To this I would briefly reply, that though a minister may have in his parish a greater number of Protestants than he can properly attend to, yet he is not on that account, I imagine, exempted from an active concern for the salvation of his Roman Catholic parishioners, who, though debarred the advantage of attending his public administrations, will, generally speaking, respectfully receive a kind admonition seasonably offered; and, as the writer has often observed, admit the force of scriptural remarks, and sometimes ingenuously grant inferences by no means favourable to their religion, or the teachers of it. The Christian minister, then, should seize the mollia tempora fandi, with which his daily intercourse (especially in the country,) with the Roman Catholics of his parish will continually furnish him; and this may be done without prejudice to what may be deemed the paramount interests of his immediate flock. In noticing the third query, which has reference to "the duty of visiting infected houses," it may be said, that where an immortal soul is at stake, no regard for his personal safety should deter a minister of Jesus Christ from the performance of one of the most important and solemn duties of bis office. No man should needlessly expose himself to danger; but in the exercise of his holy calling, the servant of Christ should ever consider himself safe under the guardian care of Him, "unto whom belong the issues from death." It is the Christian's privilege to "spend and be spent for Christ;" and he who can, with the Apostle, say, "To me to live is Christ, and to die is gain," may enter without fear, whenever duty calls, for the pestilential miasmata, unless divinely commissioned, will prove harmless as the purest atmosphere. Let it not, however, be inferred, that all precaution is unnecessary-this is by no means the case. The Christian should equally avoid presumption and distrust, so shall he approve himself "a workman that needeth not to be ashamed." I am, Sir, yours, &c. ON THE RELIGIOUS WORLD. IGNOTUS. TO THE EDITOR OF THE CHRISTIAN EXAMINER. SIR-I have often observed that you admit different views of a subject, which seems a good way of arriving at the truth, and especially in a mere matter of opinion, like the present. I have often found it profitable to reason with one who differed in opinion from myself. I therefore venture to send you a few remarks, which occurred to me on reading lately an article of your own, which seems to me somewhat calculated to mislead. In your number for February, you have an article called "The Religious World," in which you seem to advance the following positions :I. That religious professors are so occupied in committees, schools, visits, lectures, and prayer meetings, they have not sufficient time or strength for the contemplative state which forms an essential part of the Christian character. 2. That they do not search the Scriptures sufficiently, or read them deeply enough, to detect misrepresentation. 3. That they do not sit at the feet of ministers to hear the Scriptures explained. 4. That hence arise religious dissipation, curiosity, indolence, love of novelty, want of sobriety and discretion, superficial views of divinity, imaginary discoveries, partisanship, and sometimes heresy itself-too little general reading, and too much religious conversation. This, you say, is no unfair picture of the religious world, drawn from no inattentive observation. I must, as I premised, beg leave to differ in opinion from you. There is not nearly so good an attendance upon committees and schools as there should be; the Bible is studied with great care. By the by, you say, in the next page, it is read too exclusively; but this is a mistake: commentators are much bought and read, concordances used, and marginal references consulted: other works, tending to explain the Scriptures, are not neglected, as your friends, Curry and Co. can inform you: much prayer is offered up for a spirit of understanding; unscriptural errors are detected; wild views of prophecy, and of church government, or rather no government, and the miracles you allude to, have been rejected by Dublin Bible-readers: able and faithful ministers are well attended; you mention lectures yourself; and novelties do not come from the laborious, but from the contemplative; persons entangled in them in general forsake useful labours; and those most infected with them, and most infecting others, are ministers themselves. Having thus denied your premises, let me reason with you on your conclusions."The tree is known by its fruit;" and "Charity hopeth all things." We must not suppose that the active service of God unfits us for communion with Him, or that he who is most like a Christian in public is least so in private; nor yet, that the prayerful study of the Word leads to self-conceit and idle fancies. I beg to add a few thoughts which your paper suggested, connected with the study of Scripture. This has become so general, so extensive, and so accurate, that I would be glad of an opportunity to recommend to ministers to make themselves fully acquainted with the Old Testament. There are also passages in the New Testament, frequently used in sermons in a sense that does not seem to agree with the context. The methods now used in schools, force the teachers into an accurate examination of the text, and its connexion. The good old divines often employ the Scriptures fancifully; and as the general reading you recommend enables us to adopt and follow what is wrong, as much as what is right, it would not be strange if a text or two should get into pretty general use, sometimes, in rather a wrong sense. I have often thought a short list of such passages as seem frequently misquoted or misapplied, might be useful. I subjoin a few examples: "Angels rejoice over one sinner." This is a misquotation, or rather a compounding of two passages in St. Luke. "There is joy in the presence of angels;" and "likewise joy shall be in Heaven over one sinner that repenteth." "They are all ministering spirits," should be, "Are they not all?" It is a question could only be answered from the Scriptures; on these simple mistakes a theory of particular or guardian angels has been built, which seems to be unscriptural. "Eye hath not seen, or ear heard," &c.-usually applied to heaven, but seems to mean Gospel blessings, from the next verse, "God has revealed them," &c. The words used by our Lord on the cross, which are given in the origi nal to show how the people mistook, are borrowed from the 22d Psalm, for a very obvious reason; the 24th verse of that Psalm seems to contradict the inference usually drawn from them. "Not many wise' seems usually applied in too general a sense; the apostles speak of those who publish the Gospel, rather than of those who hear it. The expression, "Wood, hay, stubble," often applied to doctrine, seems rather to mean persons. The expression, "Thou hast left thy first love," sometimes forms the basis of a sermon, in which a view of a believer's progress is often given, that does not seem to agree with the Scripture figures: the sun never turns back, at least since the days of Hezekiah; nor does the corn ever grow downwards, "first the blade, then the ear," &c. We cannot safely reason on a text addressed to a church, whose members are continually changing. I observe, also, the expression to backslide is suited to this view; but in Scripture it means to fall into gross idolatry, and is borrowed from a rest ive animal. The expressions, "The whole counsel of God," and "strong meat," are used to denote doctrines: they seem rather connected with what is practical. "I have showed you, that so labouring ye ought to support the weak," &c. This was not what is usually called doctrinal; and the latter expression is addressed to the Corinthians-a church enriched by the Spirit with all utterance and all knowledge, but still needing practical teaching; and this seems reasonable: doctrine always precedes practice in Divine teaching; the danger arises when the teacher begins the other way. "The law is good, if a man use it lawfully." X. MISCELLANEOUS COMMUNICATIONS. CONTRAST OF EAST AND WEST INDIAN SLAVERY. My own personal evidence is,-1st, That during a thirteen years' residence under the Madras Presidency, with the best opportunities of knowing the condition of the natives all along the Coromandel coast, from Ganjam to Travancore, and much in the interior, I never heard of a slave, or saw one, to my knowledge. Could any one spend a day in one of our West India Islands, or walk one mile in them, or even land on their shores, without at once seeing, that slavery is the common state of the majority of their inhabitants? 2ndly, Since I have lately begun to inquire into the subject, I have met with several friends from India, who were generally as ignorant as I was on the subject: and 3dly, That the only possible way of accounting for these facts is, That the condition of the slaves in India is so little like slavery-the slaves being regarded by our laws as men equally with their masters, and no such distinction recognised as constitutes the very essence of West Indian slavery-they are so well treated-and their number is, comparatively to the immense population, so small, that their existence, as slaves, is a thing which would not naturally strike the eye or attract one's notice, and is to be discovered only by minute inquiry; and these views I find amply corroborated by the evidence above adduced. Of the districts of Canara and Malabar, where by far the worst type of East India slavery exists, I scarcely ever heard while in India. They had, until recently, been under the Bombay government; and none of my acquaintances, at that time, had been in either. I may add, however, that one of my friends, of the judicial department in Canara, and who is now in England for his health, assures me, that the slaves there are as much under the protection of our laws as their masters are, and are never restored to their masters when abused, no force being ever used to compel their return. The name of this gentleman is H. Blair, of the Madras Civil Service. It remains that I should give the evidence from the Sugar Papers. This relates not to slavery in general, but to the kind of labour by which sugar is produced. I find in them numerous accounts, such as the following:-The expense of cultivating 1 begah (40 feet square) of cane-Malda: The number of these accounts is considerable. The details are minute. The names are given. They all, without exception, set forth HIRED LABOUR. Why do they not mention slaves? Why, but because the slave is unknown in the cultivation of sugar! To suppose or assert the reverse, is to suppose and assert the most barefaced duplicity, and to slander, where there is every evidence of the greatest frankness. Yet, in direct contradiction to all these accounts of hired labourers, as one chief item in the cost of the produce of sugar in the East Indies, and in the face of all these facts on record, which prove that it is cultivated by freemen requiring wages, Dr. Stuart asserts, (page 28) that "if this were true," (viz. its produce by free labour,) "the East India Company had it completely in their power to bring forward direct and conclusive evidence that such was the case; but in the vast mass of matter with which they have furnished the Parliament and the nation, there is not a syllable advanced in proof that the sugar cultivators employ freemen, or that the Eastern sugars are the produce of free labour." He adds, too, "It was at once their interest and their duty to have produced testimony to this effect, if in their power; but they have not done so, because they could not do so consistently with truth." To this the simple answer is, that they have done so, as the above quotations put beyond all doubt; and it is only by omitting all reference to them, that the above assertions can for a moment appear well founded. Coupling this, his omission of the direct proof, that the Bengal sugar imported into this kingdom can, in no sense of the word, be * An ana is valued at about 11⁄2d. 16 anas make 1 rupee. + Labourer. Sugar Papers, page 146. The maund of sugar varies from 25 to 80 lbs. In Bengal, to which this account relates, it is commonly 80lbs. Sugar Papers, page 147. said to be the produce of slave labour, with what I have already stated, as to the excessive cheapness of the hire of free labourers, what becomes of his inference, that it is not to be believed "that sugar cultivators reject the cheap labour of slaves, and adopt the far more expensive mode of working the land by freemen?" I have already proved that slave labour would be dearer in that over-populous country: reason tells us, therefore, that they are not even under the temptation to use it; and the above accounts prove directly that it is not used. I find, in a report made by the Board of Trade, on 7th August, 1792, as to Bengal, the following words: "In this country, the cultivator is either the immediate proprietor of the ground, or he hires it." "The Bengal peasant is actuated by the ordinary wants and desires of mankind. His family assists his labour, and soothes his toil; and the sharp eye of personal interest guides his judgment." "The Bengal peasantry are freemen, and are, in the usual course of nature, replaced by their children." And again,-"In the British West Indies, the value of a seasoned ordinary man slave, in the prime of life, is about £60-say sicca rupees 600; and the interest of money is there about 6 per cent.: consequently, 36 sicca rupees per annum is the value of the stock per head, supposing the stock permanent. 36 rupees per annum is more than the average price of labour in this country."-(East India Sugar Papers, page 53.) Agreeably to the above, I find Mr. William Fitzmaurice, who had been a sugar planter in Jamaica for sixteen years, but in 1793 was settled in the same business in Bengal, declaring,- "The waste lands occupied by the tigers between this and Injelee, would produce as much sugar as the Island of Jamaica: and as to labour, thousands of labourers may be had, by the day or week, month or year, at 2 anas per day, or 3 rupees* per month, the highest hire given. "The fertility of the soil of this country is such, that it does not require the labour of one-fourth of its inhabitants; therefore the cultivation of the cane will employ thousands of poor people; and, inasmuch as the cultivation of the sugar-cane destroys annually, in the WEST, thousands of men, women, and children, by incessant toil, it will save the lives of thousands in the EAST, by giving them employment and sustenance."-(East India Sugar Papers, page 212.) In the same East India Sugar Papers, I find satisfactory evidence, that in Siam and Java sugar is cultivated by free labourt, contrary to what Dr. Stuart asserts in page 28 of his letter. Sir E. H. East, M. P., was Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Cal. cutta, from November, 1813, till January, 1822. He was examined before a Select Committee of the House of Lords on the 9th of March, 1830, and subsequently delivered in a laborious and minute report, in five parts, upon the condition of the various classes of the European and native population of Bengal. I have looked over it with much care, but could. find no mention in it even of a single slave, or of the existence of such a thing as slavery. And why? Evidently because slaves are comparatively so few in Bengal; because their condition is so fundamentally unlike what we mean by slavery; be A rupee is somewhat above 2s. + 3d Appendix, page 92, &c. |