instance,
in Madagascar, and seeking to account for it before their countrymen at
home, miss the true causes which we have been compelled, however
ungraciously, to point out, and, taking the nominal objection from the
mouths of their opponents, with heedless confidence assert that opium is
the great obstacle to the propagation of the Gospel, forgetting that it
was the difficulties connected with opium that first opened a way for them
into the heart of China; that it was the second opium war, as they love to
call it, which gave them a _locus standi_ in the country. But, in truth,
in comparing their work with that of their fellow-workers in Africa and
elsewhere, they are placing themselves at an enormous disadvantage; for we
must not forget that in China and India we are dealing with races[126]
immeasurably superior to the North American Indians and the savages of
Africa; that we are confronted by civilizations which were in their prime
when England was inhabited by naked savages, and was indeed, as the
Chinese still believe it to be, but as "an anthill in the ocean," and by a
race of men who were "learned," as Cobden said in the House of Commons,
"when our Plantagenet kings could not write, and who had a system of logic
before Aristotle, and a code of morals before Socrates." It would be
surprising indeed if we could persuade such intellectual and civilised
races to give up in a moment beliefs which have taken centuries to mature;
and the difficulty is the greater in the case of the Buddhists from the
striking similarity which exists between the general principles professed
by followers of Buddha and disciples of Christ. "Conversion to
Christianity," as Dr. Moore says, "involves the belief in certain
statements the counterparts of which, when found in Buddhism, are regarded
as impossible and untrue by Christians."

What, then, should a missionary do in the face of all these difficulties?
Let him follow Dr. Medhurst's advice, and remember that "the effectual
fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much"; let him exhort the
Chinese to abandon the habit of opium-smoking, and compel their converts
to give up the drug; and, above all, let him be careful not to make
exaggerated statements about the opium traffic, which merely tend to
disquiet the minds of his countrymen at home, and, when the falsity of his
statements becomes apparent, to throw discredit on the cause which he has
at heart. But if the missionary's duty is cle