ledown_," are articles in
constant request; and to purchase these of Europeans, the blacks will
give almost anything they possess, even their wives.[72] Thus, a
regular traffic in what is evil is carried on, and almost all that
the heathen people of Australia learn from the so-called Christians
with whom they associate, is to practise, with tenfold aggravation,
sins which God abhors, and will not allow to go unpunished. Like
children that have been always brought up in a family of foul-tongued
transgressors, the very first words of English which the natives learn
are words of wickedness and blasphemy; the only introduction to the name
of their God and Saviour is in order that they may insult that holy
Name, and blaspheme the Divine Majesty. And these lessons are taught
them, let us remember, by men calling themselves, and perhaps even
thinking themselves, civilised, enlightened, and Christian persons;--by
men, certainly, belonging to a nation, which justly lays claim to these
honourable epithets! But enough has been stated on this painful subject
to fill every thoughtful mind with humiliation and fear, when it
contemplates the "much" that "has been given" to civilised nations, and
recalls the fixed rule of truth and justice, that so much the "more"
will be required of them. Nor is this a matter concerning the British
inhabitants of the colonies alone, and with which the nation at large
has little or no concern. For if we inquire, who corrupt the natives?
the answer is, our vile and worthless population, the very scum of
mankind, whom we have cast out as evil from the bosom of their native
land. But a further question naturally offers itself. Who were, in many
instances, the passive, if not the active, corrupters of these very
corrupters themselves? Who have neglected to provide means for their
christian instruction, and so let them grow up to be worse than
heathens, until they could be endured no longer in the land? What
nation had within a single century more than doubled its population
without having built or endowed a score of new churches? To whose
neglect is it, partly, though not entirely, owing, that when heathens
meet, in far distant countries, with our lower classes, or when their
homes are visited in our great towns and cities, the very heathens are
sometimes forced to yield the palm to them in wickedness and in sin?
Such questions very nearly concern every Englishman, and they are, even
now, only beginning to