140 
POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
thropy, parties before but seldom associated | and had, 
by a vigorous and combined movement, in force and 
magnitude surpassing any thing that had been hitherto 
attempted by British Christians, introduced a new era in 
the Missionary efforts of modern times.—^It had excited 
among all classes the liveliest interest, called forth the 
most splendid efforts of sacred eloquence, and the noblest 
deeds of Christian benevolence; but, painful and deeply 
humiliating as it was, it now appeared to those devoted 
servants of God, who had, amidst protracted and 
severe privations, maintained their ground till life was 
no longer secure—after having engaged the prayers 
of the people of God, and waited in vain for the 
results of patient and self-denying toil, during twelve 
eventful years, that the scene of their labour must be 
abandoned. 
Their enemies became bold in denouncing the enter¬ 
prise as the wild project of extravagance and folly, 
and stamping upon its projectors and conductors the 
impress of the blindest fanatacism. Even those who, 
though they had not condemned the scheme as Utopian 
and visionary, had withheld their sanction and their 
aid, now pointed to the deserted field as a demonstra¬ 
tion of the soundness of their judgment, and an ex¬ 
planation of their conduct. There were others also, who, 
whatever might be their opinion of the measure itself, 
and however they might approve or disapprove of the 
choice of those with whom it originated, in the selection 
of the most distant, isolated, and, as it regarded the moral 
character of its inhabitants, the most unpromising parts 
of the world, for the first field of their labours, con¬ 
sidered its projectors as influenced in a great degree by 
self-confidence, and a desire of aggrandisement or 
