lars to the various benevolent societies of the day. The amount designated for these societies in his will was 13,200 dollars. But they were also made residuary legatees of property which he would have distributed while living, had it been practicable, without loss, to withdraw it from his business. "On his deathbed he said to a brother, 'Do good with your substance while living, and as you have opportunity; otherwise, when you come to die, you will be at a loss to know what distribution it is best to make of it. The trouble and care of such a distribution in a dying hour,' he thought, should be avoided by every Christian, by disposing of his property while in life and health, as the Lord should prosper him, and present to him opportunities of doing good.' "From the period above referred to, it became his established rule to use for benevolent distribution all the means which he could take from his business, and still prosecute it successfully and to the best advantage. He was usually secret with regard to donations of a private or personal nature. A memorandum which he kept three or four years before his death, 'lest he should think that he gave more than he did,' shows that his gifts were numerous and large-sufficiently so to prove that he adhered to his principle of holding all as consecrated to the Lord. A slip of paper, taken from his vest pocket after his death, mentions the amount of his contributions at the monthly prayer-meeting for missions among the heathen to have been thirty dollars, or 360 dollars a year. "In personal and domestic expenditure he studied Christian economy. While he denied himself no reasonable comfort, it was his habit to consider what things he might dispense with, that he might have the more to give for charitable purposes. Modest and unassuming in his natural character, he thought it not consistent with the simplicity of the Gospel for one professing godliness to follow the customs and fashions of the world. While others were enlarging their expenditures, he studied retrenchment in all things. "When he set out in the world, it was with the purpose to be rich. But grace opened his heart, and taught him that the only valuable use of money is to do good with it; a lesson which he emphatically exemplified in his practice, and which made him an instrument of good, the extent of which can never be known till it is revealed at the last day." teen he publicly professed his faith in Christ, devoting himself to the service of God in the sphere in which Providence had placed him, considering himself under the same obligation to employ his business talent for the glory of his Saviour that devolved on the minister of the Gospel to consecrate the talents intrusted to him for the same great end. At the age of twenty-three he drew up and subscribed the following remarkable document: "By the grace of God, I will never be worth more than 50,000 dollars. "By the grace of God, I will give one fourth of the nett profit of my business to charitable and religious uses. "If I am ever worth 20,000 dollars, I will give one half of my nett profits; and if I am ever worth 30,000 dollars, I will give three fourths; and the whole after 50,000. So help me God, or give to a more faithful steward and set me aside." "To this covenant," says his memoir, "he adhered with conscientious fidelity.. He distributed the profits of his business with an increasing ratio, from year to year, till he reached the point which he had fixed as a limit to his property, and then gave to the cause of God all the money which he earned. At one time, finding that his property had increased beyond 50,000 dollars, he at once devoted the surplus, 7500 dollars, as a foundation for a professorship in the Newton Theological Institution. 6 "On his deathbed he said to a friend, in allusion to the resolutions quoted above, By the grace of God-nothing else-by the grace of God, I have been enabled, under the influence of these resolutions, to give away more than 40,000 dollars. How good the Lord has been to me!'" Mr. Cobb-such is the testimony of those who, like myself, knew him well-was also an active, humble, and devoted Christian, seeking the prosperity of feeble churches; labouring to promote the benevolent institutions of the day; punctual in his attendance at prayer-meetings, and anxious to aid the inquiring sinner; watchful for the eternal interests of those under his charge; mild and amiable in his deportment; and, in the general tenour of his life and character, an example of consistent piety. His last sickness and death were peace-ful, yea, triumphant. "It is a glorious thing," said he, "to die. I have been active and busy in the world—I have enjoyed as much as any one-God has prospered Another instance is that of a cotempo-me-I have everything to bind me here-I rary of Mr. Smith, Mr. Nathaniel Ripley Cobb, at Boston, who died only seven months after him. Mr. Cobb was a merchant in that city, and a member of one of its Baptist churches. At the age of nine am happy in my family-I have property enough-but how small and mean does this world appear when we are on a sickbed! Nothing can equal my enjoyment in the near view of heaven. My hope in Christ is worth infinitely more than all other things. The blood of Christ-the blood of Christ-none but Christ! O how thankful I feel that God has provided a way that I, sinful as I am, may look forward with joy to another world, through his dear Son." But I know no instance of more systematic and long-continued benevolence, nor one that produced equal fruit from similar resources, than that of the late Mr. Solomon Goodell, of Vermont, who died when about seventy. Mr. Goodell was a farmer. The following notice of him, though long, will be read with interest. It is from a source worthy of all confidence. pairing the loss sustained by the Baptist missionaries at Serampore. He regretted that he had not been able to make the sum 500 dollars; consoled himself with the thought that he might do it still, at some period not very far distant; and said that, if any of the bank-notes proved less valuable than specie, he would make up the deficiency. 66 Mr. Goodell had made what he thought suitable provision for his children as he passed through life. After consulting his wife, he left her such portion of his estates as was satisfactory to her, gave several small legacies, and made the Board his residuary_legatee. He supposed that the property left to the Board by will would not be less than 1000 dollars; but, as some part of it was, and still is unsaleable, the exact amount cannot be stated.* "On visiting Mr. Goodell at his house, you would find no gentleman with an independent fortune, but a plain man in moderate circumstances, on one of the rudest spots in the neighbourhood of the Green Mountains, every dollar of whose property was either gained by severe personal labour, or saved by strict frugality, or re "About the year 1809, the writer of these lines observed a donation of 100 dollars to the Connecticut Missionary Society, published in the annual accounts as from Mr. Goodell. Such donations were, at that time, very uncommon in this country, and with regard to that society, nearly or quite unprecedented. The thought occurred, that doubtless some gentleman of independent fortune had thought proper to take up his residence in the interior of Vermont, and that he considered the society just named a good channel for his pious benefi-ceived as interest on small sums lent to his cence. This conclusion was strengthened by seeing a similar donation from the same source at the return of each successive year for a considerable period. neighbours. His house was comfortable, but, with the farm on which it stood, was worth only between 700 and 1000 dollars. His income was derived principally from a dairy. "When the American Board of Foreign Missions began its operations, Mr. Goodell "Besides the donations above mentiondid not wait for an agent to visit him, but ed, Mr. Goodell made many smaller ones sent a message (or came himself) more to missionary societies formed to send the than fifty miles, to a member of the Board, Gospel to new settlements. He paid fifty saying that he wished to subscribe 500 dol-dollars or more, at one time, to a missionlars for immediate use, and a thousand for the permanent fund. He sent $50 as earnest-money, and said he would forward the remaining $450 as soon as he could raise that sum; and would pay the interest annually upon the 1000 dollars until the principal should be paid. This engagement he punctually complied with, paying the interest, and just before his death transferring notes and bonds secured by mortgages, which (including the thousand dollars above mentioned) amounted to 1708 dollars, 37 cts.; that is, a new donation was made of 708 dollars, 37 cts., to which was afterward added another bond and mortgage of 350 dollars. ary whom he employed to preach in the destitute towns near him. He aided in the education of pious young men for the ministry, by furnishing them with money for their necessary expenses. He discov-ered no ostentation, so far as we have been able to learn, in his religious charities. Certain it is that he always appeared to consider himself as the obliged party, and as obtaining a favour from societies which he made the almoners of his bounty. Farthest of all was he from supposing that his charitable exertions could make any atonement for sin, or authorize any claims upon the divine mercy. He held to the most entire self-renunciation, and to dependance upon Christ alone." Before this last transaction, he had made repeated intermediate donations. At A very lovely example of benevolence one time he brought to the Rev. Dr. Ly-is to be found in one of our large cities. man, of Hatfield (the member of the Board It is the case of a comparatively young above referred to), the sum of 465 dollars. man, who was born of parents belonging After the money was counted, Dr. Lyman said to him, 'I presume, sir, you wish this sum endorsed upon your note of 1000 dollars.' 'Oh, no,' was his reply; 'I believe that note is good yet. This is a separate matter.' He then expressed his wish that the money might be remitted towards re to the Episcopal Church, and was taught the Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' Creed by his pious mother; he was instructed in in aid of missions to the heathen, we find that, from * In the summary view of Mr. Goodell's donations the 12th of February, 1812, to the 19th of November, 1816, they amounted to 3885 dollars, 16 cts. a Presbyterian Sunday-school, learned his occupation (that of an apothecary) with a Baptist, and was brought to a saving knowledge of Christ under the preaching of the Methodists. After having gained enough to furnish a comfortable competency to those of his family who are dependant upon him, he now gives all his nett profits to the promotion of the cause of his Lord and Master. Nor does he confine his charities to any one channel, or to any one denomination of Christians. On the contrary, his delight is to aid every good work, no matter by whom it may be prosecuted. It is astonishing to learn what this devoted and excellent young man has been able to do during the period of ten years. One of the most remarkable instances of benevolence I have known was that of a coloured woman, who gave sixty dollars on one occasion to educate pious but poor young men for the ministry. She supported herself by her labour as a servant. When she offered the above sum, the agent refused to receive it all until pressed by the humble donor, who said that she had reserved five dollars; that she had no one dependant on her, and that she hoped to earn enough to provide for her wants in her last sickness, and for her funeral: nor in this was she disappointed. She often gave large sums, for one in her circumstances, and rejoiced to have it in her power to do anything for Christ and his cause. Would that I could say that such benevolence is universal among the Christians of the United States. Alas! all that is done by too many of our merchants and others, who profess to love Him who died to save the world, is in reality nothing in comparison with the means which they have, or have had. Too many have indulged in a luxurious and expensive style of living, while they knew that men were dying in their sins, and ignorant of the Gospel. It is for this sin, with others, that God has caused so many of our rich Christians to lose their riches in the commercial and financial distress with which the country has been visited during the last few years. Nevertheless, it is certainly true that the spirit of benevolence is extending itself more and more among the Christian portion of the community. May God hasten the day when Christian men, in all spheres, will deliberately act on the principle of glorifying God in their business, and live for the promotion of His cause, labouring as diligently to make money for this high purpose as they now do for their own gratification. Such a day must come, or I see not how the world is ever to be converted to Christ. XI. MISCONCEPTION AND MISREPRESENTATIONS ABROAD.-To notice all the misconceptions and misrepresentations which are prevalent in some, if not in all portions of Europe, respecting the religious and moral condition of America, is wholly impossible in a work like this; we must, therefore, confine our attention to but a few of them. 1. One of the most common objections against the religious institutions of this country is, that they have not prevented the bankruptcies and other species of dishonesty which have here occurred, especially of late years. But is it reasonable to make the religious institutions of a country responsible for the occurrence of such things? Must the churches in America be blamed for the unwise legislation of the country, as well general as local, which has been the primary cause of the overtrading and inordinate speculation which prevailed a few years ago, and which was so disastrous in its reaction? Must they be accountable for the avidity with which the foreign merchant, manufacturer, and money-lender encouraged the adventurous American merchant and trader to purchase their goods on credit, and invest their money in American stocks, often with little or no effort to make a proper discrimination between them? Must they be expected not only to prevent our own people, whether in an individual or a corporate capacity, from committing acts of rascality, but also to exert a similar influence upon the foreign adventurers who come among us from all parts of the Old World (and their number is not small), the real object of many of whom is to swindle the American creditor out of all they can, and then escape to Europe? Take our merchants who are engaged in foreign commerce in the mass, and I hesitate not to say that, as a body, they have acted with as much good faith as any men in similar circumstances have ever done, during the last seven or eight years of commercial and financial difficulty through which the country has passed. Many of them ruined themselves in endeavouring to meet their engagements abroad, by paying an exorbitant interest on the loans which they made for that purpose. I speak here of them as a body; that there have been instances of dishonesty among them will not be denied, nor will any one be astonished at it. Our General Government has not failed to meet its engagements, nor is it likely to do so. And as to our twenty-nine states and territories, more than one third of them have no debts whatever; more than another third have not failed for a single day to meet their engagements; and of the others who have for a time failed to do so, only one has avowed and acted upon the doctrine of "repudiation," and that in the case of a loan which the Legislature of that state believed to have been fraudulently contracted. But this doctrine of repudiation is itself repudiated | bear the stigma of making loud professions with scorn in all other parts of the Union, and solemn promises to swindle honest and and will be so in the state in which it had unsuspecting creditors. Our debts to the its origin. Some of our states are not at last cent must be paid, whatever struggles present able to meet the engagements the effort may cost. On this point there which they made a few years ago in the must be no shuffling or evasion, but an honenormous loans which they contracted at est acknowledgment of our responsibilihome and abroad, in order to accomplish ties, and a steady and honest aim to meet the extensive lines of canals and railroads them. With this disposition prevalent, and which they undertook during the years of proved by corresponding action, the voice unbounded, and, I must say, unnatural pros- of vituperation and abuse will be hushed, perity which the country enjoyed. But and our enemies abroad and at home will they will ultimately, I doubt not, fulfil all confess that they have been too hasty and these engagements faithfully. They feel rash in their opinions of our national integunable to do so now, but they have not rity." repudiated. On this subject, the following extract from a sermon preached in the city of Philadelphia,* on a public occasion, expresses the opinions and feelings of every Christian minister in the land. We are willing that religion should be held accountable for a great deal; but we are not willing that the church in America should be blamed for not preventing what the churches in no other countries have been able to prevent. The members propevangelical, do not exceed a fifth part of our population; and though the influence which they exert is unquestionably as salutary as that of any other body of equal number in the world, yet it is obvious they cannot control circumstances such as I have alluded to. Would the churches in Great Britain, France, Holland, Germany, or any other country, like to be held responsible for all the acts of legislation, domestic and foreign, of their respective countries, and all the villanies which have been and are annually perpetrated in them? I think not; nor should they apply to their brethren in America a rule by which they would not like to be measured themselves.* "The doctrine of repudiation, upon which the changes have been rung throughout Eu-er of all our churches, evangelical and unrope to our great discredit, has, I am happy to believe, but few advocates in our Commonwealth. There is a vast difference in point of honour and morality in admitting the justice of a claim, but inability to meet it, and denying that any such claim | exists. Men, whose honesty is above suspicion, sometimes become involved and are utterly unable to meet their engagements. It may be so with a community, a state, or a nation. It is deeply to be lamented that such an exigency should ever occur. The effect is eminently disastrous in impairing public confidence, and weakening the ties which should bind men together as a great common brotherhood. But poverty is not necessarily a crime in a government any more than it is in an individual. Public engagements may not be met at the time, and yet the public faith may eventually be preserved inviolate. I have nothing to say in defence of those who advocate the doctrine of repudiation in any form or under any circumstances. They deserve all the obloquy and reproach which is heaped upon them. It is nothing better than public swindling, where the means of redress are placed beyond the reach of those who are wronged. It matters not a particle that the money borrowed has been misapplied, or squandered in projects which yield no profit. This is our misfortune, or, it may be, our fault. But it does not make void a solemn com pact, in which the public faith has been * By the Rev. Mr. Rood. 2. The Political disturbances which occur in America are not unfrequently spoken of in Europe in a way that conveys a reflection upon the churches of this land, as if they ought to prevent these things. That these disturbances do take place, no one will deny. There is not a good man in the United States who has not lamented what are called the “ Abolition Riots," and other disgraceful scenes which have occurred within the last few years. These disturbances, however, have been greatly exaggerated as to their frequency and their extent, in the reports which reach Europe. Our newsmongers, in their ea * A good deal has been said in Europe, by men who have travelled in America, respecting the impositions which they have suffered in this country. There is no Christian man in the United States who is not distressed when he hears of such things. But their religious institutions for such occurrences? is it just to blame the whole people of the land and The author of this book has travelled much in almost every country in Europe, and he can affirm, with truth, that he has suffered impositions, and some of them very gross, in them all; but he would deem himself utterly destitute of common sense, as well as of that charity which his religion requires, if he were to judge the people of any of those countries by such instances. gerness to concoct a piquant article of news for those for whom they cater, often give the most astounding exaggerations of what was a dispute or open quarrel between some firemen, or between the blacks and whites in the suburbs of our cities, or the interruption which some lecturer on slavery has encountered in some of our villages. These representations go abroad, are circulated there, and lead many people to think that our whole country is in a continual state of disorder. But every American knows how to appreciate these reports, and is no way concerned about them, except to regret their occurrence. Indeed, neither their frequency nor their nature is such as to give him any serious apprehensions. For these things are local, unfrequent, and wholly insignificant in comparison with the bruit which our newspapers make about them. And they no more affect the peace of the country than the passing cloud ruffles the bosom of our beautiful lakes. Within the last seven or eight years there have been some disgraceful instances of summary punishment, without the intervention of a proper trial before the courts of law, of some gamblers, swindlers, and negroes (who had committed shocking crimes) in some of our Southwestern States and Territories. But these instances have hardly exceeded in number that of the ten years in which they have occurred. They took place, too, in a part of the country which is new, and very thinly settled; where religious institutions have scarcely taken root, and where the forms in which the administration of justice is carried on have hardly begun to exist. However much every well-informed, good man in America must lament these things, he cannot but be less astonished at their occurrence than at the infrequency of them.† No man can look at the great extent of even the settled portion of the United States, the long line of A great deal has been said in Europe about the prejudice which exists in America against the coloured people, and the difficulty of the two races living together. But it is a singular and indisputable fact, that almost all the disturbances (which, after all, do not amount to much) that occur between the blacks and whites in the suburbs of Philadelphia, New-York, and other cities, take place between the former and the Germans and Irish which live in those districts. † When we speak of the instances of disorders which sometimes occur in the Southwestern and Western districts of the country, it is worth while to notice the remarkable instances of the triumph of order which are also sometimes witnessed in them, amid very peculiar circumstances. A few years ago, a man committed murder at the lead mines of Dubuque, in what is now Iowa Territory, before there was any sort of political government established there. The people assembled of their own accord, arrested the murderer, chose judges, constituted a court, and gave him a fair trial before a jury. He was condemned after such a trial, and peaceably executed! seacoast which bounds the country on the east and south, of wilderness frontier on the west, the mountain ranges in the centre, and the forests which abound almost everywhere, which furnish innumerable facilities for the commission of crime and escape from punishment, without being surprised that we have had so few disturb ances of a serious character, especially when we have had the element of slavery, with all its concomitant evils, to augment the difficulty of our position. It would require the army of the Czar of all the Russias to keep up a strong armed police, which some upbraid us for not having, and which would be necessary, if it were not that the moral influence which pervades the country—and which owes it existence to our religious institutions-furnishes a substitute which is infinitely better. We have had three attempts, one in Pennsylvania, one in South Carolina, and one in Rhode Island, not to overthrow the political institutions of the country, but to obtain redress of grievances, real or imaginary, in an extra-constitutional way; and yet all three were suppressed without the loss of one life taken away either in battle or by the administration of law. To what was this owing? To the patience, the conciliation, and the due use of argument which the Christianity of the country could alone inspire and teach.* Â few other facts may be stated to show the happy influence which Christianity exerts in the United States in securing the maintenance of order in a nation of eighteen and a half millions. Notwithstanding the unbounded facilities for highway robberies in almost all sections of the country, who has ever heard of the existence of hordes of banditti either in our mountains or our forests? And how few highway robberies and murders, comparatively, have ever taken place in this country! In many of the Western States, a solitary man, or even a boy, may be seen carrying the mail on horseback through unbroken forests, from town to * That the political institutions of the United States rest upon a pretty sure basis, and are deeply planted in the affections of the people, is most cer tain, whatever inferences foreigners may sometimes make from the language uttered in moments of irritation and despondency by the organs of our political parties in the hour of defeat or disappointment. In proof of this, the fact night be cited that two newspapers have been published for several years in the city of New-York, one in French and the other in English, which ably advocate the principles of monarchy as it exists in France and England, and incessantly attack and vilify the political institutions and the measures of the country which furnishes them hospitality and protection. And what is the effect? These, perhaps, are read by the foreigners among us-for whom they are in fact publishedand by some of our own people. But no American has the slightest regard for what they say, nor does the government for a moment trouble itself about them. |