"No one will ever tell in full the heroism or the stupidity of the foreign missions, the holiness-saturated devotion of the missionaries or their invincible foolishness. There were only two agencies for the extension of civilization on a large scale, armies and missions, and in the light of history the primitives who drew the armies were much the better off. The missionary was a man glad to submerge self in a holy cause but, except in a minority so small it does not count, his dedication locked him away from reality so completely that at this distance he seems crazed if not crazy. The heathen were not people to him: they were souls."
Bernard DeVoto

January 1, 1970

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Added on April 10, 2026
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Original Language: English

Sources

Ch. 8: To Men Benighted. 1834 (p. 201)

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bernard_DeVoto