Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

ed, preaching the gospel to the numerous Christian sects of Turkey, with no Turkish ruler disposed to hinder or make him afraid in so doing.

In referring this change to other than religious causes, is the writer again accused of a propensity to dwell upon political events? If limited to the class of events actually alluded to, he pleads guilty to the charge. Had the six eventful years, that he has mingled with Mediterranean affairs, where such events have so rapidly succeeded each other, found him indulging no such propensity, he would accuse himself of possessing the susceptibilities, neither of a Christian, nor of a man. Around him was the theatre in which had occurred the great transactions, that, from the remotest ages, have decided the destinies of our world; there were to be developed the wonderful scenes of yet unfulfilled prophecy; and the passing events of every day seemed to take a visible hold upon the fate of nations. What Christian, what man, could fail to open his eyes upon such a book of providence spread out before him? Is there a Christian that reads these pages, who did not stretch his eye across the Atlantic to watch the progress of the Russian arms, and whose very Christian feelings did not sharpen his vision? The writer, also, looked at the same events from a nearer point, to see what God would bring out of them for the advancement of his kingdom. That he has actually brought much out of them, and of the other events that have recently befallen Turkey, has been already shown.

But how true is it that God's ways are not as our ways! Were not Christians generally disappointed that the Russian army did not march at once upon the capital, and annihilate by force the dominion of the successors of Mohammed? Had it done so, the extension of Russian laws over Turkey would have been to the nominal Christian sects there, like the congealing of lava upon Pompeii and Herculaneum; casing them up in their present condition, immovable by their own exertions, and intangible to missionary efforts. Even missionaries to Mohammedans, would have found their hands tied, by the claims of an established church to their converts. God seems specially to have upheld the Mohammedan power, with just strength enough still to extend its levelling laws over Christian sects, to the prevention of any rising consciousness of their own power which would make them intolerant; and with just weakness enough quietly to allow the labors of missionaries among them, and expose its own pro

fessors to some evangelical influence. Indeed, who can say, that the destruction of Mohammedan power was not too high a prize to be awarded to Russian ambition, and that God has not reserved it for missionary enterprise to win, by converting Moslems to the faith of Jesus? By turning those churches, which now by their ungodly conduct only prejudice Moslems against Christianity, into truly pious communities, each set as a city upon a hill that cannot be hid; and in the mean time availing ourselves of every suitable opportunity to speak to Moslems themselves of Jesus and him crucified, even this great work may be effected.

Among the native Christians, at any rate, in the present crisis of Mohammedanism, has Providence opened a wide field for missionary culture in Turkey. Among them especially are missionaries called for. How urgent is the call, might be shown by portraying their wretched spiritual condition. But how should the picture be drawn so as to exhibit faithfully the impression which extensive survey has stamped so indelibly upon the mind of the writer? How should he express the full urgency of the call he brings?

During six years of missionary wanderings and labors, he has had chiefly to do with men bearing the name of Christians. In Egypt, he has found the Copts; in Palestine and Syria, Greek, papal Greek, and Maronite Arabs; in Greece and its islands, in European Turkey, and in Asia Minor, Greeks, mostly of the Greek church; in Armenia and elsewhere, Armenians; and in the adjacent regions of Georgia and Persia, Georgians of the Greek, and Syrians of the Nestorian church. Their whole number is probably not far from 6,000,000, a majority of whom are in the Turkish empire. They are relics of churches planted by apostles' hands; churches unto whom were first given the oracles of God; in which the candle of piety once burned brightly, and from which emanated the light that now shines upon these ends of the earth. But in treading over again the tracks of apostles and martyrs, the writer has sought in vain for an individual that now breathes the spirit of Jesus, unless he had borrowed it from a foreign source.

The history of their degeneracy is briefly this.-There having been among them from the first no means of easily multiplying copies of the Scriptures, the Bible became at length too dear and scarce for many private individuals to possess; and the people were dependent for their scriptural

knowledge upon the instructions of their clergy, and the reading of the word at church. The former source was soon corrupted, and ere long dried up. For the clergy, becoming secularized at heart, substituted in their teaching the speculations and traditions of men for the word of God, and at length preaching, of whatever kind, was entirely banished to give place to 'rites and forms.' Throughout the Greek nation now, a sermon is rarely heard except in Lent; in Armenia we heard only one, and a pulpit we did not find in a single church. The reading of the word, too, soon became of no avail, for new forms of speech springing up, the ancient dialects grew obsolete, and the Scriptures came to be sealed up in a dead language. Such was also the case with their prayers. For centuries, they have not only listened to God's instructions, but have also worshipped him, in an unknown tongue. The only exceptions to this remark now, among all of whom I am speaking, are the few who use the Arabic language.

They have become, in a word, a people without the Bible. And what is it to be without the Bible? In this country, we know not what it is. Would we know, we must go ourselves and see. We must leave the intelligent preaching and devout prayers of our holy Sabbaths, with the blessed hopes of heaven they inspire. We must leave this healthful atmosphere of principled public opinion we breathe; and the honor and honesty in the dealings of man with man around us; with our enterprising trade and prosperous agriculture, of which they are the soul. Our multiplied schools and seminaries of learning, too; with the boasted liberty of our republican institutions, we must leave, and go to those benighted people upon which the Bible has ceased to shed its influence. See how, their religion becoming defective at the heart, they have, to satisfy conscience and quiet their fears, thrown around it the drapery of ceremonies, until all are now bowed down under a grievous bondage to external rites. Superstitious observances being then set off to counterbalance their sins; see how conscience is perverted, and the foundations of moral principle and uprightness are all out of course. See, also, springing hence, the paralyzing influence of universal dishonesty upon every department of industry and enterprise; and how the fountains of knowledge, too, being from the same influence no longer frequented, are choked up and

disappear. Behold then Turkish despotism, standing upon this triple basis of their dishonesty, sloth, and ignorance, riveting upon their necks its galling yoke. And finally, after a miserable life, witness them passing by multitudes into a cheerless, hopeless eternity.

In a word, accessible to the reach of our Christian benevolence there are millions of men, sunk in ignorance and sin to a degree that makes the present salvation of any hopeless. Though bearing the same holy name by which we are called, and inhabiting places consecrated by apostles' feet, they are still so degenerate that "the name of God is blasphemed among the gentiles through them," and Moslems confirmed in the errors of the false prophet. The Christianity they profess has lost the essential principles of the gospel; its beneficial influence has ceased; it is despised and oppressed. Need we an array of argument, and power of eloquence, to make us listen to their call upon our Christian sensibilities?

There was a time when a call from thence was heard by awakened Christendom. News was brought that the Holy Land was trampled under the feet of infidels, its sacred places profaned, and their devotees abused; and Europe poured forth hundreds of thousands of warriors, spent millions of money, and shed torrents of blood. In my ardent desire that the call I bring may be heard, I could almost wish myself Peter the Hermit, standing in some market place in France or Italy, and my readers one of the chivalrous assemblages that listened to him. Were we indeed enacting that scene of the dark ages, not an ear would fail to listen with absorbing attention, nor a heart to swell with the high wrought purpose of immediate action; and our country. would be soon pouring forth her fleets and her armies to the conquests of Palestine. But I am not a pilgrim monk, reporting the profanation of sacred places, nor are my readers a collection of feudal knights, inspired only by papal superstition. I am a Christian missionary, come to bring my countrymen word, that in the vale of Egypt, among the desolations of Palestine, on the plains of Greece, in the mountains. of Armenia, and wherever my feet have carried me, the souls of men, our brethren by blood and by name, are perishing. We are believers in Christ, professing to partake of that benevolence to souls which brought him from a throne in glory to a cross on Calvary. And shall the message

[blocks in formation]

vibrate in our hearts a less thrilling chord of sympathy, and wake up a less effective zeal, than was felt by bigotted crusaders? Is a mere handful of missionaries all that enlightened Christian benevolence can send forth, where the superstition of the dark ages sent forth armies?

While urging my message, the image of the primitive ancestors of those for whom I plead, the converts of apostles and the founders of Christianity, comes up before me. I imagine their sainted spirits, with parental anxiety for their offspring increased by the knowledge and the holiness of heaven, to be hovering over us. They say to us, Brethren, once like you we gave our children precept upon precept, our daily prayers ascended to heaven for them, and we left with them that precious legaey, the word of God, anxiously hoping that their children's children, to the end of time, would follow us in unbroken succession to our mansions on high. Hereafter, upon the fair face of your beloved America, as now upon that glory of all lands which was once our country, a night of apostacy may settle down, and hordes of yet unnamed barbarian invaders fasten deep the blight of some new Mohammedanism. Would you then, yourselves, stoop from your abode in heaven to smile upon the inhabitants of some distant land, laboring to restore to your benighted and oppressed descendants, the lamp of eternal life? Hear, now, we pray you, the plea in behalf of ours. Restore to them the light so long since gone out among them, and receive the blessing of the whole assembly of prophets, apostles, and martyrs.

« AnteriorContinuar »