{"id":"01KG8AKRZRE8XP39F7BQPNW02K","cid":"bafkreicbeujvubzaeeyjqgqspmhuq73fjuyckdgc4i32eh7myk7udlssum","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":6303,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:15.152Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KG89J1H7Y803CZ7X80F0QFHZ","start_line":6239,"text":"Such was the substance of great part of this discourse; and, whatever\r\nmay be thought of it, it was specially adapted to the minds of the\r\nislanders: who are susceptible to no impressions, except from things\r\npalpable, or novel and striking. To them, a dry sermon would be dry\r\nindeed.\r\n\r\nThe Tahitians can hardly ever be said to reflect: they are all impulse;\r\nand so, instead of expounding dogmas, the missionaries give them the\r\nlarge type, pleasing cuts, and short and easy lessons of the primer.\r\nHence, anything like a permanent religious impression is seldom or\r\nnever produced.\r\n\r\nIn fact, there is, perhaps, no race upon earth, less disposed, by\r\nnature, to the monitions of Christianity, than the people of the South\r\nSeas. And this assertion is made with full knowledge of what is called\r\nthe “Great Revival at the Sandwich Islands,” about the year 1836; when\r\nseveral thousands were, in the course of a few weeks, admitted into the\r\nbosom of the Church. But this result was brought about by no sober\r\nmoral convictions; as an almost instantaneous relapse into every kind\r\nof licentiousness soon after testified. It was the legitimate effect of\r\na morbid feeling, engendered by the sense of severe physical wants,\r\npreying upon minds excessively prone to superstition; and, by fanatical\r\npreaching, inflamed into the belief that the gods of the missionaries\r\nwere taking vengeance upon the wickedness of the land.\r\n\r\nIt is a noteworthy fact that those very traits in the Tahitians, which\r\ninduced the London Missionary Society to regard them as the most\r\npromising subjects for conversion, and which led, moreover, to the\r\nselection of their island as the very first field for missionary\r\nlabour, eventually proved the most serious obstruction. An air of\r\nsoftness in their manners, great apparent ingenuousness and docility,\r\nat first misled; but these were the mere accompaniments of an\r\nindolence, bodily and mental; a constitutional voluptuousness; and an\r\naversion to the least restraint; which, however fitted for the\r\nluxurious state of nature, in the tropics, are the greatest possible\r\nhindrances to the strict moralities of Christianity.\r\n\r\nAdded to all this is a quality inherent in Polynesians; and more akin\r\nto hypocrisy than anything else. It leads them to assume the most\r\npassionate interest in matters for which they really feel little or\r\nnone whatever; but in which, those whose power they dread, or whose\r\nfavour they court, they believe to be at all affected. Thus, in their\r\nheathen state, the Sandwich Islanders actually knocked out their teeth,\r\ntore their hair, and mangled their bodies with shells, to testify their\r\ninconsolable grief at the demise of a high chief, or member of the\r\nroyal family. And yet, Vancouver relates that, on such an occasion,\r\nupon which he happened to be present, those apparently the most\r\nabandoned to their feelings, immediately assumed the utmost\r\nlight-heartedness on receiving the present of a penny whistle, or a\r\nDutch looking-glass. Similar instances, also, have come under my own\r\nobservation.\r\n\r\nThe following is an illustration of the trait alluded to, as\r\noccasionally manifested among the converted Polynesians.\r\n\r\nAt one of the Society Islands—Baiatair, I believe—the natives, for\r\nspecial reasons, desired to commend themselves particularly to the\r\nfavour of the missionaries. Accordingly, during divine service, many of\r\nthem behaved in a manner, otherwise unaccountable, and precisely\r\nsimilar to their behaviour as heathens. They pretended to be wrought up\r\nto madness by the preaching which they heard. They rolled their eyes;\r\nfoamed at the mouth; fell down in fits; and so were carried home. Yet,\r\nstrange to relate, all this was deemed the evidence of the power of the\r\nMost High; and, as such, was heralded abroad.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AKGBZX73GKKD5MKFS74WS","peer_type":"subsection","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1H7Y803CZ7X80F0QFHZ","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKRZVECD4Y1GSMEJ2GHSV","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:15.352Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:28.989Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}