But the apostle resisted both the craft of the politician and the
fierceness of the warrior.

"Treat these sons of the forest as men and brethren,'' he would say;
"and let us endeavor to make them Christians. Their forefathers were of
that chosen race whom God delivered from Egyptian bondage. Perchance he
has destined us to deliver the children from the more cruel bondage of
ignorance and idolatry. Chiefly for this end, it may be, we were
directed across the ocean."

When these other visitors were gone, Mr. Eliot bent himself again over
the half-written page. He dared hardly relax a moment from his toil. He
felt that, in the book which he was translating, there was a deep human
as well as heavenly wisdom, which would of itself suffice to civilize
and refine the savage tribes. Let the Bible be diffused among them, and
all earthly good would follow. But how slight a consideration was this,
when he reflected that the eternal welfare of a whole race of men
depended upon his accomplishment of the task which he had set himself!
What if his hands should be palsied? What if his mind should lose its
vigor? What if death should come upon him ere the work were done? Then
must the red man wander in the dark wilderness of heathenism forever.

Impelled by such thoughts as these, he sat writing in the great chair
when the pleasant summer breeze came in through his open casement; and
also when the fire of forest logs sent up its blaze and smoke, through
the broad stone chimney, into the wintry air. Before the earliest bird
sang in the morning the apostle's lamp was kindled; and, at midnight,
his weary head was not yet upon its pillow. And at length, leaning back
in the great chair, he could say to himself, with a holy triumph, "The