Let me here give my testimony on a matter of some importance—that among these Islands, if anywhere, men might be found destitute of the faculty of worship, men absolutely without idols, if such men exist under the face of the sky. Everything seemed to favour such a discovery; but the New Hebrides, on the contrary, are full of gods. The Natives, destitute of the knowledge of the true God, are ceaselessly groping after Him, if perchance they may find Him. Not finding Him, and not being able to live without some sort of god, they have made idols of almost everything; trees and groves, rocks and stones, springs and streams, insects and other beasts, men and departed spirits, relics such as hair and finger nails, the heavenly bodies and the volcanoes; in fact, every being and everything within the range of vision or of knowledge has been appealed to by them as God,—clearly proving that the instincts of Humanity, however degraded, prompt man to worship and lean upon some Being or Power outside himself, and greater than himself, in whom he lives and moves and has his being, and without the knowledge of whom his soul cannot find its true rest or its eternal life. Imperfect acquaintance with the language and customs of certain tribes may easily lead early discoverers to proclaim that they have no sense of worship and no idols, because nothing of the kind is visible on the surface; but there is a sort of freemasonry in Heathen Religions; they have mysterious customs and symbols, which none, even amongst themselves, understand, except the priests and sacred men. It pays these men to keep their devotees in the dark—and how much more to deceive a passing inquirer! Nor need we hold up our hands in surprise at this; it pays also nearer home, to pretend and to perpetuate a mystery about beads and crucifixes, holy water and relics—a state of mind not so very far removed from that of the South Sea islander, not disproving but rather strongly proving that, whether savage or civilized, man must either know the true God, or must find an idol to put in His place.