What is the use, too, of telling us what these | against them conclusive, and shuts up the men endure? Suffering is not a merit, but case. Two men possess a cow, and they quaronly useful suffering. Prove to us that they rel violently how they shall manage this cow. are fit men, doing a fit thing, and we are ready They will surely both of them (if they have a to praise the missionaries; but it gives us no particle of common sense) agree, that there is pleasure to hear that a man has walked a an absolute necessity for preventing the cow thousand miles with peas in his shoes, unless from running away. It is not only the loss we know why, and wherefore, and to what of India that is in question,-but how will it good purpose he has done it. be lost? By the massacre of ten or twenty thousand English, by the blood of our sons and brothers, who have been toiling so many years to return to their native country. But what is all this to a ferocious Methodist? What care brothers Barrel and Ringletub for us and our colonies?

But these men, it is urged, foolish and extravagant as they are, may be very useful precursors of the established clergy. This is much as if a regular physician should send a quack doctor before him, and say, do you go and look after this disease for a day or two, and ply the patient well with your nostrums, and then I will step in and complete the cure; a more notable expedient we have seldom heard of. Its patrons forget that these selfordained ministers, with Mr. John Styles at their head, abominate the established clergy ten thousand times more than they do Pagans, who cut themselves with cruel kimes. The efforts of these precursors would be directed with infinitely more zeal to make the Hindoos disbelieve in bishops, than to make them believe in Christ. The darling passion in the soul of every missionary is, not to teach the great leading truths of the Christian faith, but to enforce the little paltry modification and distinction which he first taught from his own tub. And then what a way of teaching Christianity is this! There are five sects, if not six, now employed as missionaries, every one instructing the Hindoos in their own particular method of interpreting the Scriptures; and, when these have completely succeeded, the Church of England is to step in, and convert them all over again to its own doctrines. There is, indeed, a very fine varnish of probability over this ingenious and plausible scheme. Mr. John Styles, however, would much rather see a kime in the flesh of an Hindoo than the hand of a bishop on his head.

The missionaries complain of intolerance. A weasel might as well complain of intolerance when he is throttled for sucking eggs. Toleration for their own opinions,-toleration for their domestic worship, for their private groans and convulsions, they possess in the fullest extent; but who ever heard of toleration for intolerance? Who ever before heard men cry out that they were persecuted, because they might not insult the religion, shock the feelings, irritate the passions of their fellow-creatures, and throw a whole colony into bloodshed and confusion? We did not say that a man was not an object of pity who tormented himself from a sense of duty, but that he was not so great an object of pity as one equally tormented by the tyranny of another, and without any sense of duty to support him. Let Mr. Styles first inflict forty lashes upon himself, then let him allow an Edinburgh Reviewer to give him forty more,he will find no comparison between the two dagellations.

If it were possible to invent a method by which a few men sent from a distant country could hold such masses of people as the Hindoos in subjection, that method would be the institution of castes. There is no institution which can so effectually curb the ambition of genius, reconcile the individual more completely to his station, and reduce the varieties of human character to such a state of insipid and monotonous tameness; and yet the religion which destroys castes is said to render our empire in India more certain! It may be our duty to make the Hindoos Christians,that is another argument: but, that we shall by so doing strengthen our empire, we utterly deny. What signifies identity of religion to a question of this kind? Diversity of bodily colour and of language would soon overpower this consideration. Make the Hindoos enterprising, active, and reasonable as yourselves,

destroy the eternal track in which they have moved for ages-and, in a moment, they would sweep you off the face of the earth. Let us ask, too, if the Bible is universally diffused in Hindostan, what must be the astonishment of the natives to find that we are forbidden to rob, murder, and steal ;—we who, in fifty years, have extended our empire from a few acres about Madras over the whole peninsula, and sixty millions of people, and exemplified in our public conduct every crime of which human nature is capable. What matchless impudence to follow up such practice with such precepts! If we have common prudence, let us keep the gospel at home, and tell them that Machiavel is our prophet, and the god of the Manicheans our god.

There is nothing which disgusts us more than the familiarity which these impious coxcombs affect with the ways and designs of Providence. Every man, now-a-days, is an Amos or a Malachi. One rushes out of his chambers, and tells us we are beaten by the French, because we do not abolish the slave trade. Another assures us, that we have no chance of victory till India is evangelized. The new Christians are now come to speak of the ways of their Creator with as much confidence as they would of the plans of an earthly ruler. We remember when the ways of God to man were gazed upon with trembling humility,— when they were called inscrutable,-when These men talk of the loss of our posses- piety looked to another scene of existence for sions in India, as if it made the argument, the true explanation of this ambiguous and against them only more or less strong; where- distressing world. We were taught in our as, in our estimation, it makes the argument | childhood that this was true religion; but it

turns out now to be nothing but atheism and | and we may do, by violence; but, did he make infidelity. If any thing could surprise us from Mahomedans?-or shall we make Christians? the pen of a Methodist, we should be truly sur-This, however, it seems, is a matter of pleaprised at the very irreligious and presump- santry. To make a poor Hindoo hateful to tuous answer which Mr. Styles makes to some himself and his kindred, and to fix a curse of our arguments. Our title to one of the an- upon him to the end of his days!-we have no ecdotes from the Methodist Magazine is as doubt but that this is very entertaining; and follows:-" A sinner punished-a Bee the in- particularly to the friends of toleration. But strument;" to which Mr. Styles replies, that we our ideas of comedy have been formed in might as well ridicule the Scriptures, by re- another school. We are dull enough to think, lating their contents in the same ludicrous too, that it is more innocent to exile pigs than manner. An interference with respect to a tra- to offend conscience, and destroy human hapvelling Jew; blindness the consequence. Acts, piness. The scheme of baptizing with beef the ninth chapter, and first nine verses. The broth is about as brutal and preposterous as account of Paul's conversion, &c. &c. &c. page 38. the assertion that you may vilify the gods and But does Mr. Styles forget that the one is a priests of the Hindoos with safety, provided shameless falsehood, introduced to sell a two- you do not meddle with their turbans and penny book, and the other a miracle recorded toupees, (which are cherished solely on a by inspired writers? In the same manner, principle of religion,) is silly and contemptible. when we express our surprise that sixty mil- After all, if the Mahomedan did persecute the lions of Hindoos should be converted by four Hindoo with impunity, is that any precedent men and sixteen guineas, he asks, what would of safety to a government that offends every have become of Christianity if the twelve feeling both of Mahomedan and Hindoo at the Apostles had argued in the same way? It is same time? You have a tiger and a buffalo impossible to make this infatuated gentleman in the same enclosure; and the tiger drives understand that the lies of the Evangelical the buffalo before him;-is it therefore prudent Magazine are not the miracles of Scripture; in you to do that which will irritate them both, and that the Baptist Missionaries are not the and bring their united strength upon you? Apostles. He seriously expects that we should speak of Brother Carey as we would speak of St. Paul; and treat with an equal respect the miracles of the Magazine and the Gospel.

Mr. Styles knows very well that we have never said, because a nation has present happiness, that it can therefore dispense with immortal happiness; but we have said that, where of two nations both cannot be made Christians, it is more the duty of a missionary to convert the one, which is exposed to every evil of barbarism, than the other possessing every blessing of civilization. Our argument is merely comparative: Mr. Styles must have known it to be so:-but who does not love the Tabernacle better than truth? When the tenacity of the Hindoos on the subject of their religion is adduced as a reason against the success of the missions, the friends of this understanding are always fond of reminding us how patiently the Hindoos submitted to the religious persecutions and butchery of Tippoo. The inference from such citations is truly alarming. It is the imperious duty of Government to watch some of these men most narrowly. There is nothing of which they are not capable. And what, after all, did Tippoo effect in the way of conversion? How many Mahomedans did he make? There was all the carnage of Medea's Kettle, and none of the transformation. He deprived multitudes of Hindoos of their caste, indeed; and cut them off from all the benefits of their religion. That he did,

In answer to the low malignity of this author, we have only to reply, that we are, as we always have been, sincere friends to the conversion of the Hindoos. We admit the Hindoo religion to be full of follies, and full of enormities;-we think conversion a great duty; and should think, if it could be effected, a great blessing; but our opinion of the missionaries and of their employer is such, that we most firmly believe, in less than twenty years, for the conversion of a few degraded wretches, who would be neither Methodists nor Hindoos, they would infallibly produce the massacre of every European in India;* the loss of our settlements; and, consequently, of the chance of that slow, solid, and temperate introduction of Christianity, which the superiority of the European character may ultimately effect in the Eastern world. The Board of Control (all Atheists, and disciples of Voltaire, of course) are so entirely of our way of thinking, that the most peremptory orders have been issued to send all the missionaries home upon the slightest appearance of disturbance. Those who have sons and brothers in India may now sleep in peace. Upon the transmission of this order, Mr. Styles is said to have destroyed himself with a kime.

*Every opponent says of Major Scott's book, "What a dangerous book! the arrival of it at Calcutta may throw the whole Indian empire into confusion ;" and yet these are the people whose religious prejudices may bo insulted with impunity.

HANNAH MORE.*

[EDINBURGH REVIEW, 1809.]

THIS book is written, or supposed to be written, (for we would speak timidly of the mysteries of superior beings,) by the celebrated Mrs. Hannah More! We shall probably give great offence by such indiscretion; but still we must be excused for treating it as a book merely human, an uninspired production, the result of mortality left to itself, and depending on its own limited resources. In tak ing up the subject in this point of view, we solemnly disclaim the slightest intention of indulging in any indecorous levity, or of wounding the religious feelings of a large class of very respectable persons. It is the only method in which we can possibly make this work a proper object of criticism. We have the strongest possible doubts of the attributes usually ascribed to this authoress; and we think it more simple and manly to say so at once, than to admit nominally superlunary claims, which, in the progress of our remarks, we should virtually deny.

tion is hopeless in the more perfect characters which Mrs. More has set before us; and therefore they inspire us with very little interest.

There are books, however, of all kinds; and those may not be unwisely planned which set before us very pure models. They are less probable, and therefore less amusing, than ordinary stories; but they are more amusing than plain, unfabled precept. Sir Charles Grandison is less agreeable than Tom Jones; but it is more agreeable than Sherlock and Tillotson; and teaches religion and morality to many who would not seek it in the produc tions of these professional writers.

But, making every allowance for the difficulty of the task which Mrs. More has prescribed to herself, the book abounds with marks of negligence and want of skill; with representations of life and manners which are either false or trite.

Temples to friendship and virtue must be Celebs wants a wife: and, after the death totally laid aside, for many years to come, in of his father, quits his estate in Northumber-novels. Mr. Lane, of the Minerva Press, has land to see the world, and to seek for one of its best productions, a woman, who may add materially to the happiness of his future life. His first journey is to London, where, in the midst of the gay society of the metropolis, of course, he does not find a wife; and his next journey is to the family of Mr. Stanley, the head of the Methodists, a serious people, where, of course, he does find a wife. The exaltation, therefore, of what the authoress deems to be the religious, and the depreciation of what she considers to be the worldly character, and the influence of both upon matrimonial happiness, form the subject of this novel,-rather of this dramatic sermon.

The machinery upon which the discourse is suspended is of the slightest and most inartificial texture, bearing every mark of haste, and possessing not the slightest claim to merit. Events there are none; and scarcely a character of any interest. The book is intended to convey religious advice; and no more labour appears to have been bestowed upon the story, than was merely sufficient to throw it out of the dry, didactic form. Lucilla is totally uninteresting; so is Mr. Stanley; Dr. Barlow still worse; and Colebs a mere clod or dolt. Sir John and Lady Belfield are rather more interesting-and for a very obvious reason: they have some faults; they put us in mind of men and women; they seem to belong to one common nature with ourselves. As we read, we seem to think we might act as such people act, and therefore we attend; whereas imita

Calebs in Search of a Wife; comprehending Observations on Domestic Habits and Manners, Religion and Morals. 2 vols. London, 1809.

given them up long since; and we were quite surprised to find such a writer as Mrs. More busied in moral brick and mortar. Such an idea, at first, was merely juvenile; the second time, a little nauseous; but the ten thousandth time it is quite intolerable. Calebs, upon his first arrival in London, dines out,-meets with a bad dinner,-supposes the cause of that bad dinner to be the erudition of the ladies of the house,-talks to them upon learned subjects, and finds them as dull and ignorant as if they had piqued themselves upon all the mysteries of housewifery. We humbly submit to Mrs. More, that this is not humorous, but strained and unnatural. Philippics against frugivorous children after dinner are too common. Lady Melbury has been introduced into every novel for these four years last past. Peace to her ashes!

The characters in this novel which evince the greatest skill are unquestionably those of Mrs. Ranby and her daughters. There are some scenes in this part of the book extremely well painted, and which evince that Mrs. More could amuse, in no common degree, if amusement was her object.

"At tea I found the young ladies took no more interest in the conversation than they had done at dinner, but sat whispering and laughing, and netting white silk gloves, till they were summoned to the harpsichord. Despairing of getting on with them in com pany, I proposed a walk in the garden. I now found them as willing to talk as destitute of any thing to say. Their conversation was vapid and frivolous. They laid great stress on small things. They seemed to have no shades in their understanding, but used the

strongest terms for the commonest occasions; | certain peculiar phrases are familiar: and and admiration was excited by things hardly though her friends may be correct, devout, and worthy to command attention. They were both doctrinally and practically pious; yet, if extremely glad and extremely sorry on sub- they cannot catch a certain mystic meaning,→ jects not calculated to excite affections of if there is not a sympathy of intelligence any kind. They were animated about trifles, between her and them,-if they do not fully and indifferent on things of importance. They conceive of impressions, and cannot respond were, I must confess, frank and good-na- to mysterious communications, she holds them tured; but it was evident that, as they were unworthy of intercourse with her. She does too open to have any thing to conceal, so not so much insist on high moral excellence they were too uninformed to have any thing as the criterion of their worth, as on their to produce; and I was resolved not to risk own account of their internal feelings.”—(I. my happiness with a woman who could not | 60-63.) contribute her full share towards spending a wet winter cheerfully in the country."-(I. 54, 55.)

This trait of character appears to us to be very good. The following passage is still better.

The great object kept in view, throughout the whole of this introduction, is the enforcement of religious principle, and the condemnation of a life lavished in dissipation and fashionable amusement. In the pursuit of this object, it appears to us that Mrs. More is much too severe upon the ordinary amusements of "In the evening, Mrs. Ranby was lamenting mankind, many of which she does not object in general, in rather customary terms, her own to in this or that degree, but altogether. exceeding sinfulness. Mr Ranby said, 'You Cœlebs and Lucilla, her optimus and optima, accuse yourself rather too heavily, my dear; never dance, and never go to the play. They you have sins to be sure. And pray what not only stay away from the comedies of sins have I, Mr. Ranby?' said she, turning upon Congreve and Farquhar, for which they may him with so much quickness that the poor easily enough be forgiven; but they never go man started. Nay,' said he, meekly, 'I did to see Mrs. Siddons in the Gamester, or in not mean to offend you; so far from it, that, Jane Shore. The finest exhibition of talent, hearing you condemn yourself so grievously, and the most beautiful moral lessons, are inI intended to comfort you, and to say that, terdicted at the theatre. There is something except a few faultsAnd pray what in the word Playhouse which seems so closely faults?' interrupted she, continuing to speak, connected, in the minds of these people, with however, lest he should catch an interval to sin and Satan,-that it stands in their vocabutell them. 'I defy you, Mr. Ranby, to produce lary for every species of abomination. And one. My dear,' replied he, as you charged yet why? Where is every feeling more roused yourself with all, I thought it would be letting in favour of virtue than at a good play? you off cheaply, by naming only two or three, Where is goodness so feelingly, so enthusiassuch asHere, fearing matters would tically learnt? What so solemn as to see the go too far, I interposed; and, softening things excellent passions of the human heart called as much as I could for the lady, said, 'I con- forth by a great actor, animated by a great poet? ceived that Mr. Ranby meant, that though she To hear Siddons repeat what Shakspeare wrote? partook of the general corruption Here To behold the child and his mother-the noble Ranby, interrupting me with more spirit than and the poor artisan-the monarch and his I thought he possessed, said, 'General corrup- subjects-all ages and all ranks convulsed tion, sir, must be the source of particular cor- with one common passion-wrung with one ruption. I did not mean that my wife was common anguish, and, with loud sobs and worse than other women.'-Worse, Mr. cries, doing involuntary homage to the God Ranby, worse?' cried she. Ranby, for the that made their hearts! What wretched infafirst time in his life, not minding her, went on, tuation to interdict such amusements as these! 'As she is always insisting that the whole What a blessing that mankind can be allured species is corrupt, she cannot help allowing from sensual gratification, and find relaxation that she herself has not quite escaped the infec- and pleasure in such pursuits! But the exceltion. Now, to be a sinner in the gross, and a lent Mr. Stanley is uniformly paltry and narsaint in the detail-that is, to have all sins, row,-always trembling at the idea of being and no faults-is a thing I do not quite com- entertained, and thinking no Christian safe prehend.' who is not dull. As to the spectacles of impropriety which are sometimes witnessed in parts of the theatre, such reasons apply, in a much stronger degree, to not driving along the Strand, or any of the great public streets of London, after dark; and, if the virtue of welleducated young persons is made of such very frail materials, their best resource is a nun nery at once. It is a very bad rule, however, never to quit the house for fear of catching cold.

"After he had left the room, which he did as the shortest way of allaying the storm, she, apologizing for him, said, 'he was a wellmeaning man, and acted up to the little light he had; but added, 'that he was unacquainted with religious feelings, and knew little of the nature of conversion.'

"Mrs. Ranby, I found, seems to consider Christianity as a kind of free-masonry; and therefore thinks it superfluous to speak on serious subjects to any but the initiated. If they do not return the sign, she gives them up as blind and dead. She thinks she can only make herself intelligible to those to whom

Mrs. More practically extends the same doctrine to cards and assemblies. No cards

because cards are employed in gaming; no assemblies--because many dissipated persons

pass their lives in assemblies. Carry this but them to ride, walk, row, wrestle, and dine out a little further, and we must say, no wine- religiously;-forgetting that the being to whom because of drunkenness; no meat-because this impossible purity is recommended, is a of gluttony; no use, that there may be no being compelled to scramble for his existence abuse! The fact is, that Mr. Stanley wants, and support for ten hours out of the sixteen he not only to be religious, but to be at the head is awake;-forgetting that he must dig, beg, of the religious. These little abstinences are read, think, move, pay, receive, praise, scold, the cockades by which the party are known,- command, and obey ;-forgetting, also, that if the rallying points for the evangelical faction. men conversed as often upon religious subjects So natural is the love of power, that it some- as they do upon the ordinary occurrences of times becomes the influencing motive with the the world, they would converse upon them sincere advocates of that blessed religion with the same familiarity and want of respect, whose very characteristic excellence is the-that religion would then produce feelings not humility which it inculcates. more solemn or exalted than any other topics which constitute at present the common furniture of human understandings.

We observe that Mrs. More, in one part of her work, falls into the common error about dress. She first blames ladies for exposing their persons in the present style of dress, and then says, if they knew their own interest,-if they were aware how much more alluring they were to men when their charms are less displayed, they would make the desired alteration from motives merely selfish.

"Oh! if women in general knew what was their real interest, if they could guess with what a charm even the appearance of modesty invests its possessor, they would dress decorously from mere self-love, if not from principle. The designing would assume modesty as an artifice; the coquette would adopt it as an allurement; the pure as her appropriate attraction; and the voluptuous as the most infallible art of seduction."-(I. 189.)

If there is any truth in this passage, nudity becomes a virtue; and no decent woman, for the future, can be seen in garments.

We are glad to find in this work some strong compliments to the efficacy of works,-some distinct admissions that it is necessary to be honest and just, before we can be considered as religious. Such sort of concessions are very gratifying to us; but how will they be received by the children of the Tabernacle? It is quite clear, indeed, throughout the whole of the work, that an apologetical explanation of certain religious opinions is intended; and there is a considerable abatement of that tone of insolence with which the improved Christians are apt to treat the bungling specimens of piety to be met with in the more ancient churches.

So much for the extravagances of this lady. -With equal sincerity, and with greater pleasure, we bear testimony to her talents, her good sense, and her real piety. There occur every now and then, in her productions, very original and very profound observations. Her advice is very often characterized by the most amiable good sense, and conveyed in the most brilliant and inviting style. If, instead of belonging to a trumpery faction, she had only watched over those great points of religion in which the hearts of every sect of Christians are interested, she would have been one of the most useful and valuable writers of her day. As it is, every man would wish his wife and his children to read Calebs;-watching himself its effects;

We have a few more of Mrs. More's opinions to notice. It is not fair to attack the religion of the times, because, in large and indiscriminate parties, religion does not become the subject of conversation. Conversation must and ought to grow out of materials on which men can agree, not upon subjects which try the passions. But this good lady wants to see men chatting together upon the Pelagian heresy to hear, in the afternoon, the theological rumours of the day-and to glean polemical tittle-tattle at a tea-table rout. All the disciples of this school uniformly fall into the same mistake. They are perpetually calling upon their votaries for religious thoughts and religious conversation in every thing; inviting | thodism.

separating the piety from the puerility;and showing that it is very possible to be a good Christian, without degrading the human understanding to the trash and folly of Me