Polynesian. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu], Hawaii) 1844-1864, 1861-02-16
Ghe polpnesian,
lContinued.l
Though,. on the System of Legislation

Il. u, NJ. d., s. 5. r., VI. E., District Justice and
Coroner for Hama, Maui, Notary Public for Maui
author Of NEW PRINCIPLES OF PoLITIcAL ECONOMY,
&C., &C., &C.
Such is the difference between a faith self relying
self dependent rendering divided homage to the
Lord Of Heaven, and unencumbered by earthly ties
pressing onward on His service and that faith
which hats between two masters longs for the coming
of the heavenly kingdom, and yet cannot shake itself
free from the entanglements of the earthly You
prove to men that you in earnest, before you
make them believe that what you preaehs earnest. If
you would have them take up the cross, you yourself
must carry 1t aloft not sinking under the heavy load,
but bearing it forward with countenance elate with
the joy that you have been deemed worthy to sustain
the precious burden.
| Who is so to bear it to Hawaians Who is so to
bear it to them that their unenghtened minds may be
opened to receive, and sincerely believe in all the great
| truths of which it is the emblem?
AT this very moment New England sends out band
of men engaged for this work. They have taken up
the cross they have vowed deyoting their lives
to the conversion Of the heather and this is the field
OF labor assigned them How are you to treat them
Let them alone. You cannot hinder, still less can you
forward their work If they equal to their under
taking If they true to the they have vowed
If in sngeness of heart and of purpose they their
whole souls to the enterprise they have entered if
fully possessed hem-elves by those high hopes they
would awaken in others, they well pleased spend
and be spent in the work. then it will prosper under
their hands; for Hawaiians but men, moved, like
other men, by their hopes and fears drawing their
yictOns, like other men, from what they and know
IT, then, AFTER it may be, years of painful toll these,
the messengers Of the faith. say to them: aye
witnesses how holly, and justly, and blameessy,
we have lived among you that we have so proved
love to you to make it manifest to you that
have come TO seek not yours, but yoU not yo,T dears
for ourselves, wives and children, but yOWSOUes
for Christ, then will they be prepared to receive the
written word not the word of men but of God for
they will be convinced that it is only firm belief in its
truth that could have animated to such sacrifices.
Then will they in sincerity and truth embrace the sub
lime doctrines of Christianity, and with them the pure
| morality which it incucates. Then many things in
| their former course of life will seem criminal, many
odous in the eyes of the majority of the people. Then
will come the proper season for the action of you the
legislator, for then you will be called to make laws
! in conformity the will Of the changed minds of u
majority OF the nation for the legislator is but the
embodiment OF the moral of the nation 1t vain
for him to before it. 1t is wrong for him to lag
| behind it.
If, then the messengers of the new faith are pre-
pared to act and do act in this spirit happy for the
prosperity of Hawaii the day Of their arrival. If they
lack the cessary strength of mind if they faint in
the path, step aside from it, they had better have
said at home. Let not, at least yours be the hand
that would draw them aside from it by any prospects
of worldly power honor or riches held to them.
That your part fatal error, though into
which you may easily fall. That theirs strong
temptation, and by which they might perhaps be
led astray.
For it is not unnatural for you the chiefs of the
and their natural legislators thus to reason: ''These
have out the teachers of the nation. Let
it then be entrusted to them Let everything be doue
they direct let step be taken without their sane
ton let them be in effect the rulers and law of
the people" And, such is the decefuness of the hu-
man heart such the propensity of men, when in their
imaginatons, great good lies before them, to break
through the line that fences them from it, though in
doing they commit positive wrong, that it is not
impossible that they may yield to the temptation, and
that the very men who left home to unfold the things
of another world may here immerse themselves in the
affairs of this.
Dark we're the day, and black the hour, for Hawaii
that should witness such compact. For evil well
good, exists in all things earth. Even religious
sects have their dark well their bright Sides The
puritancal sect especially, of which these the
messengers, changes nightly its aspect according
you view it from this quarter that. For while from
point Of view it must be allowed the praise of be-
ing pure in morals, great in doing and in enduring
noble defender of what it has esteemed the rght from
another it shows itself pued up with spiritual pride,
in its compass OF vision. greedy of power and of
gain.
There are characteristics which render that sect very
unfit to rule and legislate for Hawaans for, if
they stand in the place of power blinded by their self
sufficient spiritual pride instead of waiting till the
changed hearts of the people demand conformable
legislative action, they may think themselves called on
to constran them, by legal enactments into that cond
ton which In their conception perfected Christianity
produces Now the narrowness Of their views renders
them incapable of conceivng any excellence of Christian
civilization but in the precise form which they have
seen it existing in New England, or rather in which
it would exist there had they the power to purge that
land from what they conceive its defects. New En-
gland thus purified will consequently be to them the
beau ideal to which they will seek orcbly to mould the
Hawaiian race. They will be unable to understand
that the essential difference in the characteristics of the
two peoples renders the incapable Of receiving the
form of the other. That, assuming that the Hawaiian
race has within itself energies capable of causing to
grow up in fresh strength and grace, and beauty
der the day that has dswned it, STILL to force
that growth into form foreign to its nature may be
to tax these energies highly as utterly to exhaust
them.
These will be the errors of the intellect, but there
will be errors of the will accompanying them, sins all
the more dangerous that they cloak themselves un
der the guse of yirtues-the lust of power-(they will
term it the wish to do good 1.-THE lust of gain-that
will pass under their own eyes, and they will hope to
make it pass under the eyes Of others, only lauda
BILE desire provide for the being of their house
holds.
From what has been, we may certainly gather what
will be- The same sect, two hundred years ago, gain
ed the supreme power in England. What they did
there they will do here The pictures will be the same
with this difference that while this Will have a more
contracted compass, it will have greater depth Of col
or than had that Look on it, | pray you, for a
ment. And, first, as TO the foreign population, it
being proclaimed throughout the land that none but the
gody have part portion in the good things of the
Hawaiian kingdom. host of those who call themselves
such and put what esteemed the signs of godl-
ness will FIJI the Puritan camp. The same indecent
strife for Offices of power and emoument that had place
in England viii have place there. There will
quently be such scramble to mount into these high
places religions back, her garments will be de-
fled by foul feet that her best friends shall no longer
be able to recognize her. Meanwhile. without the
camp viii remain those who too openly profigate to
make any religious pretences and those who, conceiv-
ing religion to consist in something else than long pray
ritsnc livery from any prospect Of gain or advance
ment.
Two parties viii consequently be formed directly op
posed to each other and heated by TIE animosities
which such strfes engender that neither shall be able
to any good in the other Those without the camp