Author: John Williams

Publisher:

Published: 2015-07-20

Total Pages: 172

ISBN-13: 9781331909781

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Excerpt from Missionary Enterprises in the South-Sea Islands While the Author of the following pages has endeavoured to compose a volume that will be generally interesting and instructive, and to publish it in a form at once cheap and elegant, his principal design has been to secure a permanent record of facts, to which history can furnish but few parallels. In the prosecution of his task, however, the Author has experienced difficulties which he did not anticipate at its commencement. Having travelled a hundred thousand miles, and spent eighteen years in promoting the spread of the Gospel, he has gathered a mass of materials, from which he could have composed many volumes with greater ease than one; and his chief difficulty has been so to select, compress and arrange his facts as to form out of them a continuous Narrative, in which the details should be given with as much brevity as would consist with faithful description. It would have been comparatively easy to have filled the volume with general statements, instead of descending to minute particulars; but mere outlines and sketches could convey a very inadequate impression of the state of society and the progress of Christianity among the people for whose welfare he has laboured. He has therefore endeavoured as exactly as possible to describe the scenes he has witnessed as they appeared to himself, and to give upon the pages of his narrative a cast of the images and impressions which exist in his mind. With this view, he has preserved the dialogues, in which much of his knowledge was obtained, and has not spoken for the natives, but allowed them to speak for themselves. In doing this, he has carefully avoided the use of terms and phrases which are current among nations more advanced in the scale of intelligence and civilization, and the employment of which might lead the reader to form a higher estimate of the state of society in the South Sea Islands than facts would warrant; and he has been equally careful to convey native ideas in the phraseology and under the figurative garb in which they were expressed. This he has been enabled to do, not only from an intimate knowledge of the habits of thought and modes of communication with which they are familiar, but more especially from the circumstance of his having kept a minute record of most of the interviews and events which the following pages describe. In a word, the Author has endeavoured to take his reader with him to each of the islands he has visited; to make him familiar with their chiefs and people; to show him what a Missionary life is; and to awaken in his mind emotions similar to those which successively filled his own. In the course of the Narrative, but more especially in the concluding chapters, some observations will be found upon the origin, structure, and productions of those lovely islands at which the Author has resided. As, however, his days have been devoted, not to the study of geology, nor to the pursuits of the naturalist, but to the work of a Missionary, the curious and scientific must not censure him for contributing to their stores so small a portion of information. While he would not underrate the talents, the diligence, and the discoveries of those who have chosen for themselves such paths, he always felt that he had a much nobler work to perform. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com

Download or read book Missionary Enterprises in the South-Sea Islands (Classic Reprint) written by John Williams and published by . This book was released on 2015-07-20 with total page 172 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from Missionary Enterprises in the South-Sea Islands While the Author of the following pages has endeavoured to compose a volume that will be generally interesting and instructive, and to publish it in a form at once cheap and elegant, his principal design has been to secure a permanent record of facts, to which history can furnish but few parallels. In the prosecution of his task, however, the Author has experienced difficulties which he did not anticipate at its commencement. Having travelled a hundred thousand miles, and spent eighteen years in promoting the spread of the Gospel, he has gathered a mass of materials, from which he could have composed many volumes with greater ease than one; and his chief difficulty has been so to select, compress and arrange his facts as to form out of them a continuous Narrative, in which the details should be given with as much brevity as would consist with faithful description. It would have been comparatively easy to have filled the volume with general statements, instead of descending to minute particulars; but mere outlines and sketches could convey a very inadequate impression of the state of society and the progress of Christianity among the people for whose welfare he has laboured. He has therefore endeavoured as exactly as possible to describe the scenes he has witnessed as they appeared to himself, and to give upon the pages of his narrative a cast of the images and impressions which exist in his mind. With this view, he has preserved the dialogues, in which much of his knowledge was obtained, and has not spoken for the natives, but allowed them to speak for themselves. In doing this, he has carefully avoided the use of terms and phrases which are current among nations more advanced in the scale of intelligence and civilization, and the employment of which might lead the reader to form a higher estimate of the state of society in the South Sea Islands than facts would warrant; and he has been equally careful to convey native ideas in the phraseology and under the figurative garb in which they were expressed. This he has been enabled to do, not only from an intimate knowledge of the habits of thought and modes of communication with which they are familiar, but more especially from the circumstance of his having kept a minute record of most of the interviews and events which the following pages describe. In a word, the Author has endeavoured to take his reader with him to each of the islands he has visited; to make him familiar with their chiefs and people; to show him what a Missionary life is; and to awaken in his mind emotions similar to those which successively filled his own. In the course of the Narrative, but more especially in the concluding chapters, some observations will be found upon the origin, structure, and productions of those lovely islands at which the Author has resided. As, however, his days have been devoted, not to the study of geology, nor to the pursuits of the naturalist, but to the work of a Missionary, the curious and scientific must not censure him for contributing to their stores so small a portion of information. While he would not underrate the talents, the diligence, and the discoveries of those who have chosen for themselves such paths, he always felt that he had a much nobler work to perform. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com