Page:Sermons preached in the African Protestant Episcopal Church of St. Thomas', Philadelphia.djvu/250

246 his influence and pecuniary means towards supporting the various organized instrumentalities that had a tendency to elevate and improve the condition and character of his oppressed people. I doubt very much, whether there exists in the city of New York one single society having an immediate bearing on the general interests of our people, but what met with his countenance and support. He was not conspicuous in these matters. For no man, perhaps, was less given to display, or aimed less at popular applause than he. If he could hide himself from personal gaze, he seemed to be best pleased. His whole deportment seemed to say:—

A retiring modesty and unaffected diffidence formed a very prominent feature in his character. His hopes for an improvement in the character of our people were in the young and rising generation,