The Pacific Ocean was very kind to us, for it answered to its name, and was pacific beyond all our expectations. Sixteen days of smooth seas and lovely weather brought us by way of Honolulu to Yokohama. Only the last day of our voyage was dark and rainy. But though the rain continued after our landing, Japan was picturesque. On four out of our six days we drove about, shut up in water-tight buggies called "rickshaws." They were like one-hoss-shays, through whose front windows of isinglass we looked out upon the bare legs of our engineer and conductor, who took the place of the horse for twenty-five cents an hour.
There were other sights on these rainy days—endless processions of slipshod men on wooden clogs, clattering their way through the narrow streets, while they protected themselves from the watery downpour by flat oil-paper umbrellas; other strong-limbed men acting as wheel-horses to draw or push incredible weights of lumber; and saving themselves from the wet by bushy coats of straw that made them look like porcupines; women, little and big, carrying babies on their backs, occasionally a girl, aged anywhere from four to eight, loaded with a baby aged two; shops, shops, shops, one-storied, artistic, fantastic, with signs on which Ah Sing and Ah Tong havemingled Chinese characters and English, and which inform you that the proprietors can furnish you with thesakeof Japan or the gasoline of the Standard Oil Company; these things convince you that you are in the midst of a crowded population struggling for subsistence and ready to work, a population of inexhaustible vitality and enterprise.
Our first rainy day was distinguished by a visit to the palatial mansion of a Japanese millionaire. Mr. Asano, the President of the Steamship Company that brought us thither, had invited the whole lot of first-class passengers to afternoon tea at his house in Tokyo. That house is a veritable museum of Japanese art. It reminded us of the collections of Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan. There was a great retinue of servants, and we were escorted upon arrival to one of the topmost rooms, where we were served with tea and presented with symbolic cakes by a dozen gorgeously bedecked young girls, who proved to be the children and grandchildren of our host. This, however, was only a preparatory welcome, for it was followed by the real reception in a great audience-room below, where Mr. and Mrs. Asano, together with their eldest son and daughter, gave us cordial greetings. A couple of hundred of our fellow passengers were gathered there and were partaking of light refreshments, with claret, tea, and mineral waters, while an expert Japanese juggler amused them with his feats of sleight of hand. The tapestries and paintings of this house were exquisite products of taste and skill, and the total effect was that of great wealth accompanied by true love for the beautiful. But it was the mansionof an orthodox Shinto and Buddhist, for in every large room there was an alcove with the sitting figure of a bronze Buddha.
A more distinctly Christian entertainment for that same rainy day was our reception by the Conference of Baptist missionaries and workers at the new Tabernacle in Tokyo. They had been called to meet Doctor Franklin and Doctor Anderson, who had been sent by our Foreign Missionary Society to consult with them as to our educational policy in Japan. We reached the Conference on its last day of meeting, and we had a most valued opportunity of observing its method of procedure. Half of those present were Japanese workers who did not understand English, and it was a new experience to address them when every word had to be interpreted. The social intercourse that followed was delightful, for it enabled us to greet our former pupils in considerable numbers. We then took lunch at the house of Doctor Axling, the pastor of the Tokyo church, while Doctor Tenny is President of the Theological Seminary. The little Japanese missionary home, with its tiny secluded garden, its paper partitions, and its mingled reminders of an American household, were things long to be remembered. Not less to be noted was the gratitude for our visit which was shown by our hosts. We had regarded ourselves as the persons honored and entertained. We learned that missionaries in a heathen land wonderfully appreciate the sight and the companionship of friends from their distant home.
Even more unexpected was our reception at the Women's College of Japan. Since I had been morethan thirty years a trustee of Vassar College, and for some years chairman of its board of trustees, Mrs. Strong and I were the guests of honor, and I was the first speaker called upon. Before me were five hundred young women in more somber dress than prevails at Vassar. All rose to welcome me at the beginning of my address, and all rose again to thank me at its conclusion. Most of these students understood only Japanese and needed an interpreter. Doctor Zumoto, the accomplished editor of the Japanese "Herald of Asia," translated my address into his own language after I had finished, having taken notes while I spoke. Until the very end I had the impression that this was a Christian college, and I innocently made the Lord Jesus the center and substance of my remarks, declaring that the renaissance of learning in Japan needed to be supplemented by a reformation of religion. Only when the evening was over did I learn that the institution was not only undenominational, but also non-religious, having Buddhist as well as Christian professors. Doctors Anderson and Franklin were also guests, and when they followed me, they made the same mistake and made Christian addresses. But the Japanese management is very polite and very liberal, and even in the dinner that followed ourfaux pasdid not provoke a word of criticism. The guests at that dinner served by the students were from the most prominent educational institutions of Japan. We highly appreciated the honor done us, and did not regret that in our ignorance of the situation we had given to that distinguished audience the true gospel of Christ.
Another dinner of a very different sort was that which we ourselves gave at the Grand Hotel of Yokohama to the Rochester men. To my surprise twenty-four persons sat down, but this number included at least ten of the wives. Chiba and Axling, Tenny and Topping, the Fishers, father and son, Clement, Brown, Benninghoff, Takagaki, Kawaguchi, all except the last with their wives, made up the list. I was proud of them, for they are leaders of thought and of education in Japan. Only Doctor Bearing's absence on furlough in America, a furlough ended only by his lamented death, prevented us from inviting him, though he was not a Rochester man. Reminiscences of seminary life were both pathetic and amusing at that dinner. One thing impressed itself upon my mind and memory: Our missionaries have not lost their sense of humor. Under all their burdens of anxiety and responsibility they have retained their sanity, their hopefulness, and their good fellowship. The hilarity of our gathering was the bubbling over of cheerful dispositions, and the safety-valve gave evidence that there were large reserves of steam. Missionaries are not a solemn set. They are only a good set of human beings made in the divine image, for is it not written that even "He that sitteth in the heavens shall laugh"?
The next day was the brightest of the bright. We took advantage of it to visit the great temple of Kamakura, and to inspect the greatest artistic monument of Japan, the bronze image of Buddha. It is a sitting statue, with folded hands and eyes closed, as if absorbed in mystic contemplation of his own excellence as a manifestation of deity, and careless of thesorrows and sins of the world. The great bronze image is fifty feet high, but it is hollow. We entered it, climbed up by ladders to its shoulders, and looked out of windows in its back. Its hollowness seemed symbolic, for it has only the outward semblance of divinity and is deaf to all human entreaties. On that same day we visited the temple of Hachiman, the god of war, most spacious and impressive in its park-like surroundings of ancient trees and noble gateways, but fearful in its accompanying images of revenge and slaughter. Humanity needs compassion in the Godhead. The Japanese have felt this, and they have invented a goddess of mercy, Kwannon by name. Her shrine is the richest in Japan. It constitutes one of the greatest attractions of the capital. Millions visit it every year, and the offerings of its worshipers support a whole colony of Buddhist priests. The avenue leading to the temple is lined with shops where mementoes of the goddess may be purchased, as in Ephesus of old silver shrines might be bought in honor of the great goddess Diana. It is the old story of buyers and sellers in the Jewish temple. It was most pathetic to see a well-dressed and handsome woman bend herself almost double before the image, clap her hands to call the attention of the goddess, and then fold them in prayer, possibly for the child that had hitherto been denied her. It is well understood in this temple that, until the clink of coin is heard in the collection-box, it is vain to suppose that even the goddess of mercy will listen to a prayer.
The god of war reigns in Japan, rather than the goddess of mercy. War is more profitable. The saleof munitions to the Russian Government is enriching Japan, as our sales to the Allies are enriching us. The love of gain is an obstacle to the success of the gospel, here as well as in America. Nothing but a mighty influence of the Holy Spirit can convince Japan of sin, and bring her to the feet of Christ. The work of our missionaries, however, is permeating all the strata of society. Western science and Western literature are so bound up with Christianity that Japan cannot easily accept them without also accepting Christ.
We wished to see mission work in a country field, and we begged Mrs. Fisher to go with us to Kanagawa, a suburb of Yokohama, where an educated milkman is pastor, and where the Mary Colby School of Christian girls attends the worship of his church. The reverence and sincerity of the service impressed us. The warmth and abandon of the singing put to shame our Western quartet choirs. Here is a pastor who prefers to supplement his meager salary by selling milk on week-days, rather than give up the satisfaction of seeing his church entirely self-supporting. It seemed to me the model of a good ministry, and the prophecy of a multitude of New Testament churches in Japan, manned and financed and governed by the Japanese themselves. So long as we of the West furnish both the preachers and their salaries, the Japanese will not learn to depend upon their own administration or their own giving, and we will not have churches organized on correct principles and so rooted in the soil that they can stand the shocks of time and endlessly propagate the gospel. May "the little one" in Kanagawa "become a thousand"!
Japan is a country where "every prospect pleases, and only man is vile." Immorality is its curse. There is little drunkenness indeed, and gambling is strictly prohibited. But the relations of the sexes are almost wholly unregulated. Patriotism and filial devotion take exaggerated forms, and girls can lead a life of shame in order to provide means for the education of their brothers. General Nogi and his wife can commit suicide when his sons are killed in battle, and the whole country can regard it as so noble a deed that the general's desire to extinguish his family name is not permitted to prevent the adoption of it by another. The Japanese are a nation of wonderful natural gifts. Honor, enterprise, submission, accessibility to new ideas, powers of imitation and invention, make them the leaders of the Orient. Steamships of twenty-two thousand tons, and equal to any Atlantic Cunarders, yet built in their own dockyards by shipwrights who twenty years ago knew nothing of their trade, are a proof of extraordinary plasticity and ability. Civilization and Christianity may find new expression, if the Japanese are subdued by the Cross of Christ.
My interest in missions has been doubled since I came in contact with the practical work of our missionaries. We have able and devoted representatives on this foreign field, and I believe that God will make them mighty to dethrone Buddhism, and to crown Christ Lord of all. Yes, "every prospect pleases." When I sailed through the Inland Sea of Japan, two hundred and forty miles long, studded with hundreds of islands small and great, islands often surmounted with glistening white temples or fortifications, I thoughtour Thousand Islands of the St. Lawrence, and even the Isles of the Greek Ægean, were not to be mentioned in comparison. The landlocked harbor of Nagasaki, with its encircling hills, is finer than our Golden Gate of the Pacific. Fuji-yama, snow-capped and symmetrical, seen against the crimson sunset sky, is more beautiful even than Mount Ranier when seen from Tacoma, or Vesuvius when seen from Naples. Japan is a land for poetry and song, a land to awaken the loftiest patriotism, a land to inspire and lead the world. Provided, ah yes! provided, it can be converted to Christ, and made his servant. The Japanese is a natural orator; he has organizing ability of the highest order; he is accessible, yet independent. Now is the time to make him a preacher of the gospel to all the East. China and India have already felt the influence of his military and political progress. Let us, by pouring in the light of Christianity, make him also their leader in true religion!
Hongkong is a city wonderful for situation and for trade. It has a landlocked harbor encircled by precipitous hills and large enough to float the navies of the world. It is the second largest port on earth for exports and imports, over six hundred million dollars' worth in a year. It is a meeting-place of the East and the West, a fortress of Britain in China, a conglomeration of people, a center of influence for Japan and for India, an object-lesson in sanitation, education, and municipal government. The dominating religion is that of the Church of England, and the Hongkong University, though endowed in part by wealthy Chinese, follows English models and has a staff of English professors.
I mention Hongkong only to make more clear my description of Swatow, its northern neighbor. The situation of Swatow is very like that of Hongkong. A noble harbor encircled by steep hills, it is one of the chief ports between Hongkong and Shanghai, and only a single night's steamer-ride from Hongkong. Its attraction to us lay in the fact that it is more Chinese than Hongkong, a principal seat of Presbyterian and Baptist missions, and not so dominated as is Hongkong by the Church of England. As Hongkong is an island, so our Baptist Mission Compound is on an island, separated from the city of Swatow by the bayon which hundreds of sampans and fishing-boats with lateen sails are always riding, and at whose wharves many a great steamship is loading or unloading freight. When our vessel arrived, we were quickly surrounded by a multitude of smaller craft, manned by clamorous tradesmen selling wares or seeking employment. The commissioner of British customs, who was our fellow passenger, most courteously invited us to share his motor-launch, and when we had landed on the other side of the bay he sent us up the hill to the mission compound in two of his sedan-chairs, each one borne by two stout men in picturesque uniform: and wearing the insignia of the customs office.
A word about the English customs may be interesting. To satisfy English creditors, and later, to pay interest on indemnities for the Boxer uprising, China mortgaged the larger part of her duties on foreign imports. Sir Robert Hart was appointed Inspector General, to superintend this collection of duties. He introduced system and honesty, where before there had been only disorder and peculation. From twenty to thirty million dollars are in this way collected every year. Swatow is the third port in the amount thus obtained, itself furnishing two to three millions of the aggregate result. But this putting her collection of customs into the hands of foreigners, though it has taught China her own wastefulness and the superiority of Western finance, is a burden so humiliating that it cannot always continue. When China fully awakes, she will realize her strength and will reclaim what her weakness ceded to Great Britain.
Our mission compound is one of the noblest in theEast. It is due to the foresight and executive ability of Dr. William Ashmore, Senior. He began his missionary work in Bangkok, Siam, but was transferred by our Missionary Union to Swatow, with the view of opening China to our missionary efforts. He had Irish blood in his veins. He was witty and eloquent, fervid and passionate. But he was also a man of grit, and a hero of the faith. He wanted a quiet base of supplies from which he could send out expeditions into the heart of China. He had no means of any account. But he saw the possibilities in these steep and barren hillsides opposite Swatow, and for six hundred dollars he bought a tract which he gradually turned into a garden, with twenty mission buildings and residences so thrust into the rocks and so overhanging one another, that the whole plant seems a miracle of engineering. Like a fortress, it commands the city of Swatow across the bay, very much as Governor's Island commands New York. From its church and its schools have gone out a score of evangelists and native pastors, to turn Swatow and the whole country within a radius of a hundred miles into a present seed-plot and a future garden of the Lord.
William Ashmore, Senior, died seven years ago. But he left a son of the same name, who is a Chinese scholar of wide reputation, a sound theologian, and a leader greatly beloved. He has nearly completed a translation of the Bible into the colloquial Chinese—a felt need of many years. At his house, so wedged into the rocky hillside that a typhoon might seem equal to washing it down into the bay, we were most hospitably entertained. Here we spent a memorableSabbath Day. At the church service, at least five hundred church-members and pupils of the various schools were gathered, and I addressed them on "Faith, as Both a Giving and a Taking"—a giving of one's self, and a taking of Christ to be ours. Doctor Ashmore interpreted my talk to the audience, sentence by sentence. The whole service was to me an inspiring illustration of New Testament order and simplicity, for my address and the sermon of Doctor Ashmore which followed had been preceded by free participation of members of the church, in which one happy father arose to give thanks for the birth of a girl-baby, after five sons had been given him—a great change from the time when new-born girls were despised and often thrown out into the street. This reverent congregation, worshiping God in freedom and sincerity, seemed the prophecy of a redeemed China. This congeries of schools, from kindergarten to theological seminary, with Ashmore, Capen, Page, and Waters for instructors, and Groesbeck, Speicher, Lewis, Foster, and others for evangelists, has already permeated a whole province with Christian teaching. It needs an institutional plant in the city, where it already has a noble location, and it also needs a motor-launch to carry its students to the field across the bay, where they can find opportunity to win the multitude to Christ.
Even Swatow is partly Anglicized. We wished to see old China, heathen China, and Brother Groesbeck gave us the opportunity. Only twenty miles from Swatow lies the city of Chao-yang, where this pioneer missionary has for eighteen years been stationed.Chao-yang is a larger city than Swatow; the Chinese count it as containing a population of three hundred thousand. It is the converging point of all the trade that reaches Swatow from a hundred miles to the south and the west. Yet all this trade is conducted through a narrow canal, so congested with boats that there are innumerable delays. Even when the boats reach the waters of the bay, the remaining channel is shallow for lack of dredging, and launch-progress is very slow. We had ocular proof of this latter evil; but we at last reached the dock.
Then came a reception entirely new to our experience, and one which we can never forget. Eighty young men from the mission school met us, all in white uniforms with sashes of blue. We passed through their lines, forty boys on each side baring their heads as we passed. Then a procession was formed. A brass band, with bugles and resounding drums, led the way. The student escort followed. After the long rows of boys came an honor-squad of Chinese soldiers, shouldering their guns and bearing the Chinese and the American flags. This portion of the escort had been furnished by the Chinese governor, who in this way certainly showed his friendly regard for the American mission. We concluded the procession, sitting in our sedan-chairs, each of our party of four borne upon the shoulders of four men. The band struck up, a great explosion of firecrackers ensued, and we began our journey of a mile and a half to the gates of the city, and then two miles and a half farther through its crowded streets, until we reached the mission buildings and the residence of Mr. and Mrs.Groesbeck on the other side of the town. The Chinese are great on ceremonial, and all this reception had been arranged by the students themselves, in honor of Mr. Groesbeck's teacher and his teacher's wife. Needless to say that I was astounded at such a reception, for Augustus Cæsar never made an imperial entry in Rome more thrilling than the triumphal entry which Augustus Strong made that day into the great city of Chao-yang.
Mr. Groesbeck said that no public notice had been given of our coming. Yet the whole population of three hundred thousand seemed to have come out to meet us. Imagine a street two and a half miles long, but only ten to fifteen feet wide, thronged with water-carriers and beasts of burden compelled to give way to our great procession! Every nook and corner of the way, the fronts of the one-storied shops and the entrances to the cross-streets, were all a perfect sea of faces—rows of children little and big overtopped by rows of half-naked men, with scores of women peering wistfully from windows in the rear—faces by thousands and tens of thousands, till it seemed as if the whole population of the planet had emptied itself into Chao-yang. I looked upon hundreds of splendid forms of men, naked above the waist, and carrying heads worthy of notice from any sculptor, none of them hateful, all of them impressed and wondering, and they seemed to me the embodiment of China crying out for God. When we were only half-way through the city, the endless masses of humanity had so impressed me that I could not restrain the tears. The sight was simply overwhelming. And all this the parish of oneman! It is to save this great city, now almost wholly given to idolatry, that Mr. Groesbeck asks for money to build in its very center an assembly-room and an institutional church, and that Doctor Lesher asks for a hospital building to facilitate his medical work.
I made an address to those eighty boys that evening, as they stood at attention before me. Half of them were still heathen, but their fathers had sent them to this Christian school, believing that they needed a better religion than that of Confucius or of Buddha. I urged them to become soldiers of Christ, and to follow him as their Commander. I did not conceal from them the fact that such following might involve opposition and earthly loss. But I promised them that, if they suffered with Christ, they would also reign with him.
We returned from Chao-yang very sober and thoughtful, for our visit had been a revelation of appalling needs. Swatow seemed a paradise after such a visit. The smiling faces of so many Christians, and the signs of a truly Christian civilization, inspired me with new hope for the future. But our time had come for leaving China, at least temporarily, and India was at once to be visited. Our departure from Swatow was almost as spectacular as our entry into Chao-yang. There was no military guard, and there were no firecrackers, but there was a fine brass band of academy boys, to lead our procession of sedan-chairs, as we passed through the long lines of scholars who had gathered with their teachers to bid us farewell. The schools were all represented. First came the little kindergartners, then pupils of the grammar school,the girls' school, the women's school, the Bible-women's training-school, the boys' academy, and finally, the theological seminary. They numbered more than three hundred in all. Some of the teachers accompanied us to the steamer. We parted from them with regret, but we were thankful that they could remain to prepare the way for a new religion, education, and civilization in China.
My week-end in China leaves me with a new sense of the vastness of the heathen world, and of its absolute dependence upon Christ, as its only possible Saviour. The question whether the heathen will ever be saved if we do not give them the gospel, is not so serious a one for us as the other question whether we ourselves will ever be saved if we do not give them the gospel.
Each of these cities might seem to be the New Jerusalem, if you were to see only its European part and the dress of its inhabitants. Their European residents are all arrayed in white. Not all of them are saints, however. The white is purely external and compulsory. Heat is a great leveler, and we are nearing the equator. When we approached Manila we were in the tail of a typhoon, but the danger was past. Indeed, since we left San Francisco, we have encountered no storm, have had only smooth seas, and have witnessed continually what Æschylus called "the innumerable laughter of the ocean waves."
It was pleasant to perceive that American enterprise and administration have transformed Manila, the capital of the Philippine Islands, from a medieval into a modern city. Its newly constructed streets and pavements, water-works and drainage, electricity and the trolley, have turned this old and dilapidated Spanish town into a place of order and beauty. Its parks and gardens, its municipal buildings and hospitals, are an object-lesson to all beholders. The walls of the fort still remain, but the moat has been filled up. The Roman Catholic Cathedral shows the large designs of a former priesthood to capture the people by architecture and ceremonial. But Protestant churches,missions, and schools, are coming to have the first place in popular esteem. The former palace of the Spanish governor is now the meeting-place of the democratic legislature, and the Jones Bill, recently passed by our Congress, but now locally known as "the Bill Jones," has given hopes of a complete and speedy Filipino independence.
Our observation of the place, and our intercourse with residents of Manila, lead us to doubt the wisdom of our immediate relinquishment of authority over these islands. Eager as are the Filipino leaders for self-government, they have not yet learned the art of self-restraint. The recent trouble in the great hospital illustrates this. Its American superintendent has resigned his office, for the reason that his Filipino staff and subordinates conspired to make discipline and sanitary regulations impossible. They desired to manage the institution themselves, when they were incompetent to enforce cleanliness and order. What happens in hospital work happens also in all branches of civil administration. It will take a whole generation to raise up officials who can be trusted to do their work for the public good, rather than to provide comfortable and remunerative positions for themselves.
We visited the spot, five miles away, where our American troops, under Admiral Dewey, landed to besiege the town. We motored to Fort McKinley also, where our soldiers still command the situation. But our main interest was in the mission schools and in the interdenominational theological seminary. In these educational institutions all the instruction is in the English language. They are Americanizing as well asevangelizing the population. The establishment of universal and compulsory school attendance will in a few years turn a Spanish-speaking into an English-speaking people, and will unify the education and the civilization of the islands. Nothing indeed is more remarkable in the Orient than the gradual superseding of the native dialects by the printed and spoken English. In the great country of India, it is to be remembered, English is the required language in school and court, as well as in every government office. Even the Romanizing of written Chinese and Japanese will make vastly easier the political unity and the religious evangelization of China and Japan.
When we reached Singapore, we found ourselves in one of the world's greatest ports of entry. It is also one of the keys to the Orient, as Sir Thomas Raffles perceived more than a century ago. Its splendid government buildings and its strong fortifications show that the British propose to hold it to the end. The recent incipient revolt, which was fortunately nipped in the bud when it seemed to the conspirators on the verge of success, and which was punished by the summary execution of thirty or forty rebels without the news of it getting into the papers, showed that Germany had much to hope for and Britain much to fear from the unrest of these heterogeneous populations. I had a vivid reminder of all this at the Methodist Episcopal Mission, where I found over sixteen hundred scholars in attendance, and where I addressed five hundred of them at their morning prayers. One of the chief difficulties of Christian work in Singapore is the aggregation and mixture of races. Sevendifferent nationalities are represented in the schools. The Tamil, the Malay, and the Chinese are the most numerous, and of these the Chinese take the lead. Fifty thousand Chinese immigrants enter the port of Singapore every year, mainly because there is employment for them in the rubber plantations of the Straits Settlements. The congestion of population in China drives them southward to Singapore, and from Singapore they swarm northward to Burma, southward to Java, and westward to India.
This mixing up of the many different nationalities makes it impossible for the missions in Singapore to teach their pupils in any other language than the English. This requisition of English seems to some of the people a slur upon their own tongue, and a sign of British ascendency. They are jealous of the English, even while they perceive their own dependence upon them. Only British justice and watchfulness can keep in check the disposition to revolt on the part of some classes with which the government has to deal, especially when these classes are stirred up by German spies and German money. Thus far all seditious attempts have been put down, and the traveler learns to bless the wisdom of British administration, and to rest secure and confident under the folds of the Union Jack.
We left Singapore for Penang with some regret, for the reason that large steamers must be exchanged for small steamers. The one we took was exceedingly good and modern. Another on which we embarked somewhat later seemed to have come down from the days of Noah and the ark. But British steamers,however old and small, are clean and safe. You "get there" all the same. On our way to Rangoon our first stop was at Port Swetterham, from which we motored twenty-seven miles to Kuala Lumpur, the capital of the Federated Malay States—federated under the British Crown. Here is a city of Malays and Chinese, with British government buildings, Mohammedan mosques, Buddhist temples, an English cathedral, and a Methodist church. Our road thither led us through seemingly endless forests of rubber trees and of coconut palms. The profusion of tropical vegetation was both novel and impressive. These Federated Malay States furnish the world with more than half its supply of rubber, and many English and American investors are growing rich from the soaring of prices induced by the war.
Penang, however, furnished us with our greatest sensation. It was a Chinese funeral. In this city of two hundred thousand inhabitants, a millionaire Chinese banker had died. He was a Buddhist as well as a Confucianist, but also a loyal and patriotic supporter of charitable institutions, and of the British rule. He had given to the British government a number of aeroplanes to facilitate its military operations, and a large sum of money for its war-loan. When he died, the customary worship of ancestors, which is a part of Chinese religion, as well as gratitude for his past gifts, prompted his family to plan a sumptuous funeral. It is said to have cost them thirty thousand dollars. We arrived in Penang just in time to see the show. All the way from Singapore, indeed, we were accompanied on our steamer by a fine brass band,which was only one of three brass bands hired to furnish music for the funeral service.
My powers of description fail, when I attempt to tell the wonders of a funeral procession fully a half mile long. It was headed by a symbolic float of waxwork figures, in which a colossal horse, prancing on its hind legs, seemed just about to soar into the air. The horse was held in by four angelic forms following and holding in their hands scepters of royalty. This apparition reminded me of the horses and chariot in which Elijah ascended to heaven, and it seemed to indicate that the deceased had departed with all the honors heaven and earth could bestow. A band of music accompanying the float, and playing solemn but not mournful strains, gave color to this interpretation. A retinue of sedan-chairs, decorated with all the colors of the rainbow, came next in order. These sedan-chairs were empty of occupants, and contained long strips of red paper on which were written the names and merits of the millionaire's ancestors, to be read by Buddhist priests at the grave. The chairs were each the gift of some relative or friend of the departed. They symbolized the welcome given him by those who had gone before him to the better land. A second band of music was followed by a body-guard of British soldiers in khaki, deputed by the British governor to show his estimate of the character and loyalty of the deceased.
Then came the hearse, if hearse it could be called. It was really an enormous catafalque, decorated with gold tinsel and costly embroideries. Peacocks and birds of paradise were depicted on its silken hangings.A dozen men, in elaborate robes of blue, carried this gaudy structure upon their shoulders, while other gorgeously attired attendants bore great ribbon-banners of satin, say twenty feet long by four feet wide and of the most brilliant colors, inscribed with Chinese characters and making known the virtues of the departed. But the most curious part of the procession, was yet to come. Preceded by the third band of music were the offerings of food and drinks which were to furnish sustenance to the spirit in the world into which he had now entered. There were six roasted sucking-pigs, laid in order, on portable tables, with baskets of rice, oranges, bananas, all kinds of fruit and confectionery, and cups of tea and wines. These were carried to the cemetery, to be presented to the departed spirit at the grave, then jealously guarded for an interval, finally in part given to the officiating priests, and in part consumed at a feast held by the surviving members of the family. The costlier the offerings, the better would the feast be enjoyed. There was no lack of priests in this ceremonial. They were young and clean-shaven, and looked as if they had enlisted for this very service. I thought I could discern a sly twinkle in their eyes, as they inspected the preparations for the feast, before the march began.
The mourners must not be forgotten. Among the Chinese, white, and not black, is the appointed sign of mourning. The four wives of the deceased and the members of his family were accordingly dressed in the coarsest of white sackcloth, with ashes sprinkled over their faces, and they walked behind the hearse, howling. It was a piteous spectacle, reminding oneof the professional and hired wailers in Palestine, where "the mourners go about the streets," uttering dismal lamentations which can be bought for money. Far be it from me to suggest that such was the lamentation which we heard that day, for there is reason to believe that in this case the deceased was respected and beloved.
This ceremonial had required long and elaborate preparation. The death indeed occurred last July; the body had been embalmed; it had lain in state and open to public inspection for four whole months; the funeral did not take place until November. A vast amount of detail had been attended to and provided for. Great packages of silken umbrellas had been stored to shield the heads of guests and servants. All the bearers of sedan-chairs, scores in number, were clad in silken uniforms; there were banners, and inscriptions, and lanterns, galore. Everything was done to impress the Chinese multitude with the greatness of the occasion. But it was all a glorification of man and of his virtues. There was no confession of sin, nor assurance of pardon; no proclamation of a divine Redeemer; no promise of life and immortality in Christ. Heathen religions are man's vain effort to win heaven by merits of one's own. Only Christianity is God's revelation of salvation "without money and without price," through the sacrifice and death of his only Son. This is the gospel which Confucianist and Buddhist, Hindu and Mohammedan, need to-day, and which, thank God, our missionaries are giving them.
Burma is the land of pagodas. These places of worship are the most striking feature of every landscape. Their bell-shaped domes, startlingly white, or so covered with gold-leaf as to shine resplendent in the sunlight, crown many a hilltop and constitute the chief beauty of the towns. The pagodas are usually solid structures of brick, with facings of plaster, and they are buildings at which, rather than in which, worship is offered. There are exceptions, however. The more ancient of these edifices, like the Ananda at Pagan, have inner chambers enshrining gigantic statues of Buddha, with corridors around the chambers, quite comparable to the aisles of English or French cathedrals. But the greatest of all the Burmese pagodas, the Shwe Dagon of Rangoon, is a solid mass of brick, with no interior cell, yet enormous in size, erected on a broad platform one hundred and sixty-six feet from the ground, towering to an additional height of two hundred and seventy feet, and crowned with a jewelled "umbrella" at the total elevation of four hundred and thirty-six feet above the teeming streets of the city below. The main platform from which the pagoda proper rises is an immense court nine hundred feet long by six hundred and eighty-five feet wide, and crowded with minor pagodas and shrines. This great esplanade is approached from the four points of thecompass by long covered arcades, lined with shops in which offerings of every description can be bought. On the marble floor of the main court and before the minor shrines these offerings are presented by scores of worshipers prostrating themselves before statues of Buddha of every size. And yet the great conical or bell-shaped dome of the pagoda is its chief attraction, for this is covered with gold-leaf from its base to its summit, and its shining splendor salutes the traveler from miles and miles away.
The religion of Burma is Buddhism. Buddhism is a religion of "merit," so called, and the surest way to acquire "merit" is by building a pagoda. Repairing an old pagoda will not answer the purpose; hence many an old pagoda goes to ruin, side by side with a new one coated with whitewash or gold-leaf. Curiously enough, the epoch of pagoda-building was almost coincident with that of cathedral-building in England and France, that is, from A. D. 1000 to 1200. When one sees at Pagan an area along the Irrawaddy River eight miles long and only two miles wide, with nearly five thousand pagodas, multitudes of them small and in ruins, but many still standing great and splendid in their proportions, it seems impossible to doubt that a certain genuine religious impulse, however blind and mistaken, led to their erection. There they stand, mere relics of a magnificent past, but now erect in the midst of desolation, with only scattered huts about them, where once there must have been a dense population, rich and lordly. The fate of these towering monuments of idolatry and superstition, now for the most part given over to the moles and the bats, shows whatGod can do for pagodas, and encourages us to believe that missionary effort will be mighty through God to the pulling down of similar more modern strongholds, together with all the high things that exalt themselves above the knowledge of his truth.
This leads me to speak of the great missionary work that is now honeycombing and undermining the foundations of heathenism in this pagoda-land. We came to Burma to see what God has wrought. The labors and sufferings of Adoniram Judson appealed to us even in our childhood. We wished to see how the mustard-seed which Judson sowed in faith has grown up to bear fruit. So we went to Aungbinle, where for twenty long months Judson was imprisoned and tortured. There we seemed to hear God's word to Moses: "Take off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place where thou standest is holy ground." We were reminded also of the burning bush, which was ever burning but not consumed. Great forward movements in history are born in suffering. Through death to life, and the cross before the crown—that was the way of Christ, and it will be the way of his followers. We gathered, a small group of missionaries and visitors, in the little chapel that has been built upon the site of that old prison, and we prayed, with a lot of dusky villagers and children before us, that God would yet more gloriously prosper the work of missions.
We had every advantage in our investigations in Burma. Thirteen of my former pupils are now missionaries in that land. For many years they have been inviting me to visit them. Nine missionaries met us at the dock, as we landed from Singapore andPenang. They have made our visit delightful by their affectionate and boundless hospitality. Morning, noon, and night have been full of sightseeing, of visiting mission churches and schools, of "chotas," or little breakfasts, of "tiffins" or substantial lunches, or afternoon-teas and dinners at the close of the day. The social and kindly spirit of it all has turned what otherwise would have been wearisome into a succession of pleasant experiences. But there has been work, and there has been hard thinking also. Making three addresses a day, longer or shorter, for three weeks in succession, is no sinecure. I am sometimes called an "octogeranium," but I have not been permitted to waste my sweetness on the desert air. It is a wonder to me that I have survived so much stress and rushing, but I am compelled to say that good appetite and good sleep have made me feel in better health and spirits than for many months before.
What I have seen has gladdened my eyes and warmed my heart. Closer contact with mission work and mission workers has broadened my ideas, given me more sympathy, more zeal, and more hope. The vastness of these heathen populations, their appalling needs, together with their infinite possibilities, have dawned upon me as never before. Burma has sixty millions of people. It is a most fruitful land, never visited by the famines which ravage India proper, the land west of the Bay of Bengal. It enshrines a religion which, with all its ignorance and superstition, is more free from gross immorality than that which prevails on the other side of the bay. Its people are the most heterogeneous of any upon earth. Though theproud Burman native is still the dominant power, he has now to compete with the rising intelligence of the Karens, the sturdiness of the Chinese, and the subtlety of the Hindus. These last two peoples have in late years in large numbers migrated hither. Mohammedan mosques are rising side by side with the older Buddhist pagodas. The Parsees are numerous and influential, and theosophists are not rare. Rangoon is probably the capital city of Buddhism, for here at any rate is its most splendid temple. And Rangoon is a sort of melting-pot of all races. Burmans and Chinese are intermarrying, and are producing a most vigorous offspring. Sikhs and Malays, by their peculiar dress, make picturesque the streets. I know of no greater mixture of races, unless it is in the city of New York, where we have more Jews than there are in Jerusalem, and more Italians than there are in Rome. Here in Rangoon, however, all these peoples preserve their distinctive characteristics of dress and language, so that racial differences are more apparent.
The Roman Catholics and the representatives of the Church of England have made great efforts to capture Burma. They have established noble plants in the way of church edifices, hospitals, and schools. The leper asylum of the Romanists is an impressive and worthy provision for the housing and treatment of hundreds thus afflicted. The cathedral and school of the Anglican Church show a most praiseworthy estimate of the needs of this great province of the British Empire, and breakfasting with Bishop Fyffe, the metropolitan of Rangoon, gave us a pleasing impression ofhis kindly Christian spirit. The Methodist Episcopal Church has also its representative here, and all of these evangelizing agencies are supplemented by the work of the Y. M. C. A., the Y. W. C. A., and the Salvation Army. Yet it is not too much to say that the Baptists have first place in Burma, both in church-membership and in education. We were the first Christian denomination upon the ground; we have leavened the country with our influence; our Mission Press has furnished the Bible in several different languages to the people of Burma; our schools are the most advanced in grade and the most numerously attended; our churches are most nearly self-governing and self-supporting. We have great reason to thank God and take courage.
All this is the growth of a single century. It was in the year 1813 that the Judsons arrived in Burma, and it was six years after that the first Burman convert was baptized. In 1828 the first Karen convert followed Christ. These two were the first-fruits from the two leading races of Burma. Since their baptism there has sprung up a flourishing Christian community which embraces representatives both of the indigenous races of Burma and of the immigrant peoples from India proper, from China, and from other lands. The Baptist churches in Burma to-day, as their official representatives inform us, enroll members gathered from eighteen different nationalities, besides members of the Anglo-Indian or Eurasian type. "The entire Christian community in Burma, according to the Government Census of 1911, numbers 210,081; of which number, 122,265 are Baptists, while 60,088 are RomanCatholics, 20,784 are Anglicans, 1,675 are Methodists, and the remainder are distributed among smaller sects. That one Protestant convert of 1819 has become an army of one hundred and fifty thousand."
We must add to this numerical statement the facts that a corps of Christian leaders has been trained and put into service; that native Christians have found their way into influential positions as magistrates, township officers, teachers of schools, inspectors of police, and clerks in all departments of the government. Christian men are prominent in business and professional circles, as traders, contractors, brokers, physicians, lawyers; and the Christian character is everywhere recognized and honored. A church, to a large degree self-propagating, has been planted in Burma. A complete system of missionary education has been organized. Modern philanthropic work for the relief and prevention of physical ills has been transplanted to Burma. The Sunday School, the Christian Endeavor Society, the temperance movement, are common methods of Karen and of Burmese church activity. An extensive Christian literature has been provided, in addition to the printing of the Bible in all the main languages of the country. In fact, a Home Mission Society, for the evangelization of the natives in the remoter sections of the country, is in active operation. When we remember that all this is the product of a hundred years, in a land where only a little while ago Christianity was a persecuted religion, we praise God for the result.
I must mention two features of my visit which claim special attention. I refer to the work of the collegiateand other schools, and to the hospitality of non-Christian gentlemen. We have inaugurated in Burma a graded system of education, under government inspection, and leading to full university training. Nothing in my travels interested me more than to see hundreds of boys and girls of Burmese and Karen families, in which girls have hitherto been unable to read or write, singing Christian hymns from books with the music and words before them. The great need of France, as the Emperor Napoleon once said, was good mothers. It is equally true of Burma, and little children carry back into idolatrous homes their love for Christ, and their juvenile protest against heathenism. I addressed several audiences of a thousand each, where the full half were girls and women, no longer secluded and ignorant, but prepared to assume responsibility as the mothers and trainers of a new race of Burmans. In these schools, exclusive of the seminaries and Bible schools, there are enrolled more than 30,000 pupils, who pay annual tuition fees of more than $80,000. The Morton Lane School at Maulmain, the Eurasian School at the same place, the Kemendine School in Rangoon, the Girls' School at Mandalay, have each of them about three hundred scholars, and they are sending out influences which will in a few years revolutionize the civilization and the religion of Burma. Other schools of not so high a grade are doing equally faithful work. Our Baptist College at Rangoon is caring for the higher grades of education, and is preparing hundreds of young men for teaching and for government service. It was inspiring to address a thousand of its scholars, under the direction ofPrincipal David Gilmore, D. D., formerly of Rochester. The endowment of such an institution in this heathen land would be an achievement worthy of some Christian millionaire in America. And the same thing may be said for our Burman Theological Seminary at Insein under Dr. John McGuire, and our Karen Theological Seminary under Dr. W. F. Thomas.
That walls of partition are breaking down under the influence of Christianity, was made plain to us by invitations to take breakfast with a noted Parsee barrister, and to take afternoon-tea with a wealthy Mohammedan gentleman, both of them citizens of Rangoon. The courtesy and intelligence of these hosts of ours will always be a delightful memory, while their novel and beautiful homes revealed to us what art and nature can do when united in other than Christian surroundings. Our Parsee barrister had obtained his education largely in England, and the Mohammedan gentleman had enjoyed intercourse with the best of our American missionaries. The Moslem friend still maintained a sort of seclusion for his wife, and only the ladies of our party visited her in her private apartments. But when we rose to depart, he surprised us all by asking that we offer prayer, and he endorsed the prayer that was offered by uttering a hearty "Amen." As we stood ready to go, it was easy to pray for a blessing upon the house and the family which we were leaving behind us. Respect for Christianity, and a conviction that Christian education is the great need of the future, are already permeating the higher classes of Burman society.
The climax of our stay in Burma was reachedwhen Lord Chelmsford, the viceroy of India, visited Rangoon, and the lieutenant governor invited us to an afternoon-tea in his honor. The pandal, or reception pavilion, erected at the dock where the viceroy landed and where he was received with a salute of thirty-one guns, had been filled that morning by the élite of Burman society, fifteen hundred in number, and the address of welcome had drawn from the viceroy a fitting response. All Rangoon was a wonder of decoration. Arches with Saracenic domes built by the Moslems, pagodalike structures built by the Buddhists, Parsee towers, and Hindu temples, appeared at many street-crossings, and one long avenue was lined on either side with elevated rows of benches upon which were seated thousands of children from the schools. The viceroy passed in triumphal procession between files of soldiery, with cavalry for a body-guard and a dense mass of humanity thronging the sidewalks, looking on and cheering. At night, the streets and public buildings were brilliantly illuminated, and the great pagodas glittered like gems from top to bottom, encircled with rings of electric lights.
We reached the Government House, the scene of the afternoon lawn-tea, through clouds of dust raised by four lines of vehicles that struggled for precedence. At last we emerged in the grounds before the stately edifice where the lieutenant governor resides, and we were presented to Lord and Lady Chelmsford. The viceroy and his wife were simple and gracious in manner, and they made us feel that we were conferring as well as receiving honor. A group of forty dancing-girls, in antique Burmese costumes, were giving aperformance on one part of the emerald lawn, while on another white-robed servants were setting before the guests all manner of refreshments. So, amid music and feasting, the day ended. With the oncoming darkness the viceroy and his lady retired to their apartments in the great government residence, and at the same time the whole company joined in singing "God Save the King!" It was a striking close to our experiences in Burma, for fully half of the guests that day were Hindus and Mohammedans, each one of them arrayed in gorgeous garments and decorated with jewels. It left in our minds the fixed impression that the hold of Great Britain upon Burma and indeed upon all India is largely due to the Christian character of British rule, and that missionary work of evangelization and of education is to be given large credit for India's present universal loyalty to the British Crown.
This chapter would not be complete without special mention of the dinner of our Rochester men. We number thirteen of them in Burma, and they fill very important places in the work of missions. Two are graduates of our university, but not of our seminary—Mr. F. D. Phinney, the superintendent of our Mission Press, and Dr. David Gilmore, the acting principal of our Baptist College. With the wives who graced the company, seventeen persons sat down at table. Singiser presided; McGuire gave us welcome; Dudley, Cochrane, Rogers, Hattersley, Crawford, added spice to the occasion. The rewards of a teacher sometimes come late, but they are very sure. When I saw that gathering of missionary workers, and remembered Geis, Cope, and Streeter, who were prevented from coming, I feltthat my labor had not been in vain in the Lord, since Burma is being transformed by Rochester.
And I shall never forget a final reception given us at an afternoon-tea by Dr. D. W. A. Smith, the president emeritus of the Karen Theological Seminary at Insein, and by his estimable wife, to whom I had had the privilege of presenting a memorial album, on behalf of all the teachers and missionaries, on the occasion of her seventy-sixth birthday. Doctor Smith and Mrs. Smith are honored and beloved by all who know them. Like myself, he has served the cause of theological education for forty years, and has now retired for partial rest. I am glad that my name can be in any way connected with his, for I am sure that his works will follow him.
These two places are types of two different religions, the Buddhist and the Hindu. Mandalay in Burma is the representative of Buddhism; Gauhati in Assam illustrates Hinduism. The hill of Mandalay is crowned by a pagoda so unique and splendid that it draws pilgrims from every part of Burma; the hill at Gauhati is similarly attractive in Assam. I have thought that a description of the two, and of the worship at each of them, might serve to fix in memory the differences between these leading religions of the British Empire in India.
Mandalay was the terminus of our third excursion into the more remote parts of Burma. From Rangoon as a center of operations, we went first to Bassein, where our Burman and our Karen schools for boys and girls are beautifully located. Bassein is one hundred and ninety-two miles west of Rangoon. Maulmain, our second object of interest and visitation, is one hundred and seventy-one miles distant from Rangoon on the south and east. Here our great missionary, Adoniram Judson, began his work, and here are two of our chief schools for girls.
Mandalay is farther removed from Rangoon than are either Bassein or Maulmain. It lies three hundred and eighty-six miles to the north. It was a former capital of Burma. It contains the palace of KingThebaw, the foundations of which are reputed to have been laid upon human sacrifices, and from which the king was driven after a long and fierce British assault. Ancient tradition decreed that only sacred edifices should be built of brick. Thebaw's palace is therefore of wood, though it is gorgeous with carving and gilt. Surrounded by a wide and deep moat, there is a walled enclosure of more than a mile square, whose gateways are picturesque in the extreme, and which to all but modern cannon would be an impregnable fortress.
But it is the Hill of Mandalay that most excites the traveler's wonder and admiration. Upon its summit, commanding a far-reaching view of the winding river and of endless paddy-fields, with mountains in the distance, stands a pagoda which is in many respects more remarkable than the great Shwe Dagon pagoda at Rangoon. This one at Mandalay might indeed be called four separate pagodas, on successive heights, and connected with one another by a straight stairway in part hewn out of the solid rock and in part built of masonry. The stairway consists of eight hundred and twenty-two steps, in four different series, each series leading to a broad open platform on which rises a separate temple with a colossal image of Buddha in its center.
From below, this long stairway, with its railing of brick or concrete and its quartet of gilded pagodas shining in the sun, is a picturesque and unique object. The crowning pagoda seems almost impossible of access. It is set upon such a height, however, for the purpose of making the ascent to the altar difficult, and so of adding to the "merit" of its worshipers.The stairway, even when cut in the rock, has often forty or fifty steps so narrow, that the ascent from platform to platform is actually precipitous. The entire series of steps, from the bottom of the hill to the top, is roofed over with sheets of corrugated iron, until the whole looks like a covered way to the clouds. Going up seemed an exciting adventure. My physician had forbidden my climbing, and my wife declared that she could not attempt the walk. The problem became serious.
The difficulty was removed by bringing from the missionary's house two solid teak-wood armchairs, to serve us after the sedan fashion. Long poles of bamboo were lashed underneath them, and, after we had seated ourselves, eight men, four for each chair, lifted these poles, with their superimposed American pilgrims, upon their shoulders. Then began a triumphal march, which at every step of the ascent threatened to become a funeral march. The bearers all had bare feet, feet twice as long as the steps were broad, so that they practically went upward on their toes. A single misstep would have caused disaster—nothing less than an avalanche of coolies, chairs, and pilgrims. But my secretary guarded me, the missionary guarded my wife, and we went up in safety.
Going upward some two hundred steps, we rested upon a platform with a pagoda which enshrined the statue of a Buddha perhaps twenty feet in height and covered with gold-leaf from top to toe. Any worshiper can prove his faith by clapping a bit of gold-leaf upon the statue. The result is that the hands and feet of Buddha are thick with encrusted gold.He holds out his hands in seeming invitation. Two hundred feet more brought us to a second platform and a second pagoda in which Buddha also appears; but now he is in the attitude of teaching. Still another ascent, and we come to a pagoda in which Buddha stands, a towering form fifty feet in height, with his finger extended in expectation toward the plain. And a final ascent brings us to a colossal Buddha, now reclining, as if his work were done and he were entering upon the bliss of Nirvana. At this last stage there is also a series of waxwork figures which symbolize the vanity of life and of human desire. Four forms represent, first, the babe at its mother's breast; secondly, the youth full of vigor; then the older man haggard with care; and finally, the corpse, upon whose vitals the birds of the air are preying.
From the summit of this Mandalay Hill, another pagoda, almost as famous, is to be seen. I mean the Kuthodaw, in the plain below. This is four hundred and fifty pagodas in one, all but one of them little edifices, each with a small sitting statue of Buddha within it. An even more remarkable thing is that each of these diminutive pagodas has also within it a portion of the Buddhist scriptures, engraved upon a solid block of stone, and all of these together make up the Tripitaka, upon which the Buddhist pins his faith. In the center of the grand enclosure stands a beautiful white pagoda, with wreaths of gold about its graceful spire. The long rows of little temples, with their attempt to preserve the holy book in an enduring form, are a monument to the faith of King Thebaw's uncle who planned it. Few people, however, read thewriting upon the stones. For any practical result it is necessary to have the law of the Lord written upon the tables of the heart.
The descent from Mandalay Hill was even more hazardous than the ascent, for we were in continual danger of slipping from our chairs and knocking over the bearers. We were profoundly grateful when we reached the level ground again and found that we had survived. Our experiences with Buddhism were instructive. The saffron robes of the omnipresent priests and monks undoubtedly cover much laziness and much willingness to depend for a living upon others. But every Burman boy expects to spend some time, though it may be only a week or a month, in a monastery. There he usually learns to read, though his main work is that of memorizing certain portions of the Buddhist scriptures. So far as I have been able to learn, there are no positive immoralities connected with Buddhistic worship. The example of Buddha has in it some worthy elements, such as the renunciation of earthly and sensual ambitions. But Buddhism, for all that, is a pessimistic religion. It denies to man the existence of a soul, and it gives him no hope for anything but practical extinction. Buddha no longer lives to help his worshipers. In the struggle with sin, there is no atonement for the transgressions of the past, and no prospect of perfection in the future. Hence the preaching of Christ, crucified for our sins and ever present with his people, is to the Buddhist a revelation so novel and so entrancing, that it captivates and transforms him. Christianity humbles pride, but it saves the soul. It shows the impossibility of obtainingsalvation by merit of our own, and our absolute dependence upon the grace of God. Christianity awakens gratitude, and leads to unselfish devotion. It turns a Saul into a Paul, and makes him a missionary and a hero.
Gauhati is the present capital of Assam, as Mandalay was once the capital of Burma. Like Burma, Assam is overrun by Hindus, who seek employment in the tea-plantations and in every other species of labor. These Hindus have brought their religion with them, and in Assam the animistic religions of the natives very commonly give way to the more poetic and philosophic faith of the Hindus. In Gauhati the Hindus have established a temple which attracts thousands of pilgrim worshipers from all parts of Assam and indeed of India, as the pagoda of Mandalay attracts pilgrims from all parts of Burma. The Gauhati temple, like that at Mandalay, is set upon a beautiful hill not far from the town, approached only by a long and stony climb, though with many a rest-house on the way. This temple and its worship so illustrate Hinduism, that a slight account of its origin and beliefs seems to be necessary.
The god Siva had a goddess for a wife. Displeased with her unfaithfulness, he seized her, and with her as his captive he flew through the air, and as he flew, he cut her in pieces. The middle portion of her body fell to the earth on this hill, and consecrated forever this spot near Gauhati. In the temple and grove of this hill the goddess is worshiped by such rites as will please one of low and licentious tastes. In fact, the rites of this temple are said to be the most obscene ofany in the British possessions. There are reputed to be a thousand "virgins," who subsist in and upon the temple. The extent to which they are virgins may be judged by the number of fatherless children clinging to their robes or carried about. These "virgins," as is well known, are "married to the god of the temple"—which may mean married either to the priests of the temple, or to the worshipers of the temple. I asked a missionary whether these "virgins," after their term of service, could contract an ordinary marriage. I was answered that the girls were "married to the temple for life." One of these unfortunate women led by the hand a beautiful little daughter. On being asked who the father was, the mother replied: "How should I know? I am a temple-woman." So the gratification of illicit passion becomes a religious act. The residents of Gauhati are free to visit the temple, and so, alas! are the eight hundred students of the English college only two miles away. Who can measure the corrupting influence of this temple upon the lives of the people over a wide area in Assam?
A student of the college, who was also a priest of the temple, met one of our party on his visit. This student-priest was a young man of more than ordinary intelligence. He endeavored to palliate the evil of the temple-worship, and to clothe its acts with spiritual significance. He pointed to the spot where goats and buffaloes were offered in sacrifice, and he claimed that this offering was made in expiation of sin. Such an explanation of Hindu sacrifices is altogether futile. The sense of guilt is so dull in Hinduism, that sin is little more than external and physical impurity, andmay be simply failure to conform to a prescribed act of ceremonial worship. The true meaning of sacrifice for sin has, in India, been derived solely from Christian preaching. This particular student had many an opportunity to hear such preaching, and the knowledge of atonement which he tried to mix with his Hindu theology was probably gained from missionary sources. It was an illustration of the incidental and indirect ways in which Christian missions are permeating these Oriental lands, and are forcing these old religions to adopt some of the fundamental ideas of Christianity. These ideas are misunderstood and misstated, so that they become in large part forms of error. But notwithstanding, they may pave the way for a fuller knowledge of the truth, and for the entrance of Christ into the heart and into the life.