A few years since, whilst the mistaken zeal of many good men, led them
to think that their red brethren of the forest might be Christianized
before they were civilized,—a missionary was sent out among them to
convert them to the Christian faith. The missionary was unfortunately
one of those preachers who delight in speculative and abstruse
doctrines, and who teach the inefficacy of all human exertions in
obtaining salvation. He called the Indians together to hear what
he called the Gospel. The Sachem or Chief of the tribe to which he
was sent, came with the rest. The missionary in the course of his
sermon, (which was upon the very simple and intelligible doctrine of
_election_) undertook to prove, that some were made to be saved, and
some to be damned, without any regard to their good or bad conduct.
As an illustration of his doctrine, he cited the case of Jacob and
Esau, and attempted to show that God loved the one and hated the other
before either of them was born. The Sachem heard him attentively, and
after meeting invited him to his wigwam. After some conversation, the
Sachem thus addressed the Missionary: “Sir, me tell you a story: My
wife have two boys, twins; both of them as pretty as the two you tell
me about to-day. One of them she love and feed him; the other she let
lie on the ground crying. I tell her take him up, or he die. She no
mind me. Pretty soon he die. Now what shall I do to her?”—Why, said the
Missionary, she ought to be hung!—“Well,” said the Sachem, “then you
go home and hang your God, for you say he do just so. You no preach
any more here, unless you preach more good than this.” The Missionary
finding himself amongst a people too enlightened to give credence to
his narrow and heart-revolting principles, thought it expedient to seek
a new field of labor.