great point to gain the good-will of the people. A courteous, kindly demeanour will do much to secure this.

2. Places where Christianity has gained an entrance, or where a spirit of inquiry is exhibited. In general the grand difficulty is to get a footing. Where one or two families embrace the gospel, they often form nuclei which spread. Their relations are under their influence, and they may say to them, "Come with us and we will do you good." This has been one of the most powerful causes in inducing people to place themselves under Christian instruction. Give a page in the note book to each village where there are any converts; ascertain the origin of the movement, its progress, and its prospects.

3. Some important Caste.-Experience confirms the truth of the remark by Dr. Caldwell, already quoted, that " every caste or at least every circle of castes, must be made the subject of special Christian effort."* The same principle is carried out, to some extent, at home, where there are Missionaries who confine themselves principally to cabmen, sailors, and so with other classes. It is most desirable that Christianity should spread among the lower middle classes of India. It is pleasing, indeed, when Christianity is embraced even by the poor and despised sections of the community. Efforts however should not be so much limited to them. It tends to produce the impression in the higher castes that Christianity is the religion for men who mostly eat beef or carrion. If persons in better circumstances embraced Christianity, they could do more for the support of the Gospel and give a better education to their children. Humanly speaking, there would be a higher type of Indian Christianity. But the grand reason is, that the lower middle classes form the bulk

* See Page 76.

of the community. The object of the Missionary must be to bring the largest number of souls to Christ.

Brahmans and rich men are undoubtedly the most influential; but their conversion is attended with peculiar difficulties. It does not seem wise therefore to single them out. Still, where Brahmans can be isolated to some extent as mission schoolmasters, and much direct influence can be brought to bear upon them, they are far from hopeless. This will be illustrated in a subsequent chapter.

When the Missionary has selected a caste to which he will give special attention, let him make it an object of particular study. In general, when he knows accurately a few of its members, he knows them all. With slight individual differences, they think alike, possess the same amount of knowledge, bring forward the same objections, and have to encounter the same difficulties. The following article, from Christian Work, on the Ryots of Mysore, will give some idea of the manner in which the investigation should be pursued :

"The great body of the people are cultivators, who rent small portions of land from the Government, live in houses of mud walls and thatched roof, on coarse monotonous diet, and wear scanty clothing. The Brahman doctrine is that they are born to be slaves to the three castes above them; and a Brahman proverb likens them to cocoanut kernels which yield their oil only on severe pounding in the mortar, and to sugar-cane which must be pressed in the mill if you would extract the juice. These ideas have been well carried out. Generations of grinding oppression have made the ryot what we now find him; stupid as the oxen he drives, with barely their instinct; ignorant as the practical prohibition of even the rudiments of learning could leave him; stolid and unimpressible as the clods that hardly yield to his plough; yet in money matters cunning and dishonest almost as the Brahman. Dissembling, fraud, simulated obtuseness, and passive resistance, are his weapons against tyranny. His innate capability of elevation is repressed by lazy submission to his assigned lot. He looks upon education and religion as incompatible with the tending of cattle and cultiva

tion of land. Keeping his small account with government (the sole use of education) is done by the hereditary village accountant, and the village priest attends to religion for him. He laughs heartily at the idea of the clumsy mistakes he would make were he to attempt to worship for himself, and gladly pays tithe to have it done properly for him. He sincerely believes that the village idol, a natural or rudely carved stone, is God, and that it arose of itself out of the ground. Occasionally he takes a cocoanut, breaks it before the idol, pours the milk on the ground, prostrates himself or stands before it with joined hands, and prefaces his short petition for some temporal benefit with, "O great God!' A stone bull or the filthy linga is the usual idol in the temples. In his field a rough stone, occasionally bearing some unintelligible figure, receives his adoration. Often a few stones arranged like a child's baby house,' form the shrine of a shapeless piece of dried mud which he regards as a tutelar god.

"The number of female divinities, all variations of Parvati, the wife of Shiva, is immense. Besides the daily and occasional offerings, each of these is honoured with an annual festival. These festivals are numerously attended. Thousands of people assemble from the country twenty or thirty miles round. Fowls, sheep, and buffaloes, are sacrificed. At a hamlet of two or three houses within six miles of one of our mission stations, there were sacrificed at the festival held in the early part of the present year, twenty-five buffaloes, upwards of two hundred fowls, and a thousand sheep. These were offered, not even to an idol, but on a bare spot where the sanguinary goddess is supposed to dwell. With all this blood-shedding, there is no religious feeling whatever, and least of all any recognition of sacrifice for sin. To the people it is mere unmeaning slaughter. The only excuse that any can offer for it is, that it is an old custom, and it would be wrong to neglect the practices of their ancestors. They dread the evil that might result from such neglect. These festivals are opportunities of trade. They more resemble fairs than religious gatherings. They are the harvest of Brahmans and strumpets. We dare not even intimate the scenes enacted; for it is a shame even to speak of those things which are done of them in secret.'

"Blind adherence to ancient custom is the sole religion of the ryot. He deems it as perilous to forsake this as for a locomotive to quit the line. He has his religious beliefs and pre

judices; but to the fears, hopes, joys, and all the emotions of religion, he is an utter stranger. Whatever may be thought of the monstrosity or impossibility, he sincerely believes in the divinity of a stone. The evidence of his senses goes for nothing in the face of tradition. How could it spring out of the ground if it were not God? Would his forefathers have worshipped it if it were a mere stone? Does it not avert danger, succour him in trouble, remove his diseases, send rain and fruitful seasons? And how could it do these things if it were not God? It appears like any other stone, but it is only in appearance; it is truly God.

"He believes in the omni-pervasion of God; and concludes that as we cannot see the great God,' we must worship some-, thing in which He is. No matter what that something be,

worship paid to it reaches and is accepted by Him.

66

He regards all men as puppets moved to virtue or vice by God, who dwells in every man. This rids him of all personal responsibility, and makes him indifferent to his future destiny, be it heaven or hell.

"He is a firm fatalist. Every man's destiny is written in his forehead, and not even the gods can alter or efface that writing. All that he does, enjoys, or suffers is inevitable; it could not be otherwise.

He believes in the transmigration of souls; that men are rewarded or punished in the present life for the deeds of a past existence; that their enjoyments or sufferings respect past births only.

He believes in the indulgence of God, that with Him the feeding of a few lazy mendicants is a full atonement for the most heinous sins.

"Like every Hindu, he fails to perceive any inconsistency in the most contradictory teachings. And with the Papist and Puseyite he concludes that, as it is easier, it is better to believe than to reason.'

'

"He is a tenacious caste holder. Few things show the antagonism of East and West, Hinduism and Christianity, more clearly, than the dread that these all but naked, semi-barbarous, unlettered rustics have of being inveigled into the English caste.' Our books are dreaded as devices to draw them into the Missionary's caste. The horror of this calamity is a great stumbling-block to them.

"The ignorance, fatalism, oppression, and mere animality of the villager, have induced an immobility that defies and baffles the efforts hitherto put forth upon him. He listens to preaching, acknowledges its truth, laughs at his idols, but is unconcerned in the matter, and never for a moment entertains the notion of changing his life. He will send his boy to school until he can tend cattle or be of some use in the fields. But he himself cannot read, nor give his thoughts to any subject but his daily occupations. Discourse on spiritual things to him is, to use one of his own similes, like playing the lute to a buffalo. He is content in his physical, mental, and moral degradation. A full stomach is my heaven.' My stomach will soon cry out if I begin to think of anything beyond my work.' Such are his reasons for declining all efforts after salvation."

The proverbs and sayings current among the class should be collected. Any books in the possession of those who have received a little education should be studied. Besides gauging the mind and ideas, the best mode of communicating Christian truth should be investigated. Consider, in detail, the effects produced by certain statements; which illustrations may be employed with most advantage; in what way objections may be best anticipated and answered; how difficulties may be most easily overcome; what dangers require most to be guarded against. The preacher may thus seek out "acceptable words;" while all his dependence for success must be upon the blessing of the Holy Spirit.

Though the Missionary, as he has opportunity, should do good to all men, he is strongly recommended to give special attention to certain classes.

Missionary Library -To acquire correct and thorough information on the points specified, will, at present, require a good deal of study. It is most desirable that a series of volumes should be prepared by experienced men for each great Mission field, as the Bengali, Hindi, Marathi, and Tamil. A young Missicnary might thus rapidly obtain a large amount of knowledge of the most valuable character. At the end of the