RETROSPECT.
(1814-1841).
The native bent of the Maori mind caused the people, as they embraced
Christianity, gradually to place themselves as a matter of course
under the guidance of a sort of Christian theocracy. It was under the
auspices of this mild missionary regime--which, if a government, was a
very singular one, seeing that there were no laws, and an almost total
absence of crime--that the first British Governor set foot on the
shores of New Zealand.
--_Judge Wilson._
Hardly had Henry Williams returned to Paihia from his great journey
through the heart of the island, when a warship arrived in the Bay,
bearing Captain William Hobson with a commission from Queen Victoria,
authorising him to annex the country to the British Crown. A not very
friendly historian (Saunders) has summed up the situation at this point
by saying that, on his arrival, Hobson fell into the hands of the
Reverend Henry Williams, and obligingly admits that he might have fallen
into worse ones. As a matter of fact, the captain could have done but
little had he not secured the co-operation of this influential
missionary. Rusden speaks no more than the truth when he declares that
"Henry Williams had but to raise his finger, and his _mana_ would have
weighed more with the Maoris than the devices of Colonel Wakefield or
the office of Hobson."
The first act of the new official was to gather the northern chiefs on
the lawn in front of the British Residency, on the other side of the
river from Paihia, and to lay before them the famous document known as
the Treaty of Waitangi. It is sometimes asserted that Henry Williams was
really the author of this treaty. That would seem to be an error, but he
may have been consulted in the drafting of the document; and there can
be no question but that it was his influence which induced the chiefs to
sign it. It was he who interpreted to the Maoris the provisions of the
treaty, and the speech in which Hobson commended it to their acceptance;
and it was he and the other missionaries who secured the signatures of
the chiefs in other parts of the island. Whatever may be thought of the
policy of this momentous document--securing as it did to the native race
the full possession of their lands and properties under the British
flag--it is a standing witness to the influence of the missionaries, and
to the trust which the Maoris had come to place in their integrity and
benevolence of purpose.
The one place where the treaty was opposed was the new English
settlement of Wellington, where the settlers stigmatised it as "a device
to amuse the savages," and proceeded to set up a rival government of
their own. Henry Williams went once more therefore to Port Nicholson,
and succeeded in getting the treaty signed by the chiefs of that place.
Thus supported, Hobson now felt himself strong enough to proclaim the
Queen's sovereignty over the country, and himself became its first
Governor. He had no military force to depend upon, and he ruled the
country through the missionaries. His tenure of office was embittered by
the constant opposition of the Company at Wellington, as well as by the
difficulties natural to such a position; and he was harassed into his
grave within two years of his arrival. But this period may be looked
upon as the climax of missionary influence in New Zealand. After 1842,
mission work went on extending, but the old workers no longer occupied
the forefront of the stage.
Before they retire into the background to make room for other figures,
it will be well therefore to cast a glance over their work and its
methods, their characters and their example. The position which they
held was in many ways unique, and though their age lies not so far
behind us in point of time, it really belongs to an order of things
quite different from our own.
The first point of contrast with our present somewhat overgoverned
society is the absence of authority. The missionaries and settlers were
sent out to a wild country to do the best they could. The bishops of the
Church in England did not claim, nor believe that they possessed, any
jurisdiction over them. The direction of the mission lay with the
Committee of the C.M.S., but unless it sent out a sentence of dismissal,
what could such a distant body do? If it sent out instructions to New
Zealand, no answer could be expected for a whole year, during which time
circumstances might have altogether changed. Short of actual dismissal,
its power of discipline was but slight. Much of its power must of
necessity be delegated to Marsden in Australia, but Marsden's authority
was limited in the same way, though not quite to the same extent. He
could not visit the mission often, nor could he secure that his
instructions should be obeyed. As a matter of fact they were often not
obeyed. "I know nothing I can say will have any influence upon their
minds," he once wrote in despair; "they have followed their own way too
long, and despise all the orders that have been given them by their
superiors." This censure applied to certain individuals among the first
settlers, and when one reads the letters and journals of these same men,
one cannot help feeling some sympathy with them in their position.
Possibly Marsden, with his exceptional powers, expected rather much of
average human nature. But the point is that the position of an early
missionary was an independent one. There was no civil government at all,
and the instructions from ecclesiastical superiors were necessarily
infrequent, often lacking in knowledge, never quite up to date, and
backed by no compelling force except the threat of "disconnection" from
the Society.
Under such circumstances everything depended on the personalities of the
men themselves. Those who came before 1823 were on the whole
disappointing. Marsden frequently compared them to the twelve spies who
all failed, excepting Caleb and Joshua. Unfortunately he never lets us
know who his "Caleb" and his "Joshua" were. But one of them can hardly
have been other than the young schoolmaster, Francis Hall, whose letters
reveal a singularly earnest and beautiful spirit. Even he, however,
admits the demoralising influence of the surrounding paganism--an
influence which none wholly escaped, and before which some actually
succumbed. "I feel in myself," quaintly writes another, "a great want of
that spirituality of mind which New Zealand is so very unfavourable for;
because of the continual scenes of evil that there is before our eyes,
and for want of Christian society. So that you must excuse my barrenness
of writing, and give me all the Christian advice you can."
The most interesting personality among these first settlers was Kendall.
Wayward and erring, passionate and ungovernable as he was, a close study
of his letters shows a depth of sin and penitence, together with a
breadth and boldness of philosophical speculation, which fascinates the
reader. Alone among the missionaries he seems to have tried to approach
the Maori from his own side, and to enter the inmost recesses of his
thought: "I am now, after a long, anxious, and painful study, arriving
at the very foundation and groundwork of the Cannibalism and
Superstitions of these Islanders. All their notions are metaphysical,
and I have been so poisoned with the apparent sublimity of their ideas,
that I have been almost completely turned from a Christian to a
heathen." Like the ancient Gnostics, Kendall tried to combine
Christianity with a sublimated version of pagan superstitions; and if
moral restrictions stood in the way, he cast them aside. "I was
reduced," he says, "to a state so dreadful that I had given myself
entirely up, and was utterly regardless of what would become both of
body and soul."
The details of his strange career cannot, of course, be given here. He
has been represented as an utter hypocrite, and evidence is not wanting
to give colour to the charge. But another and more favourable view is
not only possible: it is forced upon anyone who studies his
self-revelation through his letters. He seems to have hoped that his
ordination would have given him moral strength and stability, but he had
to admit that he had never been so strongly tempted to sin, so unable to
resist it, or so ingloriously foiled, as since his return from England.
Marsden's sharp exercise of discipline, though it elicited outbursts of
passion, seems to have had a healing effect. "Blessed be God," he
writes, "who has certainly undertaken for me. His sharp rebuke has laid
me low; yet why should I repine, since He has inclined me to seek His
face again?" Upon his expulsion from the mission, he retired to a house
he had built at "Pater Noster Valley," and after a few months left the
country. His great services in reducing the Maori language to written
form have hardly been sufficiently recognised. Marsden, like the other
settlers, could never adapt himself to the Italian vowel sounds, and at
his request Kendall wrote out a new vocabulary on a different system;
but he soon found it unsatisfactory, and returned to the principles
which he had worked out with Professor Lee. For the rest of his life--in
South America and in Australia--he still tried to perfect his Maori
Grammar. But the tragedy of his life outweighs the value of his
philological efforts. If ever a New Zealand Goethe should arise, he may
find the materials for his Faust in the history of Thomas Kendall.
From the date of the new beginning of the mission in 1823, its agents
were, for the most part, men of a superior type. Yate, indeed, one of
the ablest amongst them, was accused on a charge of which he never
could, or perhaps _would_, clear himself. He was accordingly
"disconnected" by the Society, but a certain doubt hangs over the issue;
and his after life was spent in useful and honourable service as
chaplain to the seamen at Dover. The rest of the new workers did
excellent service for the mission, and most of them lived to an old age
in the country. Remarkable for their linguistic capacity stand out
William Williams, who translated the New Testament; and Robert Maunsell,
who followed with the Old. This remarkable man took all possible pains
to gather the correct idioms for his task--sometimes by engaging the
Maoris in argument, sometimes by watching them at their sports. The
passion for accuracy was strong in him to extreme old age, and even on
his death-bed he interrupted the ministrations of his parish priest with
the startling question, "Don't you know that that is a mistranslation?"
Apart from translation work, the missionaries had little inclination or
ability for literary pursuits. Some of them (e.g., W. Williams, Yate,
and Colenso) took an interest in the plants and animals of their adopted
country, but for the most part the missionary was a man of one book, and
that book was the Bible. Life was too serious a thing to allow of
attention to the literary graces. The place where his lot was cast was
in a special sense the realm of Satan. The evidences of demonic activity
lay all around. On the one hand were the sickening scenes of slaughter
and cannibalism; on the other were the evil lives of sailors and traders
of his own race. Now and then the great Enemy would draw nearer still,
and one of his own comrades would fall a prey. His own religion was of a
somewhat austere type. His calendar was unmarked by fast or festival; he
had few opportunities of participating in a joyous Eucharist; there was
no colour in his raupo chapel, nor variety in his manner of worship.
The home life of the missionary doubtless often presented a picture of
domestic happiness. But there were no luxuries. If he wished to vary the
daily routine of pork and potatoes, he must try to obtain some fish
or native game. Failing these, he had only his own garden and
poultry-yard to look to. Soldiers' rations of coarse groceries were
served out from the Society's stores, but everything else must be bought
out of his slender income--L50 if a married man (unordained), or L30 if
a bachelor. Often in the earlier days, while the Maoris were still
unfriendly, even pork and potatoes were not to be had. More than once
Henry Williams and his family were brought to the verge of starvation.
[Illustration: OLD CHURCH AT RUSSELL (Built in 1838).]
In spite of these and other privations, the health of the missionaries
was good and their families were large. No death occurred among them
until 1837, when Mrs. R. Davis was called to her rest. Dangers abounded
on every hand, yet accidents were rare. Mr. and Mrs. Charles Davis were
lost at sea; Marsden was wrecked on the Brampton reef, but escaped
unhurt with all his party. Henry Williams passed through a terrible
experience when returning from Tauranga in 1832. For two days his little
vessel had been enveloped in driving rain and had been blown quite out
of her course, when the missionary, who had been praying through the
whole night, seeing at daybreak a rock immediately ahead, fell back upon
his old nautical skill, seized the tiller in his own hands, and just
succeeded in saving the craft from destruction.
It was this imminent peril that raised in the mind of Henry Williams the
question of how to make provision for his numerous family in case of his
death. Like most of his colleagues, he had sons growing to manhood, and
was anxious to do his duty by them. He could have sent them to England,
but this would have meant a life-long separation between parents and
children; to Sydney, but this would involve their exposure to the
temptations of a convict settlement. He therefore decided to buy some
land near to Paihia, and on this to settle his sons. The Maoris were
pleased to sell him the land, and the Home Committee approved of the
scheme. Several of the other missionaries did likewise. The plan seems a
reasonable one, and it received the approbation of Bishop Broughton, on
the condition that the lands so obtained should be strictly devoted to
the use of the children, and not to that of their parents. But it has
brought upon the missionary body, and upon Henry Williams in particular,
the reproach of land-speculating--a reproach which is still reiterated
by modern historians such as Saunders and Collier. Fortunately, an
incident occurred at the close of our period which is enough to furnish
a decisive test, at least in the case of Henry Williams.
One of the first acts of Governor Hobson was to seek for a site for the
capital of the new Colony. Wellington was vetoed by the Home Government,
and the only other European town was Kororareka in the Bay of Islands.
In this place or its neighbourhood the governor would doubtless have
fixed his headquarters, had it not been for Henry Williams. This
sagacious man had long noted the magnificent possibilities of the
Waitemata Harbour, and on being asked his advice he took the governor to
the spot. Hobson at once saw the value of the position, and selected the
place where the city of Auckland was soon to rise. But before he could
buy the land from its Maori possessors, he was disabled by a stroke of
illness, and returned invalided to find nursing and medical attention at
the mission station of Waimate. During the period of his convalescence
he fixed his abode at Russell--a house just opposite to Paihia--and the
Auckland scheme was left in abeyance. Speculators were busy about other
suggested localities in the Bay of Islands, but the real site was known
only to Henry Williams and to the governor himself.
What a chance was here for a speculator! Never, perhaps, before or
since, has such an opportunity occurred. Williams, with his unrivalled
influence over the Maoris, might have bought up large tracts of land
near the new site. If the charges against him are true, this is what he
would have done. As a matter of fact, _he never acquired a single acre
of land in that district_. He suffered the seat of government to be
removed a hundred miles away from his own doors to a place where he did
not possess, or try to possess, a single foot. This fact should surely
set at rest for ever the question of the disinterestedness of Henry
Williams.
Land-buying was not the only fault of which the missionaries were
accused. An English artist, Earle, visited New Zealand in 1827, and on
his return published an account of his travels, in which he accused the
church clergy of churlishness and inhospitality. Yet these same men were
the ones who came to his assistance when his house was burned, and
supplied all his wants to the full. This fact Mr. Earle does not
mention, and has not a favourable word to say on behalf of those who had
befriended him.
A very different visitor arrived some eight years later in the
research-vessel _Beagle_. This was Charles Darwin, whose name had not
yet achieved renown, but who was already distinguished for that
philosophical temperament and keen observation which make his judgment
to be of exceptional value. He speaks of "the gentlemanlike, useful, and
upright characters" of the missionaries; expresses his admiration of the
civilised appearance of Waimate; and finds in the results thus achieved
the best ground for hope for the future of the country. He had evidently
been previously impressed by Earle's denunciations, and was even
surprised to see one of the missionaries' sons playing cricket with the
Maori scholars. The mention of this little incident was doubtless
intended to soften the impression of extreme austerity, and is not
without its value to this end. But it does not go very far to modify the
picture of old-fashioned gravity and severity. In modern times the
missionaries would have been playing in the game themselves.
On the whole, the reports which reached the mother country were
favourable, and caused great rejoicing among the friends of the mission
staff. But there was one doubt which agitated the minds of a certain
circle of English society, and that was as to the _churchmanship_ of the
New Zealand mission. Its agents were good men, and had achieved
astonishing success; but had they kept up the distinctive tone and
system of the mother Church? Were they distinguishable from the
Methodists by whose side they laboured? No treatment of the subject can
be considered complete which omits this feature of the situation.
Undoubtedly there was some justification for the fears entertained in
the Home land. Marsden himself had been born and brought up in a
Methodist family. From this, as a young man, he had passed without sense
of break or violent change into a church school, and thence to
Cambridge, where he was associated with the Evangelical leaders, who
emphasised the individual rather than the corporate aspect of the
Church's teaching. We have seen that in 1819 he sent over a Methodist
preacher to report upon and to stimulate his nagging workers. He was not
in favour of the Methodists sending a mission of their own to New
Zealand, but when in 1822 his friend Mr. Leigh determined to settle in
the country, Marsden put no obstacles in his way. Not only so, but in
1823 Marsden himself brought over Leigh's colleagues, Hobbs and Turner,
who established their station at Whangaroa, after consultation with the
settlers at the Bay of Islands. The stations were not far apart, and
constant brotherly intercourse was maintained between the occupants.
When the Wesleyans fled from their homes in the turmoil of 1827, it was
to Kerikeri and Paihia that they betook themselves in the first place,
and it was Marsden's parsonage at Parramatta that sheltered them
afterwards. It was by Marsden's advice that they settled at Hokianga on
their return, and they always looked forward to his visits as eagerly as
did their brethren at the Bay of Islands. He himself rejoiced to
receive them to the Holy Communion; their converts were admitted to the
same holy ordinance at Waimate and Paihia; the missionaries preached
without hesitation in one another's pulpits. So anxious were the leaders
on both sides to spare the Maoris the spectacle of Christian disunion,
and to emphasise the fact that they baptised not in their own name but
in that of their common Master, that on the occasion of the reception
into the fold of the great chief Waka Nene and his brother, Patuone,
they arranged that Patuone, who belonged to the Methodists, should be
baptised by the church clergy, while Waka, who was an adherent of the
church mission, should receive the sacred ordinance at the hands of the
Wesleyans.
Highly irregular! some will exclaim. But there are important
considerations which must be kept in mind. In the first place, the
unhappy separation between the Methodist body and the historic Church
had not then assumed the hard and fast character which it bears to-day.
The followers of Wesley were still in fairly close touch with Wesley's
mother Church; they still occupied, to a large extent, the position of a
voluntary order within the established framework. They used the Book of
Common Prayer at their services, and taught the Church Catechism to
their children. And in New Zealand they looked up to Marsden as their
apostle, and were guided in their operations by his disinterested
advice. Nor should it be forgotten that the agents of the C.M.S. were
mostly laymen. Setting aside Hadfield, Mason, and Burrows, who all
appeared upon the scene near the close of our period, there were but
four ordained clergy during the years of co-operation between the two
societies, viz., Brown and Maunsell and the brothers Williams. Nor did
the "historic episcopate" present any obstacle to intercommunion. No
bishop was seen in the land until the end of 1838, and then his stay was
but short. There was accordingly no question as to the necessity of
confirmation as a qualification for communion. Confirmation simply
could not be had. Candidates were admitted to the Eucharist after long
and careful probation. Bishop Broughton, who was a High Churchman and a
disciplinarian, found that his misgivings as to the churchmanship of the
mission were unfounded. A few things were irregular, as of course they
were likely to be in an isolated community which had been cut off from
the rest of the world for a quarter of a century, but at the end of his
visit the bishop could express his conviction that everything would be
easily set right by a bishop residing on the spot.
On the whole, the relations between the two bodies seem to have been
marked by true wisdom as well as by Christian sympathy. But the harmony
was not perfect. When the Wesleyan missionaries transferred their
operations from Whangaroa on the east coast to Hokianga on the west,
they seem to have taken it for granted that the whole of the west coast
was to be reserved for them, while the east was to be the sphere of the
Church. But the physical features of the island were opposed to such an
arrangement. Nearly all the rivers from the interior run westwards, and
the missionaries in following the movements of their people sometimes
found themselves by the western sea. The first instance of this tendency
was in the Waikato district, where, as we have seen, Hamlin and Maunsell
were drawn to the Manukau Harbour and the Waikato Heads. The result was
a confusion of operations. The Wesleyans had established stations
further to the south on the Kawhia and Raglan harbours, and thus barred
the operations of Maunsell in this direction. Much correspondence ensued
with the Home authorities, and for a time the Wesleyans withdrew from
their posts. Eventually, however, a treaty was signed at Mangungu in
1837 by Henry Williams on the one hand, and the Rev. N. Turner on the
other. By this agreement the harbours of Raglan and Kawhia, with the
hinterland as far eastwards as the Waikato and Waipa rivers, were
definitively included within the Wesleyan sphere of influence. Nothing
was said about the coast to the southward, and there was nothing
whatever to prevent the settlement of Hadfield at Waikanae and Otaki in
1839, nor that of Mason at Wanganui in 1840. The idea, however, of "the
West Coast for the Wesleyans" still survived in some minds, and there
were those who resented the settlement of Hadfield and Mason on "their"
coast as an unfriendly act. These two excellent missionaries were also
violently attacked by one of the younger Wesleyans in Taranaki,
apparently through ignorance of the Church's position. The ultimate
settlement of the boundaries was reached by tacitly recognising all the
west coast north of Wanganui (excepting of course Maunsell's district)
as lying in the Methodist sphere, and all south of Wanganui as included
in that of the Church.
These differences in the south-west of the island hardly disturbed the
comity which prevailed in the north. A more serious trouble, however,
arose in this region when a Roman Catholic mission appeared there in
1838. In that year a French bishop and a band of priests landed at
Hokianga, and afterwards moved to Kororareka, right in the centre of the
Bay of Islands. As in other parts of the world, so here, the Romanists
passed over the unoccupied territory and planted themselves in the midst
of occupied ground, where they proceeded to upset the congregations of
the older workers. For a time they drew away many of the converts to
their side. But the Maoris were shrewd men, and several of them by this
time knew their New Testament by heart. When the Roman teachers
condemned the English missionaries for having wives and children, the
Maoris were ready with an effective answer from the example of St.
Peter, the married apostle. They held their own in argument, and
eventually drew back most of their brethren to the Church of the earlier
instructors who had borne the burden and heat of the day, and proved
their faith by their sufferings and their works.
What those works and sufferings were has already been partly described
in the course of this narrative. But there is one passage in the
literature of the period which is too graphic to omit. It relates to the
adventures of two of the lesser characters among the missionaries, and
it illustrates both the hardships which they sometimes underwent and
also the nature of the Maori mind.
It was in 1835 that Wilson and Fairburn heard of the dangerous position
of a party of women and children belonging to the Waikato tribe. They
were encamped on a stream called Maramarua, and a strong _taua_, or
fighting party, was preparing to set off from the mouth of the river
Thames, with the object of cutting off the retreat of these unsuspecting
people. The two missionaries determined to baulk this scheme, and by
rowing all night succeeded in getting ahead of the pursuers. Next day
they had a toilsome walk of many hours. The _taua_ was on their track,
the way was longer than they expected, and only by a few seconds did
they at last succeed in giving warning to the Waikatos, and thus saving
their lives. But now the baulked hunters had to be reckoned with.
Respect for the white man kept them from actual violence, but as night
came on the situation was a decidedly difficult one. Wilson's journal
continues thus:
"It was now nearly dark, the rain and wind increasing, and the only
shelter was the long, narrow shed, partly finished--half of the roof
still uncovered. This hovel was about 18 feet long, 9 wide, and 7 feet
in height. The natives, to make up for the rain which came through in
every direction, lit two fires with green wood, near each end of the
house, which filled it with smoke. Into this the _taua_, about thirty
men, entered, and began to take off their wet garments and crouch round
the fires; and into this pleasant abode for the night we, too, with our
four natives, had to creep: it was either this or remain outside in a
winter easterly gale. After a time we attempted to dry some of our
clothes by one of the fires, but the smoke was so intolerable, and
the heat of the place so great, notwithstanding it was only half roofed,
that we were obliged to lie down with our faces nearly touching the
earth. We remained in silence a long time, perhaps two or three hours,
not a word being addressed to us, either by the chief, or his followers;
this by no means a good omen in native etiquette and custom. We had
brought no provisions with us, supposing Maramarua to be nearer to the
coast; and after long waiting to see the mind of the _taua_ and how
things would be, we at last were about to lie down to try to sleep, to
forget our hunger, lodging, and society. Now, it is an established
custom in New Zealand never to begin or end the day without prayer, and
though in this wretched predicament, Mr. Fairburn proposed that we
should thus close the day. The armed men were sitting moodily by the
fires, when we signified our wish to our people, who were all
Christians. This night's service will never be forgotten by me; it was
commenced by singing the sixth native hymn, the first words of which
are:
Homai e Ihu he ngakau, kia rongo atu ai,
Ki tau tino aroha nui, i whakakitia mai.
[Illustration: THE CATHEDRAL, NELSON.]
"The hymn--an invocation to Christ for the Holy Spirit's aid to
regenerate the natural heart, and impress it with love to God--I had
often heard and sung; but never before had it come home to me with such
reality, or sounded with such sweetness and power, as in _this_ solemn
appeal to the Most High.... We then prayed for this dark world, its
sorrowing and erring children, that the God of mercy would be graciously
pleased to bring them to a knowledge of himself; and after thanks for
the mercies of the day, we commended ourselves to God. Our simple
service over, we said no more. For a time all remained quiet; none
seemed willing to interrupt the silence in this strange place and on
this still stranger occasion; nothing was heard but the storm, which
appeared to be tearing the remainder of the roof from the shed, and the
rain rattling against the _raupo_. The _taua_ seemed as if struck by
the fabled wand of some mighty magician! Their former reserve and low
whispering ceased; and after a while they began to talk quietly to each
other, and shortly afterwards they spoke to ourselves and to our
natives. The gloom had passed away, their countenances became altered;
and they now began to prepare some refreshments. Each of the _taua_ had
carried at his back a small flax basket of potatoes, containing some
three or four handfuls. Of this slender stock they passed along (for
there was no moving for want of room) a liberal share for ourselves and
our natives. After this the pig was cut up and roasted; but, faint and
hungry as I was, it was nearly impossible to eat it. And now all
restraint was thrown off, and the Maoris conversed freely and
pleasantly. So the night wore on, better than it had begun. At last,
cold and weary, overpowered by the smoke, I fell asleep on a bundle of
bullrushes; and when I awoke, I found that I had been sleeping
unconsciously on one of the men's heads."
Incidents such as this did not, of course, happen every day; but this
one is typical in that it shows the _religious_ character of the Maori.
Here is a war-party who start out with the object of shooting down a
number of unsuspecting people. They come back talking in quite friendly
fashion with the men who had baulked them of their prey. What had worked
the change? Simply the singing of a hymn. Where could we find stronger
evidence of a disposition naturally religious, or a more striking
instance of the divine guardianship?
In trying to trace the causes of the wonderful spread of Christianity
among this ferocious people, it is natural to think first of the
_combination_ of benefits which the missionaries were able to bring.
They stood for all the knowledge and civilisation of the outside world,
as well as for the message of a world to come. They had no telephones,
no motor cars, nor even matches; but they brought tools of iron and of
steel, they had strange animals and plants, they used glass and china
and wool and cotton, and above all they learned from books. Such marks
of power could not fail to tell upon a shrewd people like the Maoris.
The most intelligent of the chiefs, without at all understanding the
truths of Christianity, were at once attracted by these signs of
mechanical and intellectual superiority. We have seen how much the
mission was indebted to the three great generals of New Zealand--Hongi
in the north, Waharoa in the centre, and Rauparaha in the south--for the
main steps of its advance. It might seem at first as though the
explanation of Maori Christianity were a fairly simple matter.
Yet such a conclusion would be very far removed from the truth.
Undoubtedly the prestige of the white man's civilisation gave a valuable
leverage at first, as in the notable case of Ruatara. Undoubtedly also,
many of the common people were simply swept along by the current when
once it grew strong enough to make itself felt. But the earliest real
converts were old men, delicate girls, consumptive lads, and wretched
slaves, whose hearts were caught not by axes and blankets, but by the
message of a Father's love and of a home beyond the stars. The Maori was
a religious being, and when his old faith failed him in the hour of
need, he turned to the new gospel of certitude and hope. Nobler spirits
among the race were drawn also by the social side of the new teaching;
they saw in it a prospect of ridding the land of desolating wars; but in
each case it was the true power of Christianity that operated, not the
adventitious blessings which it brought in its train.
Very interesting, as evidences of the heartfelt piety of the early
converts, are the letters which many of them wrote to Yate on the eve of
his journey to England. There is surely nothing of a merely conventional
goodness about such language as this: "I have this day, and many days,
kneeled down, and my mouth has whispered and has said loud prayers; but
I wish to know, and am saying within me, if I have prayed with my
heart. Say you, if I have prayed to God with my heart, should I say No,
and not do His bidding, as the Bible says we must and tells us how? And
should I flutter about here like a bird without wings, or like a beast
without legs, or like a fish whose tail and fins a native man has cut
off, if I had love in my heart towards God? Oh! I wish that I was not
all lip and mouth in my prayers to God. I am thinking that I may be
likened to stagnant water, that is not good, that nobody drinks, and
that does not run down in brooks, upon the banks of which kumara and
trees grow. My heart is all rock, all rock, and no good thing will grow
upon it. The lizard and the snail run over the rocks, and all evil runs
over my heart."
The anxious and self-accusing spirit which appears in this passage
deepens as the soul passes under the awe of the sacramental presence.
"My Teacher," writes another, "I have been many moons thinking about the
holy feast which Jesus Christ gave to His disciples, and told everybody
to eat it in remembrance of Him. It is not a natives' feast; for in New
Zealand everybody eats as much as he is able, and as fast as he is able;
but this is a feast of belief. If my body were hungry, I should not be
satisfied with a piece like a crumb, nor with a drop that will go in a
cockle shell; but my soul is satisfied, my heart is satisfied, though it
be a crumb and a drop. The thoughts within me yesterday were perhaps
right, and perhaps wrong. I said to myself, I am going to eat and to
drink at a table placed before us by the Great Chief of the world. I
must be very good, and must make myself good within; or, when He sees
me, He will show that He is angry. And then I thought, I will not think
anything that is not right, nor do anything that is not straight to-day;
and then, God will see that my heart is becoming good. But, Mr. Yate,
perhaps you will, and perhaps you will not, believe it: I thought no
good thoughts, and I did no good works all day; and yet I was still, and
not angry with myself, no, not at all. Now, my Teacher, you say what I
am to do, before the next day of the Lord's Supper. I think I must pray
to God for a new heart, and for His Holy Spirit."
This honest confession agrees with the observations of many outside
observers of the change wrought in the Maoris by their new religion. Not
all received the "new heart." Indeed, to judge from the accounts of men
like Wakefield and Fox, the old heart was hardly touched by the new
doctrines. The Christian Maoris were blamed for covetousness and
insolence, for dishonesty and lying. "Give me the good old Maori who has
never been under missionary influence," was the feeling of many of the
colonists. It was the same complaint as is heard in every mission field.
But calmer and more unprejudiced observers give a different verdict. The
Bishop of Australia reported: "In speaking of the character of the
converted natives, I express most unequivocally my persuasion that it
has been improved, in comparison with the original disposition, by their
acquaintance with the truths of the Gospel. Their haughty self-will,
their rapacity, furiousness, and sanguinary inclination have been
softened--I may even say, eradicated; and their superstitious opinions
have given place, in many instances, to a correct apprehension of the
spiritual tendencies of the Gospel. Their chief remaining vices appeared
to me to be indolence, duplicity, and covetousness."
In mentioning these three prevailing vices, the bishop lays his finger
upon faults which the lover of the Maori has still to deplore. His
tendency to indolence shows that Marsden's insistence on industrial
training was sound in theory, though not easy to carry out in practice.
Highly endowed as the Maori was in many respects, he found it hard to
copy the white man in his regular and even life of toil. The Maori was
in fact the Greek of the south. Intellectually he was brilliant, and his
memory was nothing short of marvellous. Somewhat later than our period,
an English surveyor on the west coast of the South Island was disturbed
in his camp by a party of Maoris who had come from Ahaura in the valley
of the upper Grey. They had never seen a white man before, but they had
picked up some knowledge from other Maoris who had come overland from
Port Cooper. During the night, "they commenced the recital of the
morning service; before morning they had repeated the Litany four times,
the whole version of the Psalms, three or four creeds, and a marriage
service, and then the whole morning service again."[4] Men who could do
this might surely be expected to be equal to anything. Altogether, the
unfolding of the Maori nature at this time was such as to arouse the
highest hopes for his future greatness. To the friends of the mission in
England it seemed as though the angels' songs over a repentant nation
could be almost heard. Their orators, like Hugh Stowell, indulged in
rhapsodies over the isle "now lovely in grace as she is beauteous in
nature"; and even a philosophic thinker like Julius Hare could give it
as his deliberate opinion that, for many centuries to come, historians
would look back to the establishment of a Christian empire in New
Zealand as the greatest achievement of the first part of the nineteenth
century.
[4] This account is taken from the _Nelson Church Messenger_, of some
years ago. Bishop Williams thinks the surveyor must have been misled
to some extent.
Second Period.