rd, was truly painful. While they are still in possession of the
comforts I once enjoyed, I am an exile from my country and my father's
house, deprived of all society and every friend but one, and with
scarcely the necessaries of life. _These privations would not be endured
with patience in any other cause but that in which we are engaged._
But since it is thy cause, blessed Jesus, we rejoice that thou didst
give us so many enjoyments to sacrifice, and madest it so plainly our
duty to forsake all in order to bring thy truth to the benighted
heathen. We would not resign our work, but live contented with our lot,
and live to Thee."

"_Sept. 5._--Yes, I do feel thankful that God has brought me to this
heathen land, and placed me in a situation peculiarly calculated to make
me feel my dependence on him and my constant need of the influences of
the Holy Spirit. I enjoy more in reading the Scriptures, and in secret
prayer than for years before; and the prosperity of this mission, and
the conversion of this people, lie with weight on my mind, and draw
forth my heart in constant intercession. _And I do confidently believe
that God will visit this land with Gospel light, that these idol temples
will be demolished_, and temples for the worship of the living God be
erected in their stead."

Let us here pause for a moment and contemplate the picture brought by
these words before our imagination. Let us survey the scene in which the
lonely missionary penned this prediction. A vast country not waste and
uninhabited, but enriched by the partial sun with every natural gift to
cheer the sense and gratify the taste of man; swarming with human beings
endowed with capacities for advancement in knowledge, and virtue, and
temporal enjoyment, as well as for immortal happiness; yet who, having
said in their heart there is no God 'that minds the affairs of men,'
have built up for themselves a fabric of absurd superstitions, and
unmeaning rites, and senseless formalities, to which they cling with a
stubbornness that nothing but the power of God can subdue; on such a
shore are cast by the providence of God two 'pilgrim strangers,' not
endowed with apostolic gifts; not able to control disease, or raise the
dead, or even to speak in a foreign tongue without long and patient and
assiduous study to acquire it; and yet with a simple and sublime faith
in the clear and sure word of their master, "Go--preach my Gospel--lo, I
am with you," these pilgrim