benefit, by becoming members of the church, than their dogs and bitches.  The usual answer he received, when exhorting their masters to do their duty in that respect, being, What! these black dogs be made christians! what! they be made like us! with abundance more of the same.  Nevertheless, he remarks that the Negroes were capable, not only of being taught to read and write, &c. but divers of them eminent in the management of business.  He declares them to have an equal right with us to the merits of Christ; of which if through neglect or avarice they are deprived, that judgment which was denounced against wicked Ahab, must befal us:  Our life shall go for theirs.  The loss of their souls will be required at our hands, to whom God hath given so blessed an opportunity of being instrumental to their salvation.”

[Footnote A:  “There is a principle which is pure, placed in the human mind, which in different places or ages hath had different names; it is, however, pure, and proceeds from God.—­It is deep and inward, confined to no forms of religion, nor excluded from any, where the heart stands in perfect sincerity.  In whomsoever this takes root and grows, of what nation soever, they become brethren in the best sense of the expression.  Using ourselves to take ways which appear most easy to us, when inconsistent with that purity which is without beginning, we thereby set up a government of our own, and deny obedience to Him whose service is true liberty.  He that has a servant, made so wrongfully, and knows it to be so, when he treats him otherwise than a free man, when he reaps the benefit of his labour, without paying him such wages as are reasonably due to free men for the like service; these things, though done in calmness, without any shew of disorder, do yet deprave the mind, in like manner, and with as great certainty, as prevailing cold congeals water.  These steps taken by masters, and their conduct striking the minds of their children, whilst young, leave less room for that which is good to work upon them.  The customs of their parents, their neighbours, and the people with whom they converse, working upon their minds, and they from thence conceiving wrong ideas of things, and modes of conduct, the entrance into their hearts becomes in a great measure shut up against the gentle movings of uncreated purity.

“From one age to another the gloom grows thicker and darker, till error gets established by general opinion; but whoever attends to perfect goodness, and remains under the melting influence of it, finds a path unknown to many, and sees the necessity to lean upon the arm of divine strength, and dwell alone, or with a few in the right, committing their cause to him who is a refuge to his people.  Negroes are our fellow creatures, and their present condition among us requires our serious consideration.  We know not the time, when those scales, in which mountains are weighed, may turn.  The parent of mankind is gracious, his care is over his smallest