THE TEACHING OF EXAMPLE. 397 by many temptations, should be crowned with a so much larger and more rapid success? The mistake of the missionaries was a very common one-they were treating symptoms instead of the disease. Outward acts, which were but eruptive indications of the inward ailment, they sought to get rid of by a severe repressive hygiene. The disease under which the patient suffered was one of the heart-and the heart they had not touched, and scarcely prescribed for. Yet, had this charge been made against the missionaries, they would possibly have replied, indignantly, that they had gone to the fountain-head of all cure; that they had taught the Hawaiians the highest heights of theology; that they had set before them the doctrines of the Trinity, Justification, Original Sin, and that great mystery, which '-binding Nature fast in Fate, Alas! between that transcendental teaching and the actual workings of a depraved nature, there was a great chasm which their doctrine did not bridge over. A more simple and parental education was required—line upon line and precept upon precept, but patiently and lovingly applied, and dropped like the gentle dew from heaven. As the angler casts his fly delicately upon the water, watches, waits, withdraws it, and throws it again, so the fisher of souls must by many tentative essays perseveringly strive to catch men. Men will not be driven into Christianity like sheep into a pen; and the human heart refuses to be transformed by enactments, penalties, and imprisonments. Of means within our own power for religious advancement, the contemplation of examples is the most certain and the most powerfulto gaze on holiness in fellow-men, and, most of all, to gaze upon the Prince of Purities, until He becomes in our eyes fairest among ten thousand and altogether lovely.' 'It is the burthen of Xavier's letters,' writes Sir James Stephen, that the living exhibition of the Christian character is the first great instrument of Christian conquest over idolatry, and that the inculcation of elementary truth is the second." CHAPTER XXV. GLANCES AT THE PAST AND GUESSES AT THE FUTURE. day upon which Hawaii has entered is one in which the light is neither clear nor dark. She ranks among the family of nations, as the last baby in a household, when it can speak and run, is gradually admitted into the companionship and games of its brothers and sisters. The isolation of her position in the centre of the ocean gives a special value and interest to the group, but leaves it open to every assailant that chooses to bring a frigate's broadside to bear on the capital. Her defences must be the equal treaties of other nations, supported by mutual jealousies, rather than the sixty guns of the forts of Honolulu. But treaties, even, will not guard her from the testy act of one foreign government in the absence of the others' ships of war, or from piratical and filibustering expeditions. Like the midnight pull at the house-bell, the annoyer will have vanished before the arrival of the police, and the whole strength of a division will not repair the injury done to the nerves of the disturbed inmates. Under the guarantee of America, France, and England, writes Sir George Simpson, referring to the period of his visit (1843), the Sandwich Islands are secured as effectually as any other community against foreign interference, excepting that, from their position and the inexperience of their rulers, they are peculiarly liable to come into collision with the very powers that have guaranteed their independence. Their position alone, with respect to the trading interests of England and America, will render neutrality extremely difficult, if not altogether impossible, in the melancholy event of a war between those kindred states; while any infringement of the law of nations in this respect will be sure to lead to the occupation of the group on the part of England, either as the avenger of her own wrongs, or as a protector against the vengeance of America. But, unlike this occasional danger, the inexperience of their rulers is a rock on which they may be dashed at any time with fatal effect; and within these few short years the cause in question has placed the native government at the mercy both of France and of England. During the progress of the Crimean war, the possible extension of which was uncertain, the King, Kaméhaméha III. issued a proclamation of neutrality, with a prohibition to his subjects to engage, directly or indirectly, in privateering. Such a step may be cynically compared to the frogs in the fable protesting against the battle of the bulls. Admitting the similitude, it must be granted that the danger which threatened the Hawaiian kingdom from an European war was that which the frogs deprecated, and theirs was a situation in which insignificance would not act as a safeguard. On the breaking out of hostilities between the states of North America, a similar manifesto was issued. The proclamation is as follows: KAMEHAMEHA IV., KING OF THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS. Be it known to all whom it may concern, that we, Kaméhaméha IV., King of the Hawaiian Islands, having been officially notified that hostilities are now unhappily pending between the Government of the United States and certain PROCLAMATION OF NEUTRALITY. 401 states thereof styling themselves 'The Confederate States of America,' hereby proclaim our neutrality between said contending parties. That our neutrality is to be respected to the full extent of our jurisdiction, and that all captures and seizures made within. the same are unlawful, and in violation of our rights as a sovereign. And be it further known, that we hereby strictly prohibit all our subjects, and all who reside or may be within our jurisdiction, from engaging, either directly or indirectly, in privateering against the shipping or commerce of either of the contending parties, or of rendering any aid to such enterprises whatever; and all persons so offending will be liable to the penalties imposed by the laws of nations, as well as by the laws of said states; and they will in nowise obtain any protection from us as against any penal consequence which they may incur. Be it further known, that no adjudication of prizes will be entertained within our jurisdiction, nor will the sale of goods or other property belonging to prizes be allowed. Be it further known, that the rights of asylum are not extended to the privateers or their prizes of either of the contending parties, excepting only in cases of distress or of compulsory delay by stress of weather or dangers of the sea, or in such cases as may be regulated by treaty stipulation. Given at our Marine Residence of Kailua, this 26th day of By the King, By the King and Kuhina Nui, KAMEHAMEHA. KAAHUMANU. R. C. Wyllie. The 'Polynesian,' the government organ, in repeating the foregoing proclamation, remarks : To proclaim neutrality, however, is one thing, and to enforce it is another. Strong and powerful governments are DD |