With reference to his sister’s reading, he continues:—­’Take care of Maurice, Fan; I do not think it too much to say that he is simply and plainly “unsound” on the doctrine of the Atonement; I don’t charge him with heresy from his stand-point, but remember that you have not been brought into contact with Quakers, Socinians, &c., and that he may conceive of a way of reconciling metaphysically difficulties which a far inferior but less inquisitive and vorsehender geist pronounces for itself simply contrary to the word of God.  There are two Greek prepositions which contain the gist of the whole matter, huper, in behalf of, and anti, instead of, in the place of.  Maurice’s doctrine goes far to do away with the truth of the last, as applied to the Sacrifice of Christ.  I have an exceedingly high regard for him, and respect for his goodness no less than his ability.  His position has exposed him to very great difficulties, and therefore, if he is decidedly wrong, it is not for us to judge him.  Read his “Kingdom of Christ,” and his early books; but he is on very slippery and dangerous ground now.  It is indeed a great and noble task to propose to oneself, viz.—­to teach that God is our Father, and to expose the false and most unhappy idea that has at times prevailed of representing God as actuated by strong indignation, resentment, &c., against the human race, so that men turned from Him as from some fearful avenging power.  This is the worst form of Anthropomorphism, but this is not the Scriptural idea of a just God.  We cannot, perhaps, conceive of absolute justice; certainly we are no judges of God’s own revealed scheme of reconciling Justice with Law, and so I call Maurice’s, to a certain extent, human teaching, more philosophy than religion, more metaphysics than revelation.’

On the 22nd the Ordination took place, and the second Maori deacon was ordained, Levi (or according to Maori pronunciation, Eivata) Ahea, a man of about thirty-eight, whose character had long been tested.  Immediately after, the Bishop, Mrs. Selwyn, Mr. Patteson, and the new deacon, set forth on a coasting expedition in the new vessel.

The language of the journal becomes nautical, and strong in praise of the conduct of the little ship, which took the party first to Nelson, where Sunday, the 7th of October, was spent, the Bishop going ashore while Patteson held a service for the sailors on board, first going round to the vessels anchored in the harbour to invite the men’s attendance, but without much success.  On the 10th he wrote:—­

’Already I feel to a certain extent naturalized.  I do not think I should despair of qualifying myself in three months for the charge of a native parish.  I don’t mean that I know the niceties of the language so as to speak it always correctly, but I should be able to communicate with them on ordinary subjects, and to preach and catechize.  But, after all, Melanesia is becoming more and more a substantial reality.’