But there can be little doubt with those who take a truly philosophical view of the future of Siam, and still less with those who take a religious view of it, that this advancement in civilization must open the way for religious enlightenment as well. Thus far there has come only the knowledge which "puffeth up." And how much it puffeth up is evident from the pedantic documents which used to issue from the facile pen of his majesty the late first king. A little more slowly, but none the less surely, there must come as well that Christian charity which "buildeth up." Even if the work of the missionaries should cease to-day, the results accomplished would be of immense and permanent value. They have introduced Christian science; they have made a beginning of Christian literature, by the translation of the Scriptures; they have awakened an insatiable appetite for Christian civilization; and the end is not yet.
[Illustration: HALL OF AUDIENCE, PALACE OF BANGKOK.]
"I do not believe," says the Marquis de Beauvoir (in his "Voyage Round the World," vol. ii.), "that there is a sight in the world more magnificent or more striking than the first view of Bangkok. This Asiatic Venice displays all her wonders over an extent of eight miles. The river is broad and grand; in it more than sixty vessels lie at anchor. The shores are formed by thousands of floating houses, whose curiously formed roofs make an even line, while the inhabitants, in brilliant-colored dresses, appear on the surface of the water. On the dry land which commands this first amphibious town, the royal city extends its battlemented walls and white towers. Hundreds of pagodas rear their gilded spires to the sky, their innumerable domes inlaid with porcelain and glittering crystals, and the embrasures polished and carved in open-work. The horizon was bounded to right and left by sparkling roofs, raised some six or seven stories, enormous steeples of stone-work, whose brilliant coating dazzled the eyes, and bold spires from one hundred and fifty to two hundred feet in height, indicating the palace of the King, which reflected all the rays of the sun like a gigantic prism. It seemed as though we had before us a panorama of porcelain cathedrals.