as preparatory to a seminary, or college, for the purpose of training up native pastors for the different stations in the South Sea Islands. It is certainly a most important institution, and will probably exert no ordinary influence on the future character of the nation at large, as well as prove highly advantageous to the individuals who become its inmates. It merits the countenance of the friends of Missions. Several individuals have kindly enriched its library with suitable elementary books, philosophical apparatus, &c. but these are still very inadequate to the accomplishment of the design contemplated.

While the establishment of this institution is a just occasion of gratitude to the Missionaries, it by no means removes all anxiety from their minds with regard to the future prospects of their families. The nature of their station, and the spirit and principles of their office as ministers of Christ, prevent the parents from making any provision for their families. The comfortable settlement of their children is an object of most anxious solicitude to Christian parents at home-to foreign Missionaries it is peculiarly so. Their remote and isolated situation precludes their embracing those openings in Divine Providence for placing their children in comfortable circumstances, of which they might avail themselves in Christian and civilized society. The prospect of filling comfortable stations there, are all uncertain; professions there are none; commerce is in its infancy, as will appear from the fact of its being still carried on by exchange or barter. The circulation of money is very limited, and its use known to but few. The fondest hope of every Missionary is, that his children may grow up in the fear of God, be made partakers

of his grace, and, under the constraining influence of the love of Christ in their hearts, imbibe their parent's spirit, select his office, spend their lives in supplying his lack of service, and carry on that work which he has been honoured to commence. In prosecuting this, they will have advantages their parents never possessed, they will have been identified with the people among whom they labour, and will not appear in language and idiom as foreigners; but they will labour under more than counteracting disadvantages, if they never visit the land of their fathers, and must necessarily be far less efficient teachers of the truths of Christianity than their predecessors in the work.

There are a thousand things known to an individual who has received or finished his education and passed his early days in England, which can only be known under corresponding circumstances, and which a Missionary can never, in such situations as the South Sea Islands, teach his child. Those born there may indeed have access to English literature; but many books, however familiar and perspicuous to an ordinary English reader, will, in many perhaps important parts, appear almost enigmatical to those who have never seen any other society than such as that now under consideration. It has always appeared to me, in reference to a rude, uncivilized, illiterate people, who are to be raised from ignorance, barbarism, and idolatry, to a state of intelligence, enjoyment, and piety-where their character, habits, taste, and opinions, have to be formed principally, if not entirely, by the Missionary-that for some generations, at least, every Missionary's child, trained for the Missionary work even by a father's hand, and blessed with the grace of God, ought to finish his education in the

land of his parents, prior to entering upon the work to which his life is devoted.

Many a Missionary spends the greater part of his life without being able to produce any powerful or favourable impression upon the people among whom he has laboured; others expire in a field, on which they have bestowed fervent prayer, tears, and toil, but from which no fruit has been gathered; the second generation have to commence under circumstances corresponding with those under which their predecessors began. When success attends their efforts, and a change takes place decisive and extensive as that which has occurred in the South Sea Islands; yet so mighty is the work, so deep the prejudices, so difficult to be overcome are evil habits, and so slow the process of improvement upon a broad scale, even under the most favourable circumstances, that the ordinary period of a Missionary's life in actual service, would appear too short to raise them from their wretchedness, and elevate them to a standard in morals, habits, intelligence, and stability in religion, at which those who were instrumental in originating their emancipation, would like to leave them. They never can be expected to advance beyond those who are their models, their preceptors, and their guides; and if the successors of the first Missionaries be in any respect inferior to their predecessors, the progress of the nation must, in regard to improvement, be retrograde-unless this deficiency be supplied from some other source.

On this account, it does appear exceedingly desirable that the successors to the first Missionaries among an uncivilized people, who may even renounce idolatry, should be in every respect equally qualified for this office with those by whom they were preceded, and that

even the children of the Missionaries should be able to carry on, to a greater degree of perfection, that work which their parents were privileged to commence.

I am aware that the expense attending measure of this kind will probably prevent its adoption in those Institutions by whom the first Missionaries are sent out; but this does not render the measure less desirable or important in its immediate or more remote and permanent influence upon the nations converted from idolatry. The same difficulties occur with regard to the promotion of civilization, and the culture of the mechanic arts, among the barbarous nations. The primary design of all Missionary contributions is the communication of Christianity to the heathen; and it is to be regretted that the smallest portion of the pecuniary means furnished by Christian liberality for this purpose, should be appropriated to any other purpose than the direct promulgation of the gospel. It has been already stated, that a sort of Civilization Society, an institution for the purpose of promoting intellectual culture, scientific pursuits, agricultural and mechanical arts, and advancing all that we understand by civilization, among the barbarous and unenlightened nations of the earth, would be highly advantageous. The agents of such an institution would merit the sanction and support, not only of every Christian, but of every friend to improvement, virtue, and humanity. They might remain distinct, and yet co-operate harmoniously with the Christian Missionary: the one directing his attention to present circumstances, the other principally to the future destinies of those to whom they were sent.

As it is, however, the Missionary Societies, in reference to unenlightened nations, where any measure of success

attends their efforts, have no alternative, but are, from circumstances, under the necessity of attending to these departments of effort. They must either supply the apparatus and sustain the heavy expense of carrying on the work of civilization, or leave those on whom they have been instrumental in bestowing the light of revelation a prey to indolence, or to unprincipled individuals, whose influence will be exerted to neutralize the advantage Christian instruction may have conferred.

Christianity and civilization ought never to be separated, and although we rejoice in the temporal advantages which follow the former, by the introduction of the arts and comforts of society, it is to be regretted that the Missionary Societies should be prevented from sending the gospel to waiting nations, by the drafts made upon their resources for the establishing and maintaining agencies for the purpose of attending only to temporal concerns. Civilization never precedes, but invariably follows Christianity, and until some other means of facilitating its progress be supplied, it will not be neglected by those who are employed in the propagation of the gospel throughout the world. The difficulties already alluded to, connected with the Missionary stations, are not the only ones that exist. They would operate powerfully, supposing the children were all that the parents could wish; supposing they were qualified by talent, disposed by deliberate choice, and prepared by Divine grace, for the work of a Christian Missionary; but these indispensable requisites, it is unnecessary to remark, a parent, with all his solicitude and care, cannot always secure. God may see fit to withhold those decisive evidences of genuine piety, without which the fondest parent would tremble at the idea of introducing even his