FIRST IMPRESSIONS FROM CHRISTIANITY. 315 
and sincerity come to him, both old and young ; 
that he would reanimate their bodies in the re¬ 
surrection ; and that he would give eternal life to 
as many as believed on his name. 
We have more than once had occasion to notice 
with peculiar interest the impression made on an 
adult heathen, when some of the sublime and 
important doctrines of religion are for the first 
time presented to his mind. Accustomed to con¬ 
template the gods of his ancestors as the patrons 
of every vice, and supernatural monsters of 
cruelty, deriving satisfaction from the struggles 
and expiring agonies of the victim offered in sa¬ 
crifice, he is surprised to hear of the holy nature 
of God, and the condescending love of Christ; 
but the idea of the resurrection of the body, the 
general judgment, and the eternal happiness or 
misery of all mankind, affects him with a degree 
of astonishment never witnessed in countries 
where the Christian religion prevails, and in 
which, notwithstanding the lamentable ignorance 
existing in different portions of the community, 
there are few who have not some indistinct ideas 
on these subjects. But the heathen, whose mental 
powers have reached maturity before the truth has 
been presented, experiences very different sensa¬ 
tions ; and we have seen the effects produced at 
these times exhibited in various ways—sometimes 
by most significant gestures, at other times by in¬ 
voluntary exclamations, or penetrating looks fixed 
on the speaker; and, occasionally, as was the 
case this afternoon, by their actually interrupting 
us, to inquire, “ How can these things be ?” or, 
declaring, in their own beautiful and figurative 
language, that the tidings they had heard “ broke 
in upon their minds like the light of the morning/' 
