Pioneers of the Cross

(A sketch of the missionary activity of the Jesuits among the Indians in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries)

Ad majorem Dei gloriam.

The broad current of the Hudson River, bathing one side of New York, cuts its path toward the ocean amid picturesque mountains. Along the very shore, conforming to all its capricious windings, runs a railroad, along which trains constantly rush with American speed. While traveling once over this wonderful line into the interior of the country, I admired both the beauties of nature and the dizzying bustle of life and movement—on land and on water. Along the shore trains are constantly rushing to meet and parallel each other, on the river stretches an endless caravan of vessels and steamships, and on the charming riverside hills nestle pretty cottages and farms, and with trim spires the Gothic towers of churches rise to the sky. At the sight of this bustling vitality all around, my thoughts involuntarily turned back several centuries. Just two centuries ago, here was a wilderness: instead of three-deck steamships, occasionally glided wretched birch-bark canoes of savages; instead of a riverside railroad, through the forest thickness wound barely visible paths, and instead of the noise of present industrial bustle, silence reigned, broken only occasionally by the war cry of Indians. What immeasurable contrast! Such a change has occurred with the other great streams of the North American continent—the St. Lawrence and Mississippi Rivers. Who first brought Christian civilization here? This is a very interesting question, and investigation of it opens one of the astonishing pages of American history.

The exploration and colonization of the country proceeded slowly. At the end of the sixteenth and beginning of the seventeenth centuries, European colonies began timidly to settle the coasts of North America. From the south colonization was conducted by the Spanish, from the north by the French, and from the east by the Dutch and English. On the site of present-day New York, in the seventeenth century stood a miserable Dutch colony, New Amsterdam, and farther north on the St. Lawrence River a insignificant French fort, Quebec. Beyond the coastal strip lay an unknown country, inhabited by unknown people. Behind the colony walls stretched impenetrable forests, into the depths of which settlers did not dare venture, however great their greed for profit from the expensive furs which they saw among the Indians. The first pioneers who carried Christian civilization into the interior of the country were Christian missionaries, Jesuits or “black robes,” as the Indians called them for their long black garments, and to them belongs exclusively the honor of exploring the depths of the North American continent. The most valiant of them were French Jesuits. Their deeds constitute an almost legendary epic in the history of the country, all the more remarkable in that all its features are composed of real historical facts[1]. If this missionary activity is not unparalleled in the power of Christian self-denial, it is nonetheless unique in the environment in which the Jesuits had to act. Here Christianity encountered the lowest degree to which humanity could have fallen in religious and moral terms, and the highest Christian culture, embodied in highly educated Jesuits, collided with its opposite—in the form of the savage Indians.

Footnotes

[1] The history of this remarkable period, by some strange chance, has been very little worked on in American literature. Until now, only one specialized study has been devoted to it, namely Parkman’s work—The Jesuits in North America in XVII century (Boston 1867), which forms the second part of his larger work titled: France and England in North America. Then several chance studies in various large courses of American history, for example in Bancroft’s History of United States (12th edition 1850 vol. III), Shea’s Catholic missions, a few articles and monographs in Catholic journals—and nothing more. Meanwhile, this period presents a mass of raw material waiting for its working up. These are reports, notes, and letters left by the very actors in the missionary field. Almost every missionary kept records of his life and activity, and all of them annually present precious material for becoming acquainted with the life, manners, and beliefs of the Native peoples. Some of them have been published in English translation, for example in the book Kip’s The early Jesuit missions in North America 1846 (the whole book consists of a simple translation of Jesuit letters) and Shea’s Discovery and Exploration of the Mississippi Valley; but most remain to this day in the French original, and moreover in editions not widely distributed. We had at hand both translated and original editions, which we were able to use in the best libraries of New York—the Astor Library and the Mercantile Library. The original under the general title: Relations des Jesuites. Quebec 1858. In three volumes.

Pioneers of the Cross

Пионеры Креста