Page images
PDF
EPUB

weeps at being deprived of all hopes of ever see ing this dear companion on earth, faith is hereby brought more into exercise. How sweet to feel dead to all below, to live only for eternity; to forget the short interval that lies between us and the spiritual world; and to live always seriously. The seriousness which this sorrow produces is indescribably precious; O that I could always retain it, when these impressions shall be worn away! My studies have been the Arabic Grammar and Persianwriting Luke for the women, and dictating 1 Pet. i, to Moonshee. Finished the Gulistan of Sadi, and began it again to mark all the phrases which may be of use in the translation of the Scriptures.”

One fruit of Mr. Martyn's prayers and result of his prudence, was the successful introduction, shortly after this, of the Sermon on the Mount, into his schools; and on the 21st of September he had the exquisite joy of hearing the poor Heathen boys reading the words of the Lord Jesus. "A wise man's heart," saith Solomon, "discerneth both time and judgment." It was in this spirit of patient and dependant wisdom, that Mr. Martyn had acted respecting the schools, and it was the same rare temper of mind which prevailed on him still to abstain from preaching publicly to the natives: again and again did he burn to begin his ministry in Patnabut again and again did he feel deeply the importance of not being precipitate: it was not, however, without much difficulty, that he checked the ardor of

bis zeal. He was determined to see what the institution of schools, and the quiet distribution of the Scriptures would effect; and was convinced, that public preaching at first, was incompatible with this plan of procedure, whereas it was clear that a way would thus be opened for preaching, of which object he never lost sight. It was this which made him resist the solicitations of those friends, who would have detained him at Calcutta; and this it was which now occasioned him to decline a very pressing invitation from Mr. Brown, urging him to take the Missionary Church at the Presidency. But Dinapore was in the midst of the Heathen; and Dinapore, further, was a scene of tranquil retirement. These two considerations, caused Mr. Martyn to refuse to comply with the very earnest desire of one whom he entirely esteemed and loved. "If ever I am fixed at Calcutta," he wrote in reply, "I have done with the natives, for notwithstanding previous determinations, the churches and people at Calcutta are enough to employ twenty Ministers. This is one reason for my apparently unconquerable aversion to being fixed there. The happiness of being near and with you, and your dear family, would not be a compensation for the disappointment; and having said this, I know of no stronger method of my expressing my dislike to the measure. If God commands it, I trust I shall have grace to obey: but let me beseech you all, to take no step towards it, for I shall resist it as long as I can with a safe conscience."

"I am happier here in this remote land,” he wrote in his Journal, "where I hear so seldom of what happens in the world, than in England, where there are so many calls to look at the things that are seen. How sweet the retirement in which I live here. The precious word, now my only study, by means of translations. Though in a manner buried from the world, neither seeing nor seen by Europeans, here the time flows on with great rapidity: it seems as if life would be gone, before any thing is done, or even before any thing is begun. I sometimes rejoice that I am not twenty-seven years of age, and that, unless God should order it otherwise, I may double the number in constant and successful labor. If not, God has many, many more instruments at command, and I shall not cease from my happiness, and scarcely from my work, by departing into another world. O what shall separate us from the love of Christ! neither death nor life, I am persuaded. Olet me feel my security, that I may be, as it were, already in heaven; that I may do all my work, as the angels do theirs; and O let me be ready for every work! be ready to leave this delightful solitude, or remain in it; to go out, or go in; to stay, or depart, just as the Lord shall appoint. Lord, let me have no will of my own; or consider my true happiness as depending, in the smallest degree, on any thing that can befal the outward man, but as consisting altogether in conformity to God's will. May I have Christ here with me in this world, not substituting imagin

ation in the place of faith; but seeing outward things as they really are, and thus obtaining a radical conviction of their vanity."

Mr. Martyn's spirits being much depressed by his recent affliction, an invitation or rather entreaty, strongly pressed upon him by one, who had a great share in his affection and esteem, which called, as he conceived, for a direct and firm rejection, could not but be a matter of some trial to him. He had not, however, the additional pain of witnessing the slightest variation in his friend's attachment: a circumstance, which does not always occur on similar occasions: for the fondness even of Christian friendship, will sometimes suffer an interruption, upon a disagreement respecting favorite projects and designs.

To this perturbation of mind, comparatively light, a very severe disappointment from another quarter succeeded a disappointment intended, doubtless, like his other troubles, for the augmentation of his faith. Such strong representations had been made, by those whose judgment he valued not a little, respecting the dreariness of a distant station in India, and the evils of solitude, that he had deemed it agreeable to the will of God, to make an overture of marriage to her, for whom time had increased, rather than diminished, his affection. This overture, for reasons which afterwards commended themselves to Mr. Martyn's own judgment, was now declined; on which occasion, suffering sharply as a man, but most meekly as a Christian, he said, "the

Lord sanctify this; and since this last desire of my heart is also withheld, may I turn away for ever from the world, and henceforth live forgetful of all but God. With thee, O my God, is no disappointment. I shall never have to regret, that I have loved thee too well. Thou hast said, 'delight thyself in the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thy heart.""

"At first I was more grieved," he wrote sometime afterwards, "at the loss of my gourd, than of the perishing Ninevehs all around me: but now my earthly woes, and earthly attachments, seem to be absorbing in the vast concern of communicating the Gospel to these nations. After this last lesson from God, on the vanity of the creature, I feel desirous to be nothing to have nothing-to ask for nothing but what he gives."

Providentially for Mr. Martyn's comfort, his thoughts were much occupied, just after the receipt of this letter, by the arrival of his co-adjutors in the work of translation; one of them, Mirza of Benares, well known in India as an eminent scholar in the Hindoostanee; the other, Sabat the Arabian, but too well known both in India and England for his rejection of that faith, which he then appeared to possess in sincerity and truth. In the latter of these, Mr. Martyn confidently trusted that he had found a Christian brother. Nor were these hopes, respecting Sabat's religious character, more sanguine than both in reason and charity, he might fairly have en

« PreviousContinue »