more absurd
and contradictory in terms, than that sometimes made, "It is not my duty
to go to the heathen, for I never had a missionary spirit;" for one
professes to be a Christian, and yet excuses himself, on the ground of
not having a missionary spirit, or in other words, of not being a
Christian--of not being in possession of a fair title to heaven. O,
remember, Christian reader, that the least desire to be excused shows a
deplorable lack of the spirit of Christ.

CHAPTER II.

CHRISTIAN STEWARDSHIP.

On account of heavy domestic afflictions, and the failure of my own
health, I was induced, a few years since, to visit the United States.
Full well I remember my feelings when returning to my native land. I had
been laboring among a heathen people, and impressions by the eye are
deep and affecting. I had seen degradation and vileness, destitution and
woe. I had a vivid impression of the urgent claim of the destitute and
the dying; and I had formed some conception of the greatness of the
work, if we would put forth the instrumentality needed to elevate and
save them. And during a long voyage, I had time, not only to think of
the Sandwich Islanders, but to cast my thoughts abroad over the wide
world. The millions and hundreds of millions of our race often came up
fresh before me, sunk in untold vileness, covered with abominations, and
dropping one after another, as fast as the beating of my pulse--twenty
millions a year--into the world of woe. Painful as it was, I could not
avoid the deep and certain conviction, that such was their end.

Then I thought of the greatness of the task, if we would be the means,
under God, of saving them from perdition: that we have idol gods without
number to destroy--a veil of superstition forty centuries thick to
rend--a horrible darkness to dispel--hearts of stone to break--a gulf of
pollution to purify--nations, in God's strength, to reform and
regenerate. With such thoughts the conviction forced itself upon me,
that the work could not be done without an immense amount of means, and
a host of laborers.

Think, then, how chilling and soul-sickening the intelligence that met
me as I landed on my native shores, (in the spring of 1838,) that
Christians were disheartened by the pressure of the times, and were
receding from ground already taken: that the bread of life must not
issue from the press, though millions were famishing for lack of it;
that thirty heralds of salvation the