Daily observation more and more convinced the brethren of the injury the baptized and the inquirers had sustained while they continued to live among their heathen countrymen; the constant incitements to their superstitious sinful customs, and to their heathenish juggling and games, they were frequently little able to resist, especially when their old inclinations were seconded by the calls of affection or friendship.  When, for example, some spell was to be tried on a sick relative, and any of those who had been taught something of Christianity opposed it, they were reproached with hating the invalid, and wishing him dead.  Another source of seduction to the half-informed heathen, was the use which the Angekoks made of the little knowledge of Christianity which they had obtained.  These sorcerers, who are held in great veneration and dread by the people, and whose atrocities, as well as their pretended inspirations, render them objects of terror; when they saw the influence of the missionaries, and felt their own importance begin to shake, introduced into their incantations the name of Jesus, whom they acknowledged to be a powerful supernatural being, inferior only to Torngak—­and the believers themselves were apt to retain and to mix some of their old opinions with their new creed.

To preserve these tender plants from the contagious breath of a heathen atmosphere, the brethren determined that in future, they should have fixed habitations adjacent to their own dwelling, and they erected houses in a substantial fashion not far from the missionary station, into which they received no Esquimaux except such as expressed their sincere resolution to renounce heathenism.  In Hopedale they had often experienced the baleful consequences of being in the neighbourhood of the heathen at Avertok.  This was peculiarly evident from a declaration of some of the baptized who had spent the winter among them.  A meeting was called on the 12th April 1786, to consult about the subject, when all the men inhabiting the station attended; it was held in the open air, and as the weather was exceedingly fine, continued for upwards of three hours.  Here the brethren were informed of the transactions which had taken place the winter before, and one professed believer thought himself bound to make a confession of the superstitious and sinful practices in which he had formerly engaged.  As these were among the actions and deeds which ought not so much as to be named among Christians, the brethren strictly forbade any such confessions in future, but particularly in public, and before the heathen; who being strongly addicted to the same abominations, and unable to distinguish between a penitent confession and an actual approval, might be hardened in their sins by hearing such narratives, which they would naturally conclude proceeded from the pleasure the persons still took in practices they delighted to talk of.