ᏢᎪᎡᎢ III.

ENCOURAGEMENTS OF CHRISTIANS TO PROSECUTE THE MISSIONARY ENTERPRISE.

As far as human agency is concerned in the eventual triumph of the Gospel, he who despairs of that triumph, is doing all he can to prevent it; and he who confidently and consistently expects it, is materially contributing to promote it. While it is admitted therefore as an axiom in Christian morals, that encouragements to duty do not form the ground of our obedience, yet when such encouragements are graciously afforded, not to regard them would be sullen ingratitude against God, and not to feel them is to remain insensible to some of the most cheering and powerful inducements to increased activity. Encouragements to Missionary labour, and to anticipate the final success of that labour, lie around us on every side. In collecting and presenting some of the more obvious among them to Christian attention, it may contribute to clearness, and sufficiently answer our present object, if we consider them in succession, as historical, political, moral, ecclesiastical, and evangelical; after which we shall mark their relation to the preceding norte and their practical application.

SECTION I.

ENCOURAGEMENT FROM HISTORY.

The first encouragement to Missionary labour to which we invite attention, is that which is derivable from the history of the propagation of Christianity. In attempting the diffusion of the Gospel we are not engaged in a novel experiment; nor is the Gospel itself a system of truth hitherto untried. It has a long and an eventful history. In order to estimate its prospects for the future, then, let us question that history concerning the past; for if it shall appear that Christianity, regarded merely as one form of religion among many, has vanquished every foe which it has encountered, passed through every ordeal to which it is ever likely to be subjected, and is still vigorous and aggressive, even the sceptic must admit that, whether its success be owing to supernatural aid, to intrinsic excellence, or to both, its friends have strong encouragement to hope for its continued progress.

Now the first question naturally arising in the mind of an inquirer on this subject would be-has the religion of the Bible triumphed already? Open the first pages of its history, we reply, and you will find that its early history is a history of its triumphs. It matters not whether that history be written by an Origen or a Pliny, an Eusebius or a Tacitus, a Tertullian or a Gibbon-friends and foes alike bear testimony to the fact that during its early ages the Gospel not merely maintained its ground, but extended its conquests on every hand with a rapidity and a vigour which left numbers of its enemies no alternative but to ascribe it to the finger of God. Perhaps, however, the advent of Christianity took place at a time when the prevailing systems of religion were of a kind less hostile to innovation than those which exist at present;

or perhaps, the character of the Gospel had a tendency to coalesce with them, and accept of their support.' So far from this the Gospel was utterly unlike every system which the mind of man had imagined; nor would it accept the remotest alliance with any, but proclaimed a war of extermination against them all; and yet it triumphed. It found every human heart a temple filled with the worship of some idol god, and the world a Pantheon, crowded with the long accumulated images. and services of an ancient idolatry; and yet it triumphed. Never, perhaps, had the prevailing systems presented a more threatening front to the pretensions of any new and rival religion than at that period; this the ages of persecution which followed sufficiently testified: but not only did the Gospel denounce them, it went even deeper, and proclaimed eternal war against the very propensities and principles of human nature which had given them birth; and yet it triumphed. But the Gospel may have owed its early successes to an instrumentality of a kind so efficient as it may never possess again.' As far as that agency was miraculous, it was doubtless demonstrative of the truth of the Gospel; but the means employed for its diffusion were simply "the foolishness of preaching." No purple clothed it, no orators pleaded its cause, no secret bribes procured it access to the ear of the great, no army hewed for it a path; and yet it triumphed.

The

apparent impotence and meanness of its agents formed one of the great objections of the day against the divinity of its origin, and the possibility of its success ; and yet it triumphed. And one of the reasons why such an instrumentality was employed doubtless was, that the Church might never, on this ground, have cause to despond; that it might feel that as long as it can furnish but twelve fishermen," it possesses an instrumentality equal, under God, to repeat the triumphs of its primitive days.

But it may be that Christianity triumphed only in one direction, and vanquished only a single kind of

opposition.' It evaded no difficulty, turned aside from no foe. It went in search of "Satan's seat." Not a people here and there merely, but many nations, and these in every stage of civilization, and exhibiting almost every variety of political and moral condition, abandoned their idolatries, and embraced the Christian

name.

'But many a system which has prospered in its early days, and which has even gained energy by conflict, has no sooner been seated in the place of ease and power than it has fallen before the first vigorous assault which it was called to sustain. One would like to see therefore whether or not Christendom could survive such an encounter.' The irruption of the Gothic and Salvic nations into the Roman empire, furnished the means of the experiment; and what was the effect? The conversion of these northern barbarians had been before but imperfectly attempted, yet now when they came to vanquish the civilized world, the second increase of Christianity took place by their nominal adoption of the faith. And thus the very event which had threatened Christendom with irreparable ruin, proved the second era of its enlargement.

'In this instance, however, the encounter of Christianity was only with barbarian force. What, if the antagonist had been armed with knowledge, with elastic mind, and intellectual might?' The supposition has been realized; realized under circumstances the most unfavorable for Christianity; and yet it triumphed. At the time when ancient literature arose from the sleep of ages like a giant refreshed; when the newly created press gave wings to thought; when philosophy rose like a sun on the old world, and science discovered a new world; and when mind in consequence received an impulse which threatened with extinction whatever was not true and good, [Christianity was found overlaid and oppressed with centuries of corruption. But with an energy of self-renovating power which could have only come from God, it arose with