FAITH IN THE SCRIPTURES. 75 
Islands, where, on my first arrival, the people were 
more opposed than inclined to all that is essential 
to Christianity, I do not remember to have met 
with an individual disposed to doubt the origin, or 
dispute the authority, of revelation. It was to the 
injunctions and doctrines of the Bible, that hum¬ 
bled their pride, and prohibited their vicious prac¬ 
tices, &c. that they objected. 
It may be said, that while they believed in ido¬ 
latry—and revelations from the gods by dreams, or 
other intimations through the medium of the priests, 
were acknowledged—they might suppose the truths 
of the Bible to be a collection of revelations 
similar in kind to these, only, as a priest on one 
occasion stated to me, better preserved, being 
“ made fast upon the paper.” But after they had 
renounced idolatry, and treated with contempt the 
notions formerly entertained respecting the power 
of the gods, and regarded all the pretended revela¬ 
tions of them as deceptions of the priests, the claims 
of the Bible remained undisputed. 
The uniform acceptance of the declarations of 
Scripture as Divine communications to mankind, 
was not the result of any arguments employed by 
us. We never attempted to establish by argu¬ 
ment what they were not inclined to doubt. Our 
instructions were, therefore, generally delivered in 
the simplicity of assertion or testimony, accom¬ 
panied with suitable admonition and application 
to our hearers; taking it as an admitted principle, 
that the scriptures contained a declaration of the 
will of God. 
When asked, as we sometimes were, u How do 
you know the Bible is the word of God ?” we did 
not adduce an infallible jchurch, by which it had 
been determined what were the canonical books, 
