 the bosom of the Church. But this result
was brought about by no sober moral convictions; as an almost instantaneous
relapse into every kind of licentiousness soon afterward testified. It was the
legitimate effect of a morbid feeling, engendered by the sense of severe
physical wants, preying upon minds excessively prone to superstition; and by
fanatical preaching, inflamed into the belief, that the gods of the missionaries
were taking vengeance upon the wickedness of the land.20
    It is a noteworthy fact that those very traits in the Tahitians which
induced the London Missionary Society to regard them as the most promising
subjects for conversion, and which led, moreover, to the selection of their
island as the very first field for missionary labour, eventually proved the most
serious obstruction. An air of softness in their manners, great apparent
ingenuousness and docility, at first misled; but these were the mere
accompaniments of an indolence, bodily and mental; a constitutional
voluptuousness; and an aversion to the least restraint; which, however fitted
for the luxurious state of nature, in the tropics, are the greatest possible
hindrances to the strict moralities of Christianity.
    Added to all this is a quality inherent in Polynesians; and more akin to
hypocrisy than anything else. It leads them to assume the most passionate
interest in matters for which they really feel little or none whatever; but in
which those whose power they dread, or whose favour they court, they believe to
be at all affected. Thus, in their heathen state, the Sandwich Islanders
actually knocked out their teeth, tore their hair, and mangled their bodies with
shells, to testify their inconsolable grief at the demise of a high chief, or
member of the royal family. And yet, Vancouver relates, that, on such an
occasion, upon which he happened to be present, those apparently the most
abandoned to their feelings, immediately assumed the utmost light-heartedness on
receiving the present of a penny whistle, or a Dutch looking-glass. Similar
instances, also, have come under my own observation.
    The following is an illustration of the trait alluded to, as occasionally
manifested among the converted Polynesians.
    At one of the Society Islands - Raiatair, I believe - the natives, for
special reasons, desired to commend themselves particularly to the favour of the
missionaries. Accordingly, during divine service, many of them behaved in a
manner, otherwise unaccountable, and precisely similar to their behaviour as
heathens. They pretended to be wrought up to madness by the preaching which they
heard. They rolled their eyes; foamed at the mouth; fell down in fits; and so
were carried
