meeting. They
had hitherto been content to hold two meetings in the
year, at the same time with the anniversary ; and it had
been thought, and very wisely thought, that at those
meetings a sufficient amount of detail was not presented
to the subscribers—at least, not so much as they were
fairly entitled to and might reasonably expect. Perhaps
it was impossible it could be otherwise, for their excellent
friends, the members of the Deputation, generally thought
that there were dome points which it was of great impor-
tance to impress on the public, and to which they devoted
their principal. attention ; and the consequence was that
when the public came to those meetings exceedingly hun-
gry for information on missionary details they were neces
sarily disappointed. He was sure they would not be dis-
appointed that evening, but that they would have great
cause to thank their clerical friends who had devoted so
much of their time and attention in making themselves
masters of the details. They would learn of many
successful results—of the planting of the gospel in the
minds of Heathenism, and of the desert blossoming like
the rose; and the reason why they would be delighted at
learning those details was simply because the society, like
the Pastoral Aid Society, did not send out men simply
because they were ordained, but because they believed
them to be, in addition to their ordination, such men as
Paul and Peter would approve of; and also because the
society's matters were arranged by a committee in Lon-
don, who were actuated by the spirit of the gospel them-
selves. With all respect for bishops—(and he was quite
sure that the ovangelical clergy, as a body, had shown
wthth
e
very greatest and truest respect for bishops)—but, i
all respect to them,' the people could not shut their
eyes, they•could not avoid seeing that men were ordained
who were not fit for the sacred office of the ministry ; and
this could not be helped in a large tiody of clergy like the
clergy of the Church of England ; but when the society
was sending out men, they first fixed upon those they
thought suitable—they then instructed them in those
particular parts of their work in which it was necessary
they should receive instruction—they never lost sight
of them after they left those shores, but they kept up a
correspondence with them to know what they were doing
in order that they might render a proper and strict ac-
count -to those who had entrusted them with the manage
merit of the funds. (Applause.)
The REP. Mr. CARPENTER next addressed the meeting
in a lengthened and deeply interesting speech. He said
it had already been stated that the principal object for
d been convened was to communt-
which the meeting ha
•respecting the proceedings of the mis-
cate information re,
d he was sure that if he should sue-
sionaries abroad ; an
need in conveying to the minds of the public any correct
statement of their labours he should be instrumental in
kindling in the hearts of all true christians gratitude to.
wards God and in awakening an increased
interest on
behalf of the society. Ilis task was to give some details
respecting the oldest mission of the society—the mission at
`Western Africa, the head quarters of which was at Sierra
'Leone. This was a spat which had been the scene of the
labours of the society from its first foundation up to the
present time ; and this spot was associated with some of
the brightest and some of the most painful events which
were revealed in the pages of missionary history. Here
'hundreds and thousands of the most miserable of the
children of sorrow—the liberated Africans, bad been glad-
dened by the tidings of a Sr viour's love, and had died full
of hope of a glorious resurrr etion ; and here some of the
most eminent servants of G. d, some of the most devoted
missionaries of the society had fallen victims, early in
-their years, to the pestilential climate, and were sleeping
in their graves. In the eolo y at Serra Lune the So-
ciety at present maintain' d 21 European teachers, 11 of
whom were clergymen of the Church of England, and
' 42 native teachers, two of whom had been admitted min-
isters of the Gospel in connexion with the Church ; and at
every town marked on the lithographed maps, which had
been previously handyd to the audience, there were Christ-
ian teachers in every town the gospel of Christ was known
and that gospel had been embraced savingly, more or less,
by the inhabitants generally. Mr. Carpenter then pro-
ceeded to give an instance of the effects of the ministry
of the gospel at a town called Ki-sey, which vas situated
.on the northern part of the Peninsula, where there
was an establishment for the education of native Af-
ricans with a view to prepare them for the ministry
of the gospel. One missionary, who, on his first visit to
-Sierra Leone, spent his first sabbath in Kissey, had writ-
ten home to say that a more delightful sabbath he had
never spent in Christian England—that he went to the
missionary church and found it crowded with 900 black
worshippers—that an African clergyman preached on the
occasion, and that, after the service was over, it had
been his privilege to assist in administering the Lord's
Supper to 300 black communicants, who devotedly knelt
at the table of the Lord, and received the emblems of a
dying Saviour's love. Similar results were to be found
in other towns extending from north to south; and all
those results were to be attributed under God to the
labours of the Church Missionary Society. In conse-
quence of that inhuman and barbarous traffic—the slave
trade—the missionaries of the society had been compelled
in 1818 to retire from other parts of the country,
and concentrate all their strength within the colony of
Sierra Leone, where their greatest exertions were re-
quired. A few years prior to that time, Sierra Leone had
been a depot for the reception of liberated Africans—the
slaves that had been rescued from slave-ships by the British
cruisers stationed along the coast for that purpose. Those
people were arriving in the colony continually, and were
located in various towns. 'Amongst other localities to
which some of them were sent, was a valley about five
miles from Freetown. where was an impenetrable forest,
and the governor cleared away some acres of wood, and
erected a substantial stone church, capable of accom-
modating 500 liberated Africans. After the Church had
been built, there was no minister to occupy its pulpit
for some time,, until at length a devoted minister of the
name of Johnson was appointed, whose constant prayer
was, that he might be made instrumental in saving one
heathen soul. When he came to see the character of the
people amongst whom he was henceforward to labour, his
heart died within him. And it was no wonder; for here
were savage men, gathered from twenty-two African na-
tions, who scarcely understood English, whose condition
was miserable in the extreme, many of whom were di-
seased, sickly, worn out under the oppression which they
had endured in the slave ships, and six or ei_ht of whom
died every day. To use the language of one of the mis-
sionaries, they were more like skeletons moved by machi-
nery than living men. They were indolent and slothful :
built houses in which to worship the devil; stole the
property of their neighbours; and dug up dogs, dead
and buried, on which to feed. Johnson began his
work by visiting from house to house; and after
some time he saw a little shaking amongst the dry
bones. He opened his church, began with a con-
gregation of nine persons, lived to see the building
crowded to excess, lived to see it five times suc-
cessively enlarged and lived to see 2,000 Africans,
which was the entire population of the town of Regent,
assembled for public worship every Sabbath. (Ap-
plause.) The consequence was, that civilization in.
creased, drunkenness and profane swearing were unknown,
and visitors came from Europe, Africa and America, to
see the blessed results. Mr. Carpenter concluded by
relating one or two instances of personal religion among
the converted heathen, and by stating that he could
continue at much further length to detail the triumphs
of the Gospel in various other parts of Western Africa.
The Rev. Mr. BARKER next addressed the meeting.
He said it would be his business to carry them in
mind and information to the East Indies—to point out
to them the ruins of a once noble temple, and some of
the more favoured children of
Shem, those who once
possessed the light of divine truth. He alluded to the
Syrian Christians, who received their bishops for centu-
ries from Antiocb. It appeared that about the year 900
a body of Christians existed on the coast of Malabar, to
whom the emperor granted rank and privileges which
raised them to the highest stations in his empire, with the
exception of one class of the inhabitants—the Brahmins.
At one time the King of Cosheen depended for his safety
against the aggressions of a neighbouring prince on 50,000
Christian soldiers. The people were also much superior
in their domestic relations to the Hindoos. They held
the Athanasian Creed with some few omissions, they
denied the supremacy of the Pope of Rome, and re-
pudiated the worship of the Virgin Marv, their final
B„...pni beim! to God himself. But their faith had 'un-
h'apl'ony ton little effect upon their lives, and they entered
into fierce centensions, and many superstitious practices
crept in amongst them, The Word of God was locked