Page:The religious instruction of the colored population.djvu/10

 We never can have galleries enough for them; and we never could gather them all into galleries, if we had them; and, unless a great change, in various particulars, shall take place in the feelings of both our white preachers and white congregations, we never can expect the ordinary and settled ministry of this city to satisfy and to supply both classes of their hearers. We must, therefore, collect these people, so far as they are yet unprovided tor, into chuiches built for themselves; amd we must devote certain men exclusively to their thorough religions training and discipline. I would have you, Christian brethren, to cast your eye over this gallery, when your pastor is eloquently discoursing in your ears the sweet music of the gospel. I would have you cast your eyes, if possible, over this gallery, and see whether it is music to the comprehension, the taste, the satisfaction, the edification, the profit, of his less educated hearers. But, no!, this is sayng far too little! I would not have you look to this gallery, where we must expect to find some intelligence as well as piety; but I would have you cast your eye over the mass of our colored population, in their ignorance and their destitution. I would have you consider whether you can ever hope to have the gospel preached to those poor wanderers by gathering them into churches like this, or under a ministry like thai which you enjoy. I would have you converse with all your servants—both those who attend here and those who go elsewhere—respecting the sermons heard by them, to see how well they understand. Yes! I would have you examine all your servants, those humble members of your family circle, and see what they can intelligently tell you of the doctrines of the gospel, or of the facts of its history. And here do not point me to those few remarkable cases which certainly do exist, wherein, notwithstanding every disadvantage of circumstances, even their intellect has worked itself out into the light of truth, as though a block of marble should chisel itself into a statue; but, ponder seriously and solemnly the moral and religious condition of the great mass of this population. Reflect, I beseech you, how few of them come within actual reach of the truth, and yet how many temptations are clustering thick around their path in this crowded city. Take your evening walk over the suburbs, and see what dens of iniquity those are at almost every corner of the streets. A minister of the gospel, now an this city, who makes it his constant practice to visit those shop-keepers, told me, that, when he calls ou some of them.