Recent History Of The Same People In Brief.
“In the Fiji islands, where half a century ago the favorite dish of food was human flesh, there are at present eight hundred [pg 148] and forty-one chapels, and two hundred and ninety-one other places where preaching is held, with fifty-eight missionaries busily engaged in preparing the way for others. The membership numbers twenty-three thousand two hundred and seventy-four persons.” The Evangelist of January 29, 1880. It is possible that some infidel might have been literally eaten up had it not been for the influence of the Bible. “According to the accounts of some of the older chiefs, whom we may believe or not as we like, there was once a time when cannibalism did not exist. Many years ago some strangers from a distant land were blown upon the shores of Fiji, and received hospitably by the islanders, who incorporated them into their own tribes, and made much of them. But, in process of time, these people became too powerful, killed the Fijian chiefs, took their wives and property, and usurped their office.”
In the emergency the people consulted the priests, who said that the Fijians had brought their misfortunes upon themselves. They had allowed strangers to live, whereas “Fiji for the Fijians” was the golden rule, and from that time every male stranger was to be killed and eaten, and every woman taken as a wife. The only people free from this law were the Tongans.
The state of the Fijians is wonderfully changed—even an American infidel may now visit those people without being flayed and roasted and devoured.
“The Samoan islands have been entirely christianized. Out of a population of forty thousand, thirty-five thousand are connected with Christian churches.
“In 1830 the native Christians in India, Burmah, and North and South Ceylon numbered 57,000. Last October there were 460,000. Facts similar in character might be given of Madagascar, South Africa and Japan.” Evangelist. What a curse (?) the Bible is to the poor heathen. It robs them of their “long-pig,” human flesh, as well as their cruel, murderous habits, and curses them (?) with virtue and the hope of “heaven.”
Are We Simply Animals?
What is man? The materialist says, “He is the highest order of the animal kingdom, or an animal gifted with intelligence.” If such be true, it may be said with equal propriety, that animals are men without reason. Are they? Does manhood consist in mere physical form? Can you find it in simple physical nature? Man holds many things in his physical nature in common with the animal; but is he, on this account, to be considered as a mere animal? There are plants that seem to form a bridge over the chasm lying between the vegetable and animal kingdoms. Are those plants animals without sensation? Why not? What is the logical and scientific difference between saying plants, which make the nearest approach to the animal are animals without sensation, and saying animals are men without intelligence? Let it be understood at all times, that if man is simply an animal endowed with the gift of reason, an animal may be simply a vegetable endowed with the gift of sensation. “The bodies of mere animals are clothed with scales, feathers, fur, wool or bristles, which interpose between the skin and the elements that surround and affect the living animal.” All these insensible protectors “ally animals more closely to the nature of vegetables.”