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1828

HIS CONTEMPT FOR MARSHMAN'S ASSAILANTS.

373

of Brother Marshman's brief memoir of the Serampore Mission. I am glad it is written in so temperate and Christian a spirit, and I doubt not but it will be ultimately productive of good effects. There certainly is a great contrast between the spirit in which that piece is written, and that in which observations upon it, both in the Baptist and Particular Baptist Magazines are written. The unworthy attempts in those and other such like pieces to separate Brother Marshman and me are truly contemptible. In plain English, they amount to thus much-The Serampore Missionaries, Carey, Marshman, and Ward, have acted a dishonest part, alias are rogues. But we do not include Dr. Carey in the charge of dishonesty; he is an easy sort of a man, who will agree to anything for the sake of peace, or in other words he is a fool, Mr. Ward, it is well known,' say they, 'was the tool of Dr. Marshman, but he is gone from the present scene, and it is unlovely to say any evil of the dead.' Now I certainly hold these persons' exemption of me from the blame they attach to Brother Marshman in the greatest possible contempt. I may have subscribed my name thoughtlessly to papers, and it would be wonderful if there had been no instance of this in so long a course of years. The great esteem I had for the Society for many years, undoubtedly on more occasions than one, put me off my guard, and I believe my brethren too; so that we have signed writings which if we could have foreseen the events of a few years, we should not have done. These, however, were all against our own private interest, and I believe I have never been called an easy fool for signing of them. It has only been since we found it necessary to resist the claims of the Committee that I have risen to this honour.

"It has also been hinted that I intend to separate from Brother Marshman. I cannot tell upon what such hints or reports are founded, but I assure you, in the most explicit

manner, that I intend to continue connected with him and Serampore as long as I live; unless I should be separated from him by some unforeseen stroke of Providence. There may be modifications of our union, arising from circumstances; but it is my wish that it should remain in all things essential to the mission as long as I live.

"I rejoice to say that there is very little of that spirit of hostility which prevails in England in India, and I trust what still remains will gradually decrease till scarcely the remembrance of it will continue. Our stations, I mean those connected with Serampore, are of great importance, and some of them in a flourishing state. We will do all we can to maintain them, and I hope the friends to the cause of God in Britain will not suffer them to sink for want of that pecuniary help which is necessary. Indeed I hope we shall be assisted in attempting other stations beside those already occupied; and many such stations present themselves to my mind which nothing prevents being immediately occupied but want of men and money. The college will also require assistance, and I hope will not be without it; I anticipate the time when its salutary operation in the cause of God in India will be felt and acknowledged by all.

"These observations respecting my own conduct you are at liberty to use as you please. I hope now to take my final leave of this unpleasant subject, and have just room to say, that I am very affectionately yours, W. Carey."

Throughout the controversy thus forced upon him, we find Dr. Carey's references to the brethren in Calcutta, in his unpublished letters, all in the strain of the following to his son Jabez :—

"15th August 1820.—This week we received letters from Mr. Marshman, who had safely arrived at St. Helena. I am sure it will give you pleasure to learn that our long-continued

1828

HIS INDIGNATION AT THE FALSEHOOD OF ENVY.

375

dispute with the younger brethren in Calcutta is now settled. We met together for that purpose about three weeks ago, and after each side giving up some trifling ideas and expressions, came to a reconciliation, which, I pray God, may be lasting. Nothing I ever met with in my life—and I have met with many distressing things—ever preyed so much upon my spirits as this difference has. I am sure that in all disputes very many wrong things must take place on both sides for which both parties ought to be humbled before God and one another.

...

"I wish you could succeed in setting up a few more schools. . . . Consider that and the spread of the gospel as the great objects of your life, and try to promote them by all the wise and prudent methods in your power. Indeed we must always venture something for the sake of doing good. The cause of our Lord Jesus Christ continues to prosper with I have several persons now coming in who are inquirers; two or three of them, I hope, will be this evening received into the Church. Excuse my saying more as my room is full of people."

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Eight years after, on the 17th April 1828, he thus censured Jabez in the matter of the Society's action at home:— "From a letter of yours to Jonathan, in which you express a very indecent pleasure at the opposition which Brother Marshman has received, not by the Society, but by some anonymous writer in a magazine, I perceive you are informed of the separation which has taken place between them and What in that anonymous piece you call a 'set-down' I call a 'falsehood.' You ought to know that I was a party in all public acts and writings, and that I never intend to withdraw from all the responsibility connected therewith. I utterly despise all the creeping, mean assertions of that party when they say they do not include me in their censures, nor do I work for their praise according to them and according to your rejoic

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I am either a knave or a fool- -a knave if I joined with Brother Marshman; but if, as those gentlemen say, and as you seem to agree with them, I was only led as he pleased, and was a mere cat's-paw, then of course I am a fool. In either way your thoughts are not very high as it respects me. I do not wonder that Jonathan should express himself unguardedly; his family connection with Mr. Pearce sufficiently accounts for that. We have long been attacked in this country—first by Mr. Adam,1 and afterwards by Dr. Bryce.2 Bryce is now silenced by two or three pieces by John Marshman in his own newspaper, the John Bull; and as to some of the tissues of falsehood published in England, I shall certainly never reply to them, and I hope no one else will, That cause must be bad which needs such means to support it. I believe God will bring forth our righteousness as the noonday."

On the 12th July 1828 the father again writes to his son Jabez thus: "Your apologies about Brother Marshman are undoubtedly the best you can offer. I should be sorry to harbour hostile sentiments against any man on the earth upon grounds so slight. Indeed, were all you say matter of fact you ought to forgive it as God for Christ's sake forgives us. We are required to lay aside all envy and strife and animosities, to forgive each other mutually and to love one another with a pure heart fervently. Thine own friend and thy father's friend forsake not.'"

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1 The Baptist missionary, who became an Arian, and was afterwards employed by Lord William Beutinck to report on the actual state of education in Bengal.

2 The first Indian chaplain of the Church of Scotland, superintendent of stationery and editor of the John Bull. See Life of Alexander Duff, D.D.

CHAPTER XIV.

CAREY AS AN EDUCATOR—THE FIRST CHRISTIAN COLLEGE

IN THE EAST.

1818-1834.

A college the fourth and perfecting corner-stone of the mission—Carey on the importance of English in 1800—Anticipates Duff's policy of undermining Brahmanism—New educational era begun by the charter of 1813 and Lord Hastings—Plan of the Serampore College in 1818—Anticipates the Anglo-Orientalism of the Punjab University—The building described by John Marshman—Bishop Middleton follows—The Scottish Free Church and other colleges—Action of the Danish Government—The royal charter—Visit of Maharaja Serfojee—Death of Ward, Charles Grant, and Bentley—Bishop Heber and his catholic letter—Dr. Carey's reply— Progress of the college—Cause of its foundation—Reasons for giving its Council control of the mission stations—The college directly and essentially a missionary undertaking—Action of the Brotherhood from the first vindicated—Carey appeals to posterity—The college and the systematic study of English—Carey author of the Grant in Aid systemEconomy in administering missions—The Serampore Mission' has eighteen stations and fifty missionaries of all kinds—Subsequent history of the Serampore College.

The first act of Carey and Marshman when their Committee took up a position of hostility to their self-denying independence, was to complete and perpetuate the mission by a college. As planned by Carey in 1793, the constitution had founded the enterprise on these three corner-stones—preaching the Gospel in the mother tongue of the people, translating the Bible into all the languages of Southern and Eastern Asia, teaching the young, both heathen and Christian, both boys and girls, in vernacular schools. But Carey had not been

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