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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Rare Volume

New Zealand a Vindication of the Character of the Missionaries and Native Christians

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New Zealand a Vindication of the Character of the Missionaries and Native Christians.

Few persons in a position of any publicity pass through life without incurring some degree of obloquy, and few enterprises which have for their object the amelioration of neglected and degraded portions of the human race are carried through without much, and often long sustained, opposition to their progress, and undeserved aspersion upon the character of their agents. Nor is the bitterness of misrepresentation or misunderstanding usually softened, but rather enhanced, when the object is of a direct and decisively spiritual nature. The servant is not greater than his Lord. If they have persecuted Me, they will also persecute you. If they have kept My saying, they will keep yours also.(John xv. 20.)

It is, therefore, no matter of surprise that, under the exciting circumstances of New Zealand at the present moment, reflections should have been cast both upon the Missionaries themselves, and upon the success of their work. The former are alleged to have embarassed, or even to have taken part against the Government. The natives whom they have brought over to the profession of Christianity, are, in substance, alleged to have exhibited a barbarity which indicates how incompletely they have been reclaimed, and how rapidly they are relapsing into the brutality of a savage state.

It is necessary, therefore, to vindicate both the Mis- page break sionaries and their converts from the charges which have been brought against them; and, so far as our materials enable us, to show that the aspersions cast upon both are either wholly unfounded, or in a very high degree exaggerated. So far as tendencies of a discouraging character exist among the Maories, the Missionaries have not disguised them; nor do the Committee desire to withhold from the public facts which may be considered unfavourable. They are anxious, however, that these should be rightly understood, and especially that what have been the consequences of a state of unusual excitement should not hastily be assumed to be its causes.

The observations now offered will be classified under two heads :—
I.The Services Rendered by the Missionary Body.
II.The Native Character Marred by Good Faith, and a Desire for Law and Order.