ue distinction of having lived more than a millennium
and a half in a heathen land, for a thousand years of which it was
entirely surrounded by a non-Christian people.

During the last half century it has been considerably influenced by the
work and example of the Church Missionary Society which is established in
that region. Through this influence a Reformed Syrian Church has come into
existence which promises to do much for the whole community in ideals and
life. The Syrian Church has hitherto been greatly cursed with the trinity
of evils--ignorance, ceremonialism and superstition. It was not until 1811
(at the suggestion of an Englishman) that it translated a part of the
Bible (the four gospels) into the vernacular. And this is the only
translation of the Scriptures ever made and published by the natives of
India.

The Syrian Church now numbers 248,741. That part of the Syrian community
which the Romish Church compelled, by the inquisition, to unite with it
numbers 322,586.

2. From the fourteenth century the ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH has continued to
send out her emissaries and missionaries to that land.

Jordanus and his brave band of missionary associates were her first
representatives.

But it was only from the arrival of Vasco da Gama and the Portuguese
conquest four centuries ago, that the influence of that Church began to be
seriously felt and its triumphs recorded.

By the sword and cruel Inquisition not only were Syrian Christians
compelled to transfer their allegiance to the Pope; non-Christians also
were, for perhaps the second time in the long history of the land,
subjected to the bitter restraints and inhuman inflictions of religious
persecution. It is a curious fact that the hideous and bloody monster of
religious intolerance was hardly known in India until, first, the
followers of Mohammed and, secondly, the disciples of the meek and lowly
Jesus began to invade the land.

Then follow the devoted and heroic labours of the saintly Xavier. He was a
man of princely extraction, of royal bearing, of Christian devotion and
self-denial. He wrought, according to his light, with supreme loyalty to
his Lord and with a divine passion for souls in South India. Many
thousands of the poor fishermen on the coast was he permitted to baptize
into the Christian faith. It is much to be regretted that, like nearly all
subsequent Romish missionaries, he gave himself, all but exclusively, to
the ceremonial salvation, rat