“I felt more, entirely withdrawn from the world, than for a long time past: what a dark atheistical state do I generally live in! Alas! that this creation should so engross my mind, and the author of it be so slightly and coldly regarded. I found myself, at this time, truly a stranger and a pilgrim in the world; and I did suppose that not a wish remained for any thing here. The experience of my heart was delightful. I enjoyed a peace that passeth all understanding; no desire remained, but that this peace might be confirmed and increased. O why should any thing draw away my attention, whilst Thou art ever near, and ever accessible through the Son of Thy love? O why do I not always walk with God, forgetful of a vain and perishable world? Amazing patience! He bears with this faithless, foolish heart, and suffers me to come, laden with sins, to receive new pardon, new grace, every day. Why does not such love make me hate those sins which grieve him, and hide him from my sight? I sometimes make vain resolutions, in my own strength, that I will think of God. Reason, and scripture, and experience, teach me that such a life is happiness and holiness; that by ‘beholding his glory,’ I should be changed ‘into his image, from glory to glory,’ and be freed from those anxieties which make me unhappy: and that, every motive to duty being strong, obedience would be easy.” He established, at his own expense, five schools for the children of the natives, in Dinapore, and some neighbouring places. We suppose that these schools were intended to enable the children to read and write their own language, and to receive instruction in the Christian religion, so that they might not grow up in ignorance and idolatry like their parents. There are two great reasons why this course is, in all cases, the most proper. First, because, if the mind is enlightened by education, it is hard to persuade a person to believe in superstitions. And the second reason is, that almost all the feelings and beliefs that men have, are the same that have been impressed on them in youth, and have been established in some degree by the power of habit. It is, therefore, of the highest importance, that the earliest habits of a child should be good; and that its instructions should be in the truth; for, in almost all cases, such a child will, by the blessing of God, retain his good habits and instructions, and have them, at length, eternally fixed by religion. This is the sense of the saying of Solomon—“Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” We find the following reflections in Martyn’s diary of the 1st of January, 1807: