A Missionary's Craft in Danger--He Preaches Against Us and Our
Doctrines, and Abuses Our Friends--His Remarks, However, Are Overruled
for Our Good--The Lord's Promise Fulfilled--I Go to Kula
On the Monday morning I returned to Lahaina, and received a warm
welcome from the brethren. They were much interested in the recital
of the incidents of my trip. From that time, however, I stayed but
little there. Much as I liked the society of the Elders, I could not be
content there, for I felt that I ought to be among the natives, trying
to teach them the principles of the gospel, and there seemed to be a
better opening for this work in other places than at Lahaina.
There being none of the Elders on the Island of Oahu, it was decided
that Elders Bigler and Farrer should go there instead of to the island
of Molokai. When they sailed for that island, which they did in a few
weeks, Brother James Keeler was left alone with no one to converse
with in English, unless he occasionally met a white man. This gave him
a better opportunity of acquiring the language than he had when we
were all there. After some weeks he also was led to leave there and to
travel around the island until he found a people who were willing to
receive him and the principles which he taught.
When the Presbyterian missionary at Wailuku saw that I had come back
there he was displeased. He used all his influence against me among
his congregation, and one Sunday he came out in public and delivered a
most abusive discourse against the Prophet Joseph and our principles,
in which he gave an entirely false statement of the cause of his death,
and also warned the people against me.
I happened to be present when this sermon was delivered. While
listening to it a variety of emotions agitated me. My first impulse was
to jump upon one of the seats as soon as he had got through, and tell
the people he had told them a pack of falsehoods. But this I thought
would produce confusion, and result in no good. When the services were
over, I walked around to the pulpit where he stood. He knew how short
a time we had been on the islands, and, I believed, had no idea that I
could understand what he had said; when he saw me, therefore, his face
turned pale, and to me he looked like a man who had been caught in a
mean, low act.
I told him I wanted to give him correct information respecting the
things he had told the people that morning, that he might remove the
effect of the lies which he had repeated to them; for, I said, they
were base lies, and I was a living witness that they were.
He said he did not believe they were lies, and he should not tell the
people anything different to what he had said; he thought he had but
done his duty, and if the people had been warned against Mahomet in his
day, he would not have got so many disciples.
I bore him a solemn testimony respecting the prophet Joseph, and the
truth of the work, and said that I would stand as a witness against him
at the judgment seat of God, for having told that people lies and for
refusing to tell them the truth when it had been shown to him.
Much more was said, for our conversation lasted about half an hour, and
while we conversed many of the congregation, some of whom understood
English, crowded around.
This was the first occurrence of the kind in my experience in which I
was personally prominent, and it had an importance in my eyes which it
would scarcely have were it to happen to-day. One of those who listened
to and understood this conversation was a brother-in-law of Napela's,
a half-white and a circuit judge, and a leading man on that island. He
gave a report of the conversation which was very favorable to me, and
altogether I think the missionary's sermon did good. He intended it for
evil; but the Lord overruled it, as He does all the plots and acts of
the wicked, for the advancement of His purposes.
The Lord gave me favor in the sight of the natives, and I had their
sympathy, though they dare not avow it, for fear of the consequences.
Another reason of the sermon not having so good an effect was the
preacher's allusions to Napela. He had called him by name, as the
man at whose house I stopped, and denounced him. This, of course,
was distasteful to Napela's relatives and friends, many of whom were
present. Thus this man, who fought in this manner against the work of
God, did not prosper as he expected, neither then nor afterwards.
The Lord has said in one of the revelations to His servants:
"Verily, thus saith the Lord unto you, there is no weapon that is
formed against you shall prosper; and if any man shall lift his
voice against you, he shall be confounded in mine own due time."
I have found every word of this to be true.
Napela was not frightened by what the missionary had said. He was
threatened with removal from his judgeship and with being cut off from
their church; but he manifested no disposition to have me leave his
house.
The pressure, however, finally became so strong through the continued
efforts of the preacher, that I thought it would be wiser for me to
withdraw from Wailuku for awhile. I felt for Napela, for he had a heavy
opposition to contend with, and I thought that if I went elsewhere, the
persecution would not be so severe.
There was a place called _Kula_, (which means a country near the
base of a mountain) where there were a few scattered villages, about
eighteen miles from Wailuku, to which I was led to go. It was rather an
out-of-the-way place, though just before I went there, a brisk trade
in Irish potatoes, which grew spontaneously in that region, had been
carried on; the people hauling them in carts, from there to a small
port not far distant. These potatoes were carried in schooners to
California to supply the gold diggers. But they were of a poor quality,
and when the farmers of California began to raise them the trade
ceased. The business had begun to fall off when I went there.
I stopped at the house of a man by the name of Pake, who had charge
of Napela's affairs in Kula, and to whom he had given me a letter
of introduction when he found that I had determined to go there. He
received me very kindly, also a man by the name of Maiola, whom I had
met in Wailuku. He was a deacon in the Presbyterian church.