d in knowledge after the
image of Him that created him, where there is neither Greek nor Jew,
circumcision nor uncircumcision, barbarian, Scythian, bond nor free, but
Christ is all, and in all," is quoted as evidence of the Divine wishes.
"So overwhelming," continues the bishop, "is the flood by which all petty
distinctions of nation, caste, privilege, rank, climate, position in
civilization are effaced, and one grand distinction substituted." And yet,
at another part of the Circular, we are told that the distinctions in
civil society are acknowledged by the Gospel, when they are "the natural
result of difference of talents, industry, piety, station, and success."
Another decision of the apostle is quoted in the same Circular, and it is
this--"There is neither Jew or Greek, there is neither bond nor free,
there is neither male nor female, for we are all one in Christ Jesus;" and
so, of course, we are all equal in his sight. And yet this is quoted as
being a decision in favour of doing away with the civil institutions of
caste, which are undoubtedly the marks of that "station" which the bishop
tells us is acknowledged by the Gospel, and in no way different from the
station that a member of the House of Lords inherits from his
predecessors. And here, though I do not think that it is advisable to
cling to isolated texts as evidence of the general conduct of the apostles
regarding the prejudices of their converts, I may mention that Peter, in
his first Epistle, says, "Submit yourself to every ordinance of man for
the Lord's sake." And if we take Dean Alford's interpretation of this, and
consider it as equivalent to a command, extending to every human
institution (and I can see no reason why we should not), it is plain that
our missionaries in India, if they wish to follow the examples of the
apostles, should yield to the prejudices of caste as long as they do not
involve idolatrous rites. But it is in the general action of the apostles,
as illustrated in Acts xv. 19, that the safest guide may, I apprehend, be
found; and when, with reference to difficulties as regarding the customs
of their converts, St. James said (Dean Alford's edition), "Wherefore my
sentence is, that we trouble not them which from the Gentiles are turned
to God; but that we write to them, that they abstain from pollutions of
idols, from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood;" and
again: "For it seemed good to the Holy Ghost, and to us, to l