182 THE CBUISE OF THE ' GUBAQOA.' 



would have passed away with increase of intelligence, have 

 been artificially prolonged in all countries for tlie purposes 

 of state-craft and priest-craft to the demoralisation and great 

 injury of society. Hence religion is first moulded by bar- 

 barism, and is afterwards employed in perpetuating it. Such 

 a result is well indicated by Erskine, where, after the passage 

 fi-om Hazlewood just cited, he says of the Fijians, ' With 

 their deep religious convictions, therefore, it is not surprising 

 that all indulgence of the gentler feelings of the heart, in 

 which the Fijian nature is not deficient, is condemned as a 

 weakness, and great pains are taken to instil into the 

 youthful mind a contempt for passionate impulse, and an 

 admiration for relentless cruelty.'^ A striking illustration of 

 the wrong which supernaturahsm often does to nature. 



The progress made by the islandei's in the waj' of civil- 

 isation is by no means so great as has been generally 

 represented.^ In endeavouring to lead them on the path of 

 progress, the chief difficulty is to find some motive to induce 

 them to advance. It is not an easy matter to prove to them 

 that it is to their advantage to adopt the civihsation of the 

 Whites. The love of ease or indolence is the ruling passion, 

 and anything discordant with it wiU find no favour in their 

 eyes. One great cause of tlie poverty of the natives is the 

 habit that prevails throughout the South Seas of begging 

 from each other whatever they may require, or sti'ikes their 



1 Pickering, ' Races of Man,' p. 247. 



2 The matter contained in this and the following pages of this chap- 

 ter is slightly varied from Llr. Consul Jones's i-eport to the Foreign 

 Ofi&ce, 'On the Present Condition of the Fiji and Tonga Islands. 1865.' 



