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with a show of honor by the governor and bishop. He arrived at Peking in December, but the Jesuits had already prejudiced the emperor against him, and he never succeeded in obtaining an audience, though he was on the point of having one when he was suddenly seized with a violent illness. He issued the mandate of Clement, "ordering that no Chinese Christian should ever practise the custoins and usages which had been interdicted by the pope. But Kanghí was not the man who would transfer to a pope the right of legislating over his own subjects, and in Dec., 1706, decreed that he would countenance those missionaries who preached the doctrines of Ricci, but persecute those who followed the opinion of Maigrot." Examiners were appointed for ascer taining their sentiments, but Tournon, who had been banished to Macao, forbade the missionaries, under pain of excommunication, holding any discussion on these points with the examiners. The bishop of Macao confined the legate in a private house, and when he used his ecclesiastical authority and powers against his enemies, stuck up a monitory on the very door of his residence, exhorting him to revoke his censures within three days under pain of excommunication, and exhibit proofs of his legation to his dioThis was reechoed from Tournon by a still severer sentence against the bishop. Three new missionaries reached Macao at this juncture in January, 1710, and one of them, P. Ripa, gives an account of a nocturnal visit they paid the legate in his prison after eluding the vigilance of his guards. Ripa remarks that about forty missionaries of different religious orders were confined with Tournon, who had lately been made a cardinal, but he himself and his companions were left at liberty. His eminence sent a remonstrance to the governor at Canton, against his imprisonment, and also a memorial to the emperor, stating that six missionaries had arrived from Europe, three of whom were acquainted with mathematics, music, and painting. Ripa, who was to be the painter, says that he knew only the rudiments of the art, and records his dissatisfaction at this change in his vocation, but soon resigned himself to obedience. Tournon died in his confinement in July of the same year.

cesan.

The proceedings of Tournon were mainly confirmed by the pope, and in 1715, he dispatched Mezzabarba, another legate, by way of Lisbon, who was favorably received at Peking. He was instructed to express the pope's sincere gratitude to Kanghí

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for his magnanimous kindness towards the missionaries, to beg leave to remain in China as their head, or as superior of the whole mission, and to obtain from Kanghí his consent that the Christians in China might submit to the decision of his holiness concerning the rites." The emperor evaded all reference to the rites, and the legate, soon perceiving that his majesty would not surrender any part of his inherent authority, solicited and obtained permission to return to Europe. The first fifteen years of the eighteenth century was the period of the greatest prosperity to the Romish missions in China. It is stated that in the governor-generalship of the Two Kiang alone, there were one hundred churches and a hundred thousand converts. The survey of the empire was commenced by the emperor's command in 1708, under the direction of ten Jesuits, of whom Regis, Bouvet, and Jartoux, were the most prominent.

The disputes between the various orders of missionaries, and the resistance of some converts to the emperor's commands respecting the ancestral rites, together with the representations of his own officers upon the tendency of the new religion to undermine his own authority, gradually opened his eyes to the true character of the propagandists. In 1718, he forbade any missionary remaining in the country without permission from himself, given only after their promise to follow the rules of Ricci. Yet no European missionary could repair to China without subscribing a formula, in which he promised fully and entirely to obey the orders of Clement XI. upon these ceremonies, and observe those injunctions without any tergiversation. Kanghí was made acquainted with all these matters, and took his measures, gradually restraining the missionaries in their work, and keeping them about him at court, while he allowed persecuting measures to be carried on in the provinces. The work of Ripa affords. evidence of this plan, and it was characteristic of Chinese policy.

After the death of Kanghí in 1723, the designs of the government and the new emperor, Yungching, were still more evident. In 1724, an order was promulgated by his majesty, in which every effort to propagate the Tien Chu kiau, or religion of the Lord of Heaven, as it was then and has ever since been called, was strictly prohibited. All missionaries not required at Peking for scientific purposes, were ordered to leave the country, by which more than three hundred thousand converts were deprived

YUNGCHING PERSECUTES THE CHRISTIANS.

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of teachers. Many of the missionaries secreted themselves, and the converts exhibited the greatest fidelity in adhering to them, even at the risk of death. When the missionaries reached Canton, where they were allowed to remain, they devised measures to return to their flocks, and frequently succeeded. The influence of the priests at Peking was exerted to regain their former toleration, but with partial success; their enemies in the provinces harassed the converts in order to extort money, and found plenty of assistants who knew the names and condition of all the leading adherents of the proscribed faith, and aided in compelling them to violate their consciences or lose their property.

The edict of Yungching, in 1724, forms an epoch in the Romish missions in China. Since that time they have experienced various degrees of quiet and storm, but on the whole decreasing in number and influence. The troubles in France and Europe, towards the latter part of the eighteenth century, withdrew the attention of the supporters of missions from those in China, while in the country itself, the maintenance of the laws against the propagation of Christianity, and an occasional seizure of priests and converts, by a zealous officer, caused a still further diminution. The edicts of Kienlung, soon after his accession in 1736, showed that no countenance was to be expected from court; the rulers were thoroughly dissatisfied with the foreigners, and ready to take almost any measures to relieve the country of them. Perhaps their personal conduct had something to do with this course of procedure, for Ripa, who cannot be accused of partiality, says, when speaking of the number of converts, "that if our European missionaries in China would conduct themselves with less ostentation, and accommodate their manners to persons of all ranks and conditions, the number of converts would be immensely increased. Their garments are made of the richest materials; they go nowhere on foot, but always in sedans, on horseback, or in boats, and with numerous attendants following them. With a few honorable exceptions, all the missionaries live in this manner; and thus, as they never mix with the people, they make but few converts. The diffusion of our holy religion in these parts has been almost entirely owing to the catechists who are in their service, to other Christians, or to the distribution of Christian books in the Chinese language. Thus there is scarcely a single missionary who can boast of hav

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ing made a convert by his own preaching, for they merely baptize those who have been already converted by others."-Page 43. But this missionary himself afterwards assigns a much better reason for their not preaching, when he adds, that up to his time in 1714, "none of the missionaries had been able to surmount the language so as to make himself understood by the people at large." There had been about 500 missionaries sent from Europe between 1580 and 1724, which was not on an average four individuals per annum during a century and a half. When the intentions of the new emperor were known, there would not long be wanting occasions to harass the Christians. In 1747, a persecution extended over all the provinces, and bishop Sanz. and five Dominican priests in Fuhkien lost their lives; all the foreign priests who could be found elsewhere were sent away-a mark of leniency the more striking, when it was supposed by the Chinese that some of them had already once returned from banishment. The missions in Sz'chuen and Shansí suffered most, but through the zeal of their pastors maintained themselves better than elsewhere; their bishops, Mullener, and after him Pottier, contrived to remain in the country most of the time between 1712 and 1792. The missions in Yunnan and Kweichau were not so flourishing as that in Sz'chuen, with which they are connected. During a severe search after foreign priests in 1767, M. Gleyo was apprehended in Sz'chuen, and endured much suffering and torture for the faith he came to preach; he remained in prison ten years, when he was liberated through the efforts of a Jesuit in the employ of government. For several years after this they enjoyed comparative quiet, but in 1784 greater efforts than ever were made to discover and apprehend all foreign priests and their abettors, owing to the detection of four Europeans in Hukwang, while they were going to their mission. M. de la Tour, the procureur of the mission at Canton, through whose instrumentality they were sent through the country, was apprehended and carried to Peking; and the hongmerchant who had been his security was glad to purchase his own safety by the sacrifice of 120,000 taels of silver.

Didier Saint-Martin, who was then in Sz'chuen, gives a long account of his own capture, trial, and imprisonment, and many particulars of the sufferings of his fellow missionaries. He says that eighteen Europeans were taken away from the missions by

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it, but none of them were actually executed; twelve were sentenced to perpetual imprisonment, six having died, but for some reason, the emperor revoked the decree soon after it was made, and gave them all the choice to enter his service or leave the country; nine of the twelve preferred to depart, the other three joining the priests at the capital. This search was so close that few of the foreigners escaped. Pottier was not taken, though he was obliged at one time to conceal himself for a month in a small house, and in so confined a place, that he hardly dared either to cough or to spit, for fear of being discovered. St. Martin and Dufresse retired to Manila, where they were received with great honors, and were enabled to return after a time to Sz'chuen. The former died in 1801 in peace, but Dufresse was executed in 1814 by beheading, and in 1816, M. Triora was strangled in Hupeh, and M. Clet, three years after. These three are the only recorded executions of foreigners during the present century, but no data are available to show the number of native priests and converts who suffered death, torture, imprisonment, and banishment in these storms. Probably the number may reasonably be estimated by hundreds.

The condition and number of the Romish missions in China since their first establishment, cannot be very satisfactorily learned from their own reports. Vague estimates of hundreds of churches, hundreds of thousands of converts, scores of missionaries and numerous catechists, are all the data given even in the flourishing days of Verbiest and Grimaldi; and since then their accessible publications seldom contain a satisfactory account of the labors performed by the missionaries, or the number of converts, churches, schools, &c. Sir A. Ljungstedt gives a table obtained from Marchini in 1820, wherein he states that there were then six bishops and two coadjutors, twenty-three foreign missionaries, eighty native priests, and 215,000 converts, including seven thousand at Macao and vicinity. The Annales de la Foi for June, 1839, states the amount then at eight bishops, fiftyseven foreigners, 114 native priests, and 303,000 converts.

The whole country is divided into the bishoprics of Peking, Nanking, and Macao, and the apostolic vicariates of Sz'chuen, Yunnan, Chehkiang, Hukwang, Shantung, Shansi, Fuhkien, and three extra provincial ones of Mongolia, Liautung, and Corea. The first bishopric is under the care of Lazarists, whose principal