Excerpt from A Missionary Voyage to the Southern Pacific Ocean: Performed in the Years 1796, 1797, 1798, in the Ship Duff, Commanded by Captain James Wilson; Compiled From Journals of the Officers and the Missionaries The relation which geographical knowledge bears to mifiionary exertion is as obvious as it is important. If fincere and enlightened Chrifiians had been attentive to the magnitude, the population, and the moral and religious Rate of the countries which are {till deftitute of the gofpel, it feems impoflible that they fhould ever have remitted their labours for the converfion of the heathen. A deficiency of information upon thefe interefiing fubjeé'ts is not merely to be la mented as an occafion of fatal negligence; it is alfo to be guarded againfi as a caufe of error, and of failure, in the conduét of mifiionary cfiorts. If thefe are excited only by cafual difcoveries of the wretched condition in which fome detached parts of the heathen world exift, other nations are liable to be difregarded, which, in a variety of refpefis, might be preferable objefts of evangelical miflions. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.