adopted a report of a Committee on the religious instruction of people of color. After urging, in a series of Resolutions, the duty of instructing slaves, they close with the following:

"Resolved, That by religious instruction be understood, VERBAL communications on religious subjects."-Vide Cincinnati Cross and Baptist Journal, as quoted in A. S. Lecturer, No. 3.

Thus careful were they to be understood as not intending to recommend giving slaves the Bible and permitting them to read.

THE BAPTIST TRIENNIAL CONVENTION.

This body was organized in 1814.

"Under its constitution, slaveholders and non-slaveholders united on terms of social and moral equality. This was its fatal error. It caused the Convention, from its birth to its dissolution, to sanction as Christian a slaveholding religion." "The first President was Richard Furman, a slaveholder of South Carolina. He filled the office till 1820, when another slaveholder, Robert B. Semple, of Virginia, succeeded him, and was President till 1832, when Spencer H. Cone,* of New York (City) was elected, who held the office till 1841, when another slaveholder, William B. Johnson, of South Carolina, was elected, at the close of whose term of office, 1844, Francis Wayland became President. Thus, for twenty-one of the thirty years of this organization, slaveholders were its Presidents."-Facts for Bap. Churches, pp. 14, 15.

Connected with the Triennial Convention was a General Board of Baptist Foreign Missions; and subordinate to this was an "Acting Board," located in Boston.

So late as 1844, near the time of the dissolution of that body, it came to light that there was a slaveholding missionary in its employ, a Mr. Bushyhead, who was laboring among the Cherokees. He lived in a fine dwelling, had a plantation, and several slaves.-Пb. p. 102.

It also appeared, not long after, that there were several southern missionaries employed by the Board, and that, among these, Mr. Davenport and his wife, at Siam, were slaveholders.

* In 1828 or 1824, Mr. Cone was pastor of a slaveholding Baptist Church in Alexandria (D. C.)

แ

This was stated, on authority of the "Christian Index," (a Southern Baptist paper) by the New York Baptist Register, of Utica, N. Y., April 6, 1845.-Ib. p. 113-17.

It was also stated, on good authority, that several others among the foreign missionaries were slaveholders.-Ib. p. 122-3.

แ THE AMERICAN BAPTIST HOME MISSION SOCIETY

was organized in the City of New York, April 27, 1832." Missionary Societies" (northern and southern) "by paying into its treasury their surplus funds, become auxiliary." Its constitution makes no distinction between slaveholders and non-slaveholders. "The Society has elected slaveholding officers, sent out slaveholding missionaries, and planted slaveholding churches, and all this in perfect keeping with its Constitution. Slaveholders are, to-day, (1850) on its list of life members, and its treasury is open to the price of men and women and little children." "As the Missionary of this Society, (Mr. Tryon,) entered Texas, he drove his slaves be fore him."-Ib. p. 63-65.

It was publicly stated, at a meeting in Philadelphia, by Eld. Duncan Dunbar, that twenty-six slaveholders had been employed by the Board.-Ib. p. 65.

The subject of employing slaveholding Missionaries came up for consideration, at its twelfth annual meeting, at Philadelphia, in 1844, but, after discussion, no action was taken against it. Instead of this, a Resolution (drawn up by Eld. R. Fuller, a slaveholder of South Carolina, and a Biblical defender of slavery,) was adopted, assuming neutral ground, and disclaiming fellowship, as a Society, either with slavery or anti-slavery. At this meeting, Eld. B. M. Hill, Corres ponding Secretary of the Society, stated that the Southern States paid more into the treasury than the Northern States, and therefore more southern missionaries were appointed than northern ones.-Ib. p. 88-90.

At the meeting of the Society at Providence, R. I., April, 1845, some further discussion was had, and some incipient

measures for a division between the North and the South were considered, and a committee appointed to mature a plan. Assurances were given that, in the meantime, no more slaveholding missionaries should be appointed. But the promise was violated. "Two slaveholding missionaries had been appointed in February, and one of them was appointed again the next year, after the fact of his slaveholding had been published in the Minutes of the Baptist Convention of North Carolina, as a proof that the Home Missionary Society was willing to employ slaveholders, and as an evidence that no rule had been adopted at Providence prohibiting the appointment of slaveholders.”—Ib. 149–162.

THE AMERICAN AND FOREIGN BIBLE SOCIETY,

(Baptist) was organized in 1837, the year of the martyrdom of Lovejoy, and after the murderous spirit of slaveholding ministers and church members against northern abolitionists had been fully revealed. It was a fraternal union between the leading ministers and the great majority of the lay brotherhood of Baptists, at the North and at the South. It had, in 1841, fifty-eight auxiliary societies in the slaveholding states. It has never been without slaveholding officers.-Ib. p. 58-9. The (Baptist) "Christian Index," Georgia, of November 16, 1848, contained an appeal in behalf of this Bible Society, and also an advertisement, in which "a plantation with some twenty negroes, stock of every kind," &c., were offered for sale.-Ib. p. 323-4.

At a meeting of this Society, it was "Resolved to furnish every family in the United States with a Bible."

Eld. Abel Brown immediately rose and inquired, mildly, whether the resolution embraced slaves? Scarcely had the words escaped his lips, when the house resounded with the cry of “Order! order! order!" and the President, Eld. Spencer H. Cone, with emphatic voice and gesture, called out to him," Sit down, Sir! you are out of order."-Ib. 327.

The Society has never published its intention of giving the Bible to the poor heathen in the slave states, though it is be

lieved that money has been repeatedly offered to the Society for the object, and that they have, invariably, refused to receive it.-Ib. 327-8.

And yet, in a communication to the committee of the (English) General Baptist Missionary Society, the Board of the American and Foreign Bible Society, Nov. 3, 1847, over the signature of Eld. Spencer H. Cone, said, of the Society,

"They have never withheld the Bible from the slave." And they further say they have reason to believe that "the colored race, bond and free," receive a fair proportion of their books!

Of the credibility of these statements, the American reader can judge.-Ib. 325–334.

The Board further says: "We have never designed, nor are we conscious that we have done aught to abet the system or practice of slavery." Yet the Society (1849) receives slave. holders to membership, has 59 auxiliaries, 506 life members, 99 life directors, and 9 Vice Presidents, in the slave states.-Ib. p. 333-4.

"THE AMERICAN BAPTIST PUBLICATION SOCIETY,"

is also "a bond of union between the North and the South," publishing nothing againt slavery.-Ib. p. 340-44.

as con

A further account of the position of Baptist organizations in respect to slavery, will appear in another chapter, nected with the movements of abolitionists, and Baptist "Free Missions."

CHAPTER XVI.

POSITION OF THE AMERICAN CHURCHES, ETC., CONTINUED.

V. THE PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CHURCH.

Testimony of John Jay, Esq.-Sermon of Mr. Freeman-Bishop Ives-Protestant Episcopal Society of South Carolina-Bishop Bowen-"The Churchman"-Prohibition of reading-General Theological Seminary-Treatment of a Colored student, Alexander Crummel-Position of Rev. Drs. Milnor, Taylor, Smith, and Hawks-Dissent of Bishop Doane-Exclusion of Colored Ministers from Ecclesiastical Councils-Episcopal Convention at Philadelphia-St. Thomas' Church.

THE prevailing temper of the Protestant Episcopal Church is thus testified of, by John Jay, Esq., of the City of New York-himself an Episcopalian-in a pamphlet entitled, “Thoughts on the Duty of the Episcopal Church, in relation to Slavery."

"Alas! for the expectation that she would conform to the spirit of her ancient mother! She has not merely remained a mute and careless spectator of this great conflict of truth and justice with hypocrisy and cruelty, but her very priests and deacons may be seen ministering at the altar of slavery, offering their talents and influence at its unholy shrine, and openly repeating the awful blasphemy, that the precepts of our Saviour sanction the system of American slavery. Her Northern (free State) clergy, with rare exceptions, whatever they may feel on the subject, rebuke it neither in public nor in private, and her periodicals, far from advancing the progress of abolition, at times oppose our societies, impliedly defending slavery, as not incompatible with Christianity, and occasionally withholding information useful to the cause of freedom.”—Birney's American Churches, &c., pp. 39, 40.

"In 1836, a Clergyman of North Carolina, of the name of Freeman, preached, in presence of his bishop (Rev. Levi S. Ives, D.D., a native of a free State), two sermons on the rights and duties of slaveholders. In these