PAGE.

-re

107

118

121

130

CHAPTER XIX.-A returned missionary, his personal history, futes the objections of his brethren. Call to missionary service, and impediments, CHAPTER XX.-A minister who had married a wife and could not go, -objects to the above reasoning,.. CHAPTER XXI. — Reply of a young clergyman who had left a congregation to go. Every indication pointing to the foreign field,.. CHAPTER XXII.- Secretary of a missionary society. Compares the effects of the gospel in Christian and in heathen countries,.. CHAPTER XXIII.-Professor of theology, approves the most liberal scale of missionary operations. -Futility of objections. Great honour of the service,. CHAPTER XXIV. - President of a college.- Young men who have determined upon this course easily distinguished. Approves of an early determination. No danger of sending too many abroad,.... 146 CHAPTER XXV. - Fifth day.-The third principle adopted by the assembly. Converted Jew. Even this principle perverted, or Christianity would have universally prevailed,.

CHAPTER XXVI.-The next principle. - Speech of a physician who had renounced a lucrative practice and gone to the heathen.- Reasons for his course,.

CHAPTER XXVII. - A merchant, -how brought to think and act cor- A new object. Advice to others,.. rectly.. CHAPTER XXVIII.A Christian of reduced fortune. The duty of giving liberally.-Motives,............

CHAPTER XXIX.-A ship-master.

The advantage of men of secular pursuits engaging in missionary labour. His own observation. Missionary communities. - Missionary ships...... CHAPTER XXX.-A surgeon of a ship.- Female usefulness.- Letter from missionary ladies. His own observations,. CHAPTER XXXI.-The next principle. The principal speaker was an aged missionary. -Refers to apostolic rule of action. - Urges Christians to read and pray,....

CHAPTER XXXII. -Sixth day. -- Miscellaneous addresses and appeals. - First address, a young man who in quest of health had visited several of the Polynesian and Australasian islands. Contradictory reports. Effects of the gospel in the Sandwich islands and many others.Necessities of many large, populous islands, New Guinea, Boreno, &c.,.

CHAPTER XXXIII. Caffree chief. Power of the gospel among his own people. - Pleads for oppressed Africa,. CHAPTER XXXIV.-Speeches of several from different parts of the world. The triumphs of Christianity and the necessity of increased exertion. A Hindoo devotee, his own efforts to obtain peace, and how he found it. Condition of India. -- Appeal to British Christians,..

CHAPTER XXXV.-A Chinese. How far China is open, and what may be done. Applies for young men and pleads for much prayer, CHAPTER XXXVI.-A convert from a corrupt branch of the Christian church. The condition of many who call themselves Christians, but know nothing of the essential doctrines of grace. - What has recently been effected.-Call for help,... CHAPTER XXXVII. - An officer of the Indian army. -The collateral influence of missions.-Conversion of many who went to India as thoughtless as the heathen,..

139

151

159

166

172

180

186

193

202

214

215

221

229

235

CHAPTER XXXVIII.- An aged minister. Approaching millennium.Exhorts all to diligence. Necessity of dependence upon the divine spirit. Advises them to look once more at our Lord's last command issued from this position, and then to go and fulfil it. - Hymn, 239

CHAPTER I.

WE will imagine that at the expiration of eighteen hundred years from the ascension of the Saviour, a grand assembly convened at the ancient city of Jerusalem, to discuss the relative claims of the various nations of the world to "the gospel of the grace of God." Representatives from all the different countries of the earth were present. Jews, Mahometans, Pagans, Christians, in every variety of their numerous sects had each their respective delegates at the meeting. Among this mingled multitude, so different in national peculiarity and early education, there was one common feature. Though they were the representatives, or rather the advocates, of all the nations and classes of men in the world, they themselves had been "delivered from the power of darkness and translated into the kingdom of God's dear Son." Convinced of the absolute necessity of the gospel, they were all desirous that their countrymen should enjoy that measure of its blessings which its great author designed for them.

After the assembly was organized, it was proposed that the session should be opened by the reading of those portions of Scripture which clearly express the divine purpose respecting the universal triumph of Christianity, and the means by which this triumph is to be achieved. The following were some of the passages selected :

Psalms ii., especially the 8th verse. —“ Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession."

Psalms xxii. 27. 28,-"All the ends of the world shall remember and turn unto the Lord and all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee. For the kingdom is the Lord's: and he is the governor among the nations."

Psalms lxxii. 11.-"All kings shall fall down before him all nations shall serve him."

:

Isaiah xlix. 6.-"And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a Light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my Salvation unto the end of the earth."

Jeremiah xvi. 19.-"O Lord, my Strength and my Fortress, and my Refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Surely our fathers

have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit."

Daniel vii. 13, 14.-"I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought him near before him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, should serve him : his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed."

Malachi i. 11.-"For from the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering: for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts."

Mark xiv. 9.-"Verily I say unto you, wheresoever this gospel shall be preached throughout the whole world, this also that she hath done shall be spoken of for a memorial of her."

Revelation xi. 15.-"And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever."

Revelation xv. 4. "Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for thou only art

:

holy for all nations shall come and worship before thee."

The following texts were adduced as illustrating the means by which the gospel is to be circulated among the nations:

Psalms cxxxviii. 4.--“All the kings of the earth shall praise thee, O Lord, when they hear the words of thy mouth."

Mark xvi. 15. "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature."

Luke xxiv. 47.-"And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.”

Romans x. 13, 14.-"For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher ?