Lectures on the Tinnevelly Missions. Robert Granville Caldwell

      1. Introductory Lecture

       Table of Contents

      The possessions which have fallen to the lot of the English nation in India are the most valuable and important that any people has ever acquired beyond its own natural boundaries. India comprises nearly a million and a half of square miles, an area which is equal to the half of Europe, leaving out Russia ; and, though nearly two-thirds of the soil are uncultivated, so thickly peopled are the cultivated districts, that the population of India amounted, in 1851, to 171,859,055 (more probably to 180,000,000 at least,) a population which is twice as great as that of the corresponding area in Europe, and which constitutes nearly a quarter of the whole population of the world.

      The smallness of the number of the English in India is very extraordinary, and is a fact which is full of significance. The whole of the inhabitants of India are either directly under British rule, or they are inhabitants of " native protected states," in which all proceedings of importance are controlled by a British " Resi dent ;" yet the English in India, to whom the government of 180 millions of Hindiis has been committed, do not number 60,000 souls ! The proportion subsisting between the English and the native population, in some of the older provinces of British India, is especially extraordinary. For example, in Tinnevelly and Madura, the two most southern " collectorates," or provinces, in the Madras Presidency, amongst a population of more than, three millions, the number of Europeans, including civilians and mili tary men, Missionaries and merchants, men, women, and children, is under 300, and the Europeans who are directly engaged in the work of government, or in that of coercion, in those two provinces do not number a hundred altogether ! It might almost be regarded as a miracle that so many should submit to the government of so few ; but, what renders it more remarkable is, that they have hitherto submitted to it, not reluc tantly, but peaceably and contentedly. The people of those pro vinces, as of all the old settled provinces of Southern India, are more easily governed than the inhabitants of any county in England. There is only one regiment, and that a regiment of Sepoys, officered by Englishmen, in the two provinces referred to, amongst a population greater than that of Scotland ; and the services of that one regiment have not been required for anything more serious than routine duty since 1809!

      It has often been said that our rule in India rests upon military force ; but recent events have proved that it depends far less upon force than upon opinion. It rests partly on the opinion of the in vincibility, in the long run, of the English arms and policy; but in a much greater degree it rests on the opinion which the Hindus, as distinguished from the Mahometans, every where entertain, that the English Government, whatever be its faults, is the best government India has seen for many generations ; not equal, indeed, to the paternal governments of the mythical golden age, but more than equal to any government that these prosaic times have heard of. It is a mistake to suppose that the Hindus feel towards the English the soreness of a conquered people. Those of them who know anything 'of the history of their nation prefer to represent matters thus : " The English never deprived us of any power or privilege of which they found us in the possession ; they rescued us from the tyranny of our Mahommedan conquerors ; and in all their early battles we fought with theia, sMe by side, not against them. "VVe arc convinced also, that if the English were driven from the country, it would be a loss, not a gain, to us Hindus ; for the Mahommedans would again get the upper hand, and they would give us a far smaller share in the government of our own country than we now enjoy, besides treating us and our religion with a harshness and bigotry of which the English have never shown any trace." Occasionally, it is true, the Hindus indulge in the popular English practice of grumbling, and not without reason, for the pressure of taxation is in some districts extreme, and the adminis tration of justice is still very defective ; but, in so far as the latter particular is concerned, it is not the English, but their own country men, that are blamed, for the fault lies with the subordinate officials, who are in variably natives; and the remedy which Hindus themselves would propose, and which I have heard many of them propose, is not the expulsion of the Europeans, but such an increase in their number as would enable them to make their influence felt in every corner of the country. Mainly and ultimately, however, I doubt not that the rule of the English in India rests neither on force nor on human opinion, but on the will of the Most High, the Supreme Ruler of the nations, who has raised up England, and confided race after race and region after region to her care, that she might " tell it out amongst the heathen that the Lord is King." It cannot be supposed that Divine Providence has placed England in so high a position, and brought about such extraordinary results, for no other purpose than our national aggrandizement : it was surely for the benefit of India that He permitted us to become the rulers of India, it was in order that we might impart to India the benefit of our just laws, our rational liberty, and our progressive civilization, and especially that we might impart to it the know ledge of the religion of Christ that religion which alone can make any nation good, happy, or permanently great.

      Our duty, as a Christian Church and nation, to promote the religious welfare of India has generally been admitted ; but until our slumbers were rudely disturbed by the recent Mutiny and the dreadful proofs that were furnished by heathens and Mahome tans that bad religions are worse than none, that duty was not sufficiently recognised in this country, and certainly was not sufficiently felt, even by religious people. An encouraging amount of interest in the progress of Christianity in India has now at last been awakened, and a demand for information has been excited : it is now felt that a great door and effectual has been opened to us in India, and that the conversion of India to Christ is one of the greatest works, if not the great work, to which the Church and nation of England are called. I proceed, therefore, to give some idea of the present position of the Christian cause in India, espe cially in the Presidency of Madras.

      Those who are acquainted Avith India, or who bear in mind the numerous and very peculiar difficulties with which Indian missions have to contend, will not expect me to paint a rose-coloured picture of missionary progress. Progress undoubtedly has been made, and year by year the prospects of Christianity become more encourag ing ; but the encouragements are of such a nature as will best be appreciated by those whose experience in some work similar to this has taught them not to " despise the day of small things."

      Only one generation has elapsed since our Christian Govern ment systematically refused permission to Missionaries to labour in India, and openly patronised heathenism. It administered the affairs of all the more important pagodas, and compelled its ser vants to do honour to heathen festivals. I have myself seen idols that had been erected by its European servants, and wholly at its expense. As might naturally be expected in so unprincipled an age, the immoral lives of most of the English then resident in India was a scandal to the Christian name, insomuch that it became a proverbial expression that they had left their consciences at the Cape of Good Hope. We have reason to be thankful that a very different state of things now prevails. The character of the English in India has wonderfully improved, especially within the last thirty years, and the Indian Government itself has parti