This, fellow citizens, Americans of the United States, is the way in which your children, spectators of these things, are to grow up in the principles and the practice of the peaceful religion of the gospel; and this too is the way in which the approach of that day is to be hastened, when wars shall cease from the earth.

ARTICLE II.

INFLUENCE OF THE PRINCIPLE OF HONESTY IL. LUSTRATED IN THE LIFE OF SWARTZ.

BY THE EDITOR.

THE history of European transactions in India, abounds in illustrations of that which puts enmity between nations, and excites them to destroy each other. Establishments made by fraud or violence-sales and countersales of states and princes -treaties formed, and as if by necessary consequence, violated -dissensions sowed, and animosities fomented--the conflagrations of war enkindled-and all in order to descend, amid the confusion and distress thus occasioned, with harpy hands, upon the treasures of the country-such are some of the traits in a picture drawn, half a century since, of the conduct of Europeans in Hindostan.* The spirit of avarice, more heartless in its nature, and more withering in its consequences than the spirit of conquest and the lust of power, had been destructive to the country, even beyond the irruptions and ravages of Arabs, Tartars, and Persians.†

The nations of Europe, known to the Hindoos under the general denomination of Christians, professing to be governed by

* Burke-Speech on Mr. Fox's East India Bill.

We believe that within the last fifty years, things have greatly changed in India, and that the rule of the East India Company has been on the whole, highly beneficent.

principles of greater purity, that those which actuate these pagan tribes, have, yet, appeared to them as under the dominion cf a single principle, bearing them across the ocean, thousands of miles from their country, their homes, and their kindredinciting them, as by unceasing impulse, to acts of artifice, fraud, and violence, towards a people with whom they had nothing in common, and whom they seemed to vie with each other for the privilege of plundering. Portuguese, Spaniards, Dutch, French, and English, successively established themselves in India; made that distant region the theatre of wars in their origin and objects entirely European; contended, as on an arena for some splendid prize, which having obtained they took their departure for the place whence they came, across the great waters,--only to stimulate others to enter on the same career. Such is the general impression which must inevitably have been made upon the minds of the natives of that ill-fated country.

Fortunately, however, they have not been left to form their opinions of Christianity solely from the conduct of its nominal professors. There have been those who visited that tropical clime, exposed themselves to the effluvia of its marshes, and the fervours of its suns, from other motives than the desire of gain. There have alighted upon the plains of Hindostan, spirits as it were from a purer world, to the excellency of whose character and religion, Europeans and Asiatics, Christians and Mohammedans-the worshippers of Vishnu, Siva, and Brahma, alike, have been compelled to do homage.

Such an one was Christian Frederick Swartz-whose life affords, perhaps, the most remarkable example on record of the power of Honesty, (we use the term in its most extended sense) superior to that of the fictions of honour, the arts of diplomacy, or the force of arms. Eighty-six years ago, Swartz, a native of Germany, embarked as a missionary to India; where during the most troublous period of European affairs, and when the conduct of Europeans was held in the greatest abhorrence

by the natives, he for the space of nearly fifty years, succeeded by the integrity of his character in commending himself to every man's conscience. Swartz was a missionary, and "because he was a missionary, became a politician." He was employed as a negotiator both by the East India company, and by native princes, and mainly for the reason that every one had perfect confidence in the purity of his motives, the veracity of his statements, and the sacredness of his plighted word. He went as a mediator between those whom avarice, fraud and broken faith, had separated, as by an insurmountable barrier. That barrier he was able to pass. The gates of fortresses and palaces opened to him--for it was not against such as he, that they were barred. Princes lent a respectful ear to his requests, and if at any time they denied them, it was with a delicacy of manner which, in fierce warriors as they were, could have been the effect of nothing but an innate sentiment of regard to virtue. The simple word of promise in him, was of more avail than the faith of the most solemn treaties. He was able to penetrate hostile camps, to stay the ravages of famine, to assuage the rigours of war, and all by the simple power of honesty. A foreigner, a European, a Christian, and a teacher of the Christian religion, come to proclaim to the idolatrous mul titudes of India that they should turn from their vain idols to the worship of the living God, was yet held in such esteem, that native chieftains honoured him in his life, mourned for him at his death, and erected monuments to his memory. Christian Frederick Swartz was a truly great man,--great, because he was good.

We proceed to verify these general positions by particular facts.

"The rajah of Tanjore sent him a letter inviting him to make him a visit. The object of this invitation was of a political nature. The rajah perceived the storm which was approaching him on the part of the nabob of the Carnatic, and was desirous of employing the respected missionary as a mediator between him and the English. Now, observes Swartz, this in itself would not be sinful; but it is a dangerous matter to engage in such things with a people so prone to deceit, and this I distinctly

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avowed to them. The king said, Padre, I have confidence in you, because you are indifferent to money.”

In 1779, Swartz was employed by Sir Thomas Rumbold, governor of Madras, on a mission to Hyder Ali Cawn. This Hyder Ali Cawn, or Khan, was the injured, maddened, chieftain whose desolation of the Carnatic has been so vividly painted by Burke. It was the Hyder Ali Khan, who, drawing "from every quarter whatever a savage ferocity could add to his new rudiments in the arts of destruction; and compounding all the materials of fury, havoc, and desolation, into one black cloud, hung for a while upon the declivities of the mountains" and "whilst the authors of these evils were idly and stupidly gazing on this menacing meteor, which blackened all their horizon, it suddenly burst and poured down the whole of its contents upon the plains of the Carnatic." It was the same Hyder Ali Khan who kindled that "storm of universal fire which blasted every field, consumed every house, destroyed every temple." It was the same Hyder Ali Khan who slaugh tered "the miserable inhabitants, as they fled from their flaming villages, or without regard to sex, to age, to the respect of rank, or sacredness of function, fathers torn from children, husbands from wives, enveloped in a whirlwind of cavalry, and amidst the goading spears of drivers, and the trampling of pursuing horses, swept them into captivity, in an unknown and distant land." The same chieftain it was, who in connexion with his more ferocious son, achieved "so accomplished a desolation that when the British armies traversed as they did the Carnatic for hundreds of miles in all directions, through the whole line of their march, they did not see one man, not one woman, not one child, not one four footed beast, of any description whatever."

This chief was believed to be meditating at that time the warlike designs which ended in this same unexampled ruin. Sir Thomas Rumbold wished to ascertain his intentions with certainty, and for this purpose deputed Swartz to visit him at his court, and to assure him of the peaceable disposition of the

*Pearson's Memoirs of Swartz. Am. Ed. p. 166.

English. "The reason," said Sir Thomas to him, "why we fixed upon you, is, because you understand the Hindostanee, consequently need no interpreter in your conferences. We are convinced that you will act disinterestedly, and will not allow any one to bribe you; you can travel privately through the country, without external pomp and parade, and thus the whole journey will remain a secret, (which is of great importance to us,) until you reach Hyder Naik himself." Swartz accepted the mission because it was a mission of peace. After a long journey he reached the palace, and was admitted to an audience with Hyder. This same ferocious Hyder Ali treated him with marked respect. "He bade me," Swartz informs us, "sit next him on the floor, which was covered with the richest carpets, and I was not required to take off my shoes." On entering his palanquin to depart, he found three hundred rupees, a present from Hyder—an evident token of his regard.

"The frank and manly bearing of Swartz," remarks the author of his memoirs, "evidently disarmed the hostility and won the confidence of the Mysorean chief. The natives of India are said to be expert in appreciating character, and Hyder Ali possessed this talent in an eminent degree. He failed not to discern, under the simple and pious demeanor of Swartz, a mind of no common order; a degree of talent and of fearless integrity which he could neither deceive nor alarm, and which at once commanded his respect and conciliated his regard. Had the Madras governor been as penetrating with respect to the character and designs of Hyder, and as sincere in his professions of peace, as his admirable envoy, the storm which afterwards burst over the Carnatic, might have been retarded, if not altogether averted."

This last sentence is deserving of particular attention. Were all who have to do with political affairs, like Swartz, we should soon cease to hear of the necessity of war.

During the progress of the war with Hyder Ali, Swartz had opportunity to try the power of his character for honesty; and the result was, to assuage the miseries of that which the mis