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Title: The American Missionary — Volume 37, No. 12, December, 1883
Author: Various
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The American Missionary — Volume 37, No. 12, December, 1883" ***
by Cornell University Digital Collections)
[Illustration: DECEMBER, 1883.
VOL. XXXVII.
NO. 12.
The American Missionary]
CONTENTS
* * * * *
PAGE.
PARAGRAPHS 353
PROCEEDINGS AT ANNUAL MEETING 354
TREASURER’S REPORT 356
ABSTRACT OF THE GENERAL SURVEY 357
SAVINGS AT THE ANNUAL MEETING 359
ADDRESS OF REV. J. E. RANKIN, D.D. 360
MISSIONARY LITERATURE, BY REV. GEO. M. BOYNTON 362
REPORT ON CHINESE WORK 366
ADDRESS OF REV. WM. A. BARTLETT, D.D. 367
REPORT ON INDIAN WORK 370
ADDRESS OF REV. DR. ANDERSON 371
ADDRESS OF REV. J. C. PRICE 373
CASTE IN AMERICA, BY SECRETARY STRIEBY 376
REPORT ON EDUCATIONAL WORK 382
ADDRESS BY PRESIDENT S. C. BARTLETT 383
CHRISTIAN EDUCATION AT THE SOUTH, BY REV. DR. GLADDEN 385
ADDRESS OF PROF. C. G. FAIRCHILD 391
REPORT ON CHURCH WORK 393
ADDRESS OF REV. T. P. PRUDDEN 396
REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON FINANCE 397
ADDRESS OF REV. D. O. MEARS, D.D. 398
ADDRESS OF REV. W. M. TAYLOR, D.D. 401
ADDRESS OF REV. DR. DENNEN 404
ADDRESS OF PROF. BARBOUR 406
RECEIPTS 408
CONSTITUTION 412
* * * * *
NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION,
Rooms, 56 Reade Street.
* * * * *
Price 50 Cents a Year, in Advance.
Entered at the Post-Office at New York, N.Y.,
as second-class matter.
THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION.
* * * * *
PRESIDENT.
Hon. WM. B. WASHBURN, LL.D., Mass.
VICE-PRESIDENTS.
REV. C. L. GOODELL, D.D.; REV. F. A. NOBLE, D.D.;
REV. A. J. F. BEHRENDS, D.D.; REV. J. E. RANKIN, D.D.;
REV. ALEX. MCKENZIE, D.D.
CORRESPONDING SECRETARY.—REV. M. E. STRIEBY, D.D.,
_56 Reade Street, N.Y._
TREASURER.—H. W. HUBBARD, ESQ., _56 Reade Street, N.Y._
AUDITORS.—WM. A. NASH, W. H. ROGERS.
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE.
JOHN H. WASHBURN, Chairman; A. P. FOSTER, Secretary; LYMAN ABBOTT,
A. S. BARNES, J. R. DANFORTH, CLINTON B. FISK, S. B. HALLIDAY,
EDWARD HAWES, SAMUEL HOLMES, CHARLES A. HULL, SAMUEL S. MARPLES,
CHARLES L. MEAD, S. H. VIRGIN, WM. H. WARD, J. L. WITHROW.
DISTRICT SECRETARIES.
Rev. C. L. WOODWORTH, D.D., _Boston_.
Rev. G. D. PIKE, D.D., _New York_.
Rev. JAMES POWELL, _Chicago_.
COMMUNICATIONS
relating to the work of the Association may be addressed to
the Corresponding Secretary; those relating to the collecting
fields, to the District Secretaries; letters for the Editor of
the “American Missionary.” to Rev. G. D. Pike, D.D., at the New
York Office; letters for the Bureau of Woman’s Work, to Miss D. E.
Emerson, at the New York Office.
DONATIONS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS
may be sent to H. W. Hubbard, Treasurer, 56 Reade Street, New York,
or, when more convenient, to either of the Branch Offices, 21
Congregational House, Boston, Mass., or 112 West Washington Street,
Chicago, Ill. A payment of thirty dollars at one time constitutes a
Life Member.
FORM OF A BEQUEST.
“I BEQUEATH to my executor (or executors) the sum of ——— dollars,
in trust, to pay the same in ——— days after my decease to the
person who, when the same is payable, shall act as Treasurer of the
‘American Missionary Association,’ of New York City, to be applied,
under the direction of the Executive Committee of the Association,
to its charitable uses and purposes.” The Will should be attested
by three witnesses.
* * * * *
[Illustration: Count Rumford.]
HORSFORD’S
ACID PHOSPHATE.
(LIQUID.)
FOR DYSPEPSIA, MENTAL AND PHYSICAL
EXHAUSTION, NERVOUSNESS,
DIMINISHED VITALITY, URINARY
DIFFICULTIES, ETC.
PREPARED ACCORDING TO THE DIRECTION OF
Prof. E. N. Horsford, of Cambridge, Mass.
There seems to be no difference of opinion in high medical
authority of the value of phosphoric acid, and no preparation has
ever been offered to the public which seems to so happily meet the
general want as this.
It is not nauseous, but agreeable to the taste.
No danger can attend its use.
Its action will harmonize with such stimulants as are necessary to
take.
It makes a delicious drink with water and sugar only.
Prices reasonable. Pamphlet giving further particulars mailed free
on application.
MANUFACTURED BY THE
RUMFORD CHEMICAL WORKS,
Providence, R.I.,
AND FOR SALE BY ALL DRUGGISTS.
* * * * *
MANHATTAN
LIFE INS. CO. OF NEW YORK,
_156 and 158 Broadway._
THIRTY-THIRD YEAR.
DESCRIPTION—One of the oldest, strongest, best.
POLICIES—Incontestable, non-forfeitable, definite cash
surrender values.
RATES—Safe, low, and participating or not, as desired.
RISKS carefully selected.
PROMPT, liberal dealing.
GENERAL AGENTS AND CANVASSERS WANTED in desirable territory, to
whom permanent employment and liberal compensation will be given.
Address
H. STOKES, President.
H. Y. WEMPLE, Sec’y. J. L. HALSEY, 1st V.-P.
S. N. STEBBINS, Act’y. H. B. STOKES, 2d V.-P.
THE AMERICAN MISSIONARY.
* * * * *
VOL. XXXVII. DECEMBER, 1883. No. 12.
* * * * *
American Missionary Association.
* * * * *
We send this number of the MISSIONARY to some who do not receive
it regularly, hoping they will find it of such interest, and the
work it represents of so much concern, that they will be induced to
become regular subscribers. The price is 50 cents.
* * * * *
_Fifty Gold Dollars._—One of the newly-elected members of our
Executive Committee has placed in our treasury fifty gold dollars,
given to him to be used in charity, at his discretion, by a friend
in New Haven, who adopted this method of commemorating his fiftieth
birthday. The example is a good one, and we hope there are scores
of others who will follow it without necessarily waiting until they
are fifty before doing so.
* * * * *
ANNUAL MEETING.
The Annual Meeting of this Association, held in Brooklyn, will be
remembered as one of special interest for several reasons: (1.)
The work done during the year was unusually encouraging; and the
reports of the committees on the several parts were discriminating
and full. (2.) The financial exhibit, showing once more a surplus
of receipts over expenditure, with, however, a falling off in
the income from the living, was examined with candor and with
warm recommendations for more liberal gifts. (3.) A topic of much
interest to the Association and to an honored sister missionary
society was considered at length in several papers, which we
present to our readers in full, without, however, intending to
hold the Association responsible for the individual views therein
expressed.
The great number of the reports, papers and addresses compels us
to select and abridge, reserving some for publication in future
numbers of the MISSIONARY or in the Annual Report. Papers relating
to work for women will appear in the January number of the
MISSIONARY, and the Sermon, as usual, will be found in the Annual
Report.
* * * * *
ABSTRACT OF PROCEEDINGS AT THE ANNUAL MEETING.
The Thirty-seventh Annual Meeting of the American Missionary
Association was held in the commodious Central Congregational
Church, Brooklyn, N.Y., beginning Tuesday, Oct. 30, at 3 P.M. In
the absence of the President, detained by illness, Rev. J. E.
Rankin, D.D., one of the Vice-Presidents, presided. Rev. C. P.
Osborne was appointed Scribe, and Revs. F. E. Snow and G. P. Lane
Assistant Scribes. Committees were appointed as follows:
_On Nominations._ Rev. G. R. W. Scott, D.D., Rev. Wm. A. Robinson,
Hon. David N. Camp, Rev. E. O. Bartlett and Rev. P. B. Davis.
_Business._ Rev. A. J. F. Behrends, D.D., Rev. W. W. Scudder, D.D.,
Rev. Frank Ayer, Rev. E. B. Palmer, H. H. Ricker, Esq.
_Arrangements._ A. S. Barnes, Esq., Chas. A. Hull, Esq., Rev. G. D.
Pike, D.D., Wm. G. Hoople, Esq., Richard M. Montgomery, Esq., G.
Johnson, Jr., Esq. and Rev. S. B. Halliday.
_Indian Missions._ Rev. Joseph Anderson, D.D., Rev. C. C. Painter,
Gen. S. C. Armstrong, Rev. Cushing Eells, D.D., and Mr. Wm. H.
McKinney.
_Chinese Missions._ Rev. Wm. Alvin Bartlett, D.D., Rev. Geo. M.
Boynton, Rev. Evarts Scudder, Rev. S. L. Blake, D.D., and Rev. Geo.
S. Smith.
_Educational Work._ President S. C. Bartlett, D.D., Rev. Washington
Gladden, D.D., Rev. C. G. Fairchild, Rev. G. L. Ewell, Rev. E. W.
Bacon.
_Church Work._ Prof. Llewellyn Pratt, Rev. T. P. Prudden, Rev. C.
L. Woodworth, D.D., Rev. Isaac Hall, Rev. G. F. Gleason.
_Finance._ Dea. Eliezur Porter, Rev. William M. Taylor, D.D., Rev.
D. O. Mears, D.D., Hon. H. D. Smith, Rev. Erastus Blakeslee.
H. W. Hubbard, Esq., Treasurer, read his annual report, which
was referred to the Committee on Finance. Rev. J. E. Roy, D.D.,
presented the report of the Executive Committee, which was referred
to the appropriate committees. Rev. G. M. Boynton read the report
of the Committee on the Constitution, which was referred to a
special committee. A half hour was spent in prayer and song.
Tuesday evening, at 7:30, Rev. Joseph Anderson, D.D., conducted
devotional services, and Rev. J. L. Withrow, D.D., of Boston,
preached the annual sermon, from Luke, 9:24. Rev. A. J. F.
Behrends, D.D., made an address of welcome. The Lord’s Supper was
administered by Rev. Samuel Scoville and Rev. W. S. Palmer, D.D.
Wednesday morning, Rev. R. B. Howard conducted a half-hour
prayer-meeting. At 9 o’clock Dr. Rankin took the chair and read
an address on “The Gospel of Christ our only Solvent for Race
Difficulties.” A committee to confer with the Conference Committee
of the Am. Home Miss. Society selected at Saratoga, was appointed
as follows: President, S. C. Bartlett, D.D.; Rev. J. L. Withrow,
D.D., Rev. Washington Gladden, D.D., Rev. D. O. Mears, D.D., and
Rev. Wm. H. Ward, D.D.
Rev. D. K. Flickinger, D.D., Secretary of the Board of the United
Brethren in Christ, gave an account of the Mendi Mission.
Rev. A. H. Bradford read a paper on “Woman in Modern Charity
and Missions.” Rev. G. M. Boynton read a paper on “The Place of
Missionary Literature in the Conversion of the World.”
Prof. Albert Salisbury, of Atlanta, Ga., read a paper entitled:
“For What are We Sent?” Rev. A. A. Myers, of Williamsburg, Ky.,
read a paper on the “Mountain White Work.”
Five-minute speeches were made by Rev. Isaac H. Hall, of New
Orleans, La.; Rev. Geo. S. Smith, of Raleigh, N.C., and Rev.
Alfred Connet, of McLeansville, N.C.
Wednesday afternoon, Rev. W. H. Ward, D.D., made a report on a
visit to the Dakota mission. The report of the Committee on Indian
Missions was read by Rev. Joseph Anderson, D.D., Chairman, and
addresses upon Indian affairs were made by Dr. Anderson, Rev.
Cushing Eells, D.D., Rev. Samuel G. Rankin and Rev. Anson Gleason,
formerly missionary to the Choctaws. The report of the Committee on
Chinese Missions was presented by Rev. Wm. Alvin Bartlett, D.D.,
Chairman, who also made an address.
On motion of Rev. S. Wolcott, D.D., Resolved, That we place
on record our thorough disapproval, as an Association, of the
exclusive and prohibitory legislation of our government relative
to the Chinese. The report of the Committee on the Constitution
was presented by Rev. W. S. Palmer, Chairman, and accepted. After
discussion the Amended Constitution was adopted with no dissenting
vote.
Evening Session.—Devotional Services were conducted by Rev. J. M.
Whiton, Ph. D. Addresses were made by a Chinaman, Ju Sing, from
Oakland, Cal.; by an Indian, Wm. Harrison McKinney, of the Choctaw
Nation, Indian Territory, a recent graduate of Roanoke University;
by a negro, Rev. J. C. Price, of Salisbury, N. C., graduate of
Lincoln University in 1879, and by Secretary James Powell. The
exercises were interspersed with singing by a choir of nine young
Chinamen, resident in Brooklyn and members of the Central Church
Sunday-School.
Thursday Morning.—The half-hour prayer meeting was conducted by
Rev. Geo. S. Smith. At 9 o’clock Dr. Rankin resumed the chair.
Secretary M. E. Strieby read a paper on “Caste in America.”
President S. C. Bartlett read the report of the Committee on
Educational Work and made an address on that subject. A committee
to consider Secretary Strieby’s paper on “Caste in America”
was appointed, consisting of Deacon Samuel Holmes, General E.
Whittlesey, Rev. S. Wolcott, D.D., Rev. G. M. Boynton, Rev. D.
L. Furber, D.D. Rev. Washington Gladden, D.D., made an address
on “Illiteracy in the South.” Rev. Edward W. Bacon, Rev. C.
G. Fairchild, and Rev. John L. Ewell, made addresses upon the
different phases of educational work at the South. Brief remarks
were also made by Rev. A. P. Foster and Rev. R. B. Howard.
Thursday Afternoon.—After devotional services, Professor Llewellyn
Pratt, D.D., read the report of the Committee on Church Work, and
Rev. T. P. Prudden followed with an address. Rev. Erastus Blakeslee
read the report of the Committee on Finance. Dr. Wm. M. Taylor
made an address on “What the Bible Says About Giving.” Rev. D. O.
Mears, D.D., made an address on “The Function and Privilege of
the Churches.” Mrs. A. A. Myers, of Kentucky, read a statement
regarding the mountain people of the South.
The following resolution was passed: “Whereas, the Finance
Committee, after careful examination of the needs of the
Association, have recommended that the contributions of churches,
Sunday-schools and individuals for the coming year be increased
50 per cent, above the amount given by them during the past year,
therefore, Resolved, That we approve this recommendation of the
Finance Committee, and urge contributors everywhere to increase
their contributions accordingly.”
The Committee appointed to consider Secretary Strieby’s paper on
Caste in America made report through the Chairman, Dea. S. Holmes.
Officers for the coming year were elected as printed on second page
of cover.
The following resolution offered by Rev. E. Blakeslee was adopted:
Resolved, That if the Executive Committee now elected have any
question as to their legal status under the Constitution, they
be and hereby are authorized to take legal advice thereon, and,
if competent to do so, to arrange themselves in three classes
according to the terms of the new Constitution.
Thursday Evening.—Rev. A. P. Foster conducted the devotional
services.
Addresses were made by Rev. S. R. Dennen on “Spiritual Life
the Supreme Power in Your Work,” and by Dr. Wm. M. Barbour, on
“Spiritual Vitality the Crowning Necessity in Missionary Work.”
A resolution of thanks offered by Secretary Woodworth was adopted,
and Dr. Behrends responded for the Brooklyn people in fitting
terms, and the meeting was dissolved.
All the sessions were characterized by a hopeful spirit and by deep
spirituality which found frequent expression in the voice of prayer.
* * * * *
SUMMARY OF THE ANNUAL REPORT OF THE TREASURER OF THE AMERICAN
MISSIONARY ASSOCIATION FOR THE YEAR ENDING SEPT. 30th, 1883.
* * * * *
_RECEIPTS._
From Churches, Sabbath Schools, Missionary
Societies and Individuals $148,389.08
From Estates and Legacies 126,366.73
From Incomes, Sundry Funds 8,512.57
From Tuition and Public Funds 25,191.06
From Rents, Southern Property 848.85
From U.S. Government for Education of Indians 750.00
From Sale of Property 2,500.00
———————————$313,567.29
Balance on hand Sept. 30, 1882 789.83
———————————
$313,357.12
===========
_EXPENDITURES._
_The South._
For Church and Educational Work, Lands,
Buildings, etc. $230,022.15
_The Chinese._
For Superintendent, Teachers, Rent, etc. 11,021.90
_The Indians._
For Church and Educational Work 18,955.44
_Foreign Missions._
For Superintendent, Missionaries, etc., for
Mendi Mission 6,227.43
For John Brown Steamer 3,714.81
For Supplemental Arthington Fund 5,837.40
For Support Aged Missionary in Jamaica 332.50
_Publications._
For American Missionary (22,000 Monthly),
Annual Reports, Clerk Hire, Postage, etc. 6,795.95
_Agencies._
For EASTERN DISTRICT.—District Secretary,
Agent, Clerk Hire, Traveling Expenses,
Printing, Postage, Rent, etc. 5,693.10
For MIDDLE DISTRICT.—District Secretary,
Traveling Expenses, Printing, etc. 3,031.59
For WESTERN DISTRICT.—District Secretary,
Clerk Hire, Special Grant and Traveling
Expenses, etc.
4,074.53
_Administration._
For Corresponding Secretary, Treasurer,
Secretary of Women’s Bureau and Clerk Hire 8,866.50
_Miscellaneous._
For Rent, Care of Rooms, Furniture, Repairs,
Traveling Expenses, Books, Stationery,
Postage, Expressage, Telegrams, etc. 3,572.10
For Wills and Estates 1,987.96
For Annual Meeting 1,334.75
For Annuity Account, balance 986.55
For Expenses of Committee on Constitutional
Amendments 248.75
Amounts refunded, sent to the Treasurer by
mistake 105.39
—————————$312,808.80
Balance on hand Sept. 30, 1883 548.32
———————————
$313,357.12
===========
_Endowment Funds Received_, 1882-1883.
Tuthill King Fund, for Atlanta University $5,000.00
Tuthill King Fund, for Berea College 5,000.00
Theological Department, Howard University 1,100.00
N. M. and A. Stone Theological Scholarship,
for Talladega College 1,000.00
————————— $12,100.00
_Arthington Mission._
Received from Oct. 1, 1882, to Sept. 30, 1883 1,417.53
_Stone Building Fund._
Balance for Atlanta University, Stone Hall, paid 10,918.70
_RECAPITULATION._
Current Fund $312,567.29
Endowment Fund 12,100.00
Arthington Fund 1,417.53
Stone Fund, balance 10,918.70
———————————
$337,003.52
===========
The receipts of Berea College, Hampton N. and A. Institute,
and State appropriation of Georgia to Atlanta University,
are added below, as presenting at one view the contributions
of the same constituency for the general work in which the
Association is engaged:
American Missionary Association $337,003.52
Berea College 11,351.47
Hampton N. and A. Institute (beside amount
through A. M. A.) 118,054.15
Atlanta University 8,000.00
———————————
$474,409.14
===========
H. W. Hubbard, Treasurer,
56 Reade Street, New York.
* * * * *
ABSTRACT OF THE GENERAL SURVEY.
WORK IN AFRICA.
Mendi Mission. The income of the Avery Fund and the “John Brown”
steamer have been transferred for five years to the United
Brethren, who have a mission—Shengay—adjoining Mendi.
The Arthington mission and fund have been offered to the United
Presbyterians, who have a successful mission in Egypt.
INDIAN WORK.
Dakota missions transferred from the American Board to the A. M. A.,
except the six churches of Sisseton Agency, which had been
transferred to the Home Mission Board of Pres. Gen. Assembly.
Leaving out those, we have now, including the mission in Washington
Territory, 5 stations, 9 schools, 5 churches, 12 missionaries, 25
teachers, 1 native pastor, 12 native teachers, 271 church members,
356 pupils, 584 Sunday-school scholars.
WORK AMONG THE CHINESE.
At our recommendation the American Board has opened a mission at
Hong Kong, China, a rally-centre for converted Chinamen returning
to their native land.
In California the last year—Rev. W. C. Pond, Superintendent—19
schools; 2,823 scholars; 40 teachers, of whom 14 are Chinese; 175
have ceased from idolatry; 121 give evidence of conversion; 400
during history of mission have turned to Christ.
WORK AMONG NEGROES.
Work in twelve States of the South, and in Kansas and District of
Columbia; 8 chartered institutions; 12 high and normal schools; 42
common schools; 279 teachers; and 9,640 students. The Theological
Department of Howard University has 34 students; Talladega, 14;
Fisk, 9; and Straight, 13, with 20 students in law.
_New Buildings_: “Whitin Hall,” at New Orleans; “Cassedy Hall,”
at Talladega; Stone Hall at Atlanta finished; Library Building at
Macon, Ga.; schoolhouse at Hillsboro, N.C.; at Memphis, Le Moyne
Institute enlarged.
_Industrial Work_: Farms at Talladega and Tougaloo and Atlanta;
shops at Memphis, Tougaloo, Macon, Charleston; cooking, nursing,
sewing, taught at Atlanta, Fisk, Tougaloo; house-work in all the
eight boarding schools.
_Church Work_: Six new churches—At McLean’s, N.C.; Knoxville,
Tenn.; Birmingham, Ala.; Jackson, Miss.; Fayetteville, Ark.; Belle
Place, La.
The six new churches of last year are all doing well. Total number
churches, 89; members, 5,974, an average of 67; additions, 667; on
profession, 528; Sunday-school scholars, 9,406; raised for church
purposes, $12,027.21; benevolent contributions, $1,049.35.
Six new church edifices built at Pekin, Oaks and McLean’s, in N.C.;
at Knoxville, Tenn.; Louisville, Ky.; Mobile, Ala. and Belle Place,
La.; Brick Church at Lawrence, Kan., rebuilt.
MOUNTAIN WHITE WORK.
Besides original churches and schools in Kentucky, a new church and
academy at Williamsburg, Ky. Other missions coming on around this
place. The academy has had 108 scholars, who have paid as tuition
$303—not one failing to pay. Work encouraging. Color question
tested and carried in accordance with the principles of A. M. A.
WOMAN’S BUREAU.
From September, 1861, on to the present time women have been
prominent workers. By 1864, 169 women workers; in 1865, 261; in
1866, 264; in 1870, 450; in 1869, 2,000 different ladies had
served; and to date not less than 3,000, an army of Gospelers!
Among Indians, 17 lady missionaries. Among Chinese in California,
24 lady missionary teachers.
Miss D. E. Emerson has been appointed as secretary. She is
experienced on the field, and acquainted with the details of office
work, as clerk for the southern field.
* * * * *
WANTS.
1. For current work, $1,000 for every day of the year.
2. Endowments in the several institutions.
3. A Boys’ Hall at Tillotson Institute, Austin, Texas.
4. $10,000 to add to Edward Smith’s $10,000 to build the first
hall, at Little Rock, of Edward Smith’s College, for whose campus
(14 acres) he paid $5,500, already greatly enhanced in price. New
hall to be named for second donor.
* * * * *
SAYINGS AT THE ANNUAL MEETING.
—Prof. Albert Salisbury: I do not approve the factory idea of
industrial instruction.
—Dr. Withrow: Selfishness is as sure to destroy what it seeks to
save as a cancer is to kill.
Never in this world was a monument made to memorialize a mere
money-getter.
—Dr. Behrends: The color-line is only a section, and a very small
section at that, of the race-line.
It is not in India alone that the existence of caste constitutes
one of the most serious obstacles to the progress of the Gospel.
—Dr. Rankin: For Southern educational work this Society has put in
millions by the side of the United States Government’s millions.
The Government has given $5,000,000, this Society has given
$5,000,000.
Westminster Abbey opened of its own accord to take the dust of
David Livingstone. Why? Because he stretched himself on Africa, as
the prophet stretched himself on the dead body of the widow’s son.
—Rev. A. H. Bradford: Florence Nightingale robbed war of half its
terrors.
These Women’s Boards of Missions do more than all other means
combined to keep alive the missionary spirit.
The women of our day have reversed the Apostolic injunction and
are reading it, “Help those men.” We need to restore the original
reading, “Help those women.”
—Rev. Isaac Hall: Speaking of the colored people’s futile efforts
to solve the race problem, he said: First we thought we would go
to Africa, but we couldn’t get ships enough: then we thought we
would go to Kansas, but we couldn’t get cars enough; then, since we
couldn’t get away, we decided we would stay; and now what are you
going to do about it?
—Dr. Wm. Alvin Bartlett stigmatized the California law which
forbade a Chinaman to live in an apartment with less than 500 cubic
feet of air, and punished him with imprisonment in a cell with less
than 200 feet of air.
The Chinese are not illiterate, but it is objected that they are
too numerous. Why, there are hardly Chinamen enough in our country
to be schoolmasters of our countrymen who cannot read and write.
But the Chinese worship their ancestors. Well, I would rather
revere my ancestors than leave my children such pernicious doctrine
as the anti-Chinese people teach. It is better to worship your
ancestors than to damn your posterity.
—Ju Sing recognized the fact that all Americans are not hostile
to Chinamen. “We know that there are some God’s people, and some
devil’s people.”
—Nine young Chinamen, residents of Brooklyn and members of the
Central Sunday-School, sang Gospel Hymns. They also sang “Pass me
not, O Gentle Saviour,” done into Chinese, Jim Sing taking the
solo.
—Secretary Powell: Now that slavery has gone, there must go with it
blind-eyed prejudice and anti-Christian caste.
—Rev. J. C. Price, North Carolina: At the close of the war Canaan
was not entered, as a recent decision of the Supreme Court tells
us, but the Red Sea was crossed. Has the Negro grown? Then his
chief object was to be in Gen. Sherman’s army; if not in it in the
wake of it. Now he is looking about for property and education.
The colored people of Georgia alone have acquired a property of
$6,000,000. In North Carolina from twelve to fifteen newspapers are
edited, owned and controlled by colored people.
If God has made the Negro a man, he requires of him all the work of
a man. Then let Christian people do all they can to qualify him for
that work. He quotes the words of the Secretary: “The true solution
of the Negro problem is not to change his color or his place of
residence, but to change his character.”
—Sec. Strieby: This Society is not handicapped for this work except
by its firm and well-known attitude against caste, and any other
Society equally faithful on that subject would soon be equally
handicapped.
—Pres. Bartlett claimed to represent an institution that from
the very first has rejected the color line; a century ago it was
educating the Indians, a half a century the Negro shared its
privileges. Speaking of the Negro’s unquestioned piety he said: “He
sees hell impending, heaven before him and the chariot swings low.”
—Dr. Gladden: No man has a right to engage in the work of governing
who does not know what just government is. I protest against that
kind of government.
From 1870 to 1880 the colored voters at the South increased 30 per
cent.; their illiteracy increased only 20 per cent. The whites
at the South are gaining in intelligence but little, the blacks
splendidly. Most of the gain South is due to the education of the
Negro.
How do you account for this gain? Did you ever hear of Fisk and
Berea and Atlanta? The census tables have heard of them if you have
not.
Any society that is as really and thoroughly Christian as this one
will meet the same objection as this one.
—Dr. Taylor: “Bring an offering and come unto my courts.” In
Scotland, where I was brought up, the first act of worship was to
lay a piece of money on the table.
Sometimes a man assigns a debt so that what is due him is paid to
another. So the Lord Jesus has assigned the debt, and we are to pay
a large part of what we owe to him to the poor and needy; to the
benighted and degraded; to the Indian, the Negro and the heathen
that need the light.
—Dr. Dennen: Speaking of denominational antipathies, he was
reminded of the brass oxen under the brazen laver standing with
their rumps toward each other and their eyes directed away to their
own selfish interests.
* * * * *
THE CROSS OF CHRIST THE ONLY SOLVENT FOR RACE DIFFICULTIES.
Rev. J. E. Rankin, D.D., who presided happily at our annual
meeting, read an interesting opening address, from which we give
the following extracts:
The Cross of Christ proves man’s universal brotherhood. If He is
our brother-man, we are His brother-men.
When last night we took that bread and drank that wine, what did
we do? We symbolized Christ’s human brotherhood. This He did for
humanity’s sake. What taint of Judaism had He? What recognition
did He ever make that He belonged to any single nationality, to
any single tribe, to any single class? Is He brother-man to the
Jew only, because he was born of a Jewish mother? Is He any less
brother-man to the Gentile? When we ate that bread, we ate that
which sets forth, what? God manifest in the flesh. God manifest in
the flesh of humanity. Not because we are Anglo-Saxon, and have
the Anglo-Saxon Bible, the Anglo-Saxon literature, the Anglo-Saxon
civilization, the Anglo-Saxon freedom and manhood, of which we
are so proud, have you and I a claim to this Brother-man? It is
because we are on the same human level with the other races, from
which we so much differ, and above which God has given us such an
exaltation. For such were we. It is because we are brother-men to
Frederick Douglas, and Sitting Bull, and the last Chinaman who has
been smuggled from the Celestial kingdom, because the continent
is too narrow for him and us. It is because we are so low and not
because we are so high, that we had a right to sit there; to eat
that bread, and drink that cup. That broken bread is the emblem,
not of Anglo-Saxon humanity, but of lost, degraded, fallen humanity.
The Cross of Christ interprets man’s universal brotherhood. It
needs to be interpreted. It is the last thing man learns here;
that in Christ Jesus the humblest man is his equal. Ask almost
any man if he wants the elevation of his brother-man; if he wants
his brother-man in India, in China, in Japan, in the South, or on
the Pacific Coast, made his equal, and given a chance to outstrip
him, in the struggle for betterment? And he will usually answer,
“Why yes, of course. Do I not pray for it and contribute for it?”
But, will you sacrifice your prejudices for his sake? He needs
different religious influences, different educational influences,
different social influences, he needs to feel that he is no
longer ostracised, and that he may aspire for himself and his
children, just as you may. Will you adopt him into your religious,
educational, social circles? But, you reply: “That is a society
question.” It is a society question. And you belong to the Kingdom
of God; to the unseen society, which, by the power of His Cross,
this God-Man, who took the form of a servant, is gathering out
of the nations; you have fellowship with Him, in His humiliation
for humanity’s sake. And yet, you propose to decide this question
according to the laws and usages of a society to which you do
not belong, out of which God has called you, and against whose
inhumanity to man, against whose worldly pride the Cross is a
standard lifted up by God himself. You are under the most sacred
of bonds to record your testimony as belonging to quite another
society.
In what sense, after all, are we brothers? Can society answer this
question? Can anything but the Cross of Christ? The Saviour gives
us a picture of what it is to be a true neighbor in the parable
of the Good Samaritan. “Who,” asks He, “was neighbor to him that
fell among thieves?” He that thought it was a society question, a
question of caste; he who came and looked on him, and passed by on
the other side? He that put money into the contribution box for
him, or sent some one else to help him to the hospital? No; only
the man that set him upon his own beast, carried him to an inn, and
took care of him. A man cannot live a neighbor to man if he is not
living a neighbor to God, as he is in Christ Jesus.
Before the war, there was organized a benevolent society, whose
anniversary occurs the present week—a society to preach the Gospel
among the heathen. Its founders said, “We cannot take money that
has been coined from slave labor. It is the price of innocent
blood. It cries up to God for vengeance.”
What is the history of that society? Why, the smoke of our civil
contest had hardly cleared away before it began to build up the
waste places of the South, heaping coals of fire upon the people
there. Under its auspices, the choicest daughters of New England
(as though they had been angels of God) went down there, with the
spelling-book and the Bible; took their share of the ostracism
meted out to the recent bondmen, for Jesus’ sake; many of them
laid down their lives there. There has scarcely been a foreign
missionary field in the world which has had more perils, which
has demanded greater sacrifices, which has developed spirits more
heroic, more Christ-like. The same spirit which led our brave boys
in blue to die to make men free, led their sisters to die to make
them holy. And what do you see to-day? This society has done more
to stay the tide of illiteracy, to lay the foundations of permanent
civil and religious prosperity than all the other agencies put
together. God’s secret is with them that fear Him. The men who, for
Christ’s sake, said, “We cannot set apart to God that which has
come from unpaid human labor; we cannot thus have fellowship with
the works of darkness;” these men God has put into the fore-front
of the great battle with ignorance and degradation—the great battle
in which the South begins to ask the Nation which cannot protect
the black man to come to her assistance, crying out, like Caesar
to Cassius, “Help, Cassius, or we sink!” They got their baptism
at the foot of the Cross. Look at the queenly institutions which
they have planted. Look at the thousands of the sons and daughters
of Ethiopia, whom they have developed into the mental, moral and
spiritual stature of true manhood; whom they have polished after
the similitude of a palace, fitted for professions, for business,
for home life. Look at the churches they have planted. This is
their conception of the brotherhood of man, as they have been
taught it at the Cross, as the Cross has interpreted it to them.
I know no difference of race,
Of African and Saxon;
Of tawny skin, of rose-cheeked face,
Of hair of crisp and flaxen.
The soul within, that is the man,
There is God’s image hidden:
And there He looks, each guest to scan,
The bidden and unbidden.
One God in love broods over all!
One pray’r to Him is taught us;
One name for mercy, when we call;
One ransom, Christ has brought us.
One heart of meekness, lowly mind,
Life’s counter currents breasting;
One Father’s House, we hope to find,
Within God’s bosom resting.
* * * * *
THE PLACE OF MISSIONARY LITERATURE IN THE CONVERSION OF THE WORLD.
REV. GEO. M. BOYNTON.
The literature of missions has a threefold function in its
relation to the conversion of the world: to inform, to quicken
and to direct. It would be hard to over-estimate the importance
of the history and record of missionary efforts and successes in
their relation to the intelligence of the Christian people of
our land and our day. If we are exhorted to _add to our faith_,
virtue (manly and holy enterprise) _and to virtue, knowledge_, the
exhortation must apply (next to the knowledge of God and of His
word) to the knowledge of the history and progress of His kingdom
in the world.
We do not call him even a fairly intelligent citizen of the United
States who does not know something of the history of his own
country—who does not know the general order of its great questions
and great conflicts. What shall we say of one who claims to have
his citizenship in heaven and yet is willingly ignorant of the
great battle-grounds of Christ’s kingdom of even the near past, and
so knows nothing of the questions which agitate the present day or
the forces of the foes now in the field?
It is no small thing to follow the current history of the world,
as it has been brought so near to us in our day, and yet with what
eagerness the morning paper is looked for in every home of even
ordinary intelligence; and after the half-hour’s search, how often
to the question, “What is there of interest to-day?” the answer
comes, “Oh, nothing.” The journals are full of manufactured news;
political squabbles; stories of scandal and of crime; with now and
then some event which marks a step in the world’s progress of more
than ordinary consequence. It is often said that our missionary
periodicals are not of thrilling interest, but I am willing to
leave it to the testimony of any candid man whether they do not
at least fairly approximate the secular press in interest and
ability, only that men are more eager to know what is going on in
the kingdoms of this world than in the kingdom of our Lord and
Saviour Jesus Christ. It is the _appetite_ which largely gives its
savor to the food. _When our hearts are all aglow_ with love to the
Master of us all, and we want to know, above all things, that he is
being satisfied with the travail of his soul, _we do not count the
tidings of the advancement of his kingdom dull_. If his interests
are ours, we shall watch them.
One of the great requisites to giving or praying is that men should
know to what their alms are directed and for what their prayers go
up to God. Let the missionary press, then, give us information, and
give it freely. The men and the women who read want to have, not
the impressions of other people reproduced, but the details which
made those impressions. They want the facts, set forth with vivid
exactness, with life-like coloring. It is only now and then one of
our missionaries at the front who seems to comprehend that he must
make us see what he sees, and must remember that his reflections
upon the things that have become familiar to him will not make
us familiar with the facts. If he can stir our imaginations and
make us his attendants during his day’s work, we shall be led to
sympathy and support.
When the Church Missionary Society of London was making its
exploration into Africa the long pages of journal written on the
spot from day to day were the most thrilling pages of current
history that were being written; and many of you have not forgotten
the diary of our own Dr. Ladd of his journey up the Nile. Nothing
should be spared to open the eyes of the givers and the prayers
to what you may call instantaneous views of the workers at their
work. Give us the facts in the best possible shape if you want our
sympathy, our prayers, our money. Until you have done that, you
cannot, if you would, call down on us the condemnation spoken to
him that “_seeth_ his brother have need” and does not help him.
But Christian character needs _inspiration_ as well as information.
It needs not only to know, but to feel; not only to have its eyes
made clear to see, but its heart stimulated to a worthy enthusiasm.
We do not get our _inspiration_ so much from great events as from
great men. Souls are quickened by quickening souls. The contagion
of enthusiasm spreads from life to life. That in the literature of
missions, which will especially kindle missionary enthusiasm is to
be found in the veins of the noble lives of the men and women who
have counted their lives not worth the keeping, for their love for
Christ and for the Kingdom of whom this world was not worthy, and
who, in the world, were least of all men of it.
What other fuel can you find to build a fire of grand enthusiasm
for the Master like the one you have in the biography of missions?
Nowhere away from the sacred record can you find nobler events
of Christian living and devotion. Nowhere are there grander
illustrations of the spirit of Christian heroism. Nowhere more
stirring suggestions of the possible attainments of Christian grace.
Nor do I recall a missionary biography which is morbid and so
misleading—which sets up an introspective and dyspeptic type of
piety as a model and standard. The missionary has no time to be
morbid. He has made a consecration of all his energies to his
Master. His life is led actually and daily by the high purpose
which he has set before him. His biography is not a picture of
still life. He cannot stop to take becoming attitudes, even before
his own eyes. He has no time to write a journal of his supposed
spiritual states. If you take his photograph you must take him in
motion, as nowadays they take a horse upon the race-track, and you
get him with every muscle set and every nerve charged with life.
I know no better books for men or boys, for matrons or maidens,
than such books as these, in which you have such lives embalmed.
Where can you find a manlier life than that of John Coleridge
Patteson, Bishop of Melanesia, his diocese the island of the sea,
inhabited by blacks. The story of his patience and his pluck and
cheerful confidence is enough to dispel the worst type of malarial
saintship—shaky and intermittent. To see him with his senior bishop
approaching a new island, rowing in his small boat as near as was
safe to the breakers, and then the two pioneers of the Gospel
taking a header through the waves and swimming to the land to tell
the Gospel of great joy to the dusky and unclad islanders! There’s
tonic in the very reading. He could be a bishop without robes or
titles. God had sent him to be an overseer of lone regions and lost
souls. Or what could be more tragic than the final scene of his
death by the treacherous arrows of the natives, and the ghastly
tableau of the still young hero of God floating out in the boat
alone toward his waiting friends.
There is a biography yet unwritten of one connected with the work
of this Association which, if it could be spread upon the record,
would equal this in the sincerity of his devotion, in purity of
his motive, in his bearing patiently when nearly all men spoke ill
of him, for Christ’s sake and the Gospel’s, and even friends for a
time began to doubt him, in his readiness to take up the hardest
thing there was to do until the end. You will know of whom I speak
when I tell you that he was equally the friend of the Indian and of
the negro; that he became the target of all the shafts of malice
when he sought to protect the poor Indian from his worse than
savage foes within the capital of the nation and on the western
reservation; that he became the victim of the deadly malaria of the
African coast, where he had gone to reorganize and direct the work
of this Association in the Mendi Mission. I speak of one whom we
all delight to honor and call reverend—the Reverend Edward P. Smith.
And there are others still upon the field, whose names may or may
not be known to any wide fame with men, and women, too, who have
hazarded their lives for the privilege of preaching and of teaching
in the name of Christ. We cannot afford to lose the records of such
positive and aggressive Christianity for their stimulus to the
Christian character of those at home and those whose characters are
forming yet.
Dr. Goodell names as one of the ten ways by which the world is to
be saved, that we keep the home and Sunday-school libraries full
of that most interesting and profitable of all our literature
for the young, the books written by Christ’s soldiers upon the
field of battle. I would emphasize even more than that—the books
written about these heroes of the faith and their lives of earnest
and joyful sacrifice. Who will not acknowledge that we need the
inspiration in our day?
If the Christian world needs for its own sake the information
and the inspiration which can only come from the literature of
missions, the missionary work itself needs equally this means to
make its opportunities known to the Christian world.
That is only in part, if at all, a Christian church which is not a
missionary church as well. The salt which has lost its savor is no
longer salt. It will save deception if you take off the label. It
is “good for nothing,” and is to be cast into the street only to
get rid of it, and not because it is good for a road.
The true Church of Christ is concerned about the progress of his
kingdom, is in earnest sympathy with those who are at the front,
is eager in its outlook for new opportunities of service. To
such a waiting ear—and, brethren, it is waiting—come through the
missionary press the tidings of opportunity, the sound of doors,
long closed, creaking on their hinges as they fling open for the
feet of the delaying messengers of grace. This is the telephone
which summons to instant response. It sounds in the counting-rooms
of our men of business, and invites them to new investments in
behalf of those for whom God goes security, for “he that giveth
to the poor lendeth to the Lord.” It rings its summons in our
Theological Seminaries and among our younger brethren in the
ministry, and calls them to occupy until He comes. It goes into the
offices of the organizations through which the churches reach the
needy east and west, north and south, and says not pull down your
barns, but build greater ones; for, as are the broad farms of the
West to the old New England homesteads, so are the harvests to be
reaped to those which have been already gathered in. It mixes in
our homes, and calls on our sons and daughters to the waiting work.
And neither we at home, nor those in the broad field, can afford to
be left unnoticed or uncalled. They need it that souls may be born
into the kingdom; we need it that we may by pure toil and sacrifice
grow unto the stature and the likeness of our risen Lord.
The Church of Christ will not know more of the advancement of His
kingdom or of its hindrances than it is told. God will not save us
the trouble of the inquiry or the report. The Church of Christ will
have no more enthusiasm in the work than it gets by entering into
sympathy with those who do it, and with Him who died that it might
go on.
And yet, in the light of all this already trite and quite
self-evident truth, you hear it said, even by those who are
concerned in the progress of the work, “What are we going to
do with this increasing mass of missionary literature? We are
quite flooded with it, and especially with these periodicals,
these Missionary Heralds, and Home Missionaries and American
Missionaries. Can’t we make it less? Can’t we combine them and
double the thing up? It bothers us.” Ah, brethren, the wonder is
that we do not cry for more and better. The wonder is not that so
many take the missionary magazines, but so few, and that so few of
those who take them read them.
Brethren, the time will come—if the time comes when men seek first
His kingdom and His righteousness, not last—that Christian men and
women will not want to wait a month to glance over the few pages of
a missionary magazine; but will want to know the latest news of the
advancement of Christ’s Kingdom in the morning before they look to
see the stock-list or the scandal-list of the day before. When the
question of the morning will be what new progress, what new delays,
what new need for the advancing hosts of Christian warriors; and
at night the thought will be, the sun has gone to shine on other
fields and other laborers, and while we sleep this work goes on.
And in those days it shall go on with speed and sureness.
Let our missionary literature then be not lessened in quantity
or deteriorated in quality. Let not our agents think the time is
lost in which they stop to tell us of the work. The growth of
Christ’s people at home is as important as the conquests of His
grace abroad, indeed, the last will be largely proportioned to the
first. Let ingenuity and enterprise be put into these channels of
communication. Let the facts be fresh and full—more fresh and full
than ever. Let them be clothed in choice and skillful diction.
Let us leave the arts which the satanic or the merely mundane
press monopolize to their uses. Let us not grudge the cost. It is
not cost of administration at all. It is not cost of collection,
though it helps that department greatly. It is more than all the
missionary work of each society for the constituency that supports
it. Our churches and our Christians here at home need it for their
own vitalizing and the direction of their awakened energies. If
our fires be not kept up at home the warmth will not be diffused.
These are days of organization. It used to be that if a man had
lost his way in these then dark country roads some one must go out
alone with his hand-lantern to guide him to safe shelter. Now your
streets are full of lamps, and your illuminated signs band them at
every corner. You may take all the care that is possible of the
lamps and burners; it will do no good if you neglect to keep the
fires up where the illuminating gas is made. If the fires go out
there the lights go out in every street and home. Do not let us ask
these organizations to lessen their efforts to inform, to quicken
and to guide our missionary zeal at home, as though it were not an
important part of their legitimate work.
* * * * *
REPORT ON CHINESE WORK.
The report of your committee on the Chinese Department of the
American Missionary Association is as follows: The keynote of
the year’s work is success. Four more schools, 256 more scholars
enrolled, nine more teachers, with an increase of four Chinese
instructors. The number of those professing to forsake idolatry
in excess of last year, 19. There have 121 given good evidence of
conversion—last year 106, making 400 who have embraced Christianity
during the history of the Mission. Only seven thousand dollars of
the nearly twelve thousand dollars expenses of the mission came out
of the treasury of the Association. The number of local churches
contributing has doubled. The receipts of the “California Chinese
Mission” have gained 37 per cent. These gratifying facts inspire
confidence that this work in purpose and method is blessed of God.
They should beget a zeal commensurate with the hope they enkindle.
The new mission established by the American Board in Hong Kong—the
natural fruit of this work—places peculiar emphasis upon its
value, as its initial demand came from Chinamen Christianized by
its influence. The Rev. Mr. Hager goes to this important control
not only with the prayers of his American brethren behind him, but
escorted over and welcomed by the devout supplications of specimen
Chinese converts. It is an omen of profound significance that four
or five Chinese workers for Christ, trained in these schools,
contribute their invaluable services to the enterprise. It is
equally suggestive that the Chinese Christians remaining behind
cheerfully gave $500, adding to their faith, men, and to men,
money, an evidence of the genuineness of their confidence. The past
year’s experience alone demonstrates that most of the ingenious,
infamous charges made against this people are lies. So Providence
has opened a golden opportunity. The narrow and bigoted ignorance,
lack of patriotism, lack of statesmanship, lack of humanity, lack
of equitable dealing exhibited by our Government in its recent
legislation on the Chinese question have corraled 75,000 of them on
these shores. It is the open day for Christian privilege. Cannot
the majority of these be surrounded by our faith, wrought on by the
power of Christianity, saturated by a genuine Christian life and
made the standing army for whom we shall send officers and soldiers
to conquest the empire? If the teeming millions are appalling can
we not subdue this installment isolated by inscrutable wisdom for
this Christian experiment?
With such a present and pressing basis of appeal this work should
have abundant means to reach without delay the limit of its
capacity.
If there be not vital Christian warmth sufficient in the United
States to resuscitate this waif upon our coasts, how can we hope to
rescue the myriad nation? It is floundering in the Arctic Ocean of
heathenism.
Respectfully Submitted,
W. A. BARTLETT, Chairman.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF REV. WILLIAM ALVIN BARTLETT, D.D.
After remarking that the Chinese question was little in some
aspects, as when fifty million people frantically rise to defend
themselves against a paltry handful of 75,000 Chinamen, Dr.
Bartlett continues: But there is a sense in which it is large. It
is a large question to any man. We find, according to the best
accounts, 430 odd millions of Chinamen. It is the largest question
of statesmanship and of commerce to know how best to handle the
largest body of men who live together, and have lived together the
longest, on the planet, and that speak one language.
But if it is large commercially, what is it in a Christian point
of view? We go here and there picking up the scraps and the
scattered remnants of races, but look at this majestic aggregation
of humanity; look at their tremendous history! It is the largest
question to-day before the missionary Christianity of the world.
Well, I am to say a word or two about the Chinese in America.
How did they come here? They came here on the invitation of the
Americans. California boasted at first of the grand people they
were to receive. But that soon changed, and they began a system
of ingenious abuse, such as has never been equalled. Take the
laws passed by San Francisco—the “basket” law; the “cubic foot of
air” law, under which, if a Chinaman was found living in a room
with less than 500 cubic feet of air, he was thrust into a prison
where he would not have over 200 cubic feet of air; and the “tax”
law, under which Chinamen were taxed for sending their children to
school and not permitted to send them. Every man in the street took
the license himself of breaking every law of God and of humanity
by pounding and stoning them. Then, it was not enough for the
municipality to seize this question, but the State took hold of it.
The Legislature of California settled all ethnological questions at
once. They passed a law and said, by majority, that the Chinaman
was an _Indian_! That settled it. Then the nation took hold of it
and passed a law—these great 50,000,000 of people against 75,000 of
people.
So the nation passed a law to keep the Chinamen out, violating all
the traditions of the country, and to import _the Chinese wall!_
They ceased importing the Chinamen and imported their wall—a
barbaric, ramshackled old thing of a great many centuries. It was a
kind of waistband to the Chinese Empire when it was young; but they
burst it long ago and ran over it.
This infamy was carried to this extent. A committee was appointed
by the United States Senate, and a corresponding committee from
the House, in 1876, to investigate this subject thoroughly. They
examined 130 witnesses. They took over 1,200 pages of evidence
from experts in all departments in regard to Chinese history and
ethnology and everything else. They met them face to face and
talked it over. Senator Sargent, the chairman of the Committee,
made this statement in his report. He says, in the first place,
that the Chinaman is an “_indigestible mass_.” Well, that is not
quite definite; a man hardly knows how to handle such a statement
as that. It is a kind of mince-pie, I suppose, in the body politic.
I think I shall leave that for the gastric juice to analyze. But
his next assertion is more practical. He says that the brain
capacity of the Chinaman is not sufficient to furnish motive power
for self-government; for all that, he has governed himself since
the time that Senator Sargent’s ancestors, assuming him to be an
Anglo-Saxon, were cautiously cracking acorns in Northern Europe and
wearing bearskins! Mr. Pixley, a gentleman we sent to California
from my part of the State of New York, a lawyer, and violently
opposed to the Chinaman, says in his opinion before this Committee
that the Chinaman is the inferior of any being that God ever made;
he says that a specimen cannot be produced that has ever been
affected in any particular by Christian influences, and that in
his (Pixley’s) opinion the Chinaman hasn’t any soul, or if he has
a soul it is not worth saving. Gentlemen, these things have been
put into laws and organized before people of influence, and their
animus spent itself in that infamous legislation in Congress which
abrogated a treaty without consultation and flew in the face of a
hundred years of precedents.
What is the fact? Why, the fact is that Chinamen are human beings.
They are _honest_ human beings as the rule goes. The word of a
Chinese merchant in California is taken everywhere. They are
_industrious_ and _frugal_. Senator Cassidy said—he was very much
opposed to them—in this book of testimony to which I have referred:
“They are the most ingenious, industrious and frugal people on the
planet; and if they come into competition with us in low forms of
industry to-day, they will come in higher forms to-morrow.”
There was an old philosopher who lived 500 years before Christ,
Confucius by name, who wrote certain maxims; and it does seem as
though he was inspired to look ahead precisely at this treaty that
they passed at Washington, when he said, “It is an evidence of the
superior man, of the great moral man, the true man, that he adheres
strictly to the old agreements, however long they may have stood.”
He was asked if he could put into one word what would express the
whole duty of man, and he said, “Is not that word '_reciprocity_'?”
(That was a “reciprocity” treaty.) He says, “We should not ask
another to do unto us what we would not be willing to do unto him.”
And then he says, “The superior man has regard to virtue and to the
sanctions of law; but the small man only thinks of himself and what
favors he is to receive.” It looks like an inspired and animated
riddling of this whole question as it stands to-day before the
nation.
One of the largest land proprietors and wheat-growers in California
said that the work could not be done without the Chinamen; they
have reclaimed two millions of acres.
Now, mind you, with all the wrongs that the Chinese have received
on our shores, every little disturbance on the Chinese coast which
has ever occurred, or where a mission station has been sacked by a
mob, we have collected and been paid every dollar of the damage;
and the Chinese Government has paid nearly a million dollars to
our Government for the wrongs perpetrated upon American people But
this Government has not paid a dollar to the Chinese. There is a
claim which the Chinese Embassy are now pressing on the Government,
for $40,000 that was destroyed in one night in Colorado; but the
reply upon such claims usually is, “We have not been in the habit
of paying such claims to Chinamen.” Isn’t that justice? Isn’t that
purity of legislation?
The Chinese are an _educated people_. They have vast libraries,
large and broad, rich in literature. They have the lives of great
men. They know about our Washington: they teach about him in their
schools. Do we know anything about their Washingtons—about their
great men who have guided the grandest nation, in some respects,
that history has given us any account of for nearly 3,000 years,
possibly more? We know about Yung Wing, who graduated at Yale
College, taking the prizes in English composition. We know the
standing of their students in our colleges generally. We know the
fact that of the 75,000 Chinese in this country every one can
read and write. In this country, according to the census before
the last, we had over 5,000,000 who could not read and write;
so that there are hardly Chinamen enough in this country to be
schoolmasters to those of our number who cannot read and write! Dr.
Hedge in Boston stated some years ago that, in a conversation with
Charles Sumner, Sir John Bowring, the representative of Her Majesty
at the Court of Pekin, said that when he was there the Chinese
Ministers were the superiors of any European cabinet. Mr. Sumner
replied: “I am astonished! You do not pretend to compare them with
Lord Palmerston, Lord Derby and Mr. Gladstone?” Said he: “I mean
precisely what I say, without any invidious comparison; I will add
that the Prime Minister of China, during my residence in Pekin, has
not, in my opinion, his intellectual superior upon the planet.”
The Chinese are a _cleanly_ people, a _decent_ people. The Chinese
laborer washes himself all over every day. As a rule they can
come into our mission schools and sit beside our ladies with
perfect propriety. When I was preaching in Indianapolis we had
every Chinaman in the city in our schools. They are not a clannish
people; they are glad for American society.
They have crimes and vices. They are human. They lie and steal,
and gamble, and have their peculiar method of getting intoxicated
with opium. But I don’t know as it ever has been proven that they
can carry on lying to such a magnificent extent as we do in an
ordinary political campaign, and they have never risen to the
refined plundering of Wall street. They say they take opium, and
you know how they took it—they took it at the cannon’s mouth at
first. England must make 400 per cent. profit in the poppy fields
of India. It was shocking to them to the utmost; and their torment
has gone on ever since in homes that were never addicted to any
crazier drug than tea and knew nothing of a hell so orthodox
as the delirium tremens. The Emperor petitioned England, in a
document which I think has not its equal in all the documents of
Governments, not to set fire to the morals of his people by loading
them with their accursed opium. But they did.
The Chinese worship their ancestors. Well, if I had to choose the
least of two improprieties, I think I would prefer to pay a very
hearty and cordial appreciation of my grandfather rather than to
curse my children with such doctrines as have been proposed toward
the Chinese. It is better, I think, to worship your ancestors than
to damn your posterity.
But the Chinese have noble qualities. In the days of the yellow
fever at Memphis I was near it. We almost felt the hot breath of
that dreadful pestilence. We needed money and men; and there came a
telegram from San Francisco that the Chinese merchants of that city
had contributed $12,000 for the yellow fever sufferers. That looked
like putting the prayer of Christ upon the cross into physical
results: “Lord, forgive them, for they know not what they do.”
We know the Chinese philosophy, the height of their morality; we
know the purity of Confucius’ recommendations and the wondrous
statement of Lotse that we should love our enemies; and we know
that the highest crest waves of this Chinese morality throw spray
around the feet of Jesus. I have stood this summer in the far West.
I have stood where you can test civilization. There in Seattle
stood a university on our right hand, and on it the Indian words
_Al-Ki_—by and by—the motto of the Territory—“By and by we will
show you.” Brethren, I am not given to nightmares nor to day
dragons, but it did seem to me as we stood there and looked out
upon that majestic sheet of water, Puget Sound, being nearer in
the centre of the majority of the population in the planet than
we are here, that the day would come, with that matchless harbor,
that wonderful climate, with coal and iron in the vicinity, with
all cereals and fruits possible, when the throne of power would
be transferred from the Atlantic to the Pacific coast, and when
the argosies of the world would float without any bar, either in
Puget Sound or in the cities around it, and ride there at peace
in the security of a gospelized and millennialized age. It can
only be done by our appreciation of the necessity of keeping our
Christianity clean and solid and aggressive, and on the old basis
of sin and salvation through a crucified Redeemer.
* * * * *
REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON INDIAN MISSIONS.
Your Committee, to whom has been referred that part of the annual
statement of the Executive Committee which relates to the American
Indians, desire to report as follows:
The chief event of the year, in the Indian department, is the
adoption by this Association of the Indian Missions of the American
Board. Your Committee look upon this as an event of conspicuous
importance in the history of the Association. As long ago as 1872,
at the annual meeting of that year, the Committees on the Indian
and the foreign work suggested a double transfer—namely, the
transfer of the foreign missions of the Association to the American
Board, and the transfer of the Indian missions of the Board to
this Association. The propriety of such an exchange has seemed
obvious to many patrons of the two societies for some time. However
satisfactory the explanation of the existing condition of things
afforded by the historical development of the two organizations,
it was plain that the time had come for such a unifying and
concentrating of the work of this Association as would result from
leaving the foreign field to others, and assuming the care of those
missions in our own country which our foreign missionary society
had so well established.
These missions are among the Dakotas, one of the most widely
extended and important of the American Indian stocks. The largest
of these missions—that at the Sisseton agency, formerly under the
care of the lamented Stephen R. Riggs—has chosen for its new mother
not our Association, but another missionary board, by which it
will doubtless be thoroughly cared for and warmly cherished. The
missions which actually come under our care constitute an important
group of churches and schools, and should be received with a hearty
welcome by an Association with such antecedents as this. The new
trust committed to us calls for new purpose and energy in our
specific work.
We find that these Dakota missions are not dead or dying, but
thoroughly alive. And because they are thoroughly alive they need
very real help. The men in charge of them are men awake to their
opportunities, believers in a forward movement, and in whatever
legitimate experiments may be involved therein. We feel that in
all such experiments they should have the ready co-operation of
the Christian Church. We therefore heartily endorse the Executive
Committee in their plans for enlargement in the Dakota field—for
improvements in the mission property and in methods of work, where
they are called for, and the establishment of new missions in
places which promise success.
One project, your Committee believe, deserves to be regarded
with special favor, the establishment of a school—agricultural,
mechanical and normal—at Fort Sully. The Executive Committee have
secured a delightful site for such a school, and they know the
man to take charge of it. What is wanted is money to furnish the
proper financial basis, and we can scarcely doubt that this will
be forth-coming. The industrial school method of missionary work
has already been thoroughly tested at the east—in Hampton and
Carlisle—and the verdict is altogether favorable. There is good
reason to believe that the adoption of the same method among the
Indians themselves would result in real benefit. Let the work of
instruction, in all its interesting details, be carried on where
the red man can see it, and it will surely make its impression upon
him. At all events, we have in favor of this view the opinions of
men who may be looked upon as experts in this matter.
In adopting as its aim these Dakota missions, and thus enlarging
its strictly missionary work among the American Indians, the
American Missionary Association gives its approval anew to the
attempt, now so long continued, to Christianize the red men. There
are those who scoff at the idea of such a work; but history—not
to say the Gospel—teaches us better. No race of men has yet been
discovered so low that it cannot be reached and moved by the
religion of the Crucified, and the American Indians are certainly
no exception. The Indians as a whole are by no means the lowest
or the least susceptible; and the results on record are far from
insignificant. God has blessed the efforts of his church in their
behalf throughout the past two hundred years, and we know he will
continue to bless them. Respectfully submitted.
JOSEPH ANDERSON, Chairman.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF REV. DR. ANDERSON.
When the question arose in my mind in what line to follow up this
brief report, it seemed to me that the subject of Indian wrongs and
Indian rights had been sufficiently discussed for the present in
this Association and elsewhere, and that it might be of advantage
for us to look for a little while in another direction.
There are few, I suppose, who are aware of the largeness of this
work as carried on upon our continent, few who appreciate the
amount of real labor and real suffering, I may say, endured in this
direction. In order to a correct estimate, it seems to me that
we ought not to lose sight of, but rather we ought to recognize,
the work which has been done by our Roman Catholic friends. They
began as long ago as 1611, and from that date onward until 1832, at
least, they carried on an extended work among the American Indians
upon eight or ten different and important fields. I find, by
looking over their lists, that 170 men gave themselves to the work
of saving the Indian from barbarism and elevating him to a higher
and Christian level during this period.
Then, in order to a correct appreciation of this work, we must
remember also what our beloved friends, the Moravians, have
done—not only what they did in Greenland, not only what they did
in the West Indies, but what they did within the bounds of our
own nation, especially in Pennsylvania and farther west. And so,
too, we must recognize the work done by the Episcopalians and the
Methodists and the Presbyterians, who, through a long series of
years and in varied fields, have been laboring for the conversion
of the American Indian.
But in none of these fields has a more satisfactory work been
done than that which has been done in this America of ours by the
Congregational churches and the men whom they have sent out. The
missionary work among the American Indians began with the founding
of the church in New England—began under the molding hand of John
Elliot in Massachusetts. A hundred years later than the day when
Elliot began that work another figure arose upon the stage of
history: David Brainerd, the humble, quiet young man, who gave
himself for Christ and for the beloved Indians, and labored and
suffered even unto death. And then, when we come down to 1813 or
thereabouts, we find the American Board, newly organized, turning
its attention to the Indians in the South and Southwest. In the
record of their early work we have such names as Cyrus Kingsbury
and Byington and Father Gleason, and in the far West Williamson and
Riggs, our lamented brethren to whom reference has already been
made, and many others, some of whom are still with us, including
our excellent brother and my fellow committeeman Rev. Cushing Eells.
Here we have a list of heroes doing their work quietly, silently,
patiently, yet a work deserving to be called heroic, as much so as
that which has been done on the islands of the sea and on the other
side of the globe—a work in which noble men and women have taken
part. What is the result? Here is the good seed sewing. What kind
of a harvest has been gathered? There are those who think—perhaps
it is the common impression—that the results of Indian missions
have been meagre and of little value at the best; but let us
consider. It seems to me that in any such calculation some account
should be made of what may be called the reciprocal effect produced
in the lives of the missionaries themselves and of the churches
sending them forth. I observe that Dr. Shay, author of the History
of Catholic Missions in America, referring to the extinction of the
Spanish missions in the southern part of our country, says that
even if they have become extinct and if there are no results that
we can trace to-day, that does not count for their condemnation
any more than the disappearance of the works of art produced so
long ago by Apelles and Zeuxis is to the condemnation of those
workers. He might have gone farther and called attention to the
effect produced upon the artists themselves by their contributions
to ancient art, the effect produced upon the artist anywhere by the
work that he does in his own field, the effect produced upon the
reformer by the work of reform which he accomplishes, the results
produced in the lives of missionaries who constitute so large a
company in our church from their labors, their sufferings and their
sorrows.
I noticed in a past number of the AMERICAN MISSIONARY published
during the present year that a cut had been reproduced representing
a group of Indians watching a railroad train—an impressive
picture; and it suggested to me that our aim should be to bring
these Indians of the West where they shall not stand suspiciously
watching a railroad train, the emblem of advancing civilization,
but where they shall co-operate with us and appreciate the railroad
train and make it theirs. We want them to adopt as rapidly as
possible all the appliances of our civilization, and above all we
want them to accept the Lord Jesus Christ.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF REV. J. C. PRICE.
On the 1st of January, 1863, the negro was like a newly-built ship
launched upon the waters without mast, sail or rudder. Pleased
with liberty, he thought his happiness complete; but a few months’
experience taught him better. When the ballot was denied, when he
could not—nay, more, when he cannot—claim as a right or privilege
the comforts of travel; when deeply-rooted prejudice on account
of his color and previous condition of servitude confronted him
at every turn, he soon found that he had not reached the full
stature of an American citizen, but was still in his infancy.
And the question that presents itself to your minds, and to the
friends of the negro and to ours, the orphaned recipients of your
generosity, is, Has the negro grown any? has he made any noticeable
advancement? Or is he where freedom found him and where slavery
left him? January, 1863, found the negro penniless, ignorant, a
homeless wanderer, his chief object to be in General Sherman’s
army, or if not in it, in the wake of it; but he is now settled,
fixed, and by industry and by perseverance he has purchased homes,
and he and his children, through the generous aid of friends, have
received some education. The land that he once sowed in slavish
fear and reaped with trembling, he now sows in joy and gathers with
the gladsome shout of a free and jubilant harvester. In fact, the
material, as well as the intellectual and moral progress of the
negro has surprised his best friends. He has gone forth without
possessing the tattered garments that he wore, without a foot of
soil on which to tread, and he has purchased those homes. And not
only has he purchased them, but he has carried into them those
things which make home what it is—the comforts of home. It is
nothing strange to go into a Southern home and see a carpet on
the floor. If it is not on all of it, it will be a big piece in
the middle. And if you don’t find it all the way up-stairs, you
will find a little as you step on the first step. That shows a
disposition to do something that is elevating. And then the fact
that they have purchased these homes is something. I have seen it
repeated in the newspapers of the North—and I regret to say by men
who do not know the negro—that he is a lazy, shiftless fellow.
Well, they do not go down South, as we term it, and go into the
negroes’ houses. They do not go into his colleges and universities
and high schools, but they ride around by the station, they see a
few at the depot—a lot of lazy negroes, as you find a lot of lazy
white men under similar circumstances. They judge us unfairly. No
man is judged by the worst, but by the best. Did you want Lord
Chief Justice Coleridge to form an opinion of America by the men
that he met by accident or saw in the slums of New York—“lazy”
men, that he saw lounging around the corners of the streets? No;
you wanted him to judge you by your best, and you put your best
forward. Now, what we ask for the negro is that he be judged by his
best and not by his worst. Of course, the best is always in the
minority, but that is the way we are judged. If these same men were
to go into the South and go into the negroes’ homes, they would
find there very often excellent comfort. Some one has asked whether
the negro has any of this race prejudice in him. No; he will give
you the best bed and the fattest pig and the best chicken he has
got in the yard. There is no prejudice there. And then, not only
these things, but you find in many of their houses instruments of
music—some with an organ, some with a piano; and you can find young
girls there who can play on both, and if you want a little singing
they can do that too. Negroes can sing as well as my friends the
Chinamen. These things, too, are not only found in the cities but
in the country places and villages.
The negro has done all this, notwithstanding that he has lost
millions—yes, the negro has been defrauded of millions, yet he
has accumulated millions, and in many instances he has become the
owner of the farms and plantations of his former master. It was no
longer than two or three years ago that the papers told us that
the farm of Mr. Jefferson Davis rightly belonged not to him, but
to two negroes, they having paid $200,000 for it. And these are
but examples. You go through the South and you find negroes owning
farms of 100 or 200 acres each; and I know of one man who owns 900
acres, all of which he has bought since the war. We have gone forth
to the earth, and with the horny hands of toil we have made the
earth to answer to our appeals; and these have been the results.
Why, in Georgia alone there are more than 85,000 colored voters
who own 500,000 acres of land valued at about $1,244,000, besides
city property valued at $2,100,000, horses and mules, etc., valued
at, $2,000,000, making an aggregate for Georgia alone of more than
$6,000,000, which the colored people in that State now own.
But why should I enumerate? In fact, the negro has made the
waste places of the South to blossom as the rose. He has built
its railroads, dug its canals, erected its mansions, makes its
carriages and buggies, and in 1878 produced for the American people
more than $250,000,000. In the face of these evidences, who would
dare question his industry, stigmatize him as “lazy,” and ridicule
his unskilled labor?
But these are but the beginnings—the gray streaks of dawn ushering
in a brighter day for this toiling and long-oppressed son of Ham.
We are often reminded of what the negro was in ancient days,
especially in Northern Africa; but to-day we are forced to see what
he is in America, notwithstanding its prejudices and its political
oppression and persecution; we are forced to look at him rising in
his incomparable glory, the anomaly of the race and the wonder of
mankind.
But there is another feature. The negro’s highest powers and
worthiest capabilities are not all shown in the development of
sterile marshes or barren highlands. If slavery brought out his
power of endurance, his patience and his unparalleled fidelity,
freedom called forth his intellectual ability and causes the world
to wonder at his rapid attainments. But this angel in him long
ago would have sought his native heaven, but slavery clipped his
wings, forbade his flight, and confined him to corn hills, cotton
rows, rice marshes and pine forests. But his wings are growing
again, and already he lifts himself somewhat from the earth. But
you say, “Are there any signs of his educational progress?” I
might answer by pointing to distinguished colored men who fill
positions of responsibility and emolument in this country. But
not only are there men who are educated among us, but there are
also schools of high grade whose portals are anxiously crowded
by young men and women thirsting for knowledge. I have taken one
State as an example of our material progress; let another show our
intellectual advancement. In 1861 there was not a school in North
Carolina to which persons of color were admitted. But to-day, in
addition to her common schools, she has Shaw University, Biddle
University, St. Augustine Normal School, four State Normal Schools,
Esther Seminary, Scotia Seminary, Bennett Seminary, and the Zion
Wesleyan Institute—institutions of high grade; these have in them
to-day an aggregate of 2,000 young men and women preparing for the
great work of uplifting their brethren, and every summer they go
forth throughout North Carolina and other Southern States doing
what they can for the improvement of their fellows. Besides this,
we have in North Carolina from twelve to fifteen newspapers,
weeklies, semi-weeklies and monthlies, edited, owned and controlled
by colored men. The negro has done something, and we consider it
something—something that we are proud of, especially when we think
of the manner in which it has been done.
But, notwithstanding this favorable aspect of the condition of
the people as seen in these two States, we are forced to ask the
question—in fact it comes to us as we travel among the people—what
is our material progress in Georgia, what is North Carolina’s
educational outlook, when we consider the masses of the people
through the South? They are but a drop in the bucket. If you could
travel through that section and view the condition of the people
away off in the remote towns and districts, you would say so,
especially when you remember that the population has increased to
almost double its original number. Since 1863 the 4,000,000 have
grown to nearly 7,000,000. It is nothing strange to see the need
of instruction among the people, even among the ministry. It is my
theory that we must get the ministry straight first; and when we
have an intelligent ministry before the people, then we will soon
have an intelligent people. “Like priest” _always_ “like people”.
It was truly said by President Tobey at the meeting of the A. M. A.
in Chicago that the presence of the negro in the United States is
of great significance, that the enthusiasms of political life in
our nation have resulted from his presence, and that he has been
the occasion of the most exhaustive discussion of the rights of
man and the formation of a new political party and is now the most
considerable element in our politics. That is true; but that is
telling us our disease without a cure. What is the remedy? That is
what you are here for to-night; that is what you have bean turning
over in your minds ever since you assembled. What is the remedy for
these existing political and social evils among us? We think it was
precisely set forth by the Secretary of the Association at that
same meeting when he said, “The true remedy for the existing evils
is not to change the negro’s color or his party, but to change his
_character_,” and that is what we ask.
Legislation cannot solve the negro problem in this country. The
thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth amendments, the Civil Rights
Bill and the Constitution itself cannot solve the negro problem.
We must go behind the Constitution, behind the amendments; we must
go to the public sentiment. What effect has a law if there is not
a public sentiment to back it up? We have had the Civil Rights
Bill for several years, but what did it amount to in some sections
of the country? It amounted to nothing, because there was not a
public sentiment to sustain it. And it seems to me that we want to
educate the public sentiment and it is evident that the solution
of this great vexing problem can only come through the gradual and
thorough development of the negro’s mental and moral nature. I say
_thorough_, because some men think that the negro need have only an
elementary training, that he is not prepared for a higher training.
Why is he not? If it has taken centuries of culture, with the best
masters and the best teachers, to uplift the white race, why is it
not necessary to uplift the black race? God has made of one blood
all nations of men that dwell upon the face of the earth; and we
believe that there are only individual and not race distinctions as
to their mental and moral capabilities. Therefore, what one race
requires another race requires; and we feel assured that, when this
has been done, the millions of minds, both in this country and
in Africa, that are now rough and unshapen as the rock from the
quarry, will begin to show signs of symmetry under the constant
hammer and steady chisel of competent workmen.
Then, and not till then, the negro’s sun of progress and
prosperity, whose earliest rays already gladden his eastern
horizon, will rise and climb the firmament of his glory until it
reaches its zenith, and from that zenith it will shed forth a light
that all the nations of the earth shall behold, whose heat shall
melt away all prejudice, in whose light all indignities and all
inhumanities shall vanish; and all these nations, in one united,
harmonious voice, shall cry aloud, “Ethiopia, Ethopia has indeed
and in truth stretched forth her hands unto God.”
* * * * *
CASTE IN AMERICA.
BY SECRETARY STRIEBY.
India has four castes, America two. The Hindoo castes are the
priest, soldier, merchant and laborer or Soodra. The last is the
largest and lowest and bears the weight of all the upper classes,
whom it is born to serve and by whom it is despised. The highest
caste may come down to the employments of the soldier or merchant,
but not to those of the Soodra, but, according to Hindoo orthodoxy,
the Soodra can as little enter a higher caste as a stone can become
a plant.
America’s two castes are simply the white and the colored races.
The latter are the Soodras, and in the orthodox theology of slavery
they were born to serve the whites. But while that high orthodoxy
suffered a rude shock in the Proclamation of Emancipation, caste
comes in to save it from utter overthrow, and has fixed a great
gulf between the races, so that especially “they cannot pass to us
that would come from thence.”
This proscription of the colored races includes the Indian and the
Chinaman, but for the sake of simplicity of presentation I shall
refer mainly to the most numerous race in this country—the Negro.
By caste prejudice they are denied fellowship which Christ
enjoins—rights which the Constitution grants, access to trades,
professions and schools where they could compete with the whites.
Caste is a worse sin in America than in India. In practicing it the
Hindoo obeys his gods and his veda; the American dishonors his God
and disobeys his Bible. The Hindoo is a heathen and is degraded
by caste; the American sends missionaries to convert him and to
denounce his caste, and yet sustains caste at home. The Hindoo is
consistent in denying equal rights to all men; the American boasts
that God made of one blood all nations, and that all men are free
and equal, and yet tolerates caste.
In sustaining caste the American perpetuates the inconsistency and
shame of slavery. No greater inconsistency was ever shown than in
holding slaves in America after the Declaration of Independence;
and no greater shame than in the zealous defense of slavery by the
press, the pulpit and the theological seminaries—at the imperious
bidding of the slaveholder. Caste is the tap root of slavery,
and the defense of it is a repetition—nay, an aggravation—of the
apologies formerly made for slavery. Men will live to be ashamed of
this defense.
Caste is a curse to America.
It injures those who cherish it. Caste-prejudice is a sin. All
prejudice is narrow, born of ignorance and hate. Caste-prejudice,
therefore, by narrowing the mind and embittering the heart, harms
the American citizen both as a man and a Christian. It hinders the
progress of its victims. The slaves are emancipated—their continued
degradation is the nation’s danger, their elevation the nation’s
hope, and yet caste shuts up the avenues of trades, professions,
schools and churches, through which alone they can escape from
ignorance and degradation. If they rise it must be in spite of all
the obstacles that caste can throw in their way.
It creates race antagonisms. The foreign immigration into this
country creates no antagonisms. It flows into the great river of
American life like brooklets, bringing down often their turbid
waters, but these are soon mingled and purified in the mightier
stream. But caste renders the colored races an opposing tide now
indeed overflowed and borne under, yet resisting their fate. That
they are overborne is seen in the nullifying of their vote in the
South and in denying them access to the rights, immunities and
privileges of the dominant class. But they are neither silent nor
submissive. We know how prompt and deadly is the resentment of the
Indian; the negro and the Chinaman are more quiet, but they resist
as best they can and await the time, in the conflict of tides, when
their volume and momentum will give them the preponderance.
Nor is that awaiting vain, nor that time distant, in view of the
astonishingly rapid increase of the colored population—an increase
of over 500 per day—an increase of 35 per cent. in ten years,
as against 28 per cent. in the white population of the South.
It is easy to estimate in how few years the colored population
will equal the whites, and it is easy to see that, as this growth
goes on and long before the equal numbers are reached, the sense
of growing strength and of continued wrong will stimulate the
negative resistance of the present to the determined hostility
of the future; and when that race conflict comes, what human ken
can foretell the issue? But we may be sure that when it comes the
North, the whole nation, can no more keep out of it than it could
keep out of the dreadful conflict with slavery, out of which this
impending struggle grows.
Special significance is given to all this by the recent decision
of the Supreme Court of the United States pronouncing the Civil
Rights Bill unconstitutional. This takes from the colored man the
last shadow of legal protection to rights which he, and all men for
themselves, consider essential to their manhood, and will stimulate
him to more determined resistance unless the conscience and good
sense of the white races shall speedily end this needless, yet
dangerous conflict.
This leads me to ask: Is there a remedy for all this, and what is
it? Not in dragging the white man down, but in lifting the colored
man up. Both races must coöperate. The white man must let down the
ladder; the black man must climb. The white man must open the door
of the shop, and the black man must go in and do as good work as
the white man can. The white man must open the school house and
the black man must go in and become as good a scholar as the white
man is. The black man can never attain positions and honors by
demanding them simply because he is a black man; he must fairly
win them by being worthy of them. The white man cannot maintain
his superiority by denying the black man the chance of becoming
his equal. He cannot hold it by force. Slavery for a time enabled
him to do so, for then he had superior numbers and the aid of the
Government, but he has no longer that aid and he cannot always have
the weight of superior numbers. The white man must give the chance,
and the black man must take it and win his position.
But the white man is not ready to give the chance—in other words,
surrender the vantage ground his color gives him. Here is a call
for an appeal to conscience. The subject must be discussed, North
and South, among white and black alike. As the anti-slavery reform
arose not out of the stagnant waters of indifference, but out
of the dashing stream of healthful agitation, so must the caste
reform be brought about. That discussion has begun in earnest,
and will not cease till caste be sent to that bourne to which
slavery, its ancestor, has gone and whence it shall never return.
But discussion must take shape; the Church must cease to sustain
caste. The time was when men were afraid to oppose slavery because
it would hinder the spread of their churches in the South. They
urged: “Why endanger the growth of our denomination by joining
in this useless clamor against slavery?” But the time came when
these same persons decided that it was more important to destroy
slavery than multiply churches that sustained slavery. Missionary
societies abandoned their churches in the South, and the great
national churches allowed themselves to be rent in twain rather
than uphold slavery. Only such an attitude against caste will
avail anything. When the North feels that ten churches or schools
that stand unequivocally against caste are more important than a
thousand churches or schools that sustain caste, then we shall see
the beginning of the end.
But the colored people themselves must be educated out of caste.
Strange as it may seem, some of them are its abettors, and,
stranger still, they are so religiously. As men, they repudiate
it; as Christians, they sustain it. They prefer separation mainly,
perhaps, because they think the whites would not welcome them.
Other reasons may be given. Some of the members love excitement
in their worship, and this they can enjoy better if no whites are
present; the leaders can be bishops and rulers among their own
people, but, if joined to the whites, these honors are denied, or,
at least, unequally divided. Why is it that religion is compelled
to shield some of the greatest wrongs on earth? Albert Barnes said,
long before slavery was abolished: “There is no power _out_ of the
Church that could sustain slavery an hour, if it were not sustained
_in_ it.” Must sinful and harmful caste, the baleful progeny of
slavery, find its bulwark in the Church—nay, in some of the colored
churches themselves?
But this wish or willingness of these churches for separation is
gravely made use of by many most excellent people as a reason for
ceasing to make war against caste. It is said triumphantly: “See
how the colored people, welcomed to Dr. Goodell’s or Dr. Rankin’s
churches, prefer churches of their own.” Does their abetting
caste help to destroy it? Did the wish of the Israelites in the
wilderness to return to Egypt help them on to Canaan? If the
slaves in this country were ever content to remain slaves, as was
sometimes alleged, that was all the greater evidence of the curse
of slavery. If the Soodra consents to remain a Soodra, all the more
does he need the breaking of his bondage that he may become a man.
And so, if the colored people consent to caste separation, all the
more do they need emancipation from the bondage of caste.
In this point of view the action of some of the large religious
bodies North and South in consenting to a separation on the color
line is riveting the chains of caste on the colored people, and
sustaining caste-prejudice in the hearts of the white race; and
it is seriously questioned by many considerate persons whether
the presence of two Congregational Missionary Societies in the
South, the one working mainly for the whites, and the other side by
side, mainly for the blacks, will not, with all explanations, be
construed into a sanction of caste. The question is fairly before
the churches, and should be met in a frank and Christian way.
The presence with us to-day of a committee appointed by the
American Home Missionary Society to confer on this very subject
renders its consideration by this meeting a matter of comity and
of Christian duty, and to aid in its intelligent and harmonious
settlement I beg leave to contribute some facts and considerations.
The A. M. A. was organized when the great missionary societies,
home and foreign, aided churches in the South that received
slaveholders as members. It was formed not as an anti-slavery
society, nor merely as a formal protest against slavery, but as
affording a channel through which anti-slavery Christians might
carry forward missions without complicity with slavery. Hence it
established missions in foreign lands and among the Indians, and
also home missions in the West.
But in the progress of the anti-slavery movement the large
missionary societies withdrew their aid from slaveholding
churches, and soon thereafter came the opening for the great work
to be done for the freedmen. The Association was believed to be
providentially prepared to undertake this work, and hence it gave
up its home missions in the West and among the Indians and entered
with alacrity into this new field.
The territory it occupied was the whole South, its schools being
located in every Southern State. But gradually it withdrew from
Delaware, Maryland, and unwisely, as I then thought, and now think,
from Florida. At the West it organized a few churches in Kansas,
which, however, it at length turned over to the American Home
Missionary Society, only resuming limited efforts there when the
great exodus of colored people thither took place. In Missouri it
never attempted much in church planting. It found that the Home
Missionary Society that had done so grand a work from the Atlantic
to the Pacific, rearing its monuments of light and piety along
the whole line of its march, had entered Missouri so effectually
that there was no more call for the Association in those parts,
and hence that state was soon and cheerfully surrendered to the
occupancy of that Society. In Texas the Association has established
one of its chartered institutions at Austin, the Tillotson
Collegiate and Normal Institute; it was the earliest Congregational
Society to plant churches in the State; its churches there, though
few, are more in number than that of any other Congregational
Society, and two calls are pressing upon us now for the
organization of new churches. Thus its field may be said to be the
“Solid South” leaving out Delaware, Maryland, Missouri, Florida and
the new State of West Virginia. In this territory it has planted
its large and permanent educational institutions; its 89 churches,
united in eight conferences, covering nearly the whole South.
The Association has been as much opposed to caste as to slavery,
as its early publications abundantly show, and has ever refused to
accept the limitation of a color line. Its schools and churches
have seemed to be almost wholly confined to the blacks, solely
because it allowed them to enter at all. But it has not confined
itself entirely to efforts for that race. It has founded schools
and churches mainly white. The church in Jacksonville, Fla., was
organized under its auspices. Its founders did not ask pecuniary
aid, but they did ask one of our District Secretaries to assist
in the organization, which he did, and spent nearly a month with
them afterward, supplying the pulpit until a permanent pastor
could be obtained. In Kentucky, John G. Fee, its first missionary
in the South, commissioned in 1848, formed white churches on an
anti-slavery basis. The same was done by Daniel Worth in North
Carolina. That church planting in Kentucky was followed by Berea
College, the most conspicuous example in the South of an anti-caste
institution, its pupils being in nearly equal numbers of both
races; and now more recently the example of Berea has been followed
by a church and school in Williamsburg, Ky., and in Clover Bottom.
Other openings of the same sort are presenting themselves in the
same region.
The only movement made by Congregationalists to found white
churches in the territory occupied by the Association was begun
during or soon after the war. At that time the work of the
Association was in its infancy, and the broad and permanent
foundations which it has since laid were scarcely anticipated. On
the other hand, this new movement for white churches was mainly
confined to the largest cities and perhaps the thought of possible
competition was not entertained. At all events the movement was not
very successful and was very nearly abandoned.
Whatever general impressions may have existed at that early day
as to the special work of the Association or whatever special
designations may since have been used as to the classes for
which it was mainly to labor, it never supposed that it was
to be confined entirely to those classes; and certainly now,
after nearly twenty years of almost exclusive occupancy of the
special territory to which it has confined itself, so far as
Congregationalists are concerned, it may well be supposed to look
with some surprise upon a movement recently inaugurated to enter
that same territory with missionary efforts that practically places
it on one side of a color line.
An agreement was made between the two societies when this question
came before them, which provides temporarily and tentatively
against the repetition of any such interferences as that which
started this discussion. Both societies have agreed not to enter
into any field occupied by the other without mutual consultation.
But this agreement provides no permanent basis for a settlement of
the question which field each society shall occupy. It only insures
Christian co-operation and forbearance until a settlement be made.
What that settlement shall be is for the constituency of our
societies to determine, and to them we must leave it. The American
Board and the Association have made a harmonious arrangement of
their respective fields of labor, and it is to be hoped that an
adjustment equally satisfactory may be reached with the American
Home Missionary Society.
In view of all this several questions ought to be considered.
1. What is the field open before us among the white population of
the South?
It is not the extent of the territory, nor the number of millions
of white people that are in the South, nor even the number that
need our school and Gospel advantages, but it is: _How many of them
can be reached by an anti-caste Gospel?_
It is not enough to say that we are to preach the Gospel, and if
people are converted the caste question will take care of itself.
Well do I remember when that plea and policy were in vogue in
regard to slavery. The Gospel was preached, churches were formed,
and the denominations were happy in their enlargement. Slavery also
did take care of itself, and good care, too, for it found snug
homes in these very churches. And well do I remember when these
same denominations cast slavery away from them and the coveted
churches along with it!
The American churches cannot afford to repeat that experience in
regard to caste. What was done then in comparative innocence,
because done in ignorance, cannot now be done without great guilt
in the light of that experience. We must remember that it is more
important to destroy caste than to found churches that will sustain
caste. No work can be done by our churches among the white people
of the South that will stand the test, that does not proceed on
the avowed and practical repudiation of caste; no school opened
that does not welcome the colored child; no church formed that
does not present the open door, the open hand and the open heart
to “Our Brother in Black.” There are Congregationalists in the
South that are ready to welcome again the polity of New England
and at the same time welcome among them the colored races, and
there are native Southerners ready for our schools and churches,
and also ready to make no distinction on account of color, and to
all such we ought to carry with joyful hearts and ready hands the
institutions we so much cherish. But we ought not to enter upon the
effort under a misapprehension. The number of openings for this
kind of labor is not great.
2. The question of two Congregational Societies on the Southern
field receives its greatest importance from its relation to
caste-prejudice. There are other difficulties. One of the saddest
features of the modern church extension at the West is the starting
of two or more feeble churches of different denominations in
small villages or among sparse populations, creating frictions
and rivalries where harmony and Christian fellowship are so
essential, and a waste of men and money where there is so much need
of economy. This would be aggravated in the poorer and sparser
settlements of the South, and still more aggravated if the same
denomination should, by two of its own societies there, thus come
into rivalry with itself. In the one case two houses are arrayed
against each other; in the other, a house is divided against
itself. It is the same railroad company running parallel lines in
competition with each other.
But all these considerations, grave as they are, are of small
importance when compared with the danger that the division of the
labors of two societies, running mainly along the color line,
would be construed as lending the sanction of the denomination to
caste separation. This is the gravamen of the difficulty. I am
happy to say that the two societies are equally committed against
caste, and will equally and honorably repudiate all intentional
sanction of it. But the bare fact that one is avowedly working
mainly for the whites and the other mainly for the blacks, will,
in spite of all protests to the contrary, array them before the
public as separated only by the color line. It is not proper for
me to speak for another society, but for my own I must speak. The
American Missionary Association was born an opponent of slavery.
Amid poverty, sneers and reproach from the best of men, as well as
the worst of men, it pressed forward in its opposition till the
glorious end came. It must oppose caste as it did slavery. It began
its work among the freedmen as the avowed enemy of caste, and amid
much misapprehension and reproach at the South, it has pressed
onward until it has gained the respect of both races. That position
it cannot, and it ought not to be asked to, surrender or jeopardize
by being placed on one side of a line of separation in missionary
labors that has no reason for its existence except the colors of
the people to be benefited.
3. If, in view of all the facts, it should be ultimately decided
that the Congregational churches should be represented at the South
by one missionary society, the decision should be reached in the
broadest spirit of Christian wisdom and kindness.
The American Missionary Association is not eager to be pushed
forward into the mission work among the whites, but it knows
something of their needs, especially their need of deliverance
from caste-prejudice that mars the symmetry of their piety and
chills their hearts as slavery did, and that perpetuates a race
antagonism that must be crushed before the South can be safe or
prosperous. If the Association should be called to that work, it
has some experiences and facilities that would be helpful. Its past
record would be a guaranty that it would not foster caste. It would
have no temptation to found schools and churches mainly white that
should be rivals of its schools and churches mainly colored, and
it could have no reason to hesitate in establishing both, if both
were needed. It is not “handicapped” for this work except by its
firm and well-known attitude against caste, and any other society
equally faithful on that subject would soon be equally handicapped.
Its large planting of schools and churches, with a value of
property of nearly a million of dollars, gives it a position and an
influence that it would take any other society a long time and a
large outlay of funds to acquire—to say nothing of the facilities
it thus possesses to extend its work among both races. It has a
wide acquaintance with the Southern people, both white and colored,
and has won for itself a large place in their confidence, by its
quiet, unselfish and useful work for both. It has, moreover,
already done something in bringing the two races together in school
and church, and for this reason it is fitted to be a bond of union
and Christian fellowship between them.
This Association, standing on the ruins of slavery, and amid the
schools and churches it has erected thereon for the benefit of the
colored race, and to some extent also for the white, would find it
both cognate and congenial to enlarge its work among the whites,
both the ignorant and the educated, carrying to them a gospel
that is not only uplifting and purifying, but that makes no caste
distinction in the school room or in the house of God.
* * * * *
REPORT ON EDUCATIONAL WORK.
The Committee on the Educational Work of the A. M. A. would
respectfully report that they find the history of the past year
highly satisfactory and encouraging. It is a record of enlarged
accommodations at several of the institutions. Stone Hall, at
Atlanta, the fourth of the buildings erected by the munificence of
Mrs. Valeria G. Stone, has been completed. New buildings, or very
considerable additions to former buildings, have been constructed
at Midway, Macon, Talladega, Williamsburg, Hillsboro, Memphis and
New Orleans; yet from several quarters the call still comes for
more room.
It is a record of increased practical efficiency. Industrial
training, which forms so important an adjunct of the work, has been
making progress by workshops established at Macon and Memphis, and
arrangements for carpentry schools at Tougaloo and Atlanta; while
farming education and training in housekeeping go on at various
points as heretofore, supplemented at Memphis by instruction in
nursing and hygiene; and Hampton continues to teach more vigorously
than ever a variety of handicrafts, such as printing, bookbinding,
iron and tin work, carpentry and wood turning, the manufacture of
sash and doors, shoe and harness making, tailoring and farming.
All this is, for the present, a very essential element of the
educational work.
It is a record of some degree of expansion, although the main
aspect is rather one of consolidation and elevation. The number of
teachers has increased by twenty-eight and the number of common
schools by four; the number of pupils being but slightly greater
than last year. The grade of these institutions is steadily
advancing. Among these pupils are found, we are happy to say,
ninety theological students—twelve more than were reported last
year. The three Teachers’ Institutes, held in as many States, may
prove to be the entering wedge of another great instrument of
power and quickening influence. The crowded halls and interested
audiences of the anniversaries of so many of our Institutions are
a striking manifestation of genuine progress. When we remember
that the oldest of these institutions has seen but a quarter of a
century, and practically but twenty years of life time, and that
now we rejoice in eight chartered institutions, comparatively
strong and effective, twelve high and normal schools and forty-two
common schools, with 279 teachers doing their soul-expanding work,
we may well say “What hath God wrought.” Far as it falls short of
our desire and our duty, so far and more also does it exceed the
boldest reasonable expectations of the dark and cloudy time of the
beginning.
But far the most satisfactory statement of the annual report is
its record of the religious spirit which guides, controls and
pervades this whole educational movement. The information that at
seven out of eight of the chartered institutions “special religious
interest has been manifest, adding scores and scores of these
scholars to the number of the disciples of Christ,” and that, “as
yet, but very few have been graduated from our various courses of
study who had not become Christians,” is a record of the crowning
mercy of God. So may it ever be. The heart and conscience must be
quickened with the intellect or there is no good hope for that
race, or for any other race. It must be _Christian_ education. The
school and the Church must move on together at the South as they
started together from Plymouth Rock, and they must extend, as far
as possible—certainly must offer—their joint benign influences, not
to a portion of the population, but to all classes and races alike.
For the part can receive its full benefit only in conjunction
with the benefit of the whole. This is no new principle, but the
method in which, as our annual reports show, this Association has
been proceeding throughout its history. Having always refused to
recognize the color-line, it can proceed on no other basis without
defeating its own ends, and compromising its own principles. And
the recent decision of the Supreme Court has rolled a new burden on
the Church.
Hence it is that your committee look with much interest upon
the experiment, tried and effectually settled at Berea, and now
extending thence among the “mountain whites,” of including all
classes and races in the purview of our educational and Christian
work. We refer to the movement at Williamsburg, a county-seat
on the Cumberland River, which is simply a repetition of the
movement at Berea of twenty years ago—with this difference, that
the abolition of the color-line, both in church and school,
at Williamsburg, is fully accepted beforehand by an actual
constituency in that place. Here the establishment of an academy
to educate teachers for the common schools of the county—of whom,
as of the population, but a small portion are colored persons—went
hand in hand with the opening of the church to both races alike,
and has led most naturally to the establishment of three adjacent
preaching places, and the formation of another church at the
nearest railway station. This method, when viewed simply on its
own merits, seems to be at once the dictate of a wise Christian
economy, and an almost necessary sequence, or rather part, of the
work of Christian education. Within the particular regions where
this Association is planting its schools, exerting its influence
and gaining the confidence of the community, it would seem to
have peculiar advantages and a special call to leaven the whole
community with the institutions of the gospel; while the molding
influence of its Christian schools will be left incomplete, except
as permanently embodied, fortified and nourished by surrounding
Christian churches, built upon the same fundamental principles.
Similar in condition, character and wants to this Whitley County,
in Kentucky, is a great area of five hundred miles by two hundred,
beginning in Virginia and extending to Alabama, occupied chiefly by
a white population numbering nearly two millions, of whom more than
half the adults can neither read nor write. It is one of the most
needy and neglected regions of our country, and presents a pressing
call to Christian philanthropy to enter and occupy.
S. C. BARTLETT, Chairman.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF PRESIDENT S. C. BARTLETT.
There is perhaps some propriety in my saying an earnest word for
the educational work of this Association, representing as I do a
college that from its birth abolished the color line in education.
More than a century ago Dartmouth College was training the red
man and more than half a century ago the black man. Our first six
graduates included three missionaries to the Indians, and the last
class that entered contains a full-blooded Dakota and a Cherokee.
Fifty-nine years ago, twenty-two years before the first anniversary
of this Association, we were educating the negro. In 1824 a young
man from Martinique, of irreproachable character and conduct, but
with some African color and African blood in his veins, applied
for admission. Objections were raised in some quarters from the
fear that his presence would prove unwelcome. The students heard
of it, held meetings and sent a committee to urge his reception,
and under the direction of a most conservative Board of Trustees,
with Dr. Bennet Tyler at its head, he was admitted, and into one of
the most distinguished classes in the history of the institution.
There, in company with forty classmates, who from that small number
have furnished six college professors, two theological professors,
two college presidents, two Indian missionaries, a senator of the
United States and a judge of a Supreme Court, Edward Mitchell went
on in comfort, graduated with honor and did a good work in the
Baptist ministry. Since then many colored men have entered without
hindrance, inconvenience, disability or disrespect. They have been
the equal companions and in some instances the room-mates of their
fellow students. In June last two such young men graduated, one of
them an appointment man and a commencement speaker.
We know the colored man as a student, a Christian and a gentleman.
And without making contrasts or comparisons, I will say that were
all our students as irreproachable as these last two colored men,
there would be no more discipline in the institution. We might burn
our college laws.
I have seen the colored student elsewhere in Northern schools. Some
of you remember that choice young man, Barnabas Root, a Christian
scholar in America, though the son of a heathen chief in Africa.
I well remember his graduating oration at Knox College, second to
no other on that occasion. I remember him as three years a student
in Chicago Theological Seminary, in all respects the peer of his
classmates. When that young man passed away just on the threshold
of his missionary career, it was a grievous loss to his race and to
the church.
It is not necessary to say that all are like these. But these show
what can be and sometimes will be. Educationally, they are a most
hopeful race, because, in the main eager for improvement. And with
whatever deductions, it may be doubted whether the summons to awake
and arise intellectually, socially and morally ever fell on the
ears of six or seven millions of people with such a simultaneous
thrill of response. When I look out on our educational work at the
South, I am greatly impressed with what has been already done, even
more than I am oppressed with what remains to be done.
What have you done? No doubt it was a notable plan of the French
authorities in this country near two hundred years ago to encircle
this young nation with a chain of military stations from the Gulf
of St. Lawrence to the Gulf of Mexico. But this Association has
done better than that. You have gone not to the outskirts, but to
the centre. You have planted your cordon of educational fortresses
from the Potomac and the Ohio almost to the Rio Grande, through
the heart of the South in all the great slave-holding States. They
are there to stay and to re-construct. They are already working
powerfully, not alone on the education of individual young men and
young women, but on the education of the community and of public
sentiment. What a change has the President of the Board of Trustees
of Berea College lived to behold—the man who was robbed and driven
out, but who now sees white men and black in nearly equal numbers
graduating together, and audiences of three or four thousand
gathered to hear them. And these sixteen other anniversaries lately
chronicled in the AMERICAN MISSIONARY, with their interested
audiences and crowded halls, sometimes in stately buildings, are
the signal tokens of a great transformation.
No more significant testimony could be given to this change than a
sort of wail in the _Atlantic Monthly_ over the “New Departure in
Negro Life,” a lament over the decadence of “the jocund customs of
the past,” with its thoughtless levity and hilarity, and over the
“half-hearted manner in which the characteristic festivities that
remain are gone through with.” What does it mean? It means, says
the writer, that “an unmistakable change in the negro character is
at hand, and in an advanced state of progress. He is putting away
childish things and striving in his own crude way to grasp matters
of higher import. The bulk of the race have learned to read after a
fashion. His primer, his _vade mecum_, is the Bible. Never before,
perhaps, in the history of the world, have two decades brought
about such a manifest change in a race. Religion, religionism,
forms the staple of his speech by day, and the stuff that his
dreams are made of by night.”
Would that the picture was more completely true. But, thank God, it
is at least founded on fact. The race is aroused, and in earnest.
It is bent on accumulation, education, elevation. The world may pay
as little heed to the movement as did the Roman world in the time
of Tacitus to the Christian Church in the Eternal City; but the
time is not distant when the world will see that this quiet work is
one of the great movements of modern history.
* * * * *
CHRISTIAN EDUCATION AT THE SOUTH.
BY REV. WASHINGTON GLADDEN, D.D.
The problem that confronts us this morning is that which is
presented by the illiteracy of this country, and especially of
the Southern States. This is not the only problem before this
Association; the problem of the irreligion and heathenism which
infest many regions also claims our energies. There is moral
evil as well as ignorance to be met and fought and overcome. The
Association has an evangelical work as well as an educational work
in its hands; and though, as we shall see, these two are properly
one, yet it is now convenient to consider them separately. It is
the educational work that is now before us.
We educate, because education is the servant of a pure religion. We
educate, because we are the missionaries of a faith which always
adds to itself virtue, and to its virtue knowledge. We educate,
because a genuine Christianity always educates; because the work
of the pulpit, the work of the Church everywhere must always be,
in considerable part, the work of education; but, more especially,
we of this Association educate, because the peoples with whom we
work are in peculiar need of education; and because nothing but
intelligence will ever break the fetters of degrading superstition
by which they are held, and lead them forth into the liberty of the
sons of God.
We educate, also, because we love our country, and because we
believe that there is no other remedy for evils that now threaten
her very existence, but the remedy of Christian education. Thus we
are brought face to face with the problem of illiteracy. Illiteracy
in a republic; what does it signify? It is the creeping paralysis
that unnerves its arm; it is the malaria that poisons its blood;
it is the cataract that dims and finally destroys its vision; it
is the slow decay that consumes its life. Illiteracy, ignorance,
in a republic is, and must always be, assailing and undermining
its very foundations. It is the natural and deadly foe of free
government. No republic can live, no republic ought to live, in
which the voters are ignorant. Voting in a republic is governing;
and no man has any right to govern me who does not know enough to
govern himself. No man has any right to take part in the government
of the nation, who has not some notion of what right government
is. I protest against such government. I have never consented
to the justice of it, and I never will. I do not believe that
the State has any right to intrust this responsible business of
governing—and voting is governing—to the hands of men who cannot
read the ballots that they cast and who have no conception of the
duties of a citizen.
But the State has done it; and what has been done cannot be undone
by any political methods. It is with the consequences that we
have to do. And the consequences are tremendous, appalling to
those who stop to consider them. The total number of men of voting
age in the Southern States at the last census was 4,154,125. Of
these 1,354,974 could neither read nor write. A little more than
thirty-two per cent. of the voters of those States were at that
time wholly illiterate. Think of that! Almost one-third of all the
voters in sixteen States of the Union so ignorant that they cannot
write their own names or read the simplest English sentence! And
these are our rulers.
I know very well that you will find among these thirteen hundred
thousand illiterate voters not a few men of great natural
shrewdness and considerable general information, who may be fairly
qualified to discharge the duties of citizenship. There are men
to whom all print is shut, who can see quite as far into public
questions as many of those to whom print is as wide open as it
was to Silas Wegg. The alphabet test is by no means an infallible
test. Some who could not pass this test are well qualified for
citizenship. On the other hand, there are tens of thousands of
those who are reported among the literates, who are put down as
being able to read and write, and who are yet utterly ignorant.
They can manage to scrawl their names, perchance, or to skip and
tumble about a little among simple words in a primer: but the
reading and writing of which they boast is of no sort of use to
them as fitting them to vote intelligently. You would need to add a
great many figures to that array in the census if you should state
fully the facts in regard to the illiteracy of the Southern States.
I think we shall all agree with Dr. Haygood when he says, as he
did at the meeting of the National Educational Association in
Washington last winter, “This is bad enough.” And perhaps we should
also be able to agree with him in the further statement that it “is
far from being the worst of this sad case. The worst,” he says,
“is this: the illiterate vote in these States is increasing. From
1870 to 1880 the increase of this army of ignorant voters in the
South amounted to 187,671.” Of course this is worse, in one sense;
for the more we learn of this illiteracy the worse we are off, no
doubt. But there is a brighter side to this picture, thank God!
It is dark enough, at best; and I want you to see it in all its
blackness; but I do not want to paint it any blacker than it is.
After you have seen the facts just as they are, you will still find
on your hands a stupendous task; but you will have, I trust, some
reasons for believing that it is not a hopeless task.
It is true, then, as Dr. Haygood says, that there was a positive
increase of illiterate voters in the South between 1870 and 1880.
He makes this increase in round numbers 197,000; the figures I have
found increase it a little to 208,000. But that is not a _relative_
increase. The increase in the illiterate vote does not keep pace
with the increase of the population. The population increased 30
per cent. in the ten years; the illiterate vote increased less than
20 per cent. In 1870, more than 40 per cent. of the voters of the
South were illiterate; in 1880, only 32 per cent. were illiterate.
This is what I call very substantial gain. Under the circumstances
I am inclined to call it a splendid gain, one that is quite worth
singing the doxology over, one that should cause us all to thank
God and take courage.
But there are other features of the case to my own mind still more
significant. Dr. Haygood says in the same address to which I have
referred: “In this downward progress the two races keep well
together.” We have seen that it is not a downward, but an upward
progress. And I think we shall see that instead of the two races
keeping well together, one of them is falling a good ways behind.
Which is it? “The increase of the illiterate _white_ vote,” says
Dr. Haygood, “was 93,279; of the illiterate negro vote, 94,392.
The whites being in the majority, take the South as a whole, the
increase of the illiterate vote is relatively greater among the
Negroes.”
This is a great misconception. Dr. Haygood has no purpose whatever
of misrepresenting the facts; we all know that. No man in the
country is doing better work for the colored people than he is
doing; no man deserves more honor; but he has misapprehended
the facts in this statement; and I know that he will be glad to
be corrected. It is true, then, that the actual increase of the
illiterate white vote in the Southern States during the last decade
was about the same as that of the illiterate Negro vote; 93,000
of the one, 94,000 of the other. But how was it in 1870? In that
year there were in the Southern States 317,281 adult whites who
were illiterate, and 820,022 adult Negroes. There were at that
time considerably more than two and a half times as many Negro
illiterates as white illiterates. Now, if the Negroes have added to
their eight hundred thousand illiterates only about 94,000, while
the whites have added to their three hundred thousand about 93,000,
it seems to me that the relative increase is immensely greater
among the whites than among the Negroes. In fact, the increase
of the illiterate white vote, in the ten years, was more than
twenty-eight per cent., while the increase of the illiterate Negro
vote was only eleven and a half per cent.
Dr. Haygood gives the figures with respect to several of the
States. “In Georgia,” he says, “the illiterate white voters in
1870 were 21,899; in 1880, 28,571; the illiterate Negro voters in
Georgia, in 1870, were 100,551; in 1880, 116,516.” Let us see what
these figures mean. In Georgia, in 1870, the whole number of males
of voting age was 237,640; in 1880, it was 321,438. The increase
of adult males was, therefore, about 31 per cent. But the increase
in the whole number of illiterate voters was only about 18-1/2 per
cent. according to Dr. Haygood’s figures. The white illiterates,
however, increased 30-1/2 per cent. while the colored illiterates
increased not quite 16 per cent.
Two other States in which we are deeply interested, are reported
to us in Dr. Haygood’s figures, and, neglecting the numbers which
he gives, I will give you the percentages, which he neglects. In
Kentucky the number of male adults has increased 23 per cent. and
the whole number of illiterate voters about 21-1/2 per cent. But
the per cent. of increase among the illiterate white voters is very
nearly 23, almost keeping up with the increase of population, where
the per cent. of increase among illiterate Negro voters is not
quite fourteen.
In Tennessee the facts are still more striking. The increase in the
whole number of males of voting age was, in the ten years, about 26
per cent., while the increase in the number of illiterate voters
was only 13 per cent. The illiterate voters increased only half as
fast as the voting population. Here, evidently, a very successful
attack has been made upon the strongholds of illiteracy. But where
have these victories been gained—among the whites or the Negroes?
Almost wholly among the latter. The number of illiterate white
voters increased during the ten years 24 percent., almost as fast
as the population, while the illiterate Negro voters increased
during the same period _less than five per cent._
Taking these three States together, we find that the percentage of
increase of males of voting age was 27; of illiterate voters, 18;
of illiterate white voters, 25; of illiterate Negro voters, 12.
Now these figures completely overthrow the statement that the
increase of illiteracy is relatively greater among the Negroes
than among the whites. They show that the proportions are all the
other way, tremendously the other way; the difference between the
two races is startling. The whites are gaining a little in this
battle with the powers of darkness; but it is very little; they
are scarcely doing more than hold their own; but the Negroes are
gaining splendidly; it is to them that the large increase in the
percentage of intelligent voters is mainly due.
Now what does this mean? Of course it is due to several causes.
The Negroes had had but about five years of opportunity when the
census of 1870 was taken; in 1880 they had had fifteen years of
opportunity. That a better chance has been offered them, and that
they are taking the chance that has been offered them, these
figures assure us. But they tell us something more, that, to us, is
very significant. The gains of intelligence among the Negroes in
all parts of the South have been much more rapid than those of the
whites; but they have been more rapid in these three States than in
most other parts of the South; and why? Why? Did you ever hear of
Fisk, and Berea and Atlanta? The census tables have heard of them,
if you have not.
It is to the hundreds of young people that go out every year from
these colleges, and such as these, teaching in public and in
private schools pupils of their own color, that this gain in the
battle with illiteracy at the South is due. They are the children
of the light, who are waging this victorious battle with the
powers of darkness. There has been great improvement, of course,
in the public schools of the South during this decade; but in
this improvement the whites have shared as well as the blacks;
the great reasons for the more rapid advancement of the blacks
are, first, that they are more eager for instruction than the
ignorant whites, and, secondly, that they are better supplied with
teachers—missionaries of education, who not only do much to supply
the demand for knowledge already existing, but who do still more to
increase this demand.
We come back, now, from our brief excursion into this fruitful and
fascinating realm of percentages, to confront again that large
mass of illiteracy that lies athwart the path of this nation. Huge
it is, but, thank God, it looks not so vast and unmanageable as
once it seemed. It is growing; but the nation is growing faster;
relatively it is decreasing. It is far too formidable yet to be let
alone; so long as ignorance rules almost one-third of our rulers
in all of these sixteen States, no man has any right to relax
his vigilance or abate his energies. What these figures show is
simply this, that work tells; that our money is not wasted; that
our labor is not in vain in the Lord; that if we will only keep
it up with our giving and our working, if we will only see to it
that these same agencies that have done this grand work in the
past ten years are fully equipped to carry it on with increasing
vigor, we may hope to gain in the next ten years still more rapid
and decisive victories. The word that comes to every friend of
the American Missionary Association, to every benefactor in deed
or in purpose of these noble schools, is the word that Grant sent
to Sheridan after the battle of Five Forks: “Push things!” You’ve
got ’em running, these legions of ignorance and darkness; up and
after them; harry them on the flank, press them in the rear, till
they plunge like the herd of devil-pestered hogs, into the Gulf of
Mexico.
You have got the forces to do this work. All you want to do is to
give them a better equipment. You want no new machinery; you only
want more power; no new organizations, but reinforcements of those
in the field.
The kinds of educational work that this Association is doing
are exactly the kinds of work that must be done. The industrial
training given in some of the schools is admirable; the normal
training of teachers is work whose results are immediate and
beneficent; the higher education, too, is abundantly justified. If
there are any who have doubts on this last score, I am not one of
them. There is nothing that these six millions of colored people
need to-day more than they need thoroughly educated men of their
own race to be their leaders. More than any other class in this
country, they are in danger of being misled by petty demagogues and
small philosophers. We cannot too soon furnish them with social
and political and religious guides who have been trained by severe
discipline to think clearly, to consider questions broadly and
historically, to reason judicially and dispassionately, to chasten
the exuberance and verbosity of their own people with the dignity
and judgment that are the fruits of sound learning. Such examples
of high character and broad culture scattered about here and there
among the Negro people will do more to form their ideals and direct
their progress than can be done in any other way. I tell you that
the money spent in making first-class men in these colleges is as
well invested as any other money that you spend. The only thing to
be desired about such schools as Fisk and Atlanta is that their
standards be made higher and more inflexible, year by year, and
that their work be more and more thorough, so that the diploma
shall mean in every case just as much as the diploma of Amherst or
Williams or Bowdoin.
It is a Christian education that pupils are receiving in these
schools of ours. Most of the pupils who go out from them to become
pastors, teachers, lawyers, physicians, merchants, citizens,
fathers and mothers are Christian men and women; and they become
messengers of a pure Gospel, living epistles of Christ, wherever
they go. Especially as teachers do they make their influence felt.
We cannot Christianize the public school systems of the Southern
States; but if we can Christianize the teachers, that is a much
more effective service. And that is precisely what we are doing in
all these Southern schools.
This Association has been promoting Christian education at the
South in quite another fashion. Gently, without censure or
denunciation, by the silent influence of Christly lives, it has
been teaching the Southern people that caste is un-Christian. It
is a great lesson; it is a lesson hard to learn; and we must not
wonder at it: the social maxims and usages of centuries are not
changed in a day. But it will be learned by and by; patience and
fidelity and sweet reasonableness in those who teach it will have
their reward in God’s good time. It only needs that we should
quietly bear our testimony and wait; the leaven may be hidden
now, but it is working; and the time will surely come, and as
speedily as it ought to come, when from churches and from schools
the color line will disappear. I do not think that the people who
have commissioned and who support this Association in its work—the
great Congregational communion, on which it mainly depends—can
propose to themselves any better sort of work than that which this
Association is doing, or can afford to carry on that work in any
other way or by any other hands. It is true, as the figures I have
quoted have shown, that the colored people have received most of
the benefit of this work, and that the whites have profited by it
but little. This is true of the educational work, and of the church
work as well. But it is not because the schools and churches of
this Association are not open to whites and blacks on equal terms.
It is simply because they _are_ open to whites and blacks on equal
terms. This is the only reason why the whites do not generally
avail themselves of these excellent advantages. It is because the
basis on which these schools and churches rest is frankly and
thoroughly Christian—because caste is not tolerated in them—that
the white people of the South have held aloof from them. For the
present, until their convictions and feelings on this subject
shall have changed, the white people of the South will, generally,
hold themselves aloof from any church or school that rests on this
basis, no matter by whom it may be administered. Any society that
is as frankly and thoroughly Christian as this society has always
been, will have the same difficulty in reaching the whites that
this society experiences.
It is possible that churches or schools might be established at
the South, nominally open to both races, but really intended
exclusively for the whites, into which some whites could be drawn.
You might put it into the constitution that no distinctions of
color were recognized in the church, and you might still keep
saying: “Of course colored people are welcome here, if they want to
come; but we think they will be happier and better off in churches
of their own.” Probably the colored people would not accept this
kind of welcome; and possibly some whites would be satisfied
with this method of establishing the color line. It would be an
effective method, no doubt. But is this the sort of thing that the
people calling themselves Congregationalists want to do? For one I
feel sure that it is not worth doing. I don’t believe that we can
afford to propagate two kinds of Congregationalism down there, one
of which is frankly and bravely Christian in its dealings with the
caste of color, and the other of which is, to say the least, less
frankly Christian, consenting, by its silence, to the maintenance
of the color line. Such a policy seems to me something other than
Christian, something less than Christian: and I, for my part, have
no time and no money to spend in propagating a Congregationalism
that is broader or narrower, or higher or lower, or tighter or
looser than simple Christianity. When our zeal for the propagation
of Congregationalism leads us to slur over the everlasting verities
of Christ’s kingdom, it is leading in doubtful ways.
It has been said that this Association is handicapped by its
record and its methods in the work of reaching the whites of the
South. Perhaps it is. So was He handicapped in His work among
the Pharisees, of whom it was said: “Why eateth your Master with
publicans and sinners?” The burden it is bearing is the cross of
Christ; nothing else. It has gone down into humiliation with its
Master to succor and save these His brethren. Would it be better
for the Association to fling aside this burden? Would it be wise
for any other society going down into that field to work to refuse
to take it up or to try to hide it from the sight of men?
The disability under which this Association labors is its glory.
And I do not believe that it will prove to be a permanent
impediment in its work. No; that cannot be. I believe in the
victorious might of Christian principles. The heroic faith and
patience of the men and women who have been toiling there so long
among Christ’s little ones, identifying themselves with the lowly
and giving their lives for them, neither striving nor crying
against the scorn that has greeted them, reviled but reviling
not again, must triumph in the end. It is the one power that is
irresistible. The barriers of caste will go down before it, and
the color line will no longer stain the threshold of the Christian
Church.
So, then, I do not believe that we, as Congregationalists, need any
other agency in the Southern field than the one that has wrought
there so nobly in the years now past. I am sure that even the
educational work of this Association would be obstructed by the
entrance of any other missionary organization into this field.
Because I love and honor the Home Missionary Society, I do not want
to see it compromise itself or imperil the interests of Christ’s
kingdom at the South by turning from its proper work, its urgent
work, to try a doubtful experiment. And I trust this Association,
in all love and kindness, but with all needful frankness, will
express its wishes in this matter. Two little boys were astride of
a hobby-horse, and the one who was riding ahead was being crowded
out of the saddle, and was clinging with some difficulty to the
neck of the wooden steed. Finally he ventured: “Jimmy, don’t you
think if one of us should get off I could ride a little better?”
I hope that the American Missionary Society will say, by her
representatives here, to her honored sister, the American Home
Missionary Society: “Don’t you think that if one of us should keep
out of this Southern field, I could do my work in it a little
better?” I am sure that she has earned the right to express this
wish, and I have not the slightest fear that the wish will not be
heeded.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF PROF. C. G. FAIRCHILD.
From the trend of the discussion this morning I find that a
large responsibility has drifted into my hands. There is among
the churches in the North a deep, unmistakable interest in those
long-neglected ignorant whites of the South. It is a difficult
problem to tell how to turn this into channels that shall benefit
these people without on the one hand neglecting the work already
undertaken by this Association or, on the other, giving some
suspicion of countenancing a color line and perhaps bringing a
clashing of interests between sister societies. In the report
on education just received, special attention was turned to the
mountain whites. Perhaps the solution of our difficulties may be
found here. Certainly there will arise in your minds no suspicion
of waning interest in the colored people or sympathy with caste on
the part of those who have heretofore been closely connected with
this mountain work at Berea College and the surrounding regions.
It is their unanimous conviction that work undertaken for these
mountain people with firm faith in Christian brotherhood and
unswerving courage will assist in unfurling upon a higher masthead
the broad motto borne on the seal of Berea College for twenty-five
years past: “God hath made of one blood all nations of men.”
The term “mountain” stands for much more than appears at first.
It stands for a larger, more inviting and fertile section than
many are aware of. It comprises a stretch of country commencing in
the Virginias and extending to Alabama, 500 miles one way by 200
the other. Much of the land, not simply in valleys, but also upon
the benches of hillsides and even upon the broad mountain tops,
is as fertile as the better known sections of the South. At the
base of these hills lies an untold wealth of coal, iron and other
minerals which is, as yet, almost untouched, while the summits of
these hills are still crowned with the virgin forests. This country
supports now a population of two millions, though its capabilities
are wretchedly developed. The growth since the war in these regions
has been at almost double the ratio of that of other parts of the
South.
But the term “mountain” bespeaks a country with different
social and political characteristics. Slavery had no use for a
self-respectful, laboring white man. The badge of manual labor was
a badge of servile degradation. Of two brothers one would chance
to get a little start, own a few slaves and all society would spur
him onward. The other, less fortunate at the start, would slip
away to some mountain hamlet and lead an uneventful, unambitious
life and bring up a large family in utter ignorance. He plodded on
his way, working only as necessity compelled him, instinctively
hating slavery, slave-owners and slaves. Thus slavery rejected not
simply this broken mountainous country, but the large class of
whites which inhabited this region. If the North cares to dignify
physical labor in the South, if it feels the need of a class that
has a natural love for free, republican institutions, if it cares
to have the common-school system take rooting in the soil, if
it desires a class of whites that shall be the wise, consistent
friends of the colored people, perhaps it may find that this large
body of whites rejected by slavery will prove the effective agency
under the divine planning for this purpose. The stone which the
builders rejected may become the head of the corner.
But one or two railroads cross this section. There are few towns
of any importance, and a man who should own $10,000 worth of
property would be the great man for twenty miles around. They are
an agricultural people, each family living on its own little farm
of 50 to 100 acres, the homestead often having been handed down
through two or three generations. The houses range from the painted
and unpainted frame house of four to six rooms to the very common
little log hut of one to two rooms where you will find huddled
together at night a father and mother, and children of every age,
and you yourself if you happen to be their guest. The most that is
needed for family wants, from corn and bacon to tobacco, is raised
by themselves. Often such a family will not see $50 in cash the
year round. Even the old hand looms find a friendly shelter in
those Rip Van Winkle hollows. A man who moved from these regions
to Berea, that he might give his seven children an education, wore
upon his back his carefully preserved wedding suit, the wool for
which he himself had cut from the backs of his father’s sheep, and
which his mother, after spinning, and weaving, and dyeing with
butternut bark, had cut and made for him. A little shovel plough,
a hand-made hoe, and an unkempt mule with a straw collar make up
the agricultural outfit. The schoolhouse is a log hut sometimes
without doors and windows, or even a floor. For religious services,
dependence is placed upon the chance visits of an exhorter who
sometimes cannot read, and is even proud of getting his inspiration
at first hand. There is a section of Eastern Kentucky, 200 miles
one way by 100 the other, that has not a settled minister of any
denomination. Some hesitate about extending the work of this
Association beyond the blacks, but they need have little scruple
here, for this section of the map of our country is black through
illiteracy. More than half of the adult white population native
born, of the same stock and lineage that furnished from the more
favored sections the Clays and Breckenridges, that gave to this
country Abraham Lincoln—more than half of this white population
cannot read or write. Thus, not on the farther side of broad
oceans, or even the distant borders of our land, but right at hand
in the very heart of the best settled and most cultured part of our
country lies this territory, vast in extent, utterly neglected by
all uplifting agencies in the past, peculiarly susceptible to the
awakening influences of the changed social conditions at the South,
where there is an ignorance so dense that when we remember that
they are our brothers and sisters, not by Christian ties simply
but by direct blood and lineage, we must hang our heads in shame.
Surely if the Church at the North is sighing for new worlds to
conquer, what more claim can there possibly be upon its attention
and benevolence?
It is a matter of congratulation that this work can be entered upon
by this Association at once and with vigor, without embarrassment
or exciting in any quarter criticism or suspicion. It is idle for
us to suppose that the social growth of generations enforced by
ignorance, savage heredity and marked physical characteristics,
has wasted away in less than a score of years. More vital than
any political problem or the growth of any special church polity
is the question whether the time can ever come in this country
when the negro in debating his chances and opportunities in life
shall not be made to feel that his color is a drawback to him.
In working out the solution of this problem this Association has
borne a part that is fast challenging the respect of the South
and the admiration of the North. This is a vantage ground that it
is hazardous to yield. The work of this Association is understood
everywhere to mean that nothing less than the utter demolishment
of every barrier in the upward progress of the negro race will
satisfy it. If, therefore, the churches lay upon it this further
work, we feel sure that not only by heritage will it prove true
to these fundamental principles, but that the workers at present
in the South will exercise an Argus-eyed vigilance that nowhere
shall there be a shadow of a suspicion that the spirit of caste has
influenced its action. Without rashness on one hand or neglecting
its opportunities on the other, the churches at the North can
thus safely gratify their present earnest and commendable, though
somewhat tardy, desire to benefit the needy whites of the South by
asking this Association to turn its attention specially to these
mountain whites.
The friends of this Association should also remember that the man
whose name as a missionary has been the longest on your roll, the
Rev. John G. Fee, was born at the base of these Kentucky hills.
You should remember, too, that the men who made an anti-slavery
church and school in a slavery State years before the war were
these mountain whites. This Association nursed its firstborn on
these mountain slopes. As patriots, some of whose sons sleep on
that Southern soil, you should remember that this whole section
was loyal in the battle for a united country unstained by slavery.
West Virginia parted from the parent State under this patriotic
impulse. Some mountain counties in Kentucky sent more men into the
Union army than they had liable to military duty. Surely gratitude
for such help in that struggle is not so dead at the North that it
will not say to this Association: “If you have the opportunity by
churches and schools to repay in part the debt we owe, we will see
that you have the money and the men.”
* * * * *
REPORT ON CHURCH WORK.
Your Committee finds in the report of the Executive Committee for
the past year, proof of healthy and steady growth in the work of
planting churches. The report records the organization of six new
churches, viz., McLeansville, N.C.; Knoxville, Tenn.; Birmingham,
Ala.; Jackson, Miss.; Fayetteville, Ark.; and Belle Place, La.,
and one new State Association of six churches in Miss.; making the
whole number of churches eighty-nine, and of State Associations
eight. The additions to these churches during the past year have
been six hundred and sixty-seven; the number of scholars gathered
in the church and Mission Sunday-schools has been nine thousand
four hundred and four; the contributions for church work $12,027.21
and for benevolent purposes $1,049.35.
We are glad to find it to be the distinct aim of the Society to
press its work of evangelization to its consummation in Christian
churches, and that while its educational and industrial work must
from the nature of the case be general in its character, the
obligation is recognized to gather up the result, so far and as
fast as opportunity affords, in a more specific and permanent form.
An intelligent Christianity, such as is fostered in the academies,
seminaries and colleges maintained by the Society, demands a
church-polity that gives scope to the developed manhood and retains
it in a process of growth. Our work would be but half done did
we leave those brought under its influence to fall back into old
methods and be lost in the mass of ignorance and superstition.
The Association was debarred from this distinctive work at first,
but when soon after the war, others, who had contributed to the
funds of this Society, seeing the magnitude of the undertaking,
wisely began efforts of their own, the Association was left to
the support of the Congregational churches, it directed its labors
to this end. This distinctive church-planting work began in 1867.
In that year the Society organized three churches. The statistics
of its growth in this direction are summarized thus: In 1867 there
were three churches; in 1870 there were twenty-three; in 1875,
fifty-six; in 1880, seventy-three; in 1883, eighty-nine. The
membership now numbers five thousand nine hundred and seventy-four,
an average of sixty-seven to each church. Every church but two has
a pastor, and eighty of the eighty-nine have their own houses of
worship. These churches give promise of permanency. They have not
sprung from a division or denominational spirit, and are not the
representations of restlessness or the mere desire to try some new
thing. Their roots are laid deep in the Christian education of the
schools, and their organization expresses the need of the growing
intelligence of those who compose them. Churches made of such
material, formed upon the New Testament plan, have thus far been
stable; those first formed are among the strongest.
Nor are these churches isolated and independent. They have
recognized the principle of the fellowship of the churches and have
grouped themselves into eight State Conferences, thus giving to
our polity an example and an acknowledged position in that great
section of our land. It is gratifying to find from the reports that
the methods of this church-government are readily apprehended by
the members of these churches, and that in the order and discipline
of the individual churches and in the management of their councils
and conferences, they are showing capacity for self-control.
This body of churches, so well organized and underlaid by Christian
schools, presents a record of sixteen years’ effort that does no
discredit to the Congregational name.
While anxious for a more rapid growth in the future, and wishing
to extend the good influences which we believe will be felt by the
establishment of such churches, we would commend the wisdom and
prudence that have seized upon strong centers and have avoided the
hasty multiplication of churches for the sake of members. While
urging for the future the utmost watchfulness for opportunity and
the pushing of this branch of the work of the Association, we
express the hope that what is done be well done, that no discredit
may come to the cause of Christ, as represented by the churches of
our polity. It is not number but might that tells in the formation
processes of a people. A single church of genuine substance,
rightly constituted and ordered and working outward, is a germ
around which a whole community will take form. More than numbers,
the inherent vitality of this molds and fashions after the ideas
and principles with which it is charged. It has vitalizing and
organic power in it, and kindling the intelligence and awakening
the responsibility of its own members, it leads and sways the
people around it. It may work dimly for a time amid the surrounding
chaos, but presently as the social fabric thus woven is brought to
light, the figure appears and it commends itself as a true church
of Christ.
But the work so well begun ought soon to be greatly enlarged.
The rapid growth of the colored population gives emphasis to
this—a growth that so far outstrips the means of education and
spiritual improvement as to leave a constantly increasing number
of illiterate voters and of degraded people. The benevolent
societies of the North, of every name and order, ought to multiply
their efforts for training the needed teachers—the business and
professional men, the mechanics and the educated and consecrated
ministers. Meantime, as the higher education of some advances,
there will be more and more demand for churches of our order. We
say this not from denominational feeling. We hold no invasive
attitude. We stir no controversy. We aim not at division, but
believing that the apostolic method of gathering churches is the
true one, that in its fluent and free adaptation, its simplicity
of form and order, in its investing Christ as the immediate Head
of each local church, in its putting the individual members upon
responsibility, and thus setting them to the study of God’s Word
for authority and the dependence upon the Divine Spirit for
guidance—that in this free and fraternal way of ordering the
churches there is a molding power for good beyond others, and
remembering its working and product elsewhere, we desire such fruit
of it all abroad.
That Providence which always surpasses our thought in preparing
its agencies has given us for this work this Association with
its schools and machinery, its knowledge of the needs of the
section where its greatest efforts have been put forth. Started
with no expectation of founding churches, it yet has nothing in
its constitution limiting it to one kind of effort nor to any one
class or race. Its schools are open to all. Its churches are simply
Christian churches. It goes to teach and preach and to elevate the
masses. That is what is needed—no distinction of caste or class,
and in the organization of churches the recognition of a regenerate
membership on the principle that mankind are of one blood and on
the fellowship of all Christians.
While practically its work has been mainly among the freedmen,
and while it may continue for some time to find itself limited to
them, theoretically its work is for all, and it should hold fast to
that principle. It should never form some churches for black men
and other churches for white men; but always Christian churches
for Christian men and women. We should deprecate any line drawn
in the Christian church based on difference in wealth, in social
position, in education, in color, in sex, in previous condition.
The only line to be drawn there is between those who give good
evidence of renewed hearts and those who do not. We recognize this
as the principle governing this Association, and therefore commend
it as the adequate agency for the evangelizing work of our churches
in the South. May it be abundantly sustained by the prayers and
sympathies and means of our churches at the North, and may it soon
find an open door through the ignorance and the prejudice by which
it is surrounded and be free to work among all classes at the South.
And looking at the work already commenced among the freedmen, what
a goodly field is opened before us! What a beneficent influence we
can exert, not only on the seven millions in our own land, who are
part of our body politic, but upon a whole race counted by its many
millions in different parts of the world! What stores of prophetic
power are lodged in every true church we establish! We have but the
merest hint and initial sign in the little bands now gathered of
the possibilities lying before us!
We commend this work to the churches at the North, and plead that
these older churches cherish a lively and effective interest in
all this outgrowth of themselves. There is danger that there may
be abatement of interest in this direction, and that the fostering
hand and special sympathy these weak churches, now that they are
churches, need in their struggles, be withheld. That distinctive
feature of Congregationalism which marks it off from sheer
independency needs to be emphasized. There are claims of community
in faith and order that should be gladly owned, and perfect
understanding and interchange should be cherished between all parts
of this fellowship of saints, mutual confidence and the gracious
tenderness of a love deeper than any kinship of race should cement
us in one.
By our liberal things we shall stand. We have sent men and women
and means with large generosity, that inquired not whether
they served our own denomination or another, if only Christ’s
cause be promoted. The work already done is a fair movement to
self-forgetful charity. We should now make our beneficence more
and more the channel of grace and fellowship to brethren whom we
have made brethren. If we do indeed hold this church polity on such
terms of intelligence as to make it fit to hold it at all, if it be
no fault of the awakened ones at the South that they hold it, then
what has been so good and fruitful here we should make strong and
fruitful there. And if this Association has come in its legitimate
growth to the establishment of self-governed churches, accept them
as our own. Our seal is on them from the first. The time is ripe
for larger advance, and for more confidence in our own work.
It is with gratitude we acknowledge the liberal plan with which
this Association is now supplementing its evangelizing and teaching
work with the timely and necessary work of church erection. It is
part of the same work. Nearly fourscore neat and serviceable church
edifices have already arisen under its auspices. No better work
and none looking more to permanent results has been done. Many a
missionary and pastor has found his work at once enlarged and all
his means of good multiplied, when the house of God has been given
him by its aid. And every such edifice stands forth as an eloquent
witness of your loving care for the people of the South, and serves
as a bond of union between the distant parts of our land.
The same divine ordinance that opened this field to us, prescribes
our work in it. Now that our mission reveals itself, shall we
not accept it thankfully, impress ourselves purposely on this
vast field, and let the poor of all classes feel the strength of
Christian community and fellowship—for we are one?
LEWELLYN PRATT,
Chairman.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF REV. T. P. PRUDDEN.
Assuming that the church work of the Association was not for
sectarian propagandism, but for saving men from sin and its
consequences, he proceeded:
Is it not evident, first of all, that the Church of Christ is
_the_ great and divinely ordained instrument for establishing the
Kingdom of God? Schools are undoubtedly instruments. But their
place is to supplement, not supplant, the Church. In that long line
of Christian work which, beginning at Jerusalem, has well-nigh
encircled the world, has not the Church of Christ been the chief
machinery through which the good seed of the Gospel has been sown
and the crop harvested, through which Christ’s servants have done
his work, through which a goodly influence has been exerted,
and through which Christian institutions have been founded and
preserved? We are seeking the civilization of a down-trodden race,
but what force was ever such a civilizer as the Christian Church?
Church work is necessary if we are to retain and conserve the
results of school work. Let secular education train a man, and he
becomes more polished and better equipped for life and work. He
has greater power, but it may be a power for sin and selfishness,
as truly as for God and righteousness. Let Christian education
work upon him as it does in the schools of this Association, he
is still more polished, he has a spiritual life. Not when in
school, but when the school is left, is the Church most necessary.
The influence of the college cannot be about a man in his home,
the influence of the Church can. The help of a teacher is
transient, the help of a pastor and the associations of a church
are permanent. To expect these to retain the best fruits of that
Christian education which this Association is so widely diffusing,
unless churches take up, and carry on what the schools have begun,
is to expect more of the colored race, with its inheritance of
degradation, and slavery and little training, than we expect of the
white race with its inheritance of Christianity and freedom, and
abundant training.
Closely allied to this is the need of church work to withstand
the evils that are incident to awakened thought and increased
knowledge. The air is laden with a sentiment of irreligion.
Educating a freedman is breaking up the hard sod of ignorance
in which such seeds of evil fall without taking root, providing
instead a soil that is very receptive.
As our educational work is, and must be, destructive of the
religion of the old slave days, it becomes more emphatically our
duty to provide a positive and intelligent religion to take the
place of that which we destroy. Not to do so is to bring a possible
curse along with our good. Moreover, churches must furnish zealous
men and woman, whom education may prepare to do the Lord’s work. It
is not enough to rely upon the possibility of conversion while the
students are in college. The Church has an earlier and a broader
opportunity. It forms the homes and the influences that form the
children. A vast proportion of the pastors and missionaries of
the North have gone to college as Christians, instead of becoming
Christians when there. They have come from Christian homes. They
were sent by Christian parents whose love for God and man was
planted and trained in Christ’s Church.
And, brethren, need I remind you that we are sowing for a slowly
maturing harvest.
The special work for the colored race to do in this country and in
Africa is appalling, by reason of its vastness. And when we ask how
it shall be done, I affirm that the churches of Christ in the South
are to be great instruments. Successful foreign missions require
vigorous home missions. Do you smile at the idea of these feeble
churches ever furnishing financial support? One of them is reported
this year as giving $90 to this Association, $70 to the American
Board, $77 to home missions, while it spent $687 for itself.
The time of defense and apology for church work is passed. It is no
longer an experiment. The night of doubt and preparation has gone.
The morning of small things when, waiting for more abundant light,
we moved with commendable slowness, has opened and glided on into
the broad full day. Now we can do what we never could before.
* * * * *
EXTRACTS FROM THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON FINANCE.
Your Committee on Finance beg leave to report that they have
carefully examined the books of account and the various annual
statements of the Treasurer, and that as statements of the business
done by the Association they find them all in the most satisfactory
condition. The books are kept by a simple but comprehensive system
of double entry, by which a double-system of checks against error
is provided, and individual and representative accounts are
each kept in proper form. The annual statements of receipts and
expenditures, of investments, of permanent funds and of real estate
held by the Association are all properly certified to as correct by
the Auditors. The committee commend the financial administration of
the Association for its economy and faithfulness.
The permanent funds held in trust by the Association, the income
of which is used according to the direction of the donors, amounts
to $203,863.60. These funds are invested mostly in U.S. government
bonds and in first mortgages on productive real estate, which are
an ample security for the amounts which they represent. The entire
safety of these investments speaks well for the financial officers
of the Association, and the wisely conservative regulations of the
by-laws of the Executive Committee regarding investments warrants
the fullest confidence in the continued security of funds committed
to their care.
The permanent investment of the Association in lands and buildings
for church and educational purposes in the South, of which it holds
undisputed titles in its own name, is inventoried at $483,370.
Berea College, Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute, and
Fisk and Atlanta Universities hold their own property by their
own boards of trustees. The estimated present value of all these
properties amounts to at least one million of dollars.
Here are a million dollars worth of tools and machinery, all in
good running order, exactly adapted to the business in hand and
located at the best possible points for doing it. Does not this
fact appeal mightily to the churches to see to it that this great
investment which they have made be used to the best possible
advantage? He would be a poor business man, who would invest a
million of dollars in a “plant” and then scrimp his business for
lack of current funds. That would be a poor business, which with
that amount of money well invested for its purposes could not
secure the working capital necessary to use it to its full capacity.
It takes a long time and much hard work to gather from the
benevolent a million dollars and to expend it judiciously in the
erection of churches, school-houses and colleges. Every dollar of
this money is freighted with prayer and winged with love. It will
be found again presently as treasure laid up in heaven. It is like
an inspiration to think how much of Christ’s spirit is represented
in these buildings built for the love of Him. But they must be
used. The very stones and brick will cry out against us, if we
neglect to follow up what has been done with still greater work in
the future.
The Executive Committee in their annual report call for one
thousand dollars a day, as needed for current expenses the coming
year. In order to raise this sum the ordinary contributions must be
increased to $225,000, an advance of one-half over last year. In
view of the great issues at stake, and the unexampled opportunities
of the Association for doing its work, your Finance Committee
recommend that this increase be made.
Let this be the key-note of our appeals this year: _One thousand
dollars a day; 50 per cent. advance on all contributions._
All of which is most respectfully submitted,
ERASTUS BLAKESLEE, for the Committee.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF REV. D. O. MEARS, D.D.
Now the question comes right here: shall we give according to what
we are, or what we have? One of the largest contributors in New
England told me the story of his conversion the other day, and it
was this, as we sat in the evening by his fireside. “My wife and
I,” he said, “had acquired a competence; money seemed to be coming
in. I had been brought up outside the Christian faith, and while
such a one was preaching on one occasion I debated the question:
Can I become a Christian? My wife found the light and for days I
wrestled with the question. Light would not come. I knew what it
was; it was my pocket book; shall that be included? When I decided
my pocketbook for Christ, then light broke in; and,” said he in
that narration, as a fit appendix to the whole, “I have never put
my means in any place where I have ever lost in all my experience.”
It is said that after the events at Pentecost, Andrew went down
to China and preached and that Thomas also, whose finger ached to
pierce the nail-torn hands of his Master and whose fist was almost
doubled that it might be thrust into that pierced side, went down
to China to preach the everlasting Gospel. Now 75,000 of that
race, whose great engineering works were the world’s marvel 250
years before the call of Abraham, whose emperor wrote a classic
a thousand years before David touched his sacred pen, are at our
very doors; and if it was worth while for Andrew and Thomas to go
from Jerusalem to China it is worth our work to preach to them and
teach them and call them to us when they are so near, is it not? I
remember it is written in the prophets, as I suppose Matthew read,
“Ethiopia shall soon stretch out her hands to God,” and Ethiopia
received the preaching of Matthew, so say many. I remember that
Mark founded the church in the upper part of that dark continent.
I remember that when our blessed Master fainted under the cross
it was an African who put his brawny shoulder under it and walked
by the side of our Lord, his Lord, to the crucifixion. And almost
as a revenge, though not revenge, Simon, the zealot, who looked
to Africa, was crucified himself in lower Egypt. If these thought
it worth while to evangelize Africa, what shall we say of the
7,000,000 of Africa’s sons at our very doors?
The question now comes: Can we give? Is there money enough to give?
There is an article in the “Century” for November, I think it is,
which states, after computation from two cities of considerable
size, that four-fifths of the inhabitants were attendants upon
church services. The figures struck me with absolute astonishment
and consternation. And, you remember, a year ago it was said
that fully one-fifth of all the property in the United States,
according to calculation, is held in the hands of Christians. I
saw this so late that I had not time to go over it extensively;
so I took the single city of Worcester. I took the 322 highest
tax-payers in that city, and I called on a man who I supposed knew
best the church-going habits and pew-owning property of these
leading business men, and I said: “Will you tell me where this one
goes and that one goes?” We marked them off last Sunday night,
and of the whole 322 we found only 65 whom we did not know to be
church-goers; and it is safe to say from the percentage that 25
of the 65 were church-goers—men who belonged to families that we
felt sure would attend the house of God. We knew that 255 attended
church; and adding the 25 that were doubtful, we had 280 out of
320 of the leading men in the city of Worcester that attend the
Protestant churches in that city. Take the banks. There are eleven
banks in Worcester, and we went over the names of the directors
and trustees. Out of the entire number (there were two unknown) we
found only three individuals that were not represented in a church,
and two of these were the same man—that is, one was a director in
two banks.
Now, what is the use? Shall we say that the money belongs to the
evil and the piety to the good? The piety and the money, the heart
and the gold, are ever in the church. We are reading of a house to
be put up in a celebrated watering-place that will cost $750,000.
I saw that in the city of New York the land where that great
opera-house is, brought the sum of $700,000. The owner of this
property in either case would keep two great organizations like
this going; and I said, “What! do we want some of that money that
is to build that summer resort by the sea?” No, we don’t want it.
“But we would like some of that money that is beneath that splendid
building that is costing its millions?” No; we don’t want it. If
men will build houses for self, let the Christian do his work for
the Master, and let us outdo the world.
But I must hasten. There is this demand of the nation upon us.
It is said that Robert Peel was riding with his daughter on her
birthday—he had given her a splendid riding habit, and the two
were admired by all who saw them, and the father looked with pride
upon his daughter—and in less than a week the daughter was beneath
the sod. The seamstress had sewed the habit while sitting by the
side of the bed of her husband groaning under the delirium of
the typhus; and in the chill that came upon him she had cast the
garment over him. The typhus of the garret became the typhus of
that celebrated house. And we are concerned with the swamps, with
the morasses, with these debased and poor colored people. We cannot
afford to be other. I would, if there were time, enlarge upon this
in connection with the report so admirably given; but I must pass
on.
It is said that the Puritan captain Hodgdon was riding one day
at the head of his company near the mountains when he heard the
sound of a bugle. As he heard it he said to his soldiers: “Halt!”
and every man leaned on his arms. “List! I love to hear the sound
of the bugle: there is so much of God in it.” Yesterday came the
report from the counties of Kentucky. It was a bugle-blast to this
assembly. Was God in it? 500,000 people who could not read their
names, though written in characters that might be read 100 rods
off—500,000 illiterate, ten years of age and above, in Kentucky,
Tennessee and West Virginia! From the mountains there comes the
sound of the bugle that has stirred us. Did it wake us up? Was God
in it? I heard a voice in that sound. We are told in our press and
from our platforms that the A. M. A. is not doing full work in the
South, and other helpers must come. Wait. Don’t hurry. The bugle
has sounded; it was God that was sounding it. I ask for no vote
of this assembly. I call for no show of hands. Yet, if you wait
before God, you must answer in the name of this world to his call:
“I ordain you to go and devote $50,000 to the mountain work, in
Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia.” It must be done. There is
no drawing back.
It is said that when Robert Bruce was marching to meet Edward, and
came within sight of the glittering sheen, he said to his soldiers,
“Kneel down, every one”; and the army of Robert Bruce, with their
eyes to the earth and their lips moving, offered their prayers to
God, then rose up—a little army—and defeated the English. It was
God’s voice that sounded like a bugle. It is for the soldiers to
pray, and to fall where the bugle calls.
One other point only, briefly, in regard to this question of the
demand that Christ makes on us. We must never establish a condition
that he has not established; never set up a standard which he
has not set up; but follow him and receive the blessing while we
follow. It was the remark of Augustus that he found Rome of brick
and left it of marble. Our fathers, a century ago, found this
nation half slave and half free. It is now left a free nation. God
grant it may become, by Christian effort, as good as it is free! In
a dark day of our war when the armies were failing, and the hopes
of the nation were placed in Lincoln and Lincoln lost hope, when
our courage depended upon him and our flag seemed as if about to be
rent by an unseen hand—when Lincoln said, “I see no hope”, for the
rush of the armies seemed away from the South and up back to the
North, Stanton uttered the words that gave courage to his heart:
“Weary man, don’t you know that the churches of the North are
everywhere praying for you?” And the weary look passed away from
his face, and the smile came back to its wonted place. The children
of Father Abraham need the prayers of the churches of Christ.
* * * * *
WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS ABOUT GIVING.
BY REV. WM. M. TAYLOR, D.D.
In his sermon entitled “How to be a Christian in Trade,” a
discourse which illustrates the wonderful combination of practical
sagacity with spiritual insight, for which he was so remarkable,
Dr. Bushnell says that “the great problem we have now on hand is
the Christianizing of the money power of the world,” and again
that “what we wait for, and are looking hopefully to see, is the
consecration of the vast money power of the world to the work, and
cause, and kingdom of Jesus Christ. For that day, when it comes,
is the morning, so to speak, of the new creation. That tide-wave
in the money power can as little be resisted when God brings it
on as the tides of the sea; and like these also it will flow
across the world in a day.” This witness is true, and it becomes
us all, to pray and labor for the fulfilment of the prophecy that
men shall come, “their silver and their gold with them, unto the
name of the Lord our God.” But here the revival must begin in the
Church itself. In former times we have had revivals with distinct
characteristics. One was remarkable for the blessing which rested
on preaching, another for the spirit of prayer which seemed to be
poured out on the people generally; another for the interest that
was evoked in the study of the Scriptures. What we have yet to
see is a revival of which the chief distinguishing feature shall
be liberal giving to the cause of the Lord Jesus, and when that
comes it will be the prophecy of yet grander things for the promise
“prove me now herewith if I will not open you the windows of heaven
and pour you out a blessing that there shall not be room enough to
receive it,” was made, not in connection with an exhortation to
prayer, as so many who quote it seem to believe, but with immediate
reference to the honoring of God with our substance, for thus it
runs: “Bring ye all the tithes into the store-house, and prove
me now herewith.” While, therefore, it is true that a spirit of
liberality in the support of the cause of Christ must be a fruit of
renewed life in the Church, it is also true that its manifestation
by the Church will be the forerunner of such spiritual triumphs
as it has never yet achieved. Thus it is of great moment that we
should use means for the awakening of Christians to a sense of the
importance of this matter, and few things, in my judgment, would
more efficiently contribute to the attainment of that end than
setting briefly and pointedly before them the teachings of the word
of God upon the subject. I cannot hope to cover all that ground in
the few minutes now at my disposal; the most I shall attempt will
be to take a general survey of it.
Beginning, then, with the act of giving itself, I find that it is
spoken of as a part of self consecration to God, for when at the
close of his reign David brought out in the sight of all the people
the treasures which he had amassed for the building of the Temple
and sought to incite them to make an offering for the same purpose,
he said, “Who then is willing to consecrate his service this day
unto the Lord?” It is regarded as an act of worship, for God
commanded his people to “come into his courts and bring an offering
with them.” It is described by Paul as a “grace.” When writing to
the Corinthians he said, “Therefore as ye abound in everything,
in faith and utterance and knowledge, and in all diligence and
in your love to us, see that ye abound in this grace also.” Only
think of it—“as ye abound in utterance, so abound in this grace
also.” What a blessed thing it would be in this America of ours, on
which the gift of tongues seems to have been so lavishly bestowed,
if Christians generally were as fluent in giving as they are in
speech! It is referred to again and again as a “communion” in such
passages as these: “Let him that is taught in the word communicate
to”—that is, have communion with Him, that teacheth in all good
things, “to do good and to communicate forget not,” or, as it might
be given more literally, “Of well doing and of communion be not
forgetful, for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.” In the
same sense Paul, who had just received a gift from the Philippians,
thanks God for their “fellowship,” that is, “communion” in the
gospel from the first day until now; and praises them for having
done well in communicating, or rather, for the word is the same, in
having communion with his affliction; while he records it to their
credit that no church communicated with him; or, for the word is
still the same, “had communion with him in the matter of giving
and receiving but they only.” To the same effect he says to the
Corinthians that the churches of Macedonia had begged him to take
upon him the “fellowship,”—that is, “communion”—of ministering to
the saints in carrying to Jerusalem their gifts to the poor of that
city, and he urges his readers to accept a part in the same service
that God might be glorified for “their liberal distribution”—that
is, for the liberality of the communion, for so the word still
is, “unto them and unto all men.” And to mention only one other
passage, the same apostle in his Epistle to the Romans bids his
readers “distribute to the necessities of the saints,”—that is, for
the word is still the same, “hold communion with the necessities
of the saints.” Thus the making of contributions for benevolence
in every form of it in which the Church is engaged is as really
a communion service as is the observance of the Lord’s Supper.
The same word is used in reference to both, and both alike are
manifestations of the oneness of all the people of Christ in their
common Lord. If this were more generally understood and felt by us
I am sure that we should all have greater enjoyment in that part of
the service on which so many look with disfavor, the making of a
contribution; for that, as Paul gives us to understand, is only the
manifestation by us in another form of the fellowship which we show
forth when the bread and wine of the supper are passed from hand
to hand among us. In this view of the case it is to be feared that
there are far more “_close_” communionists in the Church than those
who are commonly so denominated, and it may be well for us to take
the beam out of our own eyes before we seek to become oculists to
others.
Further, this giving is distinctly spoken of in the New Testament
as a privilege. Remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how He said
“It is more blessed,” that is, it is a greater happiness “to give
than to receive.” In many enterprises in which men engage the cost
is more than the profit, “the play” as the French proverb has it,
“is not worth the candle,” but here there is always blessing;
blessing in the consciousness that we have the means of doing good;
blessing in entering into fellowship with God, whose happiness is
all that of giving out; and blessing in the fact that the joy of
the recipient comes back to us and redoubles our delight.
But passing now from the act itself to the reward promised to it,
we find that set before us in three different ways. It is first,
temporal. “Honor the Lord with thy substance, and with the first
fruits of all thine increase. So shall thy barns be filled with
plenty and thy presses shall burst out with new wine.” It is,
second, spiritual, for Paul in connection with his exhortation
to the Corinthians says: “God is able to make all grace abound
toward you, that ye always, having all sufficiency in all things,
may abound to every good work being enriched in everything to all
bountifullness.” Was there ever such a piling of universal terms
one above the other as we have here? It seems as if the apostle
could not say enough to strengthen his assertion, and it is all
said in connection with cheerful giving. Nor is this all. He goes
on to say that the gifts of the Corinthians by evoking prayers
on their behalf from the hearts of the receivers, would return
in blessings into their own bosoms. You know how the process of
irrigation goes on in nature. All the rivers run into the ocean,
out of that the sun continually evaporates clouds, which the wind
blows back over the land, where they fall out in rain on the
mountains, and go to feed the rivers. Thus evermore the circle
is kept up and the lands are fertilized. Now in the same way the
gifts we make to God all run into the furtherance of his cause, and
are by him lifted up into the celestial region of his grace and
power, whence they descend again with new blessing into our hearts,
making both ourselves individually and the Church at large joyous
and productive. Then there is a third reward which is eternal; for
Jesus in the close of the parable of the prudent steward says:
“Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness that
when ye fail they may receive you into everlasting habitations.”
Money will not purchase our entrance into heaven. Nothing can do
that but the work of Christ; but the money which out of love to
Christ we give to his people and his cause will secure that we
shall be received in heaven by those whom we have been the means
of benefiting. As we enter they will take us by the hand and
lead us up to Him that sitteth on the throne, saying: This is he
whose efforts and whose gifts were, under thee, the means of our
being here; let it be done unto him as unto the man whom the King
delighteth to honor. And he will reply: Well done! “Inasmuch as ye
did it unto one of the least of these my brethren ye did it unto
me.”
Then as to the manner of the giving. We are told that it should
be cheerful, for God loveth a cheerful giver. It should be no
stereotyped and immutable thing, the same through life, but “as
God has prospered us.” It should be systematic, as the result of
careful thought and weekly planning on the Lord’s day, under the
influence of the memory of His resurrection. For it was after his
great argument on the resurrection that Paul said “now concerning
the collection,” and it was because of its connection with that
resurrection that he specified “the first day of the week” as
that on which every one should “lay by him in store as God hath
prospered him.” Weekly storing in the Lord’s box at home on the
Lord’s day, that is what Paul recommends, and then when the Lord
makes his appeal to us we can cheerfully give Him of His own. In
the neglect of this plan, and the making of gatherings for this
and that cause as each comes along, we have the explanation of
the disfavor with which, in the public service, too many hear the
announcement that a contribution will be made.
But now, finally, as to the motive. Here it is: “For ye know the
grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for
your sakes he became poor that ye through his poverty might be
rich.” The bringing of such a motive to bear on so simple a thing
as the making of a contribution for the poor saints of Jerusalem
seems like cracking a nut with a Nasmyth steam hammer. But Paul
knew what he was doing when he dictated these words. He wanted to
exalt and consecrate all Christian beneficence by having it done
from the most powerful Christian motive. And after the presentation
of such a motive there is no more to be said. For when men know
the grace of Christ, they will never feel that they have given Him
enough, and till they know it they will never give _Him_ anything.
They may contribute to keep up appearances so as to be like other
people, or to gain a reputation, but they will never give to _Him_
until they know His grace. This is the very pith and marrow of the
matter. Before men give to Christ they must receive from him, and
when they have received Christ Himself into their hearts they will
be impelled to give. _Im_pelled, not _com_pelled; for the delight
and the duty will coincide, or rather the duty will be merged in
the delight. So we come round to the point at which we set out. A
revived church will become a giving church, and a giving church is
the fore-herald of a converted world.
How much owest thou thy Lord? That is the question which the giver
has to face. Sometimes in commercial circles a man will assign a
debt that is owing him to some one else, out of friendship, that
he may take it when he has collected it and use it for himself.
Much in the same way, I think, the Lord Jesus has assigned a large
portion of the debt which we owe to him to those who are around
us—to the unconverted at our doors, to those races among whom you
labor, to the pagans far away. This was what Paul felt when he
said, “I am debtor, both to the wise and to the unwise, both to the
Greek and to the Barbarian”; and it was the constant feeling of
that sense of obligation that gave his life its nobleness and its
usefulness. So let it be with us; and let us see in those for whom
appeal is made to us through this Association, the representatives
of Christ.
There is a beautiful story told in Stevenson’s “Praying and
Working.” I am very fond of repeating it—I may have told it to
some of you before, but no matter—about a little child in the
orphanage of John Falk at Weimar. They were having supper in the
dining-hall, and the teacher gave thanks in the ordinary way before
the children began their meals, saying, “Come, Lord Jesus, and be
our guest to-night, and bless the mercies which Thou has provided.”
One little boy looked up and said, “Teacher, you always ask the
Lord Jesus to come, but he never comes. Will he ever come?” “Oh,
yes; if you will only hold on in faith, he will be sure to come.”
“Very well,” said the little boy, “I will set a chair for him
beside me here to-night to be ready when he comes.” And so the meal
proceeded. By-and-by there came a rap at the door, and there was
ushered in a poor half-frozen apprentice. He was taken to the fire
and his hands warmed. Then he was asked to partake of the meal,
and where should he go but to the chair which the little boy had
provided? and as he sat down there the little boy looked up with a
light in his eye, and said, “Teacher, I see it now! The Lord Jesus
was not able to come himself, and he sent this poor man in his
place. Isn’t that it?”
Aye, that is just it. And so, brethren, the Lord Jesus isn’t able,
according to His plans for this world, to come personally yet among
us, but He has sent those colored people, Chinese, Indians and
heathen to make appeal in His behalf to us, and who among us will
set a chair for Him? There are many friends with whom I hardly
agree who are very anxiously waiting for the appearance of the
personal Christ among us, and they are wondering what they shall
do to welcome Him. Would that the eyes of these brethren and our
own too were opened to the perception of the Christ that is already
here, in the persons of those needing to be helped and educated and
elevated, and that their ears could hear His words, “Inasmuch as
ye do it unto one of the least of these His brethren ye do it unto
Christ.”
That is the Christian philosophy of giving, and if a man does not
feel the force of these considerations I should be disposed to say
he has not yet begun to be a Christian.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF REV. DR. DENNEN.
The topic of this closing service is not only of prime importance,
but comes in its logical place. When your machinery is all
educational, industrial and church-wise, the final and vital
question is one of power to move it. The supreme motive power in
your work is _spiritual life_.
Life is force, something capable of originating or resisting power
or motion. Physical life is that mysterious something no analysis
can detect, no alembic reveal, no power resist; which swells the
bud, opens the flower, sprouts the seed, ripens the harvest.
Spiritual life, through another plane, is also a force, capable of
originating or resisting power or motion. Its realm is the human
soul, and draws nutriment from the soil, which that cunning chemist
we call life builds up into strength and beauty.
Spiritual vitality performs a similar structural function. Once
made alive in Christ Jesus, the disciple seeks for spiritual
aliment.
1. Now, spiritual life, like natural life, possesses _structural
power_. It is a master builder. One main function of the vital
principle in nature is to lay hold of inert matter and convert it
into living organisms. The growing tree absorbs tons of carbon
from the air. The local church, if a live one, takes up into her
membership more or less of the outlying population, and from aliens
converts them into fellow citizens of the saints and members of the
household of faith.
The ability, then, of this noble Association, second to none in
the land, to advance the kingdom of Christ in the several fields
where it operates, will assuredly be conditioned upon the spirit
and vigor of the churches and individuals behind it, will be
determined, not so much by the amount of money it receives or the
number of workers it puts into the field, as by the prayers and
spiritual enthusiasm of its constituency.
Carlyle once said: “The American Republic is going straight to the
devil. No government can long exist that receives the refuse of all
the rest of the world into its midst and makes citizens of them.”
Our free institutions are to undergo a strain in the near future,
I am sure, that has never yet been put upon them. Our American
churches are also to be put to a similar strain. Nay, the pressure
is already upon them. Are they equal to it? I believe so. We must,
however, leaven the multitudes of the ignorant and unsaved with our
Christianity, or they will leaven us with their illiteracy. Our
ability to meet the emergency already upon us will depend, under
God, upon our spiritual vitality.
2. Another function of life is its expulsive power. What it cannot
use and assimilate it expels. It gathers the good and casts the bad
away. Strong, vigorous life depends as much upon the one function
as the other. The religious world is full of the germs and larvæ
of skepticism, theistic and atheistic assaults and criticisms. A
robust person can walk in the midst of pestilence unscathed, while
disease springs upon one whose vitality is depressed. Precisely the
same condition obtains in respect to the individual disciple, or
the church, or our missionary boards.
The one effective answer to skepticism, then, of every grade and
degree of virulence; the one sovereign remedy for worldliness,
apathy and avarice of God’s people, is a new enduement of spiritual
power. Our lips must be touched with celestial fire and our hearts
bathed in Christ’s great love.
3. Another quality of life is its expansive power. The mightiest
force in this world is life. It mocks at gravity; it defies
cohesion; bursts every band. The same expansive property inheres in
spiritual life.
You might as well shut up a growing chicken in its shell as to
shut up a live Christianity in the shell of the fathers. No. Where
there is life there must be expansion. She breaks through old
traditions and prejudices, and steps out into new departures and
broader methods, and pushes on into new regions of thought and
conquest beyond. She lays her hand on the colored man of the South,
saves, educates him, equips him for the life that now is, as well
as for that which is to come. She stands on the shores of the great
Pacific, where the shining waves lave her feet and chant their
mighty anthems of freedom, and, with open, arms and a catholic
heart, free of all race prejudices, welcomes the Chinaman. She
uncovers the cross in the wigwam of the red man and bids the dusky
sons of the forest look and live.
4. Once more spiritual life is the only complete bond of union.
Says President Hopkins, “It is on this that the whole method of God
in the restoration of man is based, and it is for the recognition
of this by men, and their adoption of God’s method of vitality and
unity, the tardy, laboring and discordant times wait. No partial
reform will do; no coming man. Everywhere men are divergent,
repellant. The bond of common humanity is but a string of tow to
bind the Samson of human selfishness and passions. There must be
a divine life, a divine centre. This center is Christ. He is the
life. The nexus which is to bind this selfish world in one, and
unite all races and nationalities in one common fellowship and
forward movement to disciple the world, is Christ in the souls of
all men. Amid every diversity of polity and people, He is the one
vivifying and unifying spirit.
5. The principal question, however, is one of means. How is this
life to be secured? To get fresh water we go to the spring. To get
information we go to the sources of knowledge. To get spiritual
vitality we go to Christ. Life in nature is the product of living
organisms in contact. The strength and continuance of that life
depends upon the closeness of the contact. The steel must touch the
magnet to receive and retain magnetism.
So spiritual life and zeal comes from contact with a living Christ.
The strength and fervor of that life is forever conditioned upon
the closeness of our contact with our living Head.
No one thing so lowers spiritual heat and light as distance from
Christ. Neptune has not a thousandth part of our light and warmth.
He is too far away from the central orb. We are just now too far
away from Christ; hence our comparative barrenness. We must sit
where the fire and inspiration of His eye kindle in ours; where his
glowing enthusiasm passes over into us; where the greatness and
grandeur of the work He has given us to do shall thrill us and grow
upon us. Then we shall mount to its accomplishment on the wings of
eagles, and run and not be weary, and walk and not faint.
Never had this Association more call for enthusiasm, never for
greater hopefulness. What did we see here last night—the black man
and red man, men from Asia and Africa and America, strangers and
proselytes, speak in their own tongues the wonderful works of God.
I cheer you on to the labor of another year. As we go down from
this mount let us go to our upper chambers and, whether for eight
days or as many weeks, let us tarry and pray until we are endued
from on high and receive the tongues of flame and the utterance of
the Spirit. Then let us, in our various fields, gird up our loins
and go forth to achieve for the Lord of Hosts, resolved that before
another anniversary of this Association comes round we will, God
helping us, see thousands housed and happy in Christ’s dear love
all over our beloved land of very race and color.
* * * * *
ADDRESS OF PROF. W. M. BARBOUR, D.D.
The topic assigned me is in the line of the theme just discussed
by Dr. Dennen. My friend and classmate Dr. Pike insisted upon my
coming over here and taking part in this evening meeting; and
he said, “Your theme will be: Spiritual Vitality the Crowning
Necessity in Missionary Work.”
I shall take it for granted that other means have been set before
you and insisted upon—the one nearest always, money. That is a
great necessity in missionary work. You have heard, I have no
doubt, a good deal about that, and I merely wish to honor it as a
means under God of the most pressing necessity. We can do nothing
to send the blessings that God has put into our hearts abroad among
our fellow men without means; and the first means is money. But all
the money in the world will not serve our end. What is the next?
We must have men. But all the men in the world won’t do missionary
work, although we had them all enlisted in that work. Suppose
we had all the money we could use and all the men that offered
themselves and that we could procure; we would only have gone so
far. What else is needed? We need fitness in the men as another
great means. This is as necessary as money and men, this culture.
But after we have the men, and after we have them qualified, there
is still room for what in my theme to-night is called “the crowning
necessity.” You may take Yale College as it stands, with all its
culture, and you may turn out all our hundreds of young men down
into the South this blessed night; what could they do in missionary
work to-morrow morning? So you see that it is not the money, or the
men, or the culture that alone is needed; something more is needed,
and that is “spiritual vitality.”
And now, beloved, to take the first step and to say the first thing
that must be said, in my judgment (since I am called here to give
my opinion), the first position that we must assume and which this
Association has assumed from its very start—although it is one of
the old things that Christ says a well-instructed scribe must take
out of his treasury—we must begin with God. We are to stand in
his presence, we are to summon him as our witness, we are to avow
ourselves openly and frankly, every day we live, as doing this for
him.
I should like to know where our modern unbelief is that is such
a distress to us in all our efforts and in our inward life, when
you reverently, and in the deep meaning of thought say, “As the
Lord liveth”? Look at it. There are two schemes of the universe:
one, the Christian scheme, with a belief in the living God as
the original of all things—a personal being who is personally
interested in his creatures, and who is desiring, since he has made
him in his own image, to have man hold communion with himself, and
who desires to have all men reconciled to himself from their sin
and their misery and their unhappy life. There is another scheme
where there is no God, or, what is the same thing to us, we do not
know whether there is or not. And what is the idea of the universe
that follows from that? Why, that it must move along as the blind
force behind it shall urge it. Where is it going to land? The day
is coming, brethren, when we will cry, “Oh for the doctrine of a
predestinating God”—God with his eye on an end, and with an end to
which he is turning all things and which shall be satisfactory to
all the creatures that he has made in his image.
Let us take a frank position here as a missionary society, and let
it be known that we openly and avowedly, by word and deed, take the
stand that we believe in God, and that we believe he is a living
God, and in his name and for his sake and to effect his purpose we
are going to the South, to the North, to the East, to the West, to
gain trophies that shall be to the glory of his redeeming grace,
since he has revealed to us, as we believe, the fact that he will
complete these ends through our agency.
RECEIPTS FOR OCTOBER, 1883.
* * * * *
MAINE, $391.80.
Banger. Hammond St. Ch., 100; First Cong. Ch.
20 $120.00
Bethel. Second Cong. Sab. Sch. 10.00
Brunswick. Mrs. S. C. F. Hammond, _for Student
Aid, Atlanta U._ 25.00
Cumberland. Cong. Ch. and Soc. to const. CAPT.
REUBEN BLANCHARD L. M. 40.00
Hampden. Charles E. Hicks. 7.00
Lovell. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 6.00
North Anson. “A Friend” 10.00
Portland. Second Parish Ch. and Soc. 86.30
South Berwick. Hugh and Philip Lewis. 6.00
Westbrook. Second Cong. Ch. to Const. REV.
EDWARD E. BACON L. M. 46.50
———————
$356.80
LEGACY.
Bethel. Estate of Sarah W. Chapman by A. W.
Valentine, Ex. 35.00
———————
391.80
NEW HAMPSHIRE, $69.02.
Amherst. Cong. Ch. 12.98
Campton. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 18.04
Colebrook. “E. C. & W.” 2.00
Concord. Dea. McQuesten, _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 10.00
Concord. Miss Lancaster, _for Fort Berthold_. 2.00
Greenville. Cong. Ch. 10.00
Hampstead. Cong. Ch. and Soc., ad’l. 9.00
Manchester. First Cong. Ch. and Soc., 64.94 to
const. HOLMES R. PETTEE and H. W. HERRICK,
L. Ms. Incorrectly ack. in Nov. number from
Mass.
Tilton. A. H. Colby. 5.00
VERMONT, $540.02.
Attleborough. Second Cong. Ch. and Soc. 90.72
Benson. Cong. Sab. Sch., _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 5.00
Brattleborough. Cong. Ch. 39.58
Burlington. Winooski Av. Cong. Ch. 107.28
Castleton. W. C. Guernsey. 4.50
Enosburg. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 26.25
Granby and Victory. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 3.00
Manchester. Ladies’ Benev. Soc., 2 Bbls. of C,
_for Raleigh, N.C._ 1 Bbl. _for Atlanta U._
Newport. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.00
Norwich. Ashley Blodgett. 5.00
Saint Johnsbury. North Cong. Ch. 168.00
Saint Johnsbury. North Cong. Sab. Sch., _for
S. S. Work_. 26.00
Wells River. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 23.25
Westminster West. “A Friend.” 5.00
Weybridge. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 16.44
———————
$535.02
LEGACY.
Wilmington. Estate of Mary Ray. 5.00
———————
$540.02
MASSACHUSETTS $3,528.10.
Agawam. Cong. Ch. 6.00
Ashby. “A Friend” _for Student Aid, Atlanta U._ 5.00
Boston. Mrs. C. A. Spaulding, _for Student
Aid, Talladega C._ 50.00
Boston. Miss Faxon, _for Fort Berthold_. 1.00
Boxborough. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 20.00
Braintree. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 12.05
Brookline. S. C. Dizer, _for Student Aid,
Tougaloo U._ and to const. himself L. M. 100.00
Brookline. Harvard Ch. and Soc. 76.33
Buckland. Dea. S. Trowbridge. 10.00
Campello. Orthodox Cong. Ch. and Soc. ad’l to
const. REV. AND MRS. JOHN F. BLADES, LEWIS
D. DOTEN AND GEO. W. PACKARD L. Ms. 95.73
Charlestown. Winthrop Ch. and Soc. 66.48
Chelsea. Concert, under auspices of Ladies’
Union Home Mission Band, _for Student Aid,
Hampton N. and A. Inst._ 54.00
Chelsea. Miss Annie P. James, _for Student
Aid, Atlanta U._ and to const. W. H.
SINGLETON L. M. 30.00
Chelsea. “Friends” Books _for Library,
Chattanooga, Tenn._
Coleraine. Mr. and Mrs. Wm. B. McGee, 4; John
Gilchrist, 1. 5.00
Concord. Rev. H. M. Grout, D.D., and Others,
_for Atlanta U._ 40.50
Concord. Trin. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 30.00
Dalton. Cong. Sab. Sch. _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 50.00
Danvers. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. to const.
WILLIAM SINER, JR., HENRY A. WHITE and
GEORGE A. PEABODY L. M.’s. 100.00
East Boston. Mrs. Joseph Robbins, _Bdl. of
Goods, for Dakota M._
Fitchburg. Rollstone Ch. and Soc. 140.00
Gardner. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 30.00
Gloucester. Evan. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 20.00
Granby. Cong. Ch., Children’s Mission Circle,
_for Tillotson C. and N. Inst. Building_. 45.00
Hadley. E. Porter. 10.00
Hanover Four Corners. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 7.46
Hardwick. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 5.00
Harvard. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 18.50
Hyde Park. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 20.00
Indian Orchard. Evan. Ch. and Soc. 19.22
Jamaica Plain. Cong. Ch. and Soc., in part. 160.00
Lancaster. Evan. Cong. Ch. and Soc., ad’l. 10.00
Lincoln. George Ropes, _for Atlanta U._ 25.00
Lincoln. Cong. Sab. Sch., _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 20.00
Lowell. First Cong. Ch., _for Atlanta U._ 13.75
Malden. First Cong. Ch. and Soc., 40.68; “A
Friend,” 1. 41.68
Medford. “A Friend.” 5.00
Millbury. Second Cong. Ch. to const. REV. JOHN
L. EWELL L. M. 30.00
Natick. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 25.00
New Bedford. Miss Helen M. Leonard. 1.00
Newton. Eliot Ch. and Soc. 100.00
Newton Center. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 68.68
North Hadley. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 5.25
Northamption. A. L. Williston, 500; First
Cong. Ch., 247.68; Edwards Ch. Benev. Soc.
64. 811.68
North Leominster. Mrs. S. F. Houghton. 5.00
Oxford. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 22.26
Pepperell. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 12.36
Phillipston. Ladies Benev. Soc Bdl. C.
Pittsfield. Rev. C. V. SPEAR to const.
himself, GEO. N. SPEAR and MRS. ELLEN M.
SPEAR L. Ms. 250.00
Roxbury. Walnut Av. Cong. Sab. Sch. _for
Student Aid, Tougaloo U._ 17.70
Roxbury. Mrs. P. N. Livermore. 1.00
Shirley Village. 500 copies “Youth’s
Companion” by Miss Nettie A. Dickson, _for
Marietta, Ga._
South Amherst. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 5.6
Southampton. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 41.2
South Attleborough. Mrs. Harriet L. Draper, 2
and Bbl. of C. 2.00
Southborough. Pilgrim Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.10
South Hadley. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 25.00
South Sudbury. Ladies’ Home Miss’y Soc. Bbl of
C., val., 34.17, _for Atlanta U._
Southville. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 8.40
South Weymouth. Second Cong. Ch. and Soc., 51;
to const. AUGUSTINE LOUD and J. NEWTON DYER
L. Ms.; Ladies Mission Soc. of Second Ch.,
14. 65.00
South Weymouth. Mrs. Lysander Heald’s S. S.
Class., Second Ch., 10, _for Student Aid,
Talladega C._; Marion Heald, 1 _for a little
girl_ 11.00
Spencer. Mrs. G. H. Marsh’s Class Cong. Sab.
Sch., 5; G. E. Manley, 5, _for Student Aid,
Talladega C._ 10.00
Springfield. South Cong. Ch. 32.38; First
Cong. Ch., 24.85 57.23
Stoneham. Cong. Ch. and Soc., _for Student
Aid, Atlanta U._ 17.00
Uxbridge. Evan. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 14.00
Wakefield. Mission Workers, 45; Cong. Sab.
Sch., 16, _for Student Aid, Atlanta U._ 61.00
Walpole. Orthodox Cong. Ch. and Soc., to
const. Dea. WILLARD LEWIS L. M. 35.30
Warren. Mrs. Joseph Ramsdell, _for Chinese M._ 5.00
Westborough. “A Friend.” 43.00
West Boxford. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 11.00
Westfield. Second Cong. Ch. Soc. 58.00
Westford. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 7.00
West Granville. Cong. Ch. 8.00
Westhampton. Cong. Ch. 13.00
Westport. Pacific Union Sab. Sch. 2.12
Whately. Cong. Ch. 7.83
Worcester. Union Ch. and Soc., 139; Old South
Ch. and Soc. 41.63 to const. H. H. MERRIAM
L. M.; Central Ch. and Soc. 51.98; “A
Friend,” 25 257.61
Yarmouth. Roy A. Eldridge, D.D. 50.00
——— “A Friend.” 5.00
RHODE ISLAND, $1,063.18.
Pawtucket. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 75.00
Providence. Central Cong. Ch. 800; Pilgrim
Cong. Ch. and Soc., 115; “A Friend,” 50.00;
North. Cong Ch. 23.13 988.13
CONNECTICUT, $2,676.75.
East Windsor. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 10.00
Elliott. Wm. Osgood 2.00
East Avon. Cong. Ch. 38.00
Berlin. Second Cong. Ch. 19.97
Bozrahville. Cong. Ch. 5.00
Bridgeport. South Ch. Sab. Sch., Box S. S.
Books, _for Tillotson C. & N. Inst._
Derby. First Cong. Ch. 30.00
Fair Haven. First Ch. 50.00
Farmington. Cong. Sab. Sch., _for Santee
Agency, Neb._ 128.51
Farmington. Cong. Ch. 59.77
Franklin. Cong. Ch. 13.29
Glastenbury. First Cong. Ch. and Soc. 150.00
Granby. First Cong. Ch. 8.95
Hebron. J. and Mary Porter _for Tillotson C. &
N. Inst._ 10.00
Jewett City. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 15.00
Manchester. Second Cong. Ch. 75.00
Milford. Plymouth Ch. Sab. Sch. _for Tillotson
C. & N. Inst._ and to const. S. E. FRISBIE
L. M. 32.00
Mount Carmel. Mrs. J. M. Smith 10.00
New Hartford. North Cong. Ch. 17.50
New Hartford. Rev. F. H. Adams’ S. S. Class,
11; John Richards’ S. S. Class, 9, _for Fisk
U._ 20.00
New Haven. Third Cong. Ch., 23; Howard Ave.
Ch., 9.22 32.22
Norfolk. “A Friend,” _for Santee Agency_ 5.00
North Stonington. D. R. Wheeler 10.00
Norwich. Second Cong. Ch. 175.43
Plainfield. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 26.40
Poquonock. Cong. Ch. 12.59
Rocky Hill. Cong. Ch. 23.72
Rockville. Second Cong. Ch. 103.59
South Killingly. Cong. Ch. 14.00
Stratford. “A Friend” 1.00
Thomaston. Cong. Ch. 52.32
Thompsonville. Cong. Sab. Sch., _for
furnishing a room, Whitin Hall, Straight U._ 35.00
Torrington. Third Cong. Ch. and Soc. 29.25
Wallingford. Cong. Sab. Sch., _for Tillotson
C. and N. Inst. Building_ 60.00
Wapping. F. W. Gilbert, for _Tillotson C. and
N. Inst._ 12.07
Watertown. Cong. Ch. and Soc. 37.55
Windsor. Cong. Ch. 105.00
Winchester. “A Friend” 10.00
Wethersfield. Rev. G. J. Tillotson, _for
Tillotson C. and N. Inst. Building_ 150.00
————————
$1,590.13
LEGACIES.
Ellington. Estate of Maria Pitkin, by Edwin
Talcott. Ex. 190.00
Woodbridge. Estate of Mrs. Eliza Carrington 896.62
————————
$2,676.75
NEW YORK, $422.05.
Brasher Falls. Elijah Wood, $15; Mrs. Eliza A.
Bell, $3. 18.00
Brooklyn, E. D. New England Cong. Ch. 25.00
Deansville. Cong. Ch. 15.05
East Wilson. Rev. H. Halsey, $30; Chas. E.
Clarke, $3. 33.00
Elmira. Miss Clara Thurston. 5.00
Hamilton. O. S. Campbell. 5.00
Homer. Cong. C., $132.50; B. W. Payne, $10. 142.50
Lysander. Cong. Ch. 26.00
Middletown. First Cong. Ch. 16.26
New Haven. Cong. Ch. 15.00
North Pitcher. Cong. Ch. 5.81
New York. American Bible Soc., Grant of
Scriptures, val. $307.50.
Nunda. “A Friend” ($5 of which _for Chinese
M._) 15.00
Pompey. Mrs. Lucy Child, _for Indian Youth,
Hampton N. & A. Inst._ 5.00
Poughkeepsie. Mrs. M. J. Myers, _for Emerson
Inst., Mobile, Ala._ 20.00
Pitcher. Cong. Ch. 25.00
Sinclairville. Earl C. Preston. 2.00
Syracuse. C. A. Hamlin. 12.25
Volney. Ludington Sab. Sch. 5.08
West Winfield. Cong. Ch., to const. AARON
ADELBERT LEACH L. M. 31.10
NEW JERSEY, $565.53.
Chester. First Cong. Ch., $21.89, and Sab.
Sch., $6.52. 28.21
East Orange. Trinity Cong. Ch. 137.32
Paterson. Mrs. Sarah A. Cook, _for Tillotson
C. & N. Inst._ 400.00
PENNSYLVANIA, $7.00.
New Castle. John Burgess. 5.00
Philadelphia. “M.” 2.00
OHIO, $791.41.
Berlin Heights. Cong. Ch. 4.26
Cleveland. T. P. Handy, $20; James Harmer,
$20; Misses S. and A. Walworth,
$30;—Whitney. $1; _for Parsonage, Topeka,
Kan._ 71.00
Columbus. Eastwood Cong. Ch. $10; and Sab.
Sch., $5.70. 15.70
Elyria. First Cong. Ch. Sab. Sch., $40; Cong.
Ch., “M. W. C.,” $10; Individual, $9. 59.00
Fort Recovery. Pisgah Cong. Ch. 3.00
Lafayette. Cong. Ch. 6.00
Medina. Woman’s Miss’y Soc. 20.00
Oberlin. Second Cong. Ch. 35.60
Painesville. Woman’s Missionary Soc., $20,
_for Indian M._, and $10 _for Chinese M._
Incorrectly ack. from Mrs. L. A. M. Little
in Nov. number.
Pittsfield. A Friend. 12.00
Springfield. Mrs. Warren’s Sab. Sch. Class of
Young Men. 5.00
Steuben. Levi Platt. 1.00
Strongsville. First Cong. Ch. 10.00
Tallmadge. C. P. Parmelee. 5.00
Wauseon. Cong. Ch. 17.50
Wilberforce. Mrs. Joseph Morrow. 5.00
York. Cong. Ch. 20.35
Youngstown. Mrs. Whitney. 1.00
———————
$291.41
LEGACY.
Cleveland. Estate of Brewster Pelton, by John
G. Jennings, Ex. 500.00
——————
$791.41
INDIANA, $50.87.
Liber. Cong. Ch. 1.68
Michigan City. Cong. Ch. 37.00
Michigan City. Mrs. C. W. Peck _for Student
Aid, Atlanta U._ 10.00
Michigan City. “Ralph and Daisy,” 1.69;
“Golden Links,” 50c. _for Student Aid,
Storrs’ Sch., Atlanta. Ga_ 2.19
ILLINOIS, $819.54.
Albion. Olive Sab. Sch., $2.50; Mr. and Mrs.
James Green. $2. 4.50
Byron. Cong. Ch. 9.17
Carthage. Mrs. Sophia Miller. 1.50
Chicago. First Cong. Ch. $197.21; “A
Chicagoan,” 100; N. E. Cong. Ch., 79.83. 377.04
Chicago. Young Ladies Miss’y Soc., of U. P.
Ch., 17.79, _for Dakota M._; Miss Julia F.
White, 5, _for Printing Press, Santee
Agency_. 22.79
Chicago. Mrs. W. C. Kent, 5; Clinton St. Sab.
Sch., 4.37, _for Student Aid, Storrs’ Sch.
Atlanta, Ga._ 9.37
Chicago. E. W. Blatchford, 8 Pails of Paint,
_for Parsonage, Topeka, Kan._
De Kalb. Cong. Ch. 3.00
Elgin. Cong. Ch. 30.00
Evanston. Cong. Ch., ad’l. 10.00
Galesburg. Mrs. Julia F. Wells. 25.00
Galva. Cong. Ch. 22.45
Ivanhoe. Young Men’s Miss’y Soc. 2.00
Lombard. Woman’s Miss’y Soc. 1.44
Lisbon. Cong. Ch., _for Savannah, Ga._ 10.00
Mendon. Mrs. J. Fowler, _for Chinese M._ and
to const. REV. EDWARD C. CRANE, L. M. 30.00
North Hampton. R. W. Gilliam. 5.00
Oak Park. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Miss’y, Little Rock, Ark._ 52.50
Oak Park. Mr. Packard’s Sab. Sch., Boys, _for
Student Aid, Talladega C._ 25.00
Paxton. Cong. Ch. 28.00
Port Byron. Mission Circle of Cong. Ch., _for
Lady Missionaries, Mobile, Ala., and Little
Rock, Ark._ 10.00
Princeton. Mrs. P. B. Corss ($10 of which _for
Chinese M._) 20.00
Prospect Park. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary at Mobile, Ala., and Little Rock,
Ark._ 6.00
Sheffield. Cong. Sab. Sch. 1.33
Thomasborough. H. M. Seymour. 1.00
Waverly. Cong. Sab. Sch. 12.45
———————
$719.54
LEGACY.
Forrest. Estate of Mrs. Mary Stewart, by S. A.
Hoyt, Ex. 100.00
———————
$819.54
MICHIGAN, $242.08.
Adrian. A. J. Hood. 10.00
Almont. Cong. Ch. 25.30
Alpena. “A Friend,” $30; Woman’s Miss’y Soc.,
$30; E. K. Potter, $25., _for Student Aid,
Atlanta U._ 85.00
Benzonia. Amasa Waters. 10.00
Battle Creek. Miss Julia E. Williams. 5.00
Edwardsburg. S. C. Olmsted. 10.00
Frankfort. Cong. Ch. 2.39
Greenville. Cong. Ch. 35.77
Muskegon. Cong. Ch., $30; Woman’s Miss’y Soc.
$15. 45.00
Northport. Cong. Ch. 11.62
White Cloud. Ladies’ Miss’y Soc. 2.00
IOWA, $607.46.
Anamosa. Ladies’ Freedman’s Soc. of Cong. Ch.
_for Lady Miss’y, New Orleans_. 10.00
Boonesborough. Mrs. Anna M. Palmer. 10.00
Decorah. Cong. Ch. 43.83
Denmark. Cong. Ch. 20.00
De Witt. Cong. Ch. 36.34
Dunlap. Cong. Ch. 28.00
Durant. “Friends” 14.00
Garden Prairie. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans, La._ 3.00
Garwin. T. Dewey. 2.00
Green Mountain. Cong. Ch. 7.11
Green Mountain. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, New Orleans, La._ 1.25
Keokuk. Woman’s Miss’y Soc. 18.20
Maquoketa. Cong. Ch. 18.16
McGregor. Woman’s Miss’y Soc. 9.71
Meriden. Cong. Ch. 2.65
Newell. Cong. Ch. 4.00
Red Oak. Cong. Ch. 24.36
Waterloo. Ladies Miss’y Soc. of Cong. Ch. 4.85
———————
$257.46
LEGACY.
Tabor. Estate of Mrs. Abigail Cummings, by A.
C. Gaston 350.00
———————
$607.46
WISCONSIN, $271.35.
Brandon. Cong. Ch. 24.00
Brandon. Cong. Sab. Sch. _for Student Aid_. 6.00
Clinton. James H. Cooper. 5.00
Footville. Cong. Ch. 3.34
Oshkosh. First Cong. Ch. 75.00
Racine. Ladies at Convention, 14.51; Ladies of
Cong. Ch. 9, _for Lady Missionary,
Montgomery, Ala._ 23.51
Ripon. Cong. Ch. 95.00
Rosendale. Ladies of Cong. Ch., _for Lady
Missionary, Montgomery, Ala._ 3.50
Shawano. “Faith.” 2.00
Waukesha. First Cong. Ch. 19.00
———. “A Friend,” _for Student Aid, Atlanta U._ 15.00
MINNESOTA, $116.72.
Brownton. Cong. Ch. 2.40
Cottage Grove. Cong. Ch. 5.00
Cottage Grove. Ladies’ Missionary Soc. adl. to
const. REV. WM. E. ARCHIBALD L. M. 3.50
Duluth. Cong. Ch. 19.40
Minneapolis. Plymouth Cong. Ch., 31.62; Second
Cong. Ch., 10; First Cong. Ch., 14.07. 55.69
Owatonna. Woman’s Missionary Soc., Box of
household goods, val., 27.72, _for Athens,
Ala._
Preston Lake. Cong. Ch. 0.95
Sleepy Eye. Cong. Ch. 11.40
Spring Valley. Cong. Ch. 6.90
Sumpter. Cong. Ch. 0.60
Waseca. Cong. Ch., 5.04; Ladies Miss’y Soc. of
Cong. Ch., 5.84 10.88
KANSAS, $237.89.
Cawker. W. L. Barr, _for Parsonage, Topeka,
Kan._ 4.00
Great Bend. Cong. Ch. 4.62
Topeka. First Cong. Ch., 75; M. Pierce, 41.21;
H. G. Lyons, 30; A. B. Whiting, 25; A.
Clark, 5; D. H. Forbes, 5; Wm. H. Williams,
5; Topeka Lime Co., 3.06; _for Parsonage,
Topeka, Kan._ 189.27
Topeka. Tuition 40.00
MISSOURI, $10.00.
Pierce City. Cong. Ch., 8.70; Incorrectly ack.
in Nov. number from Wis.
Kirskville. J. S. Blackman 10.00
NEBRASKA, $64.70.
Fremont. Cong. Ch. 25.00
Lincoln. “K. and C.” 8.00
Sutton. German Cong. Ch. 3.00
Weeping Water. Cong. Ch. 28.70
COLORADO, $23.10.
Coal Creek. Union Cong. Ch. 13.10
Crested Butte. Cong. Ch. 10.00
CALIFORNIA, $2,006.90.
San Francisco. The California Chinese Mission 1,906.90
Oakland. Mrs. N. Gray, _for School House,
Hillsboro, N.C._ 100.00
OREGON, $5.00.
Eugene. Mrs. L. W. Judkins. 5.00
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, $30.00.
Washington. Gen. E. Whittlesey, $25; Mrs. A.
N. Bailey, $5 30.00
TENNESSEE, $12.00.
Knoxville. Second Cong. Ch. 12.00
NORTH CAROLINA, $5.50.
Troy. Cong. Ch. 0.50
Wilmington. Cong. Ch. 5.00
SOUTH CAROLINA, $10.00.
Charleston. Plym. Cong. Ch. 10.00
GEORGIA, $395.08.
Atlanta. Storrs Sch., Tuition, 297.50, Rent, 3 300.50
Atlanta. First Cong. Ch. 30.00
Macon. Cong. Ch. 4.58
McIntosh. The Sisters Benev. Soc. of Medway
Cong. Ch., by Mrs. Nancy Snelson. Pres.,
_for Mendi M._ 10.00
Savannah. Cong. Ch., _for Student Aid, Atlanta
U._ 50.00
ALABAMA, $21.33.
Marion. Cong. Ch. 1.33
Montgomery. Cong. Ch. 10.00
Talladega. Cong. Ch. 10.00
FLORIDA, $230.00.
———. “A Friend in Florida” 230.00
MISSISSIPPI, $27.00.
Tougaloo. Tougaloo, Tuition, 2; Rent, 25 27.00
TEXAS, $1.65.
Helena. Temperance Concert Cong Ch. 1.65
——————————
Total for October. $15,242.98
==========
* * * * *
ENDOWMENT FUND.
Boston, Mass. “A Friend of the Colored Race”
_for the Hastings Scholarship, to educate
Young men preparing for the Gospel Ministry,
Atlanta U._ 1,000.00
* * * * *
RECEIPTS OF THE CALIFORNIA CHINESE MISSION, from May 24 to Sept.
26, 1883. E. Palache, Treasurer.
FROM AUXILIARY MISSIONS: Marysville, Chinese
Monthly Offerings, 31; Thirteen Annual
Members, 26.—Oroville, Chinese Monthly
Offerings, 2.70; Seven Annual Members,
14.—Petaluma, Anniversary Coll., 13.50;
Chinese Annual Members, 30; American Annual
Members, 4; Chinese Monthly Offerings,
13.25.—Sacramento, Cong. Ch. Coll., 7.80;
Chinese Monthly Offerings, 21; Fourteen
Annual Members, 28; Chinese, 25, to const.
Mrs. S. E. CARRINGTON L. M.—Santa Barbara,
Chinese Monthly Offerings, 22.70; Coll.,
31.80; Mrs. J. Bates, 4.—Santa Cruz,
Anniversary Coll., 5; Annual Members, 58;
Chinese Monthly Offerings, 25; Mrs. H. A.
Martin, 1; ———, Stockton, Anniversary Coll.,
6.20; Eight Annual Members, 16; Levi
Langdon, 3 $388.95
FROM CHURCHES: Alameda, Cong. Ch.,
4.—Berkeley, Cong. Ch., 21.25.—Calaveras Co.
Churches, by Rev. A. Ostrom—Angels. 95c.;
Copperopolis, 1.25; Camp Seco, 2.30;
Murphy’s, 2.70; San Andreas, 95c.; Spring
Valley, 80c. ——— Farmdale, Cong. Ch., 7.50
——— Lockeford, Cong. Ch. Rev. and Mrs. W. H.
Pascoe, 5.—Los Angeles, Cong. Ch., 162.30;
Oakland, First Cong. Ch. 26.85; Twenty-three
Chinese, 25.30 to const. EDMUND R. SANFORD
L. M. Nine Annual Members, 18; Mrs. E.
Sanford, 5; Plymouth Av. Cong. Ch., 32;
Golden Gate Ch., 5.—Rio Vista, First Cong.
Ch., 10.—River Side, First Cong. Ch.,
5.20.—Saratoga, First Cong. Ch., 10.—San
Bernardino, Second Cong. Ch., 8.40.—San
Francisco, First Cong. Ch., in part, 50.50;
Green St. Ch., 14; Bethany Ch., in part,
Chinese Monthly Offerings, Central Sch.,
38.30; Bethany Sch., 14; West Sch. 26.35;
North Sch., 4.30; Annual Members, 122; ———,
25, to const. REV. C. R. HAZEN, of Hong
Kong, L. M.; LOW QUONG, 25, to const.
himself L. M.; Dea. S. Woo, 5.50; Ny Bo
Hong, 5; Dea. Edmund Palache, 25, to const.
MISS HELEN W. POND L. M.; “Many Friends,”
34.50 to const. LEE SAM of South China, L.
M.; Annual Members, 50; Miss Chaloner,
5.—San Jose, Cong. Ch., 20.75.—Woodland,
Three Annual Members, 6 825.95
FROM INDIVIDUAL DONORS: “M. C. N.” 30; Hon. F.
F. Low, 25; Taber, Harker & Co., 25; C.
Adolphe Low & Co., 25; Redington & Co., 25;
E. Ransome & Co., 25; Williams, Dimond &
Co., 25; Parrott & Co., 25; Eppinger & Co.,
25; T. H. Selby & Co., 25; James M. Harrn,
25; Wm. T. Coleman, 25; Cala, Furn. Mfg.
Co., 25; Liverpool, London & Globe Ins. Co.,
25; Imperial, London, Northern & Queens Ins.
Co., 25; “Cash, 405 Cala. St.,” 25; Miss
Mary Perkins, 25, to const. MRS. S. C.
PERKINS L. M.; J. J. Vasconcellos, 10;
George C. Boardman, 10; Augustus C. Flint,
10; Israel W. Knox, 10; Rev. F. A. Field,
National City, 10; “Friends,” 40 520.00
FROM EASTERN FRIENDS: “Friends in North
Maine,” 2.—Amherst, Mass., Mrs. R. A.
Lester, 100.—Stockbridge, Mass., Miss Alice
Byington, 50; Rev. F. B. Perkins,
10.—Westfield, Mass., Misses Dickinson, 10 172.00
—————————
Total $1,906.90
=========
H. W. HUBBARD, Treasurer.
56 Reade Street, N.Y.
* * * * *
CONSTITUTION.
ART. I. This society shall be called the American Missionary
Association.
ART. II. The object of this Association shall be to conduct
Christian missionary and educational operations and diffuse a
knowledge of the Holy Scriptures in our own country and other
countries which are destitute of them, or which present open and
urgent fields of effort.
ART. III. Members of evangelical churches may be constituted
members of this Association for life by the payment of thirty
dollars into its treasury, with the written declaration at the time
or times of payment that the sum is to be applied to constitute a
designated person a life member; and such membership shall begin
sixty days after the payment shall have been completed. Other
persons, by the payment of the same sum, may be made life members
without the privilege of voting.
Every evangelical church which has within a year contributed to the
funds of the Association and every State Conference or Association
of such churches may appoint two delegates to the Annual Meeting
of the Association; such delegates, duly attested by credentials,
shall be members of the Association for the year for which they
were thus appointed.
ART. IV. The Annual Meeting of the Association shall be held in
the month of October or November, at such time and place as may
be designated by the Association, or, in case of its failure to
act, by the Executive Committee, by notice printed in the official
publication of the Association for the preceding month.
ART. V. The officers of the Association shall be a President,
five Vice-Presidents, a Corresponding Secretary or Secretaries,
a Recording Secretary, a Treasurer, Auditors, and an Executive
Committee of fifteen members, all of whom shall be elected by
ballot.
At the first Annual Meeting after the adoption of this
Constitution, five members of the Executive Committee shall be
elected for the term of one year, five for two years and five for
three years, and at each subsequent Annual Meeting, five members
shall be elected for the full term of three years, and such others
as shall be required to fill vacancies.
ART. VI. To the Executive Committee shall belong the collecting
and disbursing of funds, the appointing, counseling, sustaining
and dismissing of missionaries and agents, and the selection of
missionary fields. They shall have authority to fill all vacancies
in office occurring between the Annual Meetings; to apply to any
Legislature for acts of incorporation, or conferring corporate
powers; to make provision when necessary for disabled missionaries
and for the widows and children of deceased missionaries, and in
general to transact all such business as usually appertains to the
Executive Committees of missionary and other benevolent societies.
The acts of the Committee shall be subject to the revision of the
Annual Meeting.
Five members of the Committee constitute a quorum for transacting
business.
ART. VII. No person shall be made an officer of this Association
who is not a member of some evangelical church.
ART. VIII. Missionary bodies and churches or individuals may
appoint and sustain missionaries of their own, through the agency
of the Executive Committee, on terms mutually agreed upon.
ART. IX. No amendment shall be made to this Constitution except by
the vote of two-thirds of the members present at an Annual Meeting
and voting, the amendment having been approved by the vote of a
majority at the previous Annual Meeting.
* * * * *
Our Little Ones and The Nursery.
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$925 and accrued interest will buy a $1,000 6 per
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This is a strictly first class investment bond, secured by a first
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SKIN HUMORS
CAN BE CURED BY
GLENN’S SULPHUR SOAP.
SAN FRANCISCO, Feb. 16, 1883.
_Mr. C. N. Crittenton_:
DEAR SIR: I wish to call your attention to the good your Sulphur
Soap has done me. For nearly fourteen years I have been troubled
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relief. I commenced using your “Glenn’s Sulphur Soap” nearly two
years ago—=used it in baths and as a toilet soap daily. My skin is
now as clear as an infant’s, and no one would be able to tell that
I ever had a skin complaint.= I would not be without the soap if it
cost five times the amount. Yours respectfully,
M. H. MORRIS.
LICK HOUSE, San Francisco, Cal.
The above testimonial is indisputable evidence that Glenn’s Sulphur
Soap will eliminate poisonous Skin Diseases WHEN ALL OTHER MEANS
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certain. For this reason ladies whose complexions have been
improved by the use of this soap NOW MAKE IT A CONSTANT TOILET
APPENDAGE. The genuine always bears the name of C. N. CRITTENTON,
115 Fulton street, New York, sole proprietor. For sale by all
druggists or mailed to any address on receipt of 30 cents in
stamps, or three cakes for 75 cents.
* * * * *
J. & R. LAMB,
59 Carmine Street.
Sixth Ave. cars pass the door.
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BANNERS IN SILK, NEW DESIGNS.
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SEND FOR HAND BOOK BY MAIL.
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SOLD BY DRUGGISTS
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* * * * *
FALL ISSUES, 1883.
NEW BOOKS.
Among the Mongols.
Rev. James Gilmour. A fresh and most interesting account of the
home-life, manners, customs, beliefs and practices of this strange
people. Over 30 cuts and map. 12mo. 398 pp. $1.50.
Scottish Sketches.
Mrs. A. E. Barr. The tales are exceedingly interesting; and
Scottish scenes and traits of character combine to give a peculiar
charm to the volume. 12mo. 320 pp. 6 cuts. $1.25.
Daisy Snowflake’s Secret.
Mrs. G. S. Reaney. A grand temperance story for young ladies,
showing what they may do to close our homes against such secrets as
troubled Daisy Snowflake. 12mo. 296 pp. 6 cuts. $1.25.
Cluny Macpherson.
Mrs. A. E. Barr. A story for young people disclosing Scottish life
in all its strength and depth, its romance, simplicity and beauty,
with its marked religious element. 12mo. 311 pp. $1.25.
Central Africa, Japan and Fiji.
Sketches of three of the most interesting mission fields of the
present day, showing what has been done, and what remains to do, in
bringing them to Christ. 12mo. 296 pp. 60 cuts. $1.25.
Our Brothers and Sons.
Mrs. G. S. Reaney. A book for young men, bringing out truths such
as they need; written in a most attractive style. 12mo. 270 pp. $1.
Our Daughters.
Mrs. G. S. Reaney. A book full of best suggestions for young
ladies, written by a warm-hearted Christian woman. 12mo. 250 pp. $1.
Wayside Springs.
T. L. Cuyler, D.D. These sketches are refreshing as a spring of
cold water to a traveler, and every one comes from a heavenly
fountain. 16mo. 160 pp. Limp cloth, 50c.; gilt edge, with portrait,
75c.
Morning Thoughts.
FOR OUR DAUGHTERS. Mrs. G. S. Reaney. A text of Scripture and short
devotional meditation for daily use. 16mo. 160 pp. Limp, 50c.;
gilt, 75c.
Little Glory’s Mission.
And FOUND AT LAST. Two touching stories of life among the poor.
16mo. 186 pp. 75c.
NEW S. S. CARDS.
Bible Words.
144 cards, all different texts. 25 cts.
Faithful Sayings.
12 fine floral cards with selected texts. 25 cts.
Words of Faith.
12 floral cards, with different texts. 25 cts.
“Whosoevers” of the Bible.
12 most elegant rose cards, with 52 texts. 25 cts.
Sure Promises from God’s Word.
72 cards, with different texts. 25 cts.
Words of Eternal Life.
12 floral cards, with 12 texts. 25 cts.
Gracious Invitations.
Floral cards, copyright designs, 12 cards. 25 cts.
Guiding Words.
Charming series of florals, 12 cards. 25 cts.
Living Words.
24 floral cards, with different texts. 25 cts.
Popular Series.
We have just issued the following books, giving good reading at
a very low price. They are on good paper, well printed, strongly
bound, with heavy paper covers.
Pilgrim’s Progress. 20 cts.
Annals of the Poor. 20 cts.
Mirage of Life. 20 cts.
Little Meg’s Children. 15 cts.
Alone in London. 15 cts.
Jessica’s First Prayer. 10 cts.
Grandfather’s Birthday. 5 cts.
Aunt Rose. 5 cts.
Sargent’s Temperance Tales.
12 books in box. $1.25. 10 cts. single.
Ministering Children. 50 cts.
RUTH AND LITTLE JANE. 10 cts.
SUNSHINE OF THE HEART. 10 cts.
HERBERT, TRUE CHARITY. 15 cts.
ROSE, THE LITTLE COMFORT. 15 cts.
SONGS FOR MY CHILDREN. 15 cts.
HOLIDAY PICTURES. 10 cts.
* * * * *
American Tract Society:
150 Nassau Street, New York; or
1512 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia;
153 Wabash Avenue, Chicago;
52 Bromfield Street, Boston;
75 State Street, Rochester;
757 Market Street, San Francisco.
* * * * *
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the main reflector, whence the whole mass of brilliancy illuminates
and projects the picture with startling clearness. No combination
of lenses, however ingenious, has ever been known to produce equal
effects with the light used. The cost of an outfit to enable you to
do =A PROFITABLE BUSINESS= is very small compared with the amount
of money it takes to do any other business. Any one of ordinary
intelligence can operate. =$10 to $50 per night may be earned= by
giving Parlor, Sunday-School, Academy, or Public entertainments.
=As an Educator the Electro Radiant= surpasses almost every other
apparatus used in a school. The attention of the scholar is
concentrated on just the =one= illustration before him, and on no
other, as in the dark nothing else can be seen and the mind of
the student is forcibly attracted. =Masonic= and other =Lodges or
Societies= will find the =Electro Radiant= a novel, useful, and
profitable addition to their paraphernalia in illustrating their
ritual or giving entertainments. =For public Entertainments= the
possessor of an =Electro Radiant= has something that will “draw”
with the combined power of the =Theatre=, the =Circus=, the
=Prestidigitateur=, the =County Fair=, the =Temperance Crusade=,
and the =Camp-Meeting=. A room that will hold 100 persons may be
filled nightly and a good profit be cleared. Our photograph slides
represent faithfully Beautiful Works of Art, Scriptural Scenes,
Portraits of Prominent Persons, and Comic subjects that are a
never-ending source of delight.
Even if you only wanted to amuse your friends or family, see what
a cheap and beneficial entertainment you can furnish. You have
only to tack the sheet to the wall, darken the room, place Lantern
on stand, light lamp, and you are ready to begin the exhibition.
The Magic Lantern Show is different from every other; it attracts
the school-boy equally with his master; all kinds, classes, and
degrees of folks are delighted by it. =The Electro Radiant projects
onto to the Screen a Picture Eight Feet in Diameter. Ten Thousand
Dollars= were paid for the =use of our Patent= by one Railroad
Company for =Locomotive Headlights=, it being considered the most
wonderful light ever produced for the purpose. We have retained
the exclusive right to make =Magic Lanterns= on precisely the same
principle, and the =Electro Radiant= is the result. The adjustment
of Reflector, Lenses, Tubes, Slide Rest, and Cone are made with
mathematical nicety. Optical laws governing such adjustments have
been accurately calculated, so that you have in our Lanterns far
more than appears, and we are placing within the reach of all
unsurpassed advantages for =Learning, Amusement, and Profit=.
The =Transparent Slides= for these Lanterns embrace views
illustrating =wonderful Natural Scenes= from different parts
of the world. The =Scriptures=—Subjects from both the Old and
New Testaments. =Temperance=—Showing the folly and misery of
the Drunkard. =Art=—Copies of famous Statues, Bas-reliefs, and
Engravings. =Miscellaneous=—Such as Ships at Sea in a Storm,
Steamboat Race, Fort Sumter, Daylight Scene, Moonlight, etc., etc.
=History=—Landing of Columbus, Declaration of Independence, Yankee
Doodle, etc., etc. =Comic=—Side Splitters without number, etc.,
etc. You can add to your assortment at any future time if you
choose.
Each =Lantern= with slides complete is packed in a neat box which
may easily be carried in the hand.
=PRICES.= The =Electro Radiant No. 2= (as shown in cut) with slides
and fittings complete, will be sent by express on receipt of
=$12.00=, or C. O. D. if =$3.00= on account is sent with the order,
the purchaser paying the balance, =$9.00=, at the express office.
Full instructions and list of other views sent with each Lantern.
Send money-order or registered letter.
Send all orders to WORLD MANUFACTURING CO., 122 Nassau Street, New
York.
* * * * *
MASON & HAMLIN ORGANS.
A cable dispatch announces that at the
International Industrial Exhibition
(1883) now in progress (1883) at
AMSTERDAM, NETHERLANDS,
These Organs have been Awarded the
GRAND DIPLOMA OF HONOR,
Being the VERY HIGHEST AWARD, ranking above the GOLD MEDAL,
and given only for EXCEPTIONAL SUPER-EXCELLENCE.
THUS IS CONTINUED THE UNBROKEN SERIES OF TRIUMPHS OF THESE ORGANS
AT EVERY GREAT WORLD’S INDUSTRIAL EXHIBITION
FOR SIXTEEN YEARS,
No other American Organs having been found equal to them in any.
THE RECORD OF TRIUMPHS of MASON & HAMLIN ORGANS in such severe and
prolonged comparisons by the BEST JUDGES OF SUCH INSTRUMENTS IN THE
WORLD now stands: at
PARIS, |VIENNA, |SANTIAGO,| PHILA., |PARIS, |MILAN,| AMSTERDAM,
1867 | 1873 | 1875 | 1876 | 1878 | 1881 | 1883
FRANCE.|AUSTRIA.| CHILI. |U.S. AMER.|FRANCE.|ITALY.|NETHERLANDS.
The Testimony of Musicians is Equally Emphatic.
[Illustration: THE NEW WORLD SAYS
“MUCH THE BEST MUSICIANS GENERALLY SO REGARD THEM” THEO-THOMAS AND
THOUSANDS OF OTHERS.]
[Illustration: THE OLD WORLD SAYS
“MATCHLESS” “UNRIVALED” FRANZ LISZT AND HUNDREDS OF OTHERS.]
A NEW ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE FOR 1883-4
(dated October, 1883) is now ready and will be sent free; including
MANY NEW STYLES—the best assortment and most attractive organs
we have ever offered. ONE HUNDRED STYLES are fully described and
illustrated, adapted to all uses, in plain and elegant cases in
natural woods, and superbly decorated in gold, silver and colors.
Prices, $22 for the smallest size, but having as much power as any
single reed organ and the characteristic Mason & Hamlin excellence,
up to $900 for the largest size. 50 styles between $100 and $200.
_Sold also for easy payments._ Catalogues free.
THE MASON & HAMLIN ORGAN AND PIANO CO.,
154 Tremont St., Boston; 46 East 14th Street (Union Square), New
York; 149 Wabash Avenue, Chicago.
* * * * *
7 PER CENT. to 8 PER CENT.
Interest Net to Investors
In First Mortgage Bonds ON
IMPROVED FARMS in
Iowa, Minnesota
and Dakota,
SECURED BY
ORMSBY BROS. & CO.,
BANKERS, LOAN AND LAND BROKERS,
EMMETSBURG, IOWA.
_11 Years’ Experience. Loans Absolutely Safe._
References and Circulars forwarded on Application.
_BRANCH BANKS AT MITCHELL AND HURON, D. T._
* * * * *
PAYSON’S
INDELIBLE INK,
FOR MARKING ANY FABRIC WITH A
COMMON PEN, WITHOUT A
PREPARATION.
It still stands unrivaled after 50 years’ test.
THE SIMPLEST AND BEST.
Sales now greater than ever before.
This Ink received the Diploma and Medal at Centennial over all
rivals.
Report of Judges: “For simplicity of application and indelibility.”
INQUIRE FOR
PAYSON’S COMBINATION!!!
Sold by all Druggists, Stationers and News Agents, and by many
Fancy Goods and Furnishing Houses.
* * * * *
ESTABLISHED THIRTY YEARS.
SMITH AMERICAN ORGANS
ARE THE BEST.
_Catalogues Free on Application._
Address the Company either at
BOSTON, MASS., 531 Tremont Street;
LONDON, ENG., 57 Holborn Viaduct;
KANSAS CITY, Mo., 817 Main Street;
ATLANTA, GA., 27 Whitehall Street;
Or, DEFIANCE, O.
OVER 95,000 SOLD.
* * * * *
[Illustration: THE Rising sun STOVE POLISH]
For beauty of gloss, for saving of toil,
For freeness from dust and slowness to soil,
And also for cheapness ’tis yet unsurpassed,
And thousands of merchants are selling it fast.
Of all imitations ’tis well to beware;
The half risen sun every package should bear;
For this is the “trade mark” the MORSE BROS. use,
And none are permitted the mark to abuse.
* * * * *
NOTES ON CHURCH WORSHIP.
* * * * *
When the Hymn and Tune Book, “Songs for the Sanctuary,” had
outgrown its freshness, Mr. Joseph P. Holbrook, the Musical Editor,
set about preparing the _Worship in Song_, and after years of labor
offered it for publication, and it now stands before the churches.
By common consent the general merit of the Songs for the Sanctuary
was in the musical editing, and it is safe to say that the mantle
that fell from that book dropped upon the shoulders of the Worship
in Song. Holbrook’s later and newer book contains the result of his
labor and experience through all these years, and his Worship in
Song is clearly the greatest improvement that could be made.
In addition to the Hymns and Tunes, the book contains _Dr. R. S.
Storrs’ New Psalter_, which has recently been edited and enlarged
by Dr. Storrs, and contains also a brief statement by him of the
value of responsive reading in churches. The selections of Psalms
and Scripture for responsive reading is by far the best that has
yet been published for Congregational and Presbyterian purposes,
and, as the old edition was widely used, so this will be the
standard and the best. The _Worship in Song with Psalter_, by
Storrs and Holbrook, is a successful and popular combination.
Another Hymn and Tune Book of very great importance, on account
of its giving standard classical music throughout, is Hall &
Lasar’s _Evangelical Hymnal_. This book has already been adopted
in Harvard College, Trinity College and other institutions, and is
being favorably considered by many churches. It is a marked step
in advance of all other Hymn and Tune Books, and is the recognized
standard of the Church Hymn-book of the near future.
Messrs. A. S. Barnes & Co. have also recently published Prof.
Hopkins’ “_Liturgy_, or Book of Common Prayer for Non-Episcopal
Churches.” This _Liturgy_ is the result of many years of study,
after correspondence and comparison on the part of the author
with many leading Protestant clergymen. Upon publication it was
received with great interest by clergymen of all denominations, and
a large sale immediately began. It is safe to say that no other
book presenting a Liturgy for Presbyterian and Congregational
Churches was ever received with so great enthusiasm. The sale
steadily continues, and the interest awakened is sufficient to make
it certain that the plan finds favor. Clergymen and Committees
desiring to see and examine copies of any or all of the above books
can obtain them on approval, postage prepaid, by addressing the
publishers,
A. S. BARNES & CO.,
111 and 113 WILLIAM STREET, NEW YORK.
ATKIN & PROUT, Printers, 12 Barclay St., New York.
Transcriber’s Notes
Obvious printer’s punctuation errors and omissions silently
corrected. Period spelling and inconsistent hyphenation retained.
Ditto marks replaced with the text the represent to facilitate
eBook text alignment.
Missing “t” added in “at” on the inside cover (at the New York
Office)
Changed “BEQEATH” to “BEQUEATH” on the inside cover (I BEQUEATH to
my executor).
Changed “consultatation” to “consultation” on page 380 (without
mutual consultation)
Missing digits in the entries for South Amherst and Southampton on
page 408 could not be determined.
Unbalanced quotation marks on page 406 left in place as it is not
possible to determine where they should be closed (It is on this
that the whole method)
Changed “Fragance” to “Fragrance” on page 413 (Beauty and Fragrance)
Changed “Amother” to “Another” on the back cover (Another Hymn and
Tune Book)
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The American Missionary — Volume 37, No. 12, December, 1883" ***
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