“Only to Thee, Lord Jesus Christ,”
he joined in with a clear melodious voice, and accompanied him to the end. Two hours later, about four o’clock in the afternoon of the 13th of February, 1798, Christian Friedrich Swartz breathed his last, in the seventy-second year of his age, and the forty-eighth of his mission service in India.
The cries and wailings of the poor resounded all night around the house, and Serfojee Rajah came from a distance to be present at his burial. It had been intended to sing a funeral hymn, but the cries and lamentations of the poor so overcame the clergy, that they could scarcely raise their voices. Serfojee wept bitterly, laid a gold cloth over the bier, and remained present while Mr. Gerické read the Funeral Service,—a most
unusual departure from Hindoo custom, and a great testimony of affection and respect.
A few months later arrived the decision of the East India Company, that the weak and rapacious Ameer Singh should be deposed, and Serfojee placed on the throne. He conducted himself excellently as a ruler, and greatly favoured Christians in his territory, always assisting the various schools, and giving liberal aid whenever the frequently-recurring famines of India brought them into distress.
Three years later, in 1801, Serfojee wrote to the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, to beg them to order a “monument of marble” at his expense, to the memory of the late Rev. Father Swartz, to be affixed to the pillar nearest the pulpit. Accordingly, a bas-relief in white marble was executed by Flaxman, representing the death of Swartz, Gerické behind him, two native Christians and three children standing by, and Serfojee clasping his hand and receiving his blessing. It was not exactly fact, but it was the monumental taste of the day; and it so much delighted the Rajah, that he kept it in his palace, among the portraits of his ancestors, for two years before he could resolve on parting with it to the church. The Prince likewise composed the epitaph which was carved on the stone which covers the grave of Swartz, the first instance of English verse by a Hindoo:—
“Firm wast thou, humble and wise,
Honest, pure, free from disguise;
Father of orphans, the widow’s support,
Comfort in sorrow of every sort:
To the benighted dispenser of light,
Doing and pointing to that which is right.
Blessing to princes, to people, to me,
May I, my father, be worthy of thee,
Wisheth and prayeth thy Sarabojee.”
Swartz had always been striving to be poor, and never succeeding. Living and eating in the humblest manner, and giving away all that came to him, still recognitions of services from English and natives had flowed in on him; and, after all the hosts of poor he had fed, and of churches and schools he had founded, he was an instance of “there is that scattereth and yet increaseth;” for the property he bequeathed to the Mission was enough to assist materially in carrying it on after
his death. Moreover, Serfojee maintained the blind, lame, and decrepit members of his church, and founded an asylum for the orphan children; so that the good men, Gerické, Kohloff, Pohlé, and the rest, were not absolutely dependent on Europe for assistance; and this was well, since the Orphan-house at Halle and the Society at Copenhagen had in this long course of years ceased to send out funds.
But Swartz’s work under their hands continued to prosper. He had a sort of apotheosis among the heathen, such as he would have been the last to covet; for statues were raised to him, lights burnt before him, and crowns offered up. But about Palamcotta and throughout Tinnevelly there was one of those sudden movements towards Christianity that sometimes takes place. The natives were asking instruction from their friends, and going eagerly in search of the catechists and of Sattianadem, and even burning their idols and building chapels in preparation for the coming of more fully qualified teachers. Mr. Gerické made a tour among them in 1803, and found their hearts so moved towards the Gospel, that he baptized 1,300 in the course of his journey, and the work of Sattianadem and the catechists raised the number of converts to 4,000. This was, however, this good man’s last journey. On his return, he found that his only son, an officer in the Company’s service, was dying, and, under the weight of this and other troubles, his health gave way, and he died in the thirty-eighth year of his mission. Others of the original Danish and German missionaries likewise died, and scarcely any came out in their stead. Their places were, therefore, supplied by ordinations, by the assembly of ministers, of four native catechists, of whom was Nyanapracasem, a favourite pupil of Swartz. No Church can take root without a native ministry. But the absence of any central Church government was grievously felt, both as concerned the English and the Hindoos. There were more than twenty English regiments in India, and not a single chaplain among them all.