“Are there no Moravians in the Moon, that not a missionary has yet visited this poor pagan planet of ours, to civilize civilisation and christianize Christendom?”

— Herman Melville, book White-Jacket

This has often been quoted with modernized American spelling, rendering it "to civilize civilization and christianize Christendom?"
Source: White-Jacket (1850), Ch. 64

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

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Herman Melville144

American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet 1818–1891

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“When Christianity came into the world the task was simply to proclaim Christianity. The same is the case wherever Christianity is introduced into a country the religion of which is not Christianity.
In "Christendom" the situation is a different one. What we have before us is not Christianity but a prodigious illusion, and the people are not pagans but live in the blissful conceit that they are Christians. So if in this situation Christianity is to be introduced, first of all the illusion must be disposed of.”

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“I'll try a pagan friend, thought I, since Christian kindness has proved but hollow courtesy.”

Herman Melville (1818–1891) American novelist, short story writer, essayist, and poet

“The indirect influence of Christianity has been to quicken Hinduism to life. The cultured Hindu society has admitted its grievous sin against the untouchables. But the effect of Christianity upon India in general must be judged by the life lived in our midst by the average Christian and its effect upon us. I am sorry to have to re record my opinion that it has been disastrous. It pains me to have to say that the Christian missionaries as a body, with honourable exceptions, have actively supported a system which has impoverished, enervated and demoralised a people considered to be among the gentlest and most civilized on earth…”

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"Has Christianity Failed?" http://books.google.com/books?id=C1cCAAAAIAAJ&q=&quot;even+of+death+Christianity+has+made+a+terror+which+was+unknown+to+the+gay+calmness+of+the+Pagan+and+the+stoical+repose+of+the+Indian&quot;&pg=PA215#v=onepage, in the The North American Review (February 1891)

“The virtue of Paganism was strength: the virtue of Christianity is obedience.”

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“Scratch the Christian and you find the pagan — spoiled.”

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“Thrift and foresight are among the chief teachings of all missionaries to the poor and the present day world has little sympathy for any parent”

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also see Charles Dickens, Bleak House
p. 60
Why We Fail as Christians (1919)
Context: Thrift and foresight are among the chief teachings of all missionaries to the poor and the present day world has little sympathy for any parent—whether a Harold Skimpole, a Mrs. Jellyby, a Jean Jacques Rousseau, or a Leo Tolstoy—who for any cause whatsoever feels that he should give no thought for the morrow and that his children may live like the fowls of the air.

“The Christmas-Festival is in one sense only, a Christian festival. It is based upon something belonging to the Greek and Roman paganism which the Christians took over. It is therefore older than Christianity. It is 'pagan,' to use the popular word.”

Gottfried de Purucker (1874–1942) Author, Theosophist

Source: The Story of Jesus (1938), Chapter 2

“Things impolitic and dangerous:
praise for Greek ideals,
supernatural magic, visits to pagan temples.”

Constantine P. Cavafy (1863–1933) Greek poet

Julian in Nicomedia http://www.cavafy.com/poems/content.asp?id=106&cat=1 Collected Poems (1992) Context: Things impolitic and dangerous: praise for Greek ideals, supernatural magic, visits to pagan temples. Enthusiasm for the ancient gods

“Are there no Moravians in the Moon, that not a missionary has yet visited this poor pagan planet of ours, to civilize civilisation and christianize Christendom?”

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Herman Melville144

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