Memoirs of the Life and Labours of the Rev. Samuel Marsden, of Paramatta, Senior Chaplain of New South Wales; and of His Early Connexion with the Missions to New Zealand and TahitiMarsden, Samuel
Religion
Memoirs of the Life and Labours of the Rev. Samuel Marsden, of Paramatta, Senior Chaplain of New South Wales; and of His Early Connexion with the Missions to New Zealand and Tahiti
Marsden, Samuel
Marsden, Samuel, 1765-1838; Missions -- French Polynesia -- Tahiti (Island); Missions -- New Zealand; Māori (New Zealand people)
"DEAR MADAM,--Your kind favour arrived in the Bay of Islands
September 7, the evening I returned from a long journey. I had no
sooner cast my eye over your letter, than busy imagination
transported me from the solitary woods, dreary wastes, and savage
society of New Zealand, into 'the polished corner' of
Guilford-street, and surrounded me with every cordial that could
refresh the weary traveller, revive the fainting spirits, and blow
the languishing spark of Christian love with a heavenly flame. I
had literally been living for weeks a savage life, as far as
outward circumstances went. I ate, I slept in the thick wood, in a
cave, or on the banks of a river, or sea, with my native
companions, wherever the shadows of the evening, or gathering
storm compelled us to seek for shelter. Every day as I advanced
from tribe to tribe, I was introduced to new acquaintances; my
object was to gain from observation and experience that knowledge
of savage life which I could not learn from books, and to make
myself well acquainted with the wants, wishes, and character of
the native inhabitants, to enable me, if my life should be spared,
to aid to the utmost of my power in their deliverance from their
present temporal miseries, which are great upon them, and from
their much sorer bondage to the prince of darkness. I am happy in
having obtained this object to a certain extent, at the expense of
a few temporal privations, and a little bodily evil. When I have
lain down upon the ground after a weary day's journey, wrapped up
in my great coat, surrounded only by cannibals, I often thought
how many thousands are there in civil life, languishing upon beds
of down, and saying, with Job, 'in the evening would God it were
morning,' while I could sleep free from fear or pain, far remote
from civil society under the guardian care of him who keepeth
Israel. Though I everywhere met with the greatest kindness from
the natives, as well as hospitality, for they always gave me the
best fern-root, potato, or fish in their possession, yet I could
never have duly estimated the sweets of civil life, and the still
greater mental gratification of Christian communion, if I had not
passed through these dark regions of Satan's dominions, on which
the dayspring from on high hath never cast a single ray. You
cannot conceive how great a feast your letter was, after so long a
fast. I was instantly present with every person you mentioned, and
lived over again some of those happy moments I once spent under
your hospitable roof. A sacred warmth flowed round my soul, my
heart was sweetly melted under the influence of that pure and
undefiled religion which dropped from your pen, like the heavenly
dew, as it ran through every line. What shall we call those pure
sensations that thus warm and captivate the soul? Do they flow
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