Religious services are sustained on Sabbath evenings by a few christian
friends at the house of one of their number, but there is no public
place of Protestant worship there. It was instructive to go from China,
from the depths of heathen idolatry, into the depths of formalism under
the name of Christianity. You question whether you have advanced at
all into the light of truth; for though it is a relief to be where
the Scriptures and the names and forms of christianity are heard and
seen, you are impressed with the bias of the human heart to idolatry.
To come from heathenism in China, and Roman Catholic superstition in
Manila, into christian temples here at home, makes you wonder that only
a certain number of leagues of salt water separate between us and such
places as Canton or Manila.