3. CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS.
Thus has closed what has been in some respects one of the most eventful years of the Mission. The plan of “Trusting in the Lord” for support—“Muller’s plan,” as it is called, but which, in reality, dates much further back—found at first but little favor in the eyes of our friends. It might do, they said, for England, but not for Nova Scotia,—as though the Lord were not the same everywhere. It was looked upon as an experiment, and one that would probably fail. But a plan upon which scores of ministers and missionaries both at home and in heathen lands have acted for years, and acted successfully, can hardly be regarded as an experiment. I cannot but hope that not only my own faith, but that of many others has been somewhat strengthened already. My desire to continue in the same course has been increased. The Lord can and will give us more grace, and we will go forward in His strength, giving to Him all the glory, and making mention of His righteousness, even of His only.
our success in distributing the
scriptures among the
indians.
In order to have before us distinctly the subject, we must take into account the condition of the Micmacs when we began our labours, the obstacles we have had to encounter, and then the achievements that have been made. The whole can be summed up very briefly.
I began my labours in the year 1840—nearly forty years ago. I was thirty-six years old. The Indians, so far as civilization was concerned, with very few exceptions, were in the same condition that they had been for two hundred years before. Nominally they were Roman Catholics; they had great confidence in their priests, but as to the Bible they did not know there was such a book, and had they known there was such a book, there was no possibility of their knowing what was in it. Not more than one in a thousand could read English, even imperfectly, and that one—and others to my certain knowledge—could not understand what he read, even in the plainest spelling-book. Most carefully had they been guarded against attending the Protestant schools, and adopting the habits of the white people, and their priests carefully abstained from teaching them to read, lest—as we have their own statements to prove—they might read books that would undermine their faith. They have not only not given the Indians the Holy Scriptures, but have used all sorts of means, foul and fair, to prevent them from receiving them and learning to read them. Such was the condition of things forty years ago.
This shows of itself what were some of the chief obstacles we had to meet and overcome. But there were others, and these were formidable. To have attempted to instruct them through the medium of the English language would at the time have been simple folly. To have attempted to teach them our language without understanding theirs, and while they had no wish to learn ours, and no possible means of learning it, even had they wished it, would have been simply the scheming of insanity. The task of learning the Micmac language under the circumstances, without books, without a competent teacher, and with all the zeal and ardor of the Roman Catholic hierarchy, and the prejudices and the suspicions of the tribe aroused against us to prevent it needs only to be mentioned to be appreciated. With all the natural talent with which God had endowed me for the work, for which I am amply credited, if any one imagines the task was easily accomplished, I can only say he is very much mistaken. If the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ had not been with me, encouraging and aiding me in a most marvellous manner, it never would or could have been done. But it was done, blessed be His name forever!
And now what is the condition of things at the present day? Why the whole New Testament, with several books of the old, viz., Genesis, Exodus, Psalms,—in Micmac, and the Gospel of John in Maliseet, the language of the St. John Indians, as they are sometimes called, have been published. Scores of the Indians have learned to read them, hundreds have heard them read; they know everywhere now that there is such a book as the Bible. Scores of copies have been distributed among them, and the priests are powerless to prevent it. Furthermore, numbers have given evidence of having received the truth of the Gospel in the love of it, and by their consistent lives and triumphant deaths, have given proof of the reality of the grace they professed to have received. And mark the change which has taken place in the condition of the tribe in respect to civilization since we began our labours, and as the direct result of our labours. To what else is all this to be ascribed? Certainly it has not been achieved by the Roman Catholic Church, because it has been achieved in spite of that church. The old dress both of men and women has been discarded, and that of the white people adopted very generally; you can no longer tell an Indian by his dress. Comfortable houses and all the appearance of civilization, are continually to be met with. Everywhere there is a determination to obtain learning, and to learn the English language. Indian children to some extent attend the English schools which are now open to all, and many adults have mastered the mysteries of reading Micmac, one at least now living, after forty years of age who never went to school at all. I have, within the last three or four years, seen Indians all the way from Topique, Fredericton, St. John, The Restigouche, Prince Edward Island and Cape Breton; in all these places I have distributed copies of the Scriptures and of a small volume entitled “A First Reading Book in Micmac and English;” and in all these places I have found intelligent Indians who could read them, and have been most kindly and cordially received and listened to by them, as I read and preached and prayed and sang hymns to them in their own tongue; and I have scarcely met with what deserved the name of opposition.
I have never taken a particular account of books distributed, and I have never charged the Indians anything for copies of the Scriptures. I could never make up my mind to that. We have treated the Indians in this Province with such outrageous wrong, that I would gladly undo that had I the power. We have seized upon their lands, destroyed their means of living, destroyed them, corrupted their morals in every way,—and for Christian men, after all this, to say to them: “We will not give you the Word of God unless you pay for it,” it seems to me would be the wildest wickedness, from which all those who have any regard for God or conscience, should devoutly pray: “Good Lord deliver us!”
The B. & F. Bible Society furnished the means of printing Genesis, Exodus, Psalms and three of the Gospels and Acts in Micmac, and the Gospel of John in Maliseet. The rest of the New Testament was published—one thousand copies, by private subscriptions for that very purpose, chiefly in England, but some of it came from France and other places.
There are now in Halifax unbound about nine hundred copies. All that were bound, about eight or nine years ago, have been distributed. What I now ask is, that money may be furnished for binding a portion at least of the rest. They can be bound for ——
I may add that I have in manuscript a translation of the Books of Job and of Jonah, and some of the other narratives of the Old Testament. Genesis is out of print, and so is the Gospel of John in Maliseet, the greater portion of these having been destroyed by fire, the former in a great conflagration in Halifax many years ago, and the latter in the recent great fire in St. John.
I enclose herewith a few letters that have [been] received from different places requesting books for the Indians, the most of them written by Indians themselves. In very many cases I have taken down their names, as I have been on my missionary excursions, at their request, and sent them books by mail. These letters speak for themselves. They prove two things; that there are Indians that can read and write, and that they receive and value the books that are printed in their own tongue.
The following extract from a letter dated Dublin, Feb. 28, 1880, from His Grace Archbishop Trench, to myself, must surely find a response in every true Christian’s heart:
“I thank you much for the two little books which you have been good enough to send me. Let me congratulate you very heartily on having been permitted to help so many to hear or read in their own tongue the wonderful works of God.”
Surely we have no cause to boast of our doings, but if there is one thing the advocates of the Bible in Nova Scotia have reason to be glad of,—not proud of—it surely is that under God they have been permitted to unfold their priceless volume to the long-neglected Indians.
SILAS T. RAND.
first verse of scripture translated
into micmac by dr. rand.
Mudu Nikskam teliksatcus oositcumoo wedjeigunumooedogub-unn neooktoo-bistadjul oocwisul, coolaman m’sit wen tan kedlamsitc ootenincu, ma oonma-djinpooc, cadoo ooscoto apskooawe memadjooocun.—John III: 16.
“I can never forget the thrill of emotion that filled my soul and body at the completion of this task—for task it was, taxing all my powers of mind and body.”—Extract from Dr. Rand’s private diary written during the summer of 1849.
J. S. C.