The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1898-05-23
LIFE IN INDIA.
characteristics of the People as De-
scribed by the President of Lahore.

scribed by the Pres1dent OF Lahore.
At the First Presbyterian Church yes
terday morning Rev. DIR. Ewing, of La
hore College, India, preached an interesting
sermon on the characteristics of the natives
OF India. Last night DR.. Ewing preached
at the Tabernacle Church. In the course of
his remarks yesterday morning he said:
India is not a country, but a continent.
It's people are not of one nation, but of
many. There is as much diversity amongst
Afghan and Bengalee, HinduStani and
Marathi and Dravidian as amongst Eng
lshman. F'renchman, German, Italian and
Spaniard. There are 2SS,OO0OOo OF people:
This is population as great as that of
Russia, France Germany. Turkey proper,
Great Britain and the United States COM
bined Some twenty millions of these be-
long to the educated classes. These are not
a people to be despised. They have q his
tory to which they point with =, pride, "a
is true story. Their civilization is much
older than ours, and not in all respects
INFERIOR Their forefat9fers were wearing oE
ancestors and mine in the forests of Saxony
were wearing red paint! They are not
people ready to accept the teachings of the
missionary as true simply because he ut
tiers them. Some of them are men OF
polished manners, clear and comprehensive
intellect, generous feeling and Independent
judgment such as would stamp them as gen.
tlemen in any country of the world. The
to the church of Christ to send forth to
them the best equipped men and women in
her membership. The great masses of her
people-250 600 900 of them-liVe in the prac-
tice of superstious rites and yield their al
legiance to such preposterous religious
dogma as would amaze you were there
anda and others of that ilk who came as
self-appointed delegates to the Parliament
America things which. are true. They
reared structure consisting of the bones
of Hinduism clothed with the nomenclature
of Buddhism and Brahmanism, and over
"a character
of the unthinking who were not too well
acquainted with the Bible, was laid a con-
fused and distorted version of the ethics of
the Christian Scriptures. Many silly men
and still more silly women ran after those
men of the yellow. garb and knew not what
they did. After his return to India this
Swami gave utterance to this statement:
II loved the American people much, they
were very kind T., to me; Two classes Gid did
priests. In America the great object of
every woman is to secure a husband. In
pursuance of this aim she visits all the
watering places. Failing in her efforts. she
returns home becomes religious and joins
the, church; and there she and the priests
ion of some of the people who admired
him here. / wish that you might see with
your own eyes those smoke begrimed tenn
pies filled with hideous grinning idols. One
of the most conspicuous and Venerated OBJ
iects in thousands of temples is an obscene
priests. totally naked, pass through the
crowds of women and men on festival days.
One nude holy CD man was wont to lie in
the sunshine to be worshiped by the
women as they passed by. Judged by these
points the religions of India are failure.
1t is my deliberate conviction, conviction
formed after eighteen years of intimacy
with all classes of the people. that there
is nothing in the religions that they have
that can, save them from the unspeakable
degradation in which the masses live That
Christianity can do this is amply evidenced
by the lives and character of the rapidly
growing membership of the Christian
Church. There are about three millions of
Christians in the Protestant and Roman
Catholic churches of the country. These are
increasing with startling rapidity, and the
character of many of the Christians is such
as TO give assurance of the speedy coming
of the day when through the direct agency
| of her own sons and daughters midas mill
| lions shall all hear of the worlds Savior"