This tenet of the bishop was in the eyes of the Corean public a blow at the framework of society, the base of the family, and the foundation of the state. From this time forward, many of the feeble adherents began to fall away. In the conflict of filial and religious duty, many a soul was torn with remorse. In frequent instances the earnest believer who, for conscience sake, despoiled the family oratory and piling the ancestral tablets in his garden set them on fire, saw his aged parents sink with sorrow to the grave. For this crime Paul and Jacques Kim were put upon public trial, at which, for the first time, a clear and systematic presentation of Christian doctrine and the Roman cultus was elicited. The case, after condemnation of the prisoners, was submitted to the king, who was prevailed upon by the premier to approve the finding [[352]]of the local tribunal. On December 8, 1791, the two Christians, after publicly refusing to recant, and reading aloud the sentence inscribed upon the board to be nailed over their pillory, were decapitated, while invoking the names of Jesus and Mary. Their ages were thirty-three and forty-one.
Thus was shed the first blood for Corean Christianity—the first drops of the shower to come, and the seed of a mighty church. The headless trunks, frozen to a stony rigidity which kept even the blood fresh and red, lay unburied on the ground for nine days, until devout men carried them to burial. A number of handkerchiefs dipped in their blood and preserved kept long alive the memory of these first martyrs of bloody persecution. The Nai-po now became a hunting-ground for the minions of the magistrates, who sought out all who professed themselves Christians and threw them in prison. There the tortures, peculiarly Corean, were set to work to cause apostasy. The victims were beaten with rods and paddles on the flesh and shin-bones, or whipped till the flesh hung in bloody rags. In many cases their bones were disjointed until the limbs dangled limp and useless. One man, Francis Xavier, after prolonged agonies was exiled to Quelpart, and on being removed to another place, died on the way. Peter, 61 years old, after wearying his torturers with his endurance, was tied round with a cord, laid on the icy ground at night, while pails of water were poured over him, which freezing as it fell, covered his body with a shroud of ice. In this Dantean tomb, the old martyr, calling on the name of Jesus, was left to welcome death, which came to him at the second cock-crow on the morning of January 29, 1793.
In the ten years following the baptism of Peter at Peking, in spite of persecution and apostasy, it is estimated that there were four thousand Christians in Corea.[3] [[353]]
[1] The equipment of this first native missionary propagandist of Roman Christianity in Corea, deserves notice, as it brings out in sharp contrast the differing methods of Roman and Reformed Christianity. The convert brought back numerous tracts, didactic and polemic treatises, catechisms and commentaries, prayer-books, lives of the saints, etc., etc. These were for the learned, and those able to master them. For the simple, there was a goodly supply of crosses and crucifixes, images, pictures, and various other objects to strike the eye. It is not stated that the Bible, or any part of the Holy Scriptures, was sent for the feeding of hungry souls. [↑]
[2] It was during the summer of this year, 1787, that La Perouse sailed along the eastern coast of Chō-sen, discovered the straits which bear his name, between Yezo and Saghalin, demonstrated that the Gulf of Tartary divided Saghalin from the Asian mainland, and that Corea was not sea-girt, and named Dagelet Island and its companion Boussole. He had a copy of Hamel’s book with him. He noticed the signal-fires along the coast, which from headland to headland, telegraphed to the capital the news of the stranger with his “black ships.” Not as yet, however, as afterward, did the government connect the appearance of European vessels with the activity of the Christians within the realm, although La Perouse sailed under the flag which ever afterward was indissolubly associated in Corean minds with Christianity. [↑]
[3] This rapid spread of Christian ideas may be understood if we consider, as Dallet points out, the customs of the people. In every house there is the room open to the street, where everybody, friend or stranger, known or unknown, may come and talk or hear the news and discuss events. Nothing is kept secret, and being a nation of gossips and loungers, the news of any event, or the expression of a fresh idea, spreads like fire on the prairie. A doctrine so startlingly new, and preached as it was by men already famous for their learning, would at once excite the public curiosity, set all tongues running, and fire many hearts. Though in most cases the new flame would soon die out, leaving hardly enough ashes to mark a fire, yet the steady glow of altered lives would not pale even before torture and death. [↑]