CAREY, WILLIAM. — Protestant missionary, born in Paulespury, England, in the county of Northampton, in 1761; died at Serampore, India, in 1834. Of an Anglican family, at the age of 18 he became a Baptist and was ordained a pastor in 1787. Reading the accounts of Captain Cook’s voyages led him to reflect on the immense number of those who did not know Jesus Christ, and he decided to devote himself to the conversion of the infidels.
(from Prose by G. C., 2nd ed., Bologna 1906)
CARDUCCI, GIOSUÈ — Autograph manuscript of a passage from the Note per lezioni sul Rinascimento.
He published a memorandum: An enquiry into the obligations of christians to use means for the conversion of the heathen (1792). But his sect, like the others, was not then prepared for such an undertaking. Nevertheless, in 1792 he formed a missionary society with some friends and offered himself as its first missionary, sailing from England on a Danish ship and arriving in Calcutta in 1793.
The difficulty that most seriously hindered his undertaking was the opposition of the East India Company, under which all the English possessions in India were placed. The Company did not want the Gospel preached, lest religious discord be sown among the Indians, believing that this would obstruct its commerce. Since C. could not therefore remain in the Company’s possessions as a missionary, and also in order to support himself, he accepted the supervision of an indigo factory several miles from Calcutta, and meanwhile devoted himself to studying the indigenous languages, especially Bengali and Sanskrit.
In 1799 a group of Baptist missionaries arrived in Calcutta, among them Joshua Marshman and William Ward, whose names have remained inseparable from that of C. and from the beginnings of the Indian Baptist mission. But they were forbidden to disembark. They then joined C., who by that time was free of his employment at the indigo factory, and settled in the small Danish colony of Serampore, very close to Calcutta, where they were received with open arms by the Danish governor. The way of life they adopted is noteworthy, because it demonstrates that Protestant missionaries, when they truly wish to devote themselves to missionary work, seek to imitate Catholic methods. They decided, in fact, to form a single community with a common fund into which everything that came to them was to be placed; meals and the house were held in common. Each person was given a small sum for personal expenses, and everything that remained, after deduction of common expenses, was to be devoted to the poor and to the propagation of the Gospel.
Under C.’s impetus, the mission underwent great development: a printing press was established; several grammars and dictionaries of the indigenous languages were printed; the New Testament was published in about ten languages, and the entire Bible in Bengali and Sanskrit; Serampore College was founded, from which missionaries departed for various parts of India and where, in 1812, Adoniram Judson, the missionary sent by the American Board (v. CONGREGAZIONALISTI) to India, was received; he became a Baptist and founded the mission in Burma. Here, too, C. contracted his second and third marriages, which proved happier than the first. From this centre he worked effectively to have the government prohibit the burning of widows together with their husbands’ corpses and to secure freedom for missionaries to preach in any part of the English possessions.
C. is regarded by the Baptists as the great pioneer of their
missions. Protestants, moreover, who hold that making the Bible known to all men (for them the sole rule of faith) is the most important aspect of missionary work, esteem C., on account of his translations, as one of the greatest missionaries.