penditure incurred to throw an air of neatness and comfort over the surroundings; while philanthropic ladies should be requested to lend their skill in music and song in making the meetings centres of attraction, rather than of repulsion. In this respect a change of a very cheering character is noticeable. Meetings for educated natives used to be bald and unattractive in days gone by; but of late the varied elements of attraction have been added to them; and one cannot say of them what was once said of a preacher, whose appearance on the bazar platform was hailed by the audience as a signal for dispersion. In an extensive evangelistic tour recently undertaken I was very favourably impressed, in almost every place I visited, with the lively interest manifested by European ladies and gentlemen in my work or in the meetings held. be discussions P Two important questions have to be settled under this Should these head, one referring to the character of the meetings held, and the other to the nature of the discourses delivered. Are the meetings to be discussional, or merely prelective and hortatory? Some good persons are prone to avoid the slightest approach to a religious controversy; and they are most decided in their opposition to discussional meetings. Discussions, however, are inevitable in our intercourse with all classes of our countrymen, even with those called simple and unsophisticated; and when properly conducted, they are productive of good, though perhaps not unmixed with evil. A line of distinction should be drawn between the proximate and ultimate consequences of a religious controversy; the immediate bad results being in many cases counteracted and neutralized by the fruits of subsequent reflection. Besides we cannot very well avoid the necessity of taking up, as Dr. Duff had to do so often, the gauntlet thrown down by our opponents, however unwilling we may be to throw it down ourselves. Give addresses not too The second question to be settled is simply stated,what sorts of discourses are to be delivered? They must be the misnomers, called lectures, but as far behind the pro- elaborato. ductions properly called lectures, both in precision of language and in concentration of thought, as the sermons delivered offhand in our Methodist churches in India are behind the neatly written discourses read by Government Chaplains. Some years ago I heard in a meeting held for educated natives an elaborate discourse, in which the Social Meetings. Promote social elevation of the people. subject of the inspiration of the Bible was exhaustively treated, and in which therefore a hundred points were prominently brought forward; and though I had myself studied the subject, I could with difficulty follow the lecturer, and I could not but be sure that my fellow hearers could only thank him for not disturbing their sleep. A lady present at one of my meetings laughed when my address was over, exclaiming-"These persons announce lectures, but deliver sermons!" Such solecisms have to be perpetrated, and it will do us good to remember that a rambling discourse, bristling with repetitions, is to the majority of our hearers a lecture, just as a molehill is to the ant a huge mountain. 5. Again, the revivalist utilizes social meetings, such as tea-parties &c.; and the ladies of the C. M. S. Zenana Mission, Lucknow, who entertain the Babus of that city once a year, Miss L. Skirving of the Free Church Mission, Calcutta, who kindly gave a tea-party about a year ago to introduce some Bengali gentlemen to me, and Dr. Valentine, who recently crowned a series of meetings at Agra with such a party in his house, have demonstrated the feasibility of holding such meetings. It is a question worth raising,-Is the move in this direction as decidedly progressive on the part of our Missionary friends as it obviously is on the part of some noble-minded Civilians, who are trying to bridge the chasm between the races in India. Apropos of this, I beg to state that the Missionary should follow the revivalist in his efforts to raise socially and politically the people among whom he works. Here lies the greatest difficulty of the foreign Missionary, inasmuch as he is in danger of being induced, by the traditions of the community to which he belongs, to oppose the political and social aspirations of educated natives, and thereby throw insuperable obstacles in the way of their being favourably impressed with our religion. That some Missionaries, those especially who have been dabbling in newspapers, have crippled their usefulness in this way is a notorious fact; and that others have nullified themselves, by making race distinctions as almoners of the patronage of the church, cannot be denied by one who has freely mixed with them. This question is also to be raised:-Are our Missionary friends of both sexes, pursuing in this matter a policy as liberal as that of Government ? Press. 6. It must be confessed that lecture meetings, special- Utilize the ly when continued in a place for a considerable length of time, are not successful; and it is therefore desirable to extend their influence by a recourse to other methods of operation. Here again the revivalist is our example. He does not content himself with sermons, lectures, platform orations and choral symphonies;-he utilizes the press, edits newspapers, and issues tracts and fly-leaves for present use, and big books as nuclei of bodies of permanent literature gathering around his work. We have to follow his example, and not only publish pamphlets and flyleaves for ephemeral purposes, but raise up a body of apologetic literature adapted to meet the requirements of our work for permanent use. I am sorry I cannot dwell at length on this important feature of our work, but I beg in a sentence to point out the sort of books needed. Short treatises on the evidences of our religion, together with a treatise in which Christianity is set forth as it is, that is shorn of the repellant features attached to it by infidel writers; books on the isms of the day, including Brahmoism and Aryanism; and books like Mr. Macdonald's Vedic Religion, which in debates recently held enabled me to silence the champions of Aryanism at Sitapore, Moradabad and Jeypore, and which is eminently fitted to shake the misplaced confidence with which our educated countrymen are prone to cast a retrospective glance on the sacred antiquities of the country, when vexed with its present confessedly degraded condition. My object in giving prominence to this book is, not to praise Mr. Macdonald, who can very well do without human praise, but to solicit help from the Tract Societies represented in this Conference, in publishing a book on "Hindu Philosophy," which I am now engaged in writing, on the principle of presenting a faithful picture of a particular era of Indian antiquities, by means of quotations from books regarded as authoritative standards. 7. Again, domiciliary visitation is extensively followed Domiciliary by the revivalists; and in the prosecution of our work visitation. it, I believe, is the choicest resource at our disposal. Our lectures reach a very small section of the educated community; our publications extend indeed the area of influence, but fail to influence all classes; but the nooks and corners left uninfluenced by these methods yield, so to speak, to the visitation system. Let me cheerfully bear testimony to the fact that, as a rule, the Missionary Special agency needed. No special method needed. is received by our educated countrymen, and listened to with courtesy; but if he expects to be able to avoid controversy in the retirement of private talk, he expects an impossibility! 8. And lastly, the necessity of setting apart a special agency for this special work is patent. How is this agency to be raised? Not so much in academies, though academic influence is almost a sine qua non, as in the field of action. Educated men, fitted for the work by the Great Master Himself, should be set apart; and schemes deprecated such as tend to demoralize them, either by leaving them unprovided for, and consequently in circumstances fitted to distract their attention, or by placing on their shoulders a load of miscellaneous work adapted to neutralize the work to which they are to be consecrated, heart and soul. There are giants in these days, as there were in days gone by, men whose broad Atlas-like shoulders can bear a huge globe of avocations, a fact proved by the very interesting book for educated natives written by an Indian Bishop amid the presence of his multifarious duties. But with reference to ordinary men, the principle to be observed is that of one work to one The best preachers raised under the banner of revival are successful because in the first place they have enough to eat, and in the second place they have one work to do; while those of them who have not enough to eat, and are called upon to groan under a crushing load of miscellaneous work, are anxiously looking for the first outgoing steamer to take them away from a country which simply demoralizes them. A preacher of the Gospel in rags, or compelled pendulum-like to oscillate between incompatible lines of business, is an anomaly; and woe be to the system which lends the sanction of an approved norm to an abnormal state of things! man. OPENING SPEECH BY K. C. BANERJEA, ESQ., F. C. S., Calcutta. In approaching this subject I cannot help expressing gratitude to God because He has raised up a numerous English speaking community, so that brethren and sisters from America or Europe can find a native audience to whom they can speak the day they land, and to whom those Missionaries can speak who cannot acquire the vernaculars. The first chapter of 1st Corin thians contains the principle on which work among English speaking Hindus should be conducted, just as among others. It is often thought that special methods are needed for work among English speaking natives, but this is a mistake. To begin with, it is calculated to exert a bad influence on the worker himself. He is apt to consider it below his dignity to preach the gospel. I have myself keenly felt this temptation. Again, it seems to lay down a principle contrary to that of Paul who said, "Not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect." There is a brother in Calcutta who does not even know English, but who preaches to the educated men of Calcutta most acceptably, because he preaches with love. Third, by setting apart special workers for the educated classes, we are in danger of doing them harm by making them feel that they are great and wise. Fourth, by appointing special Missionaries for this class, there is a danger of trying to meet their logic and philosophy by logic and philosophy. And then these educated men feel that they must never acknowledge that their logic is faulty or their philosophy false. Moreover, we thus encourage these men to despise those who are appointed to preach the gospel in the usual way. And in the long run we thus teach them to despise the special workers themselves. They get tired of our logic and will not come to our English lectures. When meeting philosophy by philosophy, we fail to reach the fundamental point of religion and to touch the hearts which must be moved in order to be led to Christ. Our best weapons are those of the Bible itself. So let us first try to bring Scripture to bear on their consciences and to arouse their religious sensibilities. The Word of God is the divine instrument to change the heart. Let us not be deluded. Let us make the Bible prominent, not this essay or that book. When English lectures will not draw these educated men, attractive evangelistic services with singing and pointed addresses will draw them. "Not with wisdom of words." Do not meet philosophy with philosophy. Colleges. THE REV. E. S. SUMMERS, B. M. S., Acting Principal of the Religious Serampore College, said :-In our College we insist on attendance instruction in at religious teaching, but this is no compulsion. We charge no smaller fees than other Colleges near by us, and if students choose, they could go there. But as a matter of fact young men prefer to come to our Institution even when their friends wish them to go elsewhere. As an Englishman I would not use compulsion in religious matters, but during my five years of experience, I have found that pupils who at first were opposed to Bible instruction soon got interested in it. Mr. Williams, our late Principal, told me that the best pupils rarely, if ever, leave College without more or less conviction of sin. At street preachings |