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ART. II. A Sketch of Native Education in India, under the Superintendence of the Church of Scotland. With Remarks on the Character and Condition of the Hindus, as these bear upon the Question of Conversion to Christianity. By JAMES BRYCE, D.D. Late Chaplain on the Bengal Establishment of the East India Company. London: W. H. Allen & Co. 1839.

AN opinion has been very widely spread, that the efforts of Missionaries in India, which of late years have been prosecuted with remarkable zeal by various religious establishments and sects, have been all but profitless. This opinion has very frequently been expressed by persons ignorant or regardless about the propagation of Christianity, and such as profess to look upon all systems of religion as equally good, arguing that every nation should be allowed to follow the faith peculiar to it, be it Mahommedan or Pagan. Not a few ministers of the Gospel and believers in Christianity have felt discouraged at the small ascertained amount of conversions among the natives of British India. No later than last month, we found the Rev. Mr. Thelwall, when treating of the Iniquities of the Opium Trade with China, uttering a sweeping sentence on this subject, which we at the time considered too unguarded, when he said all the Missionary efforts had hitherto failed in the regions alluded to.

That the triumphs of the Christian cause in India have been far fewer and slighter than many sanguine advocates of Missions contemplated, we admit to be a truth; but it is also not less agreeable to reason, probability and experience that good seed may be sown which is destined to live and ripen, although to the hun.an eye or apprehension it may be dormant for a season. We find in the present volume many attestations to the effect, that inroads have, through the instrumentality of the Missionaries, been made upon the superstitions of the Hindus,-that some of the prejudices formerly tenaciously cherished by them, are yielding, and that there never has before been such an opening and such encouragement for Christian philanthropists to continue and enlarge their exertions among the many millions of that peculiar people as now. This looks not like the waste, the folly, the rashness, or the premature interference, which the enemies, the doubters, and the despairing, have with more or less warmth charged against the Eastern enterprize. If Dr. Bryce's testimony, experience, and enumeration of facts are to be trusted, very great and benign achievements have already been realized; which, however, promise at an early date a very abundant harvest. We shall proceed to conduct our readers to some of his statements, after having presented a few notices of his opportunities of becoming acquainted with the

matters described, statements which are indeed exceedingly gratifying, not merely considering the destinies of the natives of India, but as affording undeniable proofs of the cultivation, growth, and development of great moral principles, and apprehensions at this moment throughout Christendom.

Dr. Bryce, as the title of his book announces, is a member of the Church of Scotland; and as it may not be generally known, beyond the boundaries of that kingdom, that this Church has of late signalized itself as a great promoter of the intellectual, moral, and religious amelioration of mankind, both at home and abroad, we shall, guided by our author, shortly describe the efforts of the Establishment. These are divided into what are called "The Four Great Schemes." One of them is confined to the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, with the view of supplying such inaccessible and impoverished localities with a properly conducted Christian education. A second follows the emigrant to Canada, and Australia, and "labours to preserve and to strengthen the religious chain that is still to bind him to the place of his birth." A third takes the dense masses of the Scottish population for its field, where the "voluntary system toils in vain to overtake them." The fourth has in view by far the most gigantic achievement, viz. the conversion of the millions of British India, in which enterprize Dr. Bryce has distinguished himself as one of its earliest, most efficient, and conspicuous servants. It is not less worthy of record, that the people of Scotland have heartily responded to the calls of these Schemes, the last being regarded by them with peculiar anxiety and hope, and having drawn from them, as it continues to do, constant aid.

This mighty field, our author tells us, became to him an object of interest before he had well left the walls of the University at which he studied for the Church; and circumstances which he could not have calculated upon, in a remarkable way brought the thing desired to be realized. The late Dr. Claudius Buchanan had appointed prizes to be given for the best Dissertation on the means of civilizing India, and our author was adjudged the successful competitor. This Essay also attracted the attention of a far more influential body in regard to the East than the Members of the University who had awarded the prize-the Court of Directors of the Honourable East India Company, then engaged in bestowing Chaplains of the Church of Scotland on their Indian establishments; and Dr. Bryce was the first chosen.

It was in 1814 when this branch of the Church of Scotland was extended to India, the supply of Christian instruction to the Presbyterians at the Presidencies, or wherever a demand was made, appearing to have been the only or principle object then contemplated. Our author indeed candidly confesses that he went to the scene of his Eastern labours strongly impressed with a belief, that should he

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step beyond the pale of his countrymen, he would find every attempt to shake the Hindu in his faith futile and unavailing. But he adds, that a few years' experience and knowledge of the native character and condition satisfied him that he was wrong; and that, if but a slender advance had as yet been made, in bringing the Hindus to the reception of a better creed, it was as much owing to the inaptitude of the means employed, as to the obstacles presented by native prejudices. At length, principally we believe, owing to the representations and arguments of Dr. Bryce, the General Assembly and the people of his native country were induced to look to the heathen of India, and a Mission was accordingly instituted, having for one of its prime objects the education of the natives in intellectual knowledge. The establishment of this Mission, its rise and progress, together with schools, as well as the progress and state of the Scottish Church in India, the institution of Presbyterians, in connection with the mother country, and other ecclesiastical, missionary, and educational matters, are subjects which enter into the present sketch. But this is not all; for he presents many views, details many facts, and delineates many features belonging to Indian character, feelings, habits, and ameliorations, that must possess an unwonted importance in the estimation of all who desire to become acquainted with the actual state and the prospects of the inhabitants as well as of the government of that vast empire.

A number of circumstances concurred to favour the Scottish Mission and schools in India. The countenance of the Court of Directors, of several influential individuals at home, that of not a few men of rank and wealth in Hindostan, especially the confidence and approval of the Government, have lent great encouragements. But what was also a novelty, the native population regarded the General Assembly's Institution with respect, seeing the manner in which it was viewed and treated by distinguished Europeans and local authorities. This institution, in fact, has been held forth by Lord William Bentinck, in the most marked and honourable manner, as an example to all other Christian bodies having the same object in view; and its public examinations have been attended by Lord Auckland. And, adds Dr. Bryce, "It is, indeed, worthy of observation, that the attendance of the Governor General, at the public examinations of this avowedly Christian Institution, was not given until the desire of the natives, who had sent their children to receive education within its walls, had reached his knowledge."

The Church of Scotland's Mission had not only the advantage derived from certain failures and errors of preceding labourers and sects, but has now recommended itself, at the three Presidencies, by its judicious and approved conduct, as the above extract partly indicates. The Church has been exceedingly careful, and not less fortunate in the choice of labourers sent out, these having been men

of learning, ability, zeal, prudence, and personal respectability. Connected with this part of the subject, we quote the precise words of our author at some length :

"It is not meant to be denied, that the Christian missionary in India has had his difficulties to encounter, arising from causeless fears and prejudices on the part of the natives, stirred up from interested motives to withstand him. But in every instance in which this has taken place, such have been the prudence, yet firmness, of those attached to the institution of the General Assembly, that the occurrence has but served the more to satisfy the natives, that they have no object in view, but the promoting of the best and highest interests of their heathen brethren; and that this object is pursued under, at once, a firm belief of its paramount importance, and under a sense of the imperative duty of those, who have undertaken its accomplishment, to urge it with every kind and considerate allowance for the ignorance and prejudices, which they have to combat and overcome.

"It will not be supposed, that in these observations the writer is withholding from other missionary bodies the tribute of a like kindly feeling towards the natives, which he is claiming for those of the Church of Scotland; but he could not, in justice to the task which he has undertaken, have omitted noticing, that the Scheme of the General Assembly originated under circumstances, which led from the beginning to the anticipation, that such would pre-eminently be the spirit in which it would be conducted; a spirit, which every subsequent step, taken under the judicious, yet ardent management of Dr. Duff and his colleagues, has more and more strengthened and confirmed; and which, in the opinion of every candid man, who has witnessed its operations on the spot, has given to the institution of the General Assembly a manifest advantage over every other of the same kind. This remark is not hazarded until after a most careful attention to facts; and it is confidently felt, that it will be borne out by all, who have regarded the progress of events in the world of NATIVE EDUCATION. The School and Mission of the General Assembly unquestionably occupies a most distinguished position among the bodies, who are labouring in the missionary field properly so called; and one the more honourable, that it is in a great degree peculiar to itself. It is the aim of all these associations to convince the Hindu of the degrading ignorance, into which superstition has plunged him, and the demo ralizing influence of the idolatry in which he is immersed; and in doing this there certainly mingles, in the labours of the Church of Scotland's missionaries, less of that asperity towards the creed which is to be subverted, than the natives have hitherto witnessed; while at the same time not a doubt can rest on the sincerity, and ardent faith of the teachers, in the truth and infinite superiority of that, which they seek to substitute n its place. In one word, and in all the sincerity of truth, it may be averred, that in the work of native conversion, as it is conducted through the medium of the General Assembly's Institution, there has from the beginning been so much of the charity of Christianity enlisted, as to engage the hearts and affections of those, who are to be instructed, to a greater degree, than under any formerly tried system; while there runs

through the whole, as we shall soon see, an appeal to their intellectual faculties, which, it may surely be said without offence to any well-meaning Christian, is gratifying to the pride of the natives, and on that account not the less likely to obtain their attention. Nor will this appeal be re

garded by any as misplaced, who keep in mind the class of natives with whom, at the very outset, the missionaries of the Church of Scotland come into contact, and through whom they have been enabled to make the impression they are now doing, on the less instructed sections of the native population of India."

Several of the schools are very numerously attended, nearly a thousand attending at the Institution at Calcutta. Nay there are cases of indigenous liberality in founding schools upon the Assembly's scheme. Female education, too, has made considerable progress at several stations, a desideratum of singular importance among the natives of India. But what is perhaps the most remarkable step taken by the Assembly's Mission, has been the vesting Presbyteries with the power of licensing native youth to preach the doctrines of Christianity to their countrymen. "The progress of many of the young natives, receiving their education at the Assembly's Institution," says Dr. Bryce, "in the knowledge of the evidences and doctrines of Christianity, and the manifestation, on the part of some of them, of a desire to become themselves instruments of still farther diffusing this knowledge among their countrymen," has pointed to the approach of a period when the means of rendering this desire available should be afforded. Not unconnected with this circumstance the following statement may be read :

"Were the labours of the Assembly's Institution confined to bestowing a mere elementary education on the children and youth, who are brought within its walls, they would scarcely be felt in their effects on the great mass of ignorance, and moral and religious demoralization, which they are endeavouring to remove: and it might even be problematical, how far they would deserve the commendation they are receiving, if they generated wants and desires, which there was no prospect of being satisfied. Much must obviously depend on the policy pursued by the government of India, in rendering the rewards of this education commensurate with its value; but the Institution itself, it must be remembered, is less an elementary, than a NORMAL SCHOOL; and the sending forth Schoolmasters rather than scholars, in the ordinary acceptation of the word, is ⚫its great object."

Other missionary institutions in India, that of the Baptists at Serampore, Bishop's College maintained by the Church of England, &c., pursue similar methods of instructing and sending forth native youth, who must, one would presume without the evidence of facts, make some impression upon the minds of many of their countrymen.