AS far as England is concerned it may be said that the history of missions to the heathen began with John Eliot. He was one of those who left England’s shores for the New World in order that he might worship his God according to the rules laid down in His Word. There are few names in American history more truly venerated than that of John Eliot, who spent his years in preaching the gospel to the Red Indians. He was one of the three authors of the metrical version of the Psalms known as the Bay Psalm-book (1640). He also translated the Psalms into the Indian dialect of Massachusetts (1658), which was the first part of the Bible translated into this dialect. It was by the singing of these Psalms he found the readiest means of arresting the attention of his hearers. The next honoured name on the missionary roll to the Red Indians is that of the saintly David Brainerd. His religious experience is narrated in his well known journal. It is a book that “fired” the imagination of William Carey; it stirred the zeal of Henry Martyn; it inspired the decision of David Livingstone to become a missionary. The book of Psalms is his great treasure-house; his hopes, fears, aspirations and joys are either expressed in the words of the Psalms or recalls certain passages of them. The religious experiences of Brainerd are deeply interesting. It was a hard struggle, a struggle in which fear, hope and despair all had their place, but a struggle which left Brainerd on that side of the Slough of Despond which was nearest the Celestial City. When the full assurance of hope came, which he retained to the end, it was through the Psalms. “That holy confidence,” he says, “can only arise from the testimony of a good conscience. ‘Then,’ says the holy Psalmist, ‘shall I not be ashamed when I have respect unto all Thy commandments.'” (Ps. cxix. 6.) It is on the Psalms that he bases his “fine
1 The Psalms in Human Life. By R. E. Prothero, M.V.O. London: John Murray, 1904.
distinguishing marks of a true Christian.” This is the fifth mark he gives:—”The laws of God are his delight, Ps. cix. 97 (Lord, what love have I unto thy law; all the day long is my study in it). These he observes not out of constraint, from a servile fear of hell; but they are his choice, Ps. cxix. 30 (I have chosen the way of truth; and thy judgments have I had before me). The strict observance of them is not his bondage, but his greatest liberty, Ps. cxix. 45 (and I will walk at liberty; for I seek thy commandments).”
The first English missionary to India’s millions, who in their blindness bowed down to wood and stone, was William Carey. He had become a Baptist in 1783, and was by trade a shoemaker. The one great dream of his life was the conversion of the world. If he could only give the Bible to the heathen in their own language he fondly hoped that this end would be accomplished. In October, 1792, was formed the Particular Bible Society for Propagating the Gospel among the Heathen, and a few weeks later William Carey, accompanied by Thomas, a surgeon, set out for India. The sermon preached at his dedication to his great life work was from the Psalms—”They that run after another god shall have great trouble.” (Ps. xvi. 4.) He severed his connection with his native land for the sake of preaching the gospel to the heathen, and it was destined that he should never set foot on English soil again. Years afterwards thoughts of his native land came into his mind as he looked at some daisies he had taken out with him and planted at Sevampore. “I know not,” he says, “that I ever enjoyed since leaving Europe a simple pleasure so exquisite as the sight which this English daisy afforded me, not having seen one for thirty years, and never expecting to see one again.”
Thirty-four translations of the Bible were made or edited by him. He had himself completed the Bengali, Hindi, Maratti and Sansperil versions.
In December, 1823, he lay as he thought dying, and in that hour he could say, “I had no joys, nor any fear of death or reluctance to die; but never was I so sensibly convinced of the value of an atoning Saviour as then. I could only say ‘hangs my helpless soul on Thee,’ and adopt the language of the first and second verses of the 51st Psalm, which I desired might be the text of my funeral sermon, ‘Have mercy upon me, O God, after Thy great goodness; according to the multitude of Thy mercies do away mine offences. Wash me thoroughly from my wickedness and cleanse me from my sin.'” Carey, however, survived this illness, and lived to see Henry Martyn and Alexander Duff, two of the greatest missionaries of modern times.
Henry Martyn, who died so young, and whose portrait in the study of Charles Simeon seemed always to be saying “Don’t trifle! don’t trifle!” was a brilliant student. He was Senior Wrangler at Cambridge in 1807 and a very distinguished classical
scholar as well, but he willingly laid all his talents at the feet of that Master whom he loved so well and whom he served with such single-hearted devotedness. His diary tells his life story as a missionary. “In the stress of his struggles in 1804 he found that by learning portions of the Psalms by heart he quickened his devotional feelings and in this way committed to memory Ps. cxix. . . . During his long and tedious voyage, surrounded by uncongenial companions, it was to the Psalms he turned for comfort. Day after day the entries in his journal of the daily events of his life began with a verse from the Psalms followed by a short comment. From the Psalms he drew encouragement in his missionary enterprise. Thus (Dec. 10th, 1805) he quotes Ps. xxii. 27, ‘All the ends of the earth shall remember and be turned to the Lord,’ and thus continues ‘sooner or later they will remember what was preached to them, and though missionaries may not live to see the fruits of their labours, yet the memory of their words shall remain and in due time shall be the means of turning them unto the Lord.’ In failing health and sleepless nights, assailed by temptation, yet straining after purity of heart, his hope and trust is in the words, ‘Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean; wash me and I shall be whiter than snow.’ (Ps. li. 7.) At Shiraz, in the midst of daily disputes with Mahometan doctors, and the laborious revision of his Persian translation of the New Testament, he found a sweet employment in translating the Psalms into Persian. The work ’caused six weary moons that waxed and waned since its commencement to pass unnoticed.’ It was the Psalms that soothed the fatigue of his headlong ride from Tabraz to Tokat on his homeward journey:—’4th Sept., 1812—I beguiled the hours of the night by thinking of the 14th Psalm.’ ’10th Sept.—All day at the village, writing down notes on the 15th and 16th Psalms.'” (Psalms in Human Life, pp. 342, 3.) So Henry Martyn struggled on, finding in the Psalms so much to comfort and strengthen him. His career on earth ended on the 16th October, 1812, and Macaulay’s epitaph fitly gives expression to the virtues of one who died so young, and who while his day lasted wrought with all his might.
Here Martyn lies. In manhood’s early bloom
The Christian hero finds a pagan tomb.
Religion, sorrowing o’er her favourite son,
Points to the glorious trophies that he won.
Eternal trophies! not with carnage red,
Not stained with tears by hapless captives shed;
But trophies of the Cross! for that dear name
Through every form of danger, death and shame,
Onward he journeyed to a happier shore,
Where danger, death and shame assault no more.
Another great name on the roll of missionaries is that of Alexander Duff, the first missionary sent out by the Church of Scotland to India. It was in the latter end of the year 1829 that he and his wife set sail for India. Four months later the ship in which they sailed ran aground in Table Bay, Cape of Good
Hope, and became a complete wreck. All the passengers were saved, but all their belongings were lost. A sailor in search for food some time after the passengers had been brought to a place of safety found two books cast on the shore by the waves. The one was a Bible the other a Scottish Psalm-book, both with Alexander Duff’s name on them. This was all that came on the shore from the ship—all Duff’s other books were lost. The incident made a profound impression on the shipwrecked party and on Duff himself. They knelt on the sand while he read to them Ps. cvii., and from this moment onwards Duff determined that all human learning would only be regarded as a means to an end. On this principle he founded his college. All secular teaching was to be hallowed by the study of the Bible.
There are other great names on the consecrated roll of men who loved the Lord and went to preach the glad tidings to the heathen, such as Hannington, Gardiner, and Livingstone, and who found in the book of Psalms a well of deep comfort, but enough has been written to show what a large place the Psalms had in their religious life.
D. B.