Judson, Adoniram, 1788-1850; Missionaries -- Burma -- Biography; Missionaries -- United States -- Biography
“When he first came in, I thought him an ordinary man. He has only one
good eye; but I soon discovered that that one eye has as ‘great a
quantity of being’ as half a dozen common eyes. In his manners he is
just the reverse of Moung Thah-ee—all suavity, and humility, and
respect. He professed to be an inquirer after the truth; and I
accordingly opened to him some parts of the Gospel. He listened with
great seriousness, and when I ceased speaking, remained so thoughtful
and apparently impressed with the truth, that I began to hope he would
come to some good, and therefore invited him to ask some question
relative to what he had heard. ‘Your servant,’ said he, ‘has not much
to inquire of your lordship. In your lordship’s sacred speech,
however, there are one or two words that your servant does not
understand. Your lordship says, that in the beginning God created one
man and one woman. I do not understand (I beg your lordship’s pardon)
what a man is, and why he is called a man.’ My eyes were now opened in
an instant to his real character; and I had the happiness to be
enabled, for about twenty minutes, to lay blow after blow upon his
skeptical head, with such effect that he kept falling and falling; and
though he made several desperate efforts to get up, he found himself,
at last, prostrate on the ground, unable to stir. Moung Shwa-gnong,
who had been an attentive listener, was extremely delighted to see his
enemy so well punished; for this Moung Long has sorely harassed him in
time past. The poor man was not, however, in the least angry at his
discomfiture, but, in the true spirit of his school, said that, though
he had heard much of me, the reality far exceeded the report.
Afterward he joined us in worship, and listened with great attention,
as did also his wife.
“_May 21._ Moung Thah-ee came again, with several others; but he was
so outrageous, and vulgar, and abusive, that I found it impossible to
hold any rational conversation with him; and he finally went away in a
great passion, saying that he had been sent by some men in authority
to spy us out, and that by to-morrow he would bring us into trouble.
Such threatenings tend to sink our spirits, and make us realize our
truly helpless, destitute condition, as sheep in the midst of wolves.
‘Lord, behold their threatenings,’ etc.
“_June 4._ Moung Long spent two or three hours with me, in which I
endeavored to lay before him all the evidences of the truth of the
Christian religion. His wife proves to be as sharp as himself, and has
been harassing Mrs. Judson with all sorts of questions about the
possibility of sin’s finding entrance into a pure mind, or of its
being permitted under the government of a holy sovereign.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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