are indebted for much of our science, our literature, and for all that is valuable in our constitution. But it ought never to be forgotten that those liberties were gained for us in the same field in which the martyr obtained his crown.

"The prodigious superiority," observes a philosophical and eloquent writer*, "which Europe possesses over Asia and Africa, is chiefly to be ascribed to this cause. It is the possession of a religion which comprehends the seeds of endless improvement; which maintains an incessant struggle with whatever is barbarous, selfish, or inhuman; which, by unveiling futurity, clothes morality with the sanction of a divine law, and harmonizes utility and virtue in every combination of events, and every stage of existence; a religion which, by affording the most just and sublime conceptions of the Deity, and of the moral relations of man, has given birth at once to the loftiest speculations and the most child-like humility, uniting the inhabitants of the globe into one family, and the bonds of a common salvation. It is thus religion, rising upon us like a finer sun, has quickened moral vegetation, and replenished Europe with talents, virtues, and exploits, which, in spite of physical disadvantages, has rendered it a paradise, the delight and the wonder of the world."

"We ought not to be discouraged," says that profound thinker Bishop Butlert, "in this good work, though its future success were less clearly foretold, and though its effects have, in reforming mankind, appeared

*The Rev. Robert Hall.

† See Sermon preached before the Incorporated Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts, 1738.

ground to hope for The bare establisheven the external

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id +into be as little as our adversaries pretend. They, indeed, and some others, seem to require more than either experience or Scripture give in the present course of the world. ment of Christianity in any place, form and profession of it, is a very important and valuable effect. It is a serious call to men to attend to the natural and revealed doctrines of religion. It is a standing publication of the gospel, and renders it a witness to them; and, by this means, the purposes of Providence are carrying on with regard to remote ages as well as to the present. 'Cast thy bread upon the waters, for thou shalt find it after many days.' 'In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand; for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they shall both be alike good.' We can look but a very little way into the consequences of things; our duty is to spread the incorruptible seed as widely as we can, and leave it to God to give the increase. Yet this much we may be almost assured of, that the gospel, wherever it is planted, will have its genuine effects upon some few; upon more, perhaps, than are taken notice of in the hurry of the world. There are, in every country where this gospel is preached, a few persons who come under the description of those of whom our Lord speaks in the parable of the sower, as understanding the word, and bearing fruit, and bringing forth some an hundred fold, some sixty, some thirty.' One might add, that those persons, in proportion to their influence, do at present better the state of things;-better it even in the civil sense, by giving some check to that avowed profligateness which is a contradiction to all order and

government, and, if not checked, must be the subver. sion of it."

To such as think that nothing is doing by the missions, unless they are continually hearing of miraculous conversions, I must be allowed to hazard a remark, for the accuracy of which I can vouch, as far as my own observation extends, that the number of conversions which come under the notice of missionaries do not bear a greater proportion to the general good done by the missions, than the conversions and triumphant deaths recorded in our monthly publications in England do to the entire sum of good done in our native country, by the preaching of the gospel and the institutions of Christianity. While the missionaries are complaining that they have so very few striking instances of the power of divine grace to record in their communications to their respective societies, let it be remembered that their influence is much more extensive, and the change carrying on by them much greater, than they themselves are able to imagine. In those countries where our missions have gained a marked ascendency there is scarcely one spot, however much secluded, impervious to their all-pervading light and heat. Where perhaps they are grossly misrepresented and spoken against, they are checking the grinding power of oppression, raising the standard of morals, proclaiming liberty to the captives, opening the prison doors to those that are bound, diffusing abroad the lights of science and literature, undermining the false systems of religion against which they have to contend, multiplying those charitable institutions that have for their object the relief of suffering humanity, vanquishing infidelity by the most direct and powerful of all arguments, by living exhibitions of

VOL. II.

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the truth of Christianity, and changing the very face of our colonies; while they are accelerating the approach of that moral revolution which will shortly usher in the kingdoms of this world as the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ.

APPENDIX.

No. I.

Stuurman's Kraal.—(Vide vol. i., p. 110.)

THE following account of the fate of David Stuurman and his followers, is extracted from an article in the New Monthly Magazine, for January, 1828, from the pen of my friend Mr. Pringle, who has also embodied the same affecting story in the notes appended to his poems written in South Africa. Mr. Pringle mentions that he obtained the details from a gentleman in the Cape colony, who knew the circumstances well, and had himself been a personal witness of many of them :

"On the death of Klaas Stuurman, who was killed in hunting the buffalo, his brother David, who had been his faithful associate in peace and war, succeeded him, by the unanimous suffrages of the little community at Kleine Rivier, as their chief or protector.

"The existence of this independent kraal gave, however, great offence to the neighbouring boors, the more especially as the two Stuurmans and their followers had particularly distinguished themselves in fighting against the Christians' during the late disturbances. The policy of the Batavian government, in protecting them in independence, was much blamed; and Stuurman and his people, though conducting themselves inoffensively, were jealously watched, and every possible occasion embraced of preferring complaints against them; with the view of getting them rooted out, and reduced to the same state of servitude as the rest of their na

tion had been now universally subjected to. For several years no suitable opportunity presented itself to obtain the accomplishment of this purpose; but with such feelings of mutual enmity and suspicion, occasions of offence could not fail to occur; and, at length, in 1810, when the colony was once more under the government of England, this Hottentot captain and his associates became outlaws in the following manner :

"Two individuals, belonging to this village, or kraal, had engaged themselves, for a certain period, in the service of a neighbouring boor; who, when the term of their agreement had expired, refused them permission to depart-a practice at that time very general, as at this day it still continues to be. The Hottentots, upon this, went off without permission, and returned to their own village. The boor followed them thither, and demanded them back: but