creatures are the enemies of God and man. The Bible belongs of right to every man. It is the property of the world." Thus speaks the Protestant defender of slavery, Charles C. Jones ("Catechism," p. 80). But to prevent a slave from reading the Bible is not by any means to keep the Bible from him! In what a Catholic spirit he thus exhorts the slaves! ("Catechism," p. 79,) "What benefit will this precious book be to us, unless we diligently study it, and embrace opportunities of receiving instruction from it, such as are afforded us in the house of God, in the sabbathschool, and in the Bible-class? Search the Scriptures' is the Redeemer's command."* "We cannot," he says ("Religious Instruction," p. 167), "cry out against the Papists for withholding the Scriptures from the common people, and keeping them in ignorance of the way of life; for our inconsistency is as great as theirs, if we withhold the Bible from our servants, and keep them in ignorance of its saving truths, which we certainly do while we will not provide ways and means of having it read and explained to them"! So readily, at the bidding of slavery, will Protestants surrender the most distinctive feature of Protestantism!

It is obvious, that, if any religious instruction is to be imparted to slaves, it must be given them by others. But it is in the power of the owner to forbid all such instruction. "The whole arrangement of the religious instruction of the negroes, as to teachers, times, places, matter and manner, is in our own power," says Mr. Jones (ib. p. 98).

The Presbytery of Georgia, in the memorial before alluded to, says

* How carefully does Mr. Jones teach the slaves "to search the Scriptures ! ("Catechism," p. 103.)

"Q. Is it not our duty, on the sabbath, to go to the house of God, to the meeting for prayer, to the sabbath-school, and wherever we may worship God and learn his will? A. Yes.

"Q. What was done with the man that gathered sticks on the sabbathday, not caring for God's commandment? - A. He was stoned.

"Q. Is sabbath-breaking a great sin in the sight of God? — A. Yes. (Ib. p. 104) He who breaks the sabbath robs God of his own; for the day is the Lord's."

"The law of the land makes and can make no provision for their religious instruction. That instruction is committed to owners, as the instruction of children is to parents; and they can give or withhold it at pleasure. We owners and ministers are 'the almoners of divine mercy to them,' and, if we do not open the door of salvation, they may grope their way into a miserable eternity; for they have no power of any kind to originate and establish and carry forward church organizations and associations for their own benefit. They are entirely dependent upon us for the gospel of salvation."

"We may," says Mr. Jones ("Religious Instruction," p. 158), "according to the power lodged in our hands, forbid religious meetings and religious instruction on our own plantations; we may forbid our servants going to church at all, or only to such churches as we may select for them; we may literally shut up the kingdom of heaven against men, and suffer not them that are entering to go in!"

Wherever an owner is willing to permit such instruction, it must still be carried on wholly by oral communications. "This immense mass of immortal beings," says Mr. Jones, "is thrown for religious instruction upon oral communications entirely" (ib. p. 157). That any oral instruction of the adult or aged slaves is worth but little he evidently admits, because he says (ib. p. 229), "If a people are to be instructed orally, let the instruction be communicated to them in early life;" and "the great hope of permanently benefiting the negroes is laid in sabbath-schools, in which children and youth may be trained up in the knowledge of the Lord." Our minds are so constituted, that, unless our powers of memory have been strengthened by constant or frequent use in youth, we cannot in after-life either receive or retain much benefit from oral instruction. And if this is true of the freeman, how much more is it true of the slave! Consequently, the only method of instructing the slaves, which law or custom or both do not forbid, is the very last, -the poorest method for their real good which can be devised!

There are colored preachers at the South, "and some of them," says Mr. Jones, "are able to read" (ib. p. 175).

When in Louis

"The preacher quoted Scripture

The following anecdote, illustrative of their capacity to impart knowledge, is told by Charles Lyell. ville, Ky. he attended a Methodist Church. was a full black, spoke good English, and well." "It appeared," says Prof. Lyell, "from his explanation of 'Whose superscription is this?' that he supposed the piece of money to be a dollar note, to which Cæsar had put his signature."

Some, probably most of them, are slaves. We have now before us the advertisement of a runaway slave who claimed to be a Methodist preacher! The Alabama Baptist Association bought one of its missionaries, named Cæsar, in 1828, and owned him till the time of his death! He lived to be

76 years old. A writer in the "Georgia Christian Index" begins an obituary notice of him thus, "A good colored man has fallen in Israel;" and ends by saying, "The writer can truly say that his labors have been much blest." Mr. Jones gives the names of several other slave preachers. ever, they are discountenanced.

Still, how

The "Revised Statutes" of NORTH CAROLINA (chap. 111, sec. 34; "Revision of Statute," 1831, chap. 4, sec. 1) provide that

"It shall not be lawful, under any pretence, for any slave or free person of color to preach or exhort in public, or in any manner to officiate as a preacher or teacher in any prayer-meeting or other association for worship where slaves of different families are collected together; and if any free person of color shall be thereof duly convicted, on indictment, before any court having jurisdiction thereof, he shall for each offence receive not exceeding thirty-nine lashes on his bare back; and when any slave shall be guilty of a violation of this section, he shall, on conviction before a single magistrate, receive not exceeding thirty-nine lashes on his bare back."

In ALABAMA (Stat. 1832, chap. 8, sec. 24; "Clay's Digest," 545, sec. 35), –

"If any slave or free person of color shall preach to, exhort, or harangue any slave or slaves or free persons of color, unless in the presence of five respectable (!) slaveholders, any such slave or

free person of color so offending shall, on conviction before any justice of the peace, receive, by order of said justice of the peace, thirty-nine lashes for the first offence, and fifty lashes for every offence thereafter; and any person may arrest any such slave or free person of color, and take him before a justice of the peace for trial, Provided that the negroes so haranguing or preaching shall be licensed thereto by some regular body of professing Christians immediately in the neighborhood, and to whose society or church such negro shall properly belong."

In GEORGIA, the Act approved Dec. 23, 1833, sec. 5 ("Prince's Digest," 808; "Hotchkiss's Codification,” 840, 841), provides that

66 No person of color, whether free or slave, shall be allowed to preach to, exhort, or join in any religious exercise with, any persons of color, either free or slave, there being more than seven persons of color present," &c.

In MISSISSIPPI, the law declares (How. and Hutch. 178) that

"It shall not be lawful for any slave, free negro or mulatto to exercise the functions of a minister of the gospel under the penalty of thirty-nine lashes, - Provided that it shall be lawful for any master or owner to permit his slave to preach upon his own premises, but not to permit any other slaves but his own to assemble there on such occasion."

In MISSOURI, the Act approved Feb. 16, 1847, sec. 2, provides that

"No meeting or assemblage of negroes or mulattoes for the purpose of religious worship or preaching shall be held or permitted, where the services are performed or conducted by negroes or mulattoes, unless some sheriff, constable, marshal, police officer, or justice of the peace shall be present during all the time of such meeting or assemblage, in order to prevent all seditious speeches and disorderly and unlawful conduct of every kind."

66

Negro preachers are discouraged," says Mr. Jones ("Religious Instruction," p. 157), "if not suppressed, on the ground of incompetency, and liability to abuse their office and influence to the injury of the morals of the people, and the infringement of the laws and peace of the country. I

would not go all the lengths of many on this point; for, from my own observation, negro preachers may be employed and confided in, and so regulated as to do their own color great good, and community no harm." Ib. p. 274: "The appointment of colored preachers and watchmen by the white churches, and under their particular supervision, in many districts of country, has been attended with happy effects; and such auxiliaries, properly managed, may be of great advantage." Doubtless, when thus "properly managed," they are of great advantage! "I shall never forget," says Mr. Jones (ib. p. 215), "the remark of a venerable colored preacher, made with reference to the Southampton tragedy" (i.e. Nat. Turner's insurrection in Southampton, Va. in 1832). "With his eyes filled with tears, and his whole manner indicating the deepest emotion, said he, 'Sir, it is the gospel that we, ignorant and wicked people, need. (!) If you will give us the gospel, it will do more for the obedience of servants and the peace of community than all your guards and guns and bayonets.' This same Christian minister, on receiving a packet of inflammatory pamphlets through the post-office, and discovering their character and intention, immediately called upon the mayor of the city, and delivered them into his hands. Who can estimate the value in community of one such man acting under the influence of the gospel of peace ?”

Not only are negro preachers thus discountenanced, unless they are the abject tools of the slaveholders, but only a certain class of white teachers are allowed. The following extract is taken from the "Georgia Christian Index: "—

"PREACHERS FOR THE SLAVES. We think the instruction of the blacks in the South should be committed wholly to white men; and they should be Southern men, in whom the masters have confidence. If the preacher is himself a slaveholder, as are Mr. Jones and Mr. Law, they will command the greater confidence, and have access to the larger number of plantations."

"The field of labor among the negroes in the South," says Mr. Jones ("Religious Instruction," p. 196), "is one,