The Life of William Carey, Shoemaker & MissionarySmith, George
Religion
The Life of William Carey, Shoemaker & Missionary
Smith, George
Carey, William, 1761-1834; Missions -- India
Christ is irresistible and that an idol is nothing in the world. This
he voluntarily ceased to wear in a few years. Two more Brahmans were
brought in by Petumber Singhee in 1804, by the close of which year the
number of baptised converts was forty-eight, of whom forty were native
men and women. With the instinct of a true scholar and Christian Carey
kept to the apostolic practice, which has been too often departed
from--he consecrated the convert's name as well as soul and body to
Christ. Beside the "Hermes" of Rome to whom Paul sent his salutation,
he kept the "Krishna" of Serampore and Calcutta.
The first act of the first convert, Krishna Pal, was of his own accord
to build a house for God immediately opposite his own, the first native
meeting-house in Bengal. Carey preached the first sermon in it to
twenty natives besides the family. On the side of the high road, along
which the car of Jagganath is dragged every year, the missionaries
purchased a site and built a preaching place, a school, a house for
Gokool, and a room for the old widow, at the cost of Captain Wickes,
who had rejoiced to witness their baptism. The Brahman who owned the
neighbouring land wished to sell it and leave the place, "so much do
these people abhor us." This little purchase for £6 grew in time into
the extensive settlement of Jannagur, where about 1870 the last of
Carey's converts passed away.
From its native chapel, and in its village tank, many Hindoos have
since been led by their own ordained countrymen to put on Christ. In
time the church in the chapel on the Hoogli became chiefly European and
Eurasian, but on the first Sunday of the year, the members of both
churches meet together for solemn and joyful communion, when the
services are alternately in Bengali and English.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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