“Sunday, 13th.—I arose this morning with a great desire to preach to the ship’s company, yet did not know how I should be able to accomplish my wish. We were now four ships in company. Our captain had invited the captains belonging to the other three to dine with us to-day. As soon as they came on board I mentioned my design to one of them, who immediately complied with my wish, and said he would mention it to our captain, which he did, and preparations were made for me to preach. I read part of the church prayers, and afterwards preached from the 3rd chapter of St John, the 14th and 15th verses: ‘As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness,’ etc. The sailors stood on the main deck, I and the four captains upon the quarter-deck; they were attentive, and the good effects were apparent during the remainder of the day.
“Thursday, 12th December.—I have been reading of the success of Mr. Brainerd among the Indians. How the Lord owned and blessed his labours to the conversion of the heathen! Nothing is too hard for the Lord. This gives me encouragement under my present difficult undertaking. The same power can also effect a change upon those hardened ungodly sinners to whom I am about to carry the words of eternal life.
“January 1st, 1794.—A new year. I wish this day to renew my covenant with God, and to give myself up to his service more than ever I have done heretofore. May my little love be increased, my weak faith strengthened, and hope confirmed.”
In this humble yet trustful spirit, Mr. Marsden entered his new field of labour. On board the ship there were a number of convicts, whose daring wickedness—in which, indeed, they were countenanced by the whole conduct of the captain and his crew—grieved his righteous soul from day to day; while at the same time it prepared him, in some measure, for scenes amidst which his life was to be spent. “I am surrounded,” he says, “with evil-disposed persons, thieves, adulterers, and blasphemers. May God keep me from evil, that I may not be tainted by the evil practices of those amongst whom I live.” His last sermon was preached, “notwithstanding the unwillingness there was in all on board to hear the word of God,” from the vision of dry bones (Ezekiel xxvxii.) “I found some liberty, and afterwards more comfort in my own soul. I wish to be found faithful at last, and to give up my account with joy to God.” To add to his anxieties, Mrs. Marsden was confined on shipboard, in stormy weather, and under circumstances peculiarly distressing, “though both the mother and daughter did well.” But the same day the scene brightened; the perils and privations of the voyage were drawing to a close, and they were in sight of their future home—that magnificent Australia—destined hereafter to assume, perhaps, a foremost place among the nations of the earth, though scarcely known to Europe when Mr. Marsden first stepped upon its shores; and valued only by the British government as a settlement for the refuse of our jails. He thus gives utterance to the feelings of a grateful heart:—
“March 2nd.—I shall ever retain a grateful sense of the mercies received this day, and the deliverances wrought. The Lord is good, and a stronghold in the day of trouble, and knows them that fear him.... As soon as I had the opportunity to go upon deck, I had the happiness again to behold the land: it was a very pleasing sight, as we had not seen it since the 3rd of December. We came up with the Cape about noon.”
In a few days, Mr. Marsden had taken up his abode in the “barracks” of Paramatta, a few miles from Port Jackson, and entered upon his arduous and toilsome duties as chaplain to the colony. His first Sunday in Australia is thus described:—“Saw several persons at work as I went along, to whom I spoke, and warned them of the evil of sabbath-breaking. My mind was deeply affected with the wickedness I beheld going on. I spoke from the 6th chapter of Revelation.—‘Behold the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?’ As I was returning home, a young man followed me into the wood, and told me how he was distressed for the salvation of his soul. He seemed to manifest the strongest marks of contrition, and to be truly awakened to a sense of his danger. I hope the Lord will have many souls in this place.” He had, for a short time, a single associate, in the Rev. Mr. Johnson, the senior chaplain, a good and useful minister, but unequal to the difficulties peculiar to his situation. This gentleman soon relinquished his appointment, and returned to England. And thus Mr. Marsden was left alone with a charge which might have appalled the stoutest heart, and under which even his would have given way, had he not learned to cast himself for help on One who comforted the apostle, under circumstances of the keenest suffering, with the assurance, “My grace is sufficient for thee.” On that grace our missionary chaplain trusted; and he found it all-sufficient.
CHAPTER II.
Discovery and early History of New South Wales—Becomes a Penal Settlement—Its state, moral and religious, on Mr. Marsden’s arrival.
The colony in which Mr. Marsden was now entering on his labours, and on which he was to leave the impression both of his holy zeal, and his far-sighted practical wisdom, is one of whose history our readers may naturally wish to have some account. We shall therefore suspend our narrative for a few pages, and lay before them a brief sketch of the earlier days of the great Australian colony.
Europeans are indebted for their first knowledge of the existence of the vast country which now bears the name of Australia, to the enterprise of Spain and Holland, when these nations were at the head of the world’s commerce, two centuries and a half ago. In 1607, Luis de Torres, who was sent out by the Spanish government on a voyage of discovery, passed through the straits which still bear his name, and which separate New Guinea from the greater continent of Australia; but he was not aware of its vast extent, and merely concluded that the coasts along which he sailed were those of a group of islands. Just about the same time, the Dutch explored the eastern shores of what has since been termed the Gulf of Carpentaria; and their knowledge of Australia was extended by subsequent voyagers, of whom the chief was Abel Tasman. In 1642, he discovered Van Diemen’s Land, which was long supposed to be a part of the great continent named by the Dutch New Holland—the Australia of modern times. Known as Tasmania, Van Diemen’s Land now immortalizes the great sea-captain. But these discoveries led to no immediate results of importance; and for upwards of a century New Holland was laid down, in charts and maps, as a region whose coasts were not defined, and whose interior was utterly unknown. Early in the reign of George the Third a noble spirit of enterprise animated the British government. Voyages of discovery were undertaken in the Southern Seas, under Captains Wallace, Carteret, and others; and at length the celebrated Captain Cook may be said to have retrieved a new world from romance and fable, and to have made it over to England and to the best interests of mankind.