THE CHRISTIAN HERALD.

VOL. VII.]

Saturday, April 7, 1821.

[No. XXIII.

Miscellany.

From the New-York Literary Journal.

HENRY MARTYN.

In the second and third numbers of the present volume, we published a brief memoir of this "man of God," which was chiefly an abstract from "Memoirs of the Rev. Henry Martyn, B. D." &c. by the Rev. James Sargent, jun. Two editions of this most interesting work have been republished in Boston, and are now for sale at the principal bookstores in this city.

THE records of human philanthropy can furnish no ensample of affection and heroism, like that of the faithful missionary of Christ, on his pilgrimage through distant climes. There is no field of suffering like that which he is called to tread; his sacrifices are those to which it were vain to search a parallel; his motive is higher than all else, for it is drawn from the very fountain of that heavenly love, which passeth all understanding. The reward which awaits his journey of tribulation and tears, has nothing temporal, nothing present, nothing obvious to mortal sense. His hope and treasure lie hidden in a certain, but unknown state of being: and for these earth is accounted as nothing; the thousand charms of this world are cast unheeded away; and, till the last repose comes, the herald of mercy must sit down and weep, like captive Israel, by the waters of a strange land.

It is not merely in the actual extent of physical endurance and privation, that the bitterness of this holy martyrdom consists; though the body has no small share in the encounter. It is into the spirit that the cup of sorrow is emptied to its dregs. The very absence from those endearments of social love which make life's chiefest pleasure, were enough to intimidate the stoutest heart, were that all that is certain in the evils of this wilderness of existence. But there is besides a continued struggle with passions, strange and discordant; a contention with prejudices, obstinate and inveterate; contact of mind without communion ; He who sets out an appeal to bosoms that answer no return. like Xavier, Brainerd, and Swartz, to plant the standard of the gospel of truth, in those dry and thirsty lands where the wells of salvation have been never known; to break down the strong holds of the adversary's kingdom, in the very point and centre of his power; to crush the terrible bulwarks of a deep-rooted and VOL. VII. 4 U

complicated idolatry; to tear up the habits, the associations, the establishments of ages; meets that which none but those who feel it can ever know, and of which the most fiery trials in a Christian clime can afford no explanation. All that man suffers either of positive or of negative evil, in a land of common religion and reciprocal sympathy, is but the lighter or deeper shade of that cloud which is ever interposing between him, and the vision of his brightest hopes. The mist is not always hanging; whatever be the reasons of its intervention, they find either an interval or an end; and a pure, though short sunshine, will scatter the darkness away. But for him whom oceans and deserts separate from the chances of such a change, his griefs are a long night, on which the day-spring can never arise. What arm of man shall hold him when he fails? What voice shall speak peace, when his weary spirit sinks? Who shall explain his doubts, comfort his fears, encourage his hopes? He stands single in creation's extended scene; he toils, but who can estimate his labours; he perishes, and who layeth it to heart?

As all wretchedness is made more intense by the contrast of former experience, there will be degrees in the suffering of the individuals composing this heavenly band, proportioned to the sweetness of those enjoyments they have for ever left behind. He who parts from the shores of his nativity, inured to poverty and self-denial, enters the lists with a body more steeled against the keen sense of personal misery: he will not ache in the sudden void of luxuries untasted, and gratifications unsupplied; he will have passed through the difficult school of self-dependence; and his frame, in the new regimen, will feel a change, but not a fall. In the concerns also of mind, the uneducated adventurer will prove less anguish in the anticipation and advancement of his future career. He will not see himself so desolate in the transit from an intellectual to an unintellectual atmosphere of being: the thirst for literary enjoyments will not be for ever drawing his af fections back to the high communion of genius and of learning, in which he cannot hope again to participate. The alteration for him will be purely spiritual: he will pass from a world where heaven is all manifest, to a region of dubious twilight, or thick darkness; his solitude will be that of the pilgrim to a better country, without one companion to beguile the ruggedness of the road; his woes will be less various, for they will be emanations from one source.

Who, then, shall assign the measure of that mixed draught of pain, which cultivated talent tastes in this untried waste of things? Here is the double struggle with the prepossessions of a Christian and a man: for there has been the two-fold refining hand of worldly knowledge, and of that wisdom which cometh from above. Who shall count the tears of him who descends from the superfluities of high, or the comforts of middle life? He starts at a

destitution which he never knew; at obstacles which no previous lessening has taught him to surmount. He begins with all his sensibilities softened and alive; with his energies reluctant and unnerved; his alarms too sudden and frequent; his expectations too eager and unlimited. He will rush to the battle unprovided experience only will be his preparation; and in the very tumult of conflict he will learn the nature of that true armour of defence, which is to serve him in the hour of trial.

Among the foremost, nay, first of the foremost in the list of great as well as pure beings, who have left all that they might gather in the desolate heathen to their Saviour's fold, stands one, the fourth edition of whose memoirs has already issued from the London press, and, we rejoice to find a fifth on this side of the Atlantic. In an age of piety and learning, HENRY MARTYN may be regarded as one of the most cultivated scholars that ever graced the walls of a college, and one of the best and heavenliest spirits in the annals of Christian benevolence. The fellow-student of Kirk White, like him he toiled in the labours of mind, and then cast his blushing honours at the foot of the cross. Like him, though not so soon, he sunk into an early grave: with a constitution somewhat stronger, a temperament more ardent, a mind more versatile and powerful, a faculty of acquisition more mighty and rapid, he made the interests of his Master's kingdom all his own; threw behind him every fond vision of preferment in that illustrious church in whose ranks he was enrolled; flew to the distant East; and after a race of learning and of love unparalleled in the records of missionary exertion, poured out his exhausted spirit in the solitude of a Persian desert.

The life of this wonderful character is drawn up by the Rev. John Sargent, jun. a clergyman of the Church of England. He has followed the true method of all faithful biographers, by suffering Martyn to speak for himself. In a journal which was never intermitted to the time of its author's death, and in occasional extracts from his correspondence, we are permitted to live with him through his short, but splendid career; to penetrate the varied workings of his heart; to join in the hard struggles of his nature; to follow the impetuous strides of his mind. It is, in truth, one of the most interesting of books: it has attracted universal attention in the land where talent and virtue always find their market; and if not suffered here to lie unheeded between avarice on the one hand, and indifference on the other, may yet carry the voice. of heavenly peace to ears that never heard the sound.

It is impossible to peruse the memorials of a course like this, without a sublimity of feeling fresh at every burning page. And, indeed, where is the understanding so acute, the range of knowledge so extended, the piety so devoted, as to catch no inspiration from the effusions of such a man? In very truth it is a question whether many such glowing spirits breathe upon this earth;

but if so, they must draw new glory from so bright a centre of light. The scholar will prove it, as he wanders with him through the groves of classical enchantment; the philosopher, as he treads with him through the wide fields of metaphysical inquiry; the poet, as with him he drinks pure melody from the immortal streams; the painter, as with him he makes nature start on the canvass into second life; the musician, who wakes like him the heavenly harmony of sounds; the mathematician, as he winds with him through the mazes of subtle calculation; the minister of Christ, as, like him, through this fretting and tempestuous scene, his affections are ever drawn longing to that peaceful home, where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest.* L. C.

From the Presbyterian Magazine.

THOUGHTS ON REVIVALS OF RELIGION.

By the Rev. Wm. Neill, D. D.

This is certainly a subject of some importance. The avidity with which pious people receive narratives of religious revivals clearly evinces, that, in their judgment, "times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord" are devoutly to be wished. Christians may differ in their views, concerning the nature of a genuine revival; but the thing itself all will readily acknowledge to be desirable. The diversity of opinion which obtains, on this subject, among the friends of Christianity, is, perhaps, rather ap parent than real. In our apprehension, it arises partly from a want of agreement, in regard to the meaning of certain terms and phrases, commonly used on topics of this kind, and partly from a neglect to distinguish the effects of a divine influence on the heart, from those excesses of passion, or extravagances of conduct, which sometimes attend a real work of grace, and which ought to be ascribed to the ignorance and depravity of the human heart.

Every denomination of Christians have a set of phrases, or forms of expression, against which other denominations are very apt to entertain some prejudice: hence a mere strife of words is often mistaken for a doctrinal difference, where none exists in fact. If you choose to distinguish what I call a revival of religipn, by another name, be it so; I will not contend with you about the name, provided you concede that the work intended to be designated thereby, is of God. Call it, if you please, an awakening, an outpouring of the Spirit, a display of redeeming mercy, a shower of gracious influence, an ingathering of souls to the Saviour, or an extension of the power of godliness; any of

The following is the title of the work to which we have referred : « Memoir of the Rev. Henry Martyn, B. D. late Fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge, and Chaplain to the Honourable East India Company."

these phrases would be sufficiently intelligible, and might be used interchangeably, without detriment, so far as we can perceive, to the cause of vital piety. If Christians would take a little more pains to understand one another, and agree to construe each other's language and conduct fairly and charitably, might they not offer to God their joint supplications for the revival of religion, with as much consistency and cordiality, as they do for the coming of the Redeemer's kingdom?

We should be careful also, to distinguish the genuine effects of a divine influence on the minds of men, from those wild excesses of feeling, and extravagances of conduct, which often attend strong religious excitement. Considering what human nature is, we should expect some departures from Christian decorum, where large numbers of careless persons, many of them very ignorant of divine things, are roused to a deep and awful concern about the salvation of their souls. To prevent or correct evils of this sort, should be the constant aim of ministers and other experienced Christians. No intelligent friend to revivals approves, or countenances fanaticism, or the violation of church order; nor should he be rashly charged with such a design. On the other hand, we should not suppose that a temperate remonstrance against those disorders that sometimes appear in extensive revivals, implies hostility to a work of grace, or a cold indifference to the saving power of true religion.

While we would resist confusion and all infringement of that wise and wholesome order, which Christ has appointed in his church, we deprecate a languid monotony of feeling, on the momentous concerns of the soul. "Let all things be done decently and in order;" but "let us not sleep, as do others." The day of grace is a short term; and the bliss of heaven is suspended on its religious improvement. It is our seed time for eternity: "he that soweth to his flesh shall, of the flesh, reap corruption; but he that soweth to the spirit shall, of the spirit, reap life everlasting."

The writer of these thoughts is far from thinking that no souls are converted to the Lord, or that nothing is done towards the edifying of the body of Christ, where there are no special revivals of religion. He firmly believes that, wherever the pure gospel of the grace of God is preached, it proves, to some of the people, "a savour of life unto life." A portion of the seed, wherever it is faithfully dispensed, falls into good ground, and bears fruit. He is well aware, too, that a large proportion of real believers have been brought to the knowledge and love of the truth, not, indeed, without deep conviction of sin, and a feeling sense of their lost and helpless condition by nature, but in circumstances which have excited no great degree of attention, even in the church to which they belong. God's methods in turning sinners