fifty thousand communicants. Our quarterly and yearly meetings had passed resolutions condemning slavery, while our general conference had uttered its voice clear and distinct against it. Our position had not, till recently, been known. Even Dr. Stowe did not know till recently, that the F. Baptists had taken steps in Anti-slavery, in advance of other denominations. The report alluded to a remark of Mr. Goodell, that "a majority of their [F. W. B.] members is on the side of slavery, especially at the ballot box." On reading this statement of Mr. Goodell's, the Secretary had dropped a line to him, requesting his authority for making it. In reply, Mr. G. had admitted that he had no direct evidence for it, and stood ready to correct it whenever evidence to the contrary should be given. Under these considerations, the Secretary had requested, through the Star, information relative to the political action of voters in the different quarterly meetings. From a number he had received returns. So far as these went they were supposed to vindicate the denomination's Anti-slavery character. The Secretary read them at length, and they will aspear in the published report, &c., &c. Rev. J. Chaney, of Danielsonville, Con., said, "We shall probably all agree, that whenever we act, we act not only for ourselves, but for others--not only for the present, but for the future. But there are periods in the life of individuals as well as of associated bodies around which very unusual interests cluster. Such was the period when Noah was building the ark for the salvation of the race, when Abraham was going forth to offer up his son Isaac, and when Moses was refusing to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. He might refer also to the period when David with his youthful arm wielded successfully the sling and stone against the haughty Philistine; and when Daniel prayed with his windows open towards Jerusalem. He might refer to Cæsar at the Rubicon, and with still more force to the moment when the Jews preferred Barrabbas, the robber, to Jesus Christ. In all these instances, the actors acted not only for themselves, but for others; not only for the present, but for the future.

And such points of special interest are not wanting in the history of our own prosperous and strong nation. For instance, go back to the time when the Puritans in England came to the noble and high minded decision that the privilege of worshipping God according to the dictates of their own conscience, was of more value to them than the endearments of their own native land and the home of their childhood! That decision was fraught with vital interest to them and to the future. That was a time around which clustered the highest consider

ations, when they resolved to leave their native country, embarked in the May Flower, and landed on Plymouth rock. The tread of their pilgrim feet on the cold December snows of their dreary landing place, has left an impression upon many generations and the whole world.

But another important period arrived, when the same eternal sentiment that led the pilgrims to persevere mid the hardships of the wilderness, mid savages and wild beasts, far from their early home, had wrought out another issue, in which our fathers were brought to resist the oppression of the British king. When the struggle came, the question was put, and they made the noble declaration of our country's independence, and the bill of rights. When they put forth that political gospel, it harmonized with the religious creed they had expressed long before.

My object, Mr. President, in making these remarks, is to bring us along the track of the history of our country by those peculiar points of interest in the history of our ancestors-those times of special crises which they were called to endure, down to our own point-that point in which there are essential interests clustering around us as a nation. I wished o bring you down by the way of the crises of our fathers to our own crisis in our own time. For we now have it presented to us. I refer especially to slavery. Our fathers, at the day of the declaration of independence, were called to go forth and contend with the mighty British power. They acted their part nobly, manfully.

The foul institution of American slavery, whose existence and extirpation we are met together this evening to contemplate, began to cause trouble. It caused much trouble, and much agitation in the early congresses of the nation. And meeting with much and manful opposition, it at length asked only that it might live for twenty years longer, giving encouragement by its advocates, that at the close of that term it would consent to give up the ghost. Our fathers gave the consent. While the blow of extermination was raised over the hideous institution, it was suspended for the space of twenty years. Our fathers did not anticipate that in the course of those twenty years, or in the space of half a century, that institution would build for itself a strong and mighty fortress in the centre of our nation-that it would in that time become surly and proud, and gain the entire control of our political organization,-that it would make for itself a nest in our sanctuaries, and in its conscious strength turn and require us to ask of it, whom we might put in onr pulpits. But such has been the unhappy result.

We wish to give our fathers credit for

the fidelity with which they acted. But we lament that they had not given to slavery the exterminating blow. We now have our crisis. As a nation, after having broken away from foreign oppressors--after having asserted our firm and unshaken belief in the religion that tells us that one is our master, even Christ, that all we are brethren, that God has made of one blood all the nations of the earth,-and after having proclaimed to the world in our political creed, that all men are created equal-after having proclaimed these sensentiments for more than half a century from the pulpit, the political stand, and halls of state, so that we have attracted the attention of almost the whole world, bebold to-day we are seen holding almost four millions of our own countrymen in a state of the most abject slavery that the world presents. This is our crisis! Professing to teach the world the great principles of human freedom, and having proudly and publicly engaged to give the principles of civil and religious liberty to the nations, we are now brought quite to a stand by our own relations to slavery. The question now is, what shall we do in our crisis? Our fathers did nobly in theirs. They contended with a strong foreign We are called upon, Mr. President, at the power, and gained freedom for themselves. present day, to contend with our own slavishness, and to break the yokes of our own oppression. We are called to a stand certainly as trying and self-sacrificing as was that of our fathers. I am ready to conclude that there are many men in our nation to day, who would not heistate to face the roar of a British cannon, who nevertheless do quail before the power of American slavery. Many men in political life, and in religious life also, who would do it-who do do it! Shall we prove ourselves as equal to our day, and to our crisis, as did our fathers to theirs? Or shall we prove recreant? Is it ours to promulgate the great principles of human rights, and of a pure gospel to the nations of the earth? and have we the agencies for doing it above all others, save our relation to slavery? and shall we fail here? Because we cannot conquer ourselves, and break our own yoke of oppression, shall we prove recreant to the great and high and holy trust that has been committed to us, while God and the nations look on? I cannot bring myself to conclude that the citizens of these United States-that the men and women before me to night, will stoop so low as to ask of slavery what they may say as men and ministers, and what they

may do at the ballot box in choosing a President. I do believe that there is yet left in the bosom of this people, a spirit that will refuse to grant the demands of slavery, and will have a man to sit in the chair of state who will not ask of slavery the privilege of sitting there. I believe there is a spirit in the church of Christ that will refuse to ask of slavery what we may and what we may not say as ministers of Christ, and disciples of the Lamb of God.

While we have this great evil among us, we have motives for labouring against it-why the people should arouse, and with united effort, making God their trust, strike directly for its abolition. I will simply say [the speaker felt that he had but a few minutes to occupy,] that if the institution of American Slavery is permitted to continue, it will destroy our religious character abroad among the nations of the earth. What must the effect be of proclaiming to the nations the gospel that proclaims "the golden rule," and then proclaim that we enslave one-sixth part of own population. Slavery will destroy all influence at home. It will, if it continue, destroy our free government, with all its free and happy institutions. For slavery or freedom has got to govern throughout these United States.

All should be engaged in striving for the removal of slavery. I rejoice in what we have done. But I am pained at what we have not done. We are told that it does not belong to the minister to meddle with this subject. We are accused of a want of patriotism because we urge attention to the wrongs of slavery, and demand national reform. I have a word or two to say to this, and must give way. As to patriotism, if it means 66 our country, right or wrong," then I do not profess to be a patriot. But if it means love of our country as a birthplace, then I am a patriot. But I love my country chiefly as a part of our world where our Father in Heaven has put the great family of men. I love it as a part of the great whole-I love it because the love of Jesus Christ and redeeming love extends over all. And I ask, how do whips and chains, and public sales of human beings, look in such a state and with such a law as our Father has given us? In this view of the subject, I hope we shall all feel this night to renew our pledge to war against American slavery-to go forth against this sum of all villainies.

How full of mystery is the name of Christ! "His name shall be called Wonderful." While it is an obvious truth that the holy Scriptures are the testimony God has given of his Son; and while that testimony is so plain and clear that it is impossible to mistake its meaning, unless the mind be perverted by some predisposition or preconception, it is also most manifest that in this plainly-given testimony, and the facts which it contains, there are mysteries beyond our ken, and truths which excite our profoundest wonder and admiration. In him self and in his works God is ever a mystery. We see his works, we have in them ample proofs of his own being, and yet, with this knowledge, how little do we comprehend!

When man became a fallen creature, the promise was given of a mysterious deliverer. "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." This seed was surely to be of the same nature as the woman, but as he was to "bruise the serpent's head," or destroy the works of their destroyer, he must have powers far mightier than belong to man. He must have powers even beyond those of the angels; for it was the VOL. 1.-N. S.

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prince of the host of the fallen angels who had been the seducer and destroyer of our race. In other words, he must combine in himself the elements of humanity, with the authority and power of God! How mysterious and wonderful this person! How mixed and admiring the hopes which this promise excited!

But the promise was repeated and amplified in after times. To Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, it was given. A long line of patriarchs looked for its accomplishment. The nation, tribe, family, from which, according to the flesh, he was to spring, was in process of time pointed out. The offices he should bear, and the work he should perform, were shadowed forth under the law; the time and place of his appearing; his character, treatment, sufferings, death, and resurrection, were all spoken of beforehand with most astonishing precision; so that when we compare the events with the prediction, and the person and work of Christ with the promises, types, and shadows of him, we are astonished at their perfect agreement. How circumstantial! How exact! How wonderful that for thousands of years these promises

should have been given! How do all meet, like so many converging rays, in one point, and unite in presenting to us "Jesus of Nazareth," as the promised Messiah, the one that should come. Guided by the light of prophecy, of promise, and of type; by the testimony of history, and by the hopes and confidence of God's own people, we are led to his feet; and while we wonder at the past testimony concerning him, and at its most astonishing accomplishment, and behold in admiration the person and work of our blessed Lord, we exclaim, "We believe and are sure, that thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God."

We have said that the original promise implied that the deliverer, while of the nature of man, should have the power of God, that he might destroy the works of the devil; such is the recorded fact. What evidence can be plainer than that we have as to his true humanity? He was born; he grew from infancy to manhood; he felt fatigue, hunger, thirst, and pain; he suffered and died as a man. All the attributes proper to humanity were present in him. His, too, were the power, the wisdom, the nature of the everlasting God. His own claims, his own works, the testimony of the prophets and apostles, of angels, and of God, all go to prove that he was divine. In his person the Godhead and manhood were united. This is plainly reiterated in the sacred word, as a few words from which will suffice to shew. "They shall call his name Emmanuel, which, being interpreted is, God with us." "In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God; all things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made :-and the word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,

"Jesus

full of grace and truth." Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David, according to the flesh, and declared to be the Son of God with power." "This is my beloved Son." "Thy, throne, Ö God, is for ever and ever."

The fact is thus clearly set before

us. Words could not be invented that could present it to us more plainly. But while we receive the testimony, and fully and firmly believe it, how wonderful, how mysterious, how far beyond our comprehension, does it appear! The God of all and man united in one person! He who made all things one with a Ichild of Adam! We admit the evidence of the fact itself; we see that great and glorious results are accomplished by it, but we can never comprehend its mystery. We can only adore and exclaim, "Great is the mystery of Godliness: God was manifest in the flesh."

Let us, moreover, contemplate the deeds performed by this mysterious person, while he sojourned among men. His whole spirit, temper, and conversation, exhibited every virtue and grace that can adorn mankind. He was "meek and lowly in heart;" he was "holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from sinners;" he "taught the way of God truly." "Never man spake like him." He "went about doing good." He was void of all ostentation, opposed to all pride, and full of tenderness and compassion. But what wonderful deeds he performed! He rebuked the devils, and they fled. He commanded the winds and the waves, and they obeyed him. He called the dead from the sepulchre, and they came. The blind received their sight, the lame their feet, the dumb their tongue, the deaf their hearing, the sick their health, and hungry myriads their food by the mere expression of his will. His works, his miracles, were endless, and they all demonstrated his divine pow

er.

Often did the admiring multitudes exclaim, "We never saw it in this fashion :-We have seen strange things to-day." We, too, as we contemplate these things, are sensible that we are bound to acknowledge "the mystery of Christ." He is "wonderful in working."

If, guided by apostolic and inspired testimony and revelation, we meditate on the riches of the grace of Christ, how sublime, how profound, how mysterious the theme! Who

can comprehend the love which Christ felt and displayed to a lost world? None! This love must be estimated by the guilt and desert of those for whom he came; things which in all moral beings excite loathing, and which must be overcome by mightier love. It must be estimated by the dignity of our Lord's divine nature; by the humiliation to which he stooped, when he took on him our flesh; by the intensity of the woes which he suffered as our surety; and by the endurance of that love, which continues for ever;-by all these combined, (each apart being an example of affection, unbounded and incomprehensible) we are called on to estimate the love of Christ. Oh! it is wonderful; it is mysterious. It has "breadth and length, and depth and height, which pass all knowledge.'

How wonderful are the riches of his grace! He gives to sinful men, when they see and lament their errors and look to him, the full and free forgiveness of all their transgressions. He freely removes them from condemnation, and cancels all their guilt. He gives them, too, a sense of divine love, the spirit of adoption. They become the children of God, and in their feelings and affections are brought near to God. He will secure to them eternal life; infinite, endless good will be theirs. Here are mysteries as great as those that encircle his throne.

What amazing power is manifested in his renewing grace! What has it done? It has humbled the proud. It has cleansed the polluted. It has restored the fallen. It has brought those who were afar off, nigh. It has recovered those who were filled with a thousand demons, whose vices were both notorious and terrible, and brought them to "sit at the feet of Jesus, clothed, and in their right mind." How wonderful the power which thus triumphs over the waywardness, the selfishness, and the sins of men! Every believer looks on his own conversion as a miracle of grace. What numbers, too, have felt this influence!

The present exalted position of our Lord, and the relationship he sustains to his church, are not devoid of mystery. Let us follow him, whose life on earth presented a series of inexplicable wonders; let us see him after the bloody sweat, the cruel thorns, the shameful cross, the sealed tomb, and the glorious resurrection: let us follow him with our eyes as he ascends to heaven from Bethany, from the midst of his admiring disciples, until "a cloud receives him out of our sight;" let us by faith behold him escorted by myriads of angels to his throne, saying, "lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting doors, and the King of Glory shall come in," and say, does all wonder now cease? are there no more marks of grandeur, and glory, and mystery to excite our admiration? Rather do not they now, as it were, only begin, and crowd themselves on our bewildered and astonished mind more numerously than ever?

Read the scripture testimony;"He is gone to heaven, and is on the right hand of God, angels, and authorities, and powers, being made subject unto him." He is seated on the throne of glory. "He is Lord of all." Angels worship him. "All