36o MISAPPREHENSIONS. 



tiniious instruction for several years past, there would 

 doubtless be a very much larger proportion who would 

 remain steadfast, whatever might be the change of circum- 

 stances ; and the experience of the time of persecution 

 assures us that there is an element of persistence in the 

 native character which would again brave suffering and death 

 for Christ's sake. 



It would have prevented much misapprehension as to the 

 real character of the change which, nine or ten years ago, 

 came over society in the central provinces, if it had been 

 remembered that the vast majority of those who then pressed 

 into the churches had never previously had any instruction 

 whatever. They had just come out of absolute heathenism, 

 and the great reason for their burning their idols and 

 attending Christian worship was that their sovereign had 

 burned her idols and had put herself under Christian 

 instruction. There has been in j\Iadagascar no parallel at all 

 to that remarkable awakening which a few years ago passed 

 over the native churches in the Sandwich Islands, and stirred 

 up thousands to seek for forgiveness and salvation. Such 

 a revival could not have been expected in Madagascar ; the 

 circumstances of the two countries were totally different : in 

 the one, there had been many years of uninterrupted labour 

 in a comparatively small field, and the Spirit of God came 

 down to vivify seed which had long lain dormant in many 

 hearts ; but in the other, thousands of those who pressed 

 into the hastily run-up mud chapels knew nothing whatever 

 about even the elementary truths of religion. 



It may also be added, that even among those who we can- 

 not but think are sincere Christians there is remarkably little 

 depth of feeling or emotion, as shown either in a feeling of 

 guilt before God, sorrow for sin, earnestness in seeking salva- 

 tion, or joy in a sense of pardon and believing in Christ. 

 At any rate, it is rare to meet with any expression or mani- 

 festation of such feelings. No doubt this in part arises from 

 the unemotional character of the whole Malayo-Polynesian 

 race, to which family of people the Malagasy belong. But 

 still, accepting the Divine criterion, " By their fruits ye 

 shall know them," we have reason to believe that the gospel 



