The average person, of average acquaintance with the history of our country, knows but little of the missionary labors of our Christian ancestors. He remembers hearing something, or reading somewhere, about a certain John Eliot, a Puritan preacher, who tried for years to Christianize some Indian communities near Boston; and to him Eliot was simply a visionary and a gently-stubborn fanatic, unpractical and unreasonable as the enthusiastic preacher sometimes is; but of course Eliot was the only preacher foolish enough to try to Christianize Indians; and the slow development and the final decay of Eliot's enterprise proved conclusively the utter folly and futility of giving the white man's religion to the red man, and also proved conclusively that Eliot himself was little more than a dreamer, or a monomaniac, to foresee his cause triumphant finally over countless impossibilities. Christian preachers and people generally devote themselves to labors more profitable and objects more sensible.
Frederic Baraga’s Short History of the North American Indians Edited and translated by Graham MacDonald
