again disturb the subject, possibly to settle it wrong? I have had enough of declarations and manifestations of special interest in, and love for, the souls of "the freedmen," under existing circumstances. When I see them almost universally banded to make themselves the eager tools of the remorseless enemies of my country, to assail my vital rights, and to threaten the very existence of civil society and the church, at once; I must beg leave to think the time rather mal appropos for demanding of me an expression of particular affection. If I gave it, I should not expect any one to credit it. Were you traveling in Mexico, assailed by bandits, wounded, dragged from your carriage, bound to a tree, and looking with a bleeding pate upon the rifling of your baggage, if you were called on to state, then and there, how exceedingly you desired the spiritual good of the yellow-skinned barbarians who were persecuting you, it is to be presumed that you would beg to be excused, under the circumstances. So I, for one, make no professions of special love for those who are, even now, attempting against me and mine the most loathsome outrages. If I can only practice the duty of forbearance successfully, and say, "Father, forgive them; they know not what they do," I shall thank God for his assistance in the hour of cruel provocation.
I oppose this overture, second, because it is both incorrect and ambiguous. It begins—"Whereas the Memphis Assembly has been erroneously construed," &c. Mr. Moderator, the malignant slanderers of that Assembly do not misunderstand it. They know well enough what the Assembly meant. Their accusations are prompted by no zeal for truth or good, but solely by a spiteful pleasure in goading us by the obtrusion of a distasteful and difficult subject. Tell me not that there is any true regard for the negro's good in these people, when I have before me the proof of their cruel indifference to both the bodies and souls of their own free blacks, and their recent perpetration upon the Southern negroes, of the most enormous crime of the century, at the bidding of factious zeal. I, for one, will not so degrade myself as to truckle to this spiteful hypocrisy, by explanations and uncandid retractions. The meaning of the Memphis Assembly is plain; and it is, in the main, correct. They say that while the blessings of redemption are free to all, of every race or caste, the privileges of church office may be properly withheld from some, at the dictate of a sound discretion. This is Scriptural truth. The Memphis Assembly was right in principle, (although wrong in details) and is not misunderstood.
This overture demands that the Assembly shall declare that "ordination shall be given to all those called of God to, and qualified for the work, without respect of persons." Now, sir, there is a sense in which every one in this house will assent to this as a general proposition. But in which meaning is it to be taken? Does it imply that we may properly decide that the evidence of God's call and qualification is fatally defective, where an insuperable difference of race, made by God and not by man, and of character, and social condition, makes it plainly impossible for a black man to teach and rule white Christians to edification? If so, I adopt it. Or does it mean, that it is right to ordain a black man possessed of the piety, integrity and learning required by our standards, (if we have any such,) to preach to black
