第 69 节
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垃圾王 更新:2021-02-24 22:52 字数:9322
m magnifying his office and glorifying God as the example of Paul should have encouraged him to do。 Most important of all for the cause; he personally called Ward to be his associate; and his writings drew Dr。 and Mrs。 Marshman to his side; while his apostolic charity so developed and used all that was good in Thomas and Fountain; that not even in the churches of John and James; Peter and Paul; Barnabas and Luke; was there such a brotherhood。 When troubles came from outside he won to himself the younger brethren; Yates and Pearce; and healed half the schism which Andrew Fuller's successors made。 His Enquiry; followed 〃by actually embarking on a mission to India;〃 led to the publication of the Letters on Missions addressed to the Protestant Ministers of the British Churches by Melville Horne; who; after a brief experience as Church of England chaplain in Zachary Macaulay's settlement of Sierra Leone; published that little book to excite in all Christians a passion for missions like the Master's。 Referring to the English churches; Established and Nonconformist; he wrote:〃Except the Reverend Mr。 Carey and a friend who accompanies him; I am not informed of any。。。ministers who are engaged in missions。〃 Such was the impression made by Carey on John Newton that; in 1802; he rebuked his old curate; Claudius Buchanan; for depreciating the Serampore missionaries; adding; 〃I do not look for miracles; but if God were to work one in our day; I should not wonder if it were in favour of Dr。 Carey。〃
The Serampore Mission; at an early period; called forth the admiration of the Scottish philanthropist and essayist; James Douglas of Cavers; whose Hints on Missions (1822); a book still full of suggestiveness; contains this passage:〃Education and the press have only been employed to purpose of very late years; especially by the missionaries of Serampore; every year they have been making some improvements upon their former efforts; and。。。it only requires to increase the number of printing presses; schools; teachers; translators; and professors; to accelerate to any pitch the rate of improvement。。。To attempt to convert the world without educating it; is grasping at the end and neglecting the means。〃 Referring to what Carey had begun and the Serampore College had helped to develop in Asia; as in Africa and America; Douglas of Cavers well described the missionary era; the new crusade:〃The Reformation itself needed anew a reform in the spirit if not in the letter。 That second Reformation has begun; it makes less noise than that of Luther; but it spreads wider and deeper; as it is more intimate it will be more enduring。 Like the Temple of Solomon; it is rising silently; without the din of pressure or the note of previous preparation; but notwithstanding it will be not less complete in all its parts nor less able to resist the injuries of time!〃
Henry Martyn died; perhaps the loftiest and most loving spirit of the men whom Carey drew to India。 Son of a Cornish miner…captain; after passing through the Truro Grammar School; he was sixteenthe age at which Carey became a shoemaker's apprenticewhen he was entered at St。 John's; and made that ever since the most missionary of all the colleges of Cambridge。 When not yet twenty he came out Senior Wrangler。 His father's death drove him to the Bible; to the Acts of the Apostles; which he began to study; and the first whisper of the call of Christ came to him in the joy of the Magnificat as its strains pealed through the chapel。 Charles Simeon's preaching drew him to Trinity Church。 In the vicarage; when he had come to be tutor of his college; and was preparing for the law; he heard much talk of William Carey; of his self…sacrifice and his success in India。 It was the opening year of the nineteenth century; the Church Missionary Society had just been born as the fruit partly of a paper written by Simeon four years previously; and he offered himself as its first English missionary。 He was not twenty…one; he could not be ordained for two years。 Meanwhile a calamity made him and his unmarried sister penniless; he loved Lydia Grenfell with a pure passion which enriched while it saddened his short life; and a chaplaincy became the best mode in every way of his living and dying for India。 What a meeting must that have been between him and Carey when; already stricken by fever; he found a sanctuary in Aldeen; and learned at Serampore the sweetness of telling to the natives of India in one of their own tongues the love of God。 William Carey and Henry Martyn were one in origin; from the people; in industry; as scholars; in genius; as God…devoted; in the love of a great heart not always returned。 The older man left the church of his fathers because there was no Simeon and no missionary society; and he made his own university; he laid the foundation of English missions deep and broad in no sect but in Christ; to whom he and Martyn alike gave themselves。
The names of Carey and Simeon; thus linked to each other by Martyn; find another pleasant and fruitful tie in the Rev。 Alexander Stewart; D。D。; Gaelic scholar and Scottish preacher。 It was soon after Carey went out to India that Simeon; travelling in the Highlands; spent a Sunday in the manse of Moulin; where his personal intercourse and his evening sermon after a season of Communion were blessed to the evangelical enlightenment of Stewart。 Moulin was the birthplace ten years after of Alexander Duff; whose parents previously came under the power of the minister's new…found light。24 Like Simeon; Dr。 Stewart thenceforth became a warm supporter of foreign missions。 Finding in the Periodical Accounts a letter in which Carey asked Fuller to send him a copy of Van der Hooght's edition of the Hebrew Bible because of the weakness of his eyesight; Dr。 Stewart at once wrote offering his own copy。 Fuller gladly accepted the kindness。 〃I with great pleasure;〃 writes Dr。 Stewart; 〃followed the direction; wrote a letter of some length to Carey; and sent off my parcel to London。 I daresay you remember my favourite Hebrew Bible in two volumes。 I parted with it with something of the same feelings that a pious parent might do with a favourite son going on a mission to the heathenwith a little regret but with much goodwill。〃 This was the beginning of an interesting correspondence with Carey and Fuller。
Next to Andrew Fuller; and in the region of literature; general culture and eloquence before him; the strongest men among the Baptists were the younger Robert Hall and John Foster。 Both were devoted to Carey; and were the most powerful of the English advocates of his mission。 The former; for a time; was led to side with the Society in some of the details of its dispute with Dr。 Marshman; but his loyalty to Carey and the principles of the mission fired some of the most eloquent orations in English literature。 John Foster's shrewder common sense never wavered; but inspired his pen alike in the heat of controversy and in his powerful essays and criticisms。 Writing in 1828; he declared that the Serampore missionaries 〃have laboured with the most earnest assiduity for a quarter of a century (Dr。 Carey much longer) in all manner of undertakings for promoting Christianity; with such a renunciation of self…interest as will never be surpassed; that they have conveyed the oracles of divine truth into so many languages; that they have watched over diversified missionary operations with unremitting care; that they have conducted themselves through many trying and some perilous circumstances with prudence and fortitude; and that they retain to this hour an undiminished zeal to do all that providence shall enable them in the same good cause。〃 The expenditure of the Serampore Brotherhood up to that time; leaving out of account the miscellaneous missionary services; he showed to have been upwards of ?5;000。 Dr。 Chalmers in Scotland was as stoutly with Carey and his brethren as Foster was in England; so that Marshman wrote:〃Thus two of the greatest and wisest men of England are on our side; and; what is more; I trust the Lord God is with us。〃 What Heber thought; alike as man and bishop; his own loving letter and proposal for 〃reunion of our churches〃 in the next chapter will show。
Of all the publicists in the United Kingdom during Carey's long career the foremost was William Wilberforce; he was not second even to Charles Grant and his sons。 Defeated in carrying into law the 〃pious clauses〃 of the charter which would have opened India to the Christian missionary and schoolmaster in 1793; he nevertheless succeeded by his persuasive eloquence and the weight of his character in having them entered as Resolutions of the House of Commons。 He then gave himself successfully to the abolition of the slave…trade。 But he always declared the toleration of Christianity in British India to be 〃that greatest of all causes; for I really place it before the abolition; in which; blessed be God; we gained the victory。〃 His defeat in 1793; when Dundas and the Government were with him; was due to the apathy of public opinion; and especially of the dumb churches。 But in the next twenty years Carey changed all that。 Not merely was Andrew Fuller ever on the watch with pen and voice; but all the chur