We have seen the tree—dwarfed and yellow-leafed—in the sterile rockbound soil of the mountain peak, and we have felt that its life was a mere existence, a mere hair's-breadth remove from death. The fearful regime of slavery had reduced the mental life of the Negro to the point where its activity was a simple, natural struggle for existence. By the terms mental life are designated especially the knowing faculties and voluntary powers, as well as that part of the emotional nature that has to do with character-making. I mean to say that in his intellect, will, and moral sense, the Negro was, by slavery, reduced to the minimum. It could not be otherwise for these reasons: (a) It was unlawful for him to know books; he must know nothing save what his master told him, and must never ask for a reason. (b) He was not allowed to have any will of his own except in minor points, with reference to a brute or a fellow slave. His master's will was substituted for his, and out of his master's choice his words and deeds must proceed, even as concerned the most sacred relations of life. At his master's choice he took the wife, and at his choice he gave up the wife. (c) He was not allowed to

(a) Not long since a white merchant of this state remarked to me: “No people have ever improved so much in so short a time as your people have.” I replied: “I think no people ever had a more faithful, self-sacrificing leadership.” I think it may be said of us that we have done what we could. The work began when we owned neither land for home nor land for church house—when there was no church, no association, no mission board to offer any pay for labor. I speak of course of the rule. True, there were a few colored churches in “slavery time,” three missionary and one primitive; but what were three churches in the midst of such a vast population, scattered over so much territory? What could they do in their poverty and want of training to support 400 or 500 pioneer organizers? We went to the battle at our own charges. With homeless mothers and fathers, with homeless wives and children, and with oppression on every side—with all these burdens and much more which cannot be told upon us—we bravely undertook the work of building the walls of Zion. The writer knows a minister who, (between 1866 and 1875, especially between '66-'77, during the reign of the “K. K. Klan,” when the people could not in many places be induced to open their doors after dark for fear of being shot), has endured some of the severest privations and performed some of the hardest toils known to the ministry, at his own charges. This case is only one in hundreds. Our ministry, whatever the faults and imperfections which have attended them, have wrought nobly and wrought to good results.

The following will serve to show why the writer is inclined to believe these early pioneers were often especially favored of God in controlling the people for good: On one occasion two preachers met for the first time. The younger man spoke, and the elder was one of the hearers. The sermon was ended. The two preachers, approaching each other and grasping hands, spoke to each other thus: The younger man: “I feel the Lord wants me to preach, but I am not able to preach.” The elder man: “God has called you to preach the gospel, but you are not now in the spirit of the ministry, You are proud and 'pend too much upon yourself. You get self out so God can fill you up with his spirit. Go and pray to God for the spirit of the gospel ministry.” This advice was heeded and the end revealed the correctness of the elder man's views. Another case:

A young man of some attainment in letters, who taught school under the “Freedmen's Bureau,” being anxious to rid himself of a sense of duty to preach the gospel, decided to go off to another state where his church connections were unknown. He did so. After he had quit the train and put down his baggage at the home of a family who had consented to entertain him, and as evening drew on, he was requested by his hostess to attend the preaching which was to come off at a neighbor's house that evening (there was no church house). The young man went. A pen picture of the preacher is given after this fashion: Lean, brown skin man, whose shirt showed much of his breast; whose feet were sockless and in shoes which left the toes uncovered; whose stiff locks held a comb. He told us of a wicked city that was laying beneath the pending judgments of God.

It needed a message of warning—only this, and it would face about and clothe itself in humble penitence. God had the message, and He imparted it to the messenger and ordered him to go. Here the preacher drew a picture of Jonah: He is shrinking from his glorious charge—has his back toward Nineveh, and is fleeing in an opposite direction; is boarding a ship that he may go to regions over the sea; is going down into the hold of the ship; is fast asleep. Here the storm and the raging deep receive notice: A cloud rises and quickly covers the skies; winds attend it with a fury hitherto unknown to the shipmen, who seem at once to discern in the storm the tokens of judgment; the sea is wild; the sailors, as a last resort, awake Jonah and cast lots; the lot falls upon Jonah, and he is cast into the maddened sea, where a sea monster swallows him. At this point, changing his voice more into the imperative tone, the preacher said: “I 'spect there is a Jonah here to-night, and I warn him to take the message of his God and carry it to poor, lost sinners who do not know their right hands from their left; I warn him to go before he shall be in the belly of hell.” The reader is left to imagine how this affected the young school teacher who was fleeing from his duty. In some parts of Limestone county the people use an improvised lamp, the oil vessel of which is a snuff bottle. This is a rough vessel, but it holds the oil which feeds the flame. This reminds us of Mr. Spurgeon's beer-bottle candlestick. Well, I want to say that God used these men, whatever were their imperfections—they had power. But we have had help from without.

(a) Our white neighbors—some of them, at least—have aided us. They have helped us build our church houses and, in some cases, contributed to our schools. They have taught in our Sunday schools, preached in our pulpits, helped us in the work of organizing associations, etc. They have taught ministers' classes and held ministers' institutes among us. The writer once held the position of teacher of institutes under the appointment and support of the white Baptist Convention of Alabama, and Dr. McAlpine now serves under the appointment of the Southern Board. Several of our best men were enabled to attend the Home Mission schools on money given by their white brethren.

(b) We have been improved by our public schools. It is a strange providence which, in our public school system, now returns upon the black man something of the interest due him in consideration of unrewarded labors. These schools have given us some choice men and women, who are strong in the work of the church. However, it is in place to say that we have not derived from our public school system all the good which it is capable of bestowing, first, because poor teachers have far too often been put upon the people. But, on the other hand, there has been loss because we have not properly appreciated our needs and opportunities, as considered from an educational point of view. The sessions of the public schools could be supplemented and extended in most cases so as to cover six or eight months of each year.

(c) The Publication Society has rendered substantial aid in the gift of books to our ministers and Sunday Schools as well as by the personal touch and teaching of their Sunday School Missionaries.

(d) The Missionary Societies of the Baptist women of Chicago and Boston have done a great work among us. Their good missionaries, such as Misses Moore, Knapp, Voss and others whose names will ever be precious to our people, have given themselves to work among our women and girls. They have breathed into our home life their beautiful piety, and

Thirty years we have been beneath the opportunities and duties of free manhood, which is to say that for thirty years we have been associated with the family institution as husband, as wife, as parent, as sister, as brother, as son, and as daughter. Three decades with the family, developing affection and making patience.

Thirty years of business life has passed upon us, which is to say that we have for this length of time been associated with those facts which grow out of our physical wants, such as labor, system, economy, competition, skill, etc.

We have had thirty years over our own consciences, over our own wills, over our own church affairs. We have had thirty years with books and schools. We have had thirty years under the duties of citizenship. What have we attained to in this time? Have these years given us any fruits? Are we where we were in 1865? Let us see.

(a) CHURCH PROPERTY.—At the close of the war we owned (?) two frame buildings in Mobile and owned (?) the brick basement of the building now occupied by our white brethren in Selma, worth—all told—about $8,000. We now own nine brick buildings, worth not less than $100,000 above their indebtedness. And we cannot make an estimate of the church property whereon are frame structures. The property of this sort in the city of Birmingham and vicinity is worth $15,000, in Montgomery $26,000, in Mobile $12,000, in Talladega $10,000, in Greensboro $3,000, in Eufaula $6,000, in Tuskegee $2,500, in Opelika $2,500, in Eutaw $2,000, in Demopolis

(b) SCHOOL PROPERTY.—Our school at Selma is now worth about $30,000. It was bought in 1878 for $3,000, and has been in constant operation ever since, though at one time a debt of about $8,000 threatened its life. We owe a debt of a little over $3,000 at this time. The Howard College, the leading school of our white brethren, owes it is said a debt of about $33,000, and lately the report has come to the writer that the management had thought of assigning, because they could not see how they could raise money enough to meet the interest. I mention this only to show that our struggles are similar to the struggles of other good people, and that we have abundant cause for rejoicing and hope.

Well, we have in Selma University an educational foundation. The Marion Academy, worth about $2,000, begins academies.

(c) EDUCATED MEN AND WOMEN.—Over one hundred young people have received diplomas from Selma University. Graduates have come to Alabama from other States. Baptists have graduated from other schools in this State—schools like Talladega and Tuskegee, the school at Huntsville, and the school at Montgomery. This statement of facts is calculated to turn our minds toward a possibility and prophecy of the near approach—even on the part of the masses—of that state of mind which lives and moves in the higher pleasures and to the more sacred ends of life.

(d) HOMES.—The wandering life which characterized the masses of the people in 1865, is fast giving place to settled home life. We have invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in town lots and farm lands, where we are quietly and contentedly rearing our loved ones, studying the good of our community, and arranging for the prosperity of the house of God. In other words, we are fixtures in the country and fixtures in the cities and towns. We have attained to affairs—to the possession of money and other forms of material value—so that we have power in the world of exchange. Prof. B. T. Washington is a wonder among men as the builder and manager of the greatest school in Alabama, and his friend, Mr. Logan, proves that the colored men can manage great money schemes, while Mr. B. H. Hudson and others, of Birmingham, establish the Negro as a banker.

(e) ORGANIZATIONS.—We are now together—acquainted, organized. In the beginning of 1865, the minister in one part of the State did not know the minister in the other part. There was no union, no plan of agreement. Now there are about 800 churches, all organized into associations. Each church may be reached and affected through its association, with regard to any line of work. We have created a strong sentiment in favor of education and a strong sentiment against intemperance, so that the masses of the people may be easily led in right directions. The day of pioneering lies behind us, and most of the pioneers are gone to their long home. We are now at the point for action on new lines. As individual Christians we need to turn our attention more directly upon the one aim of human life, namely, God-like character building in ourselves and in them with whom we have to do. As churches, we need to see to it not only that we win souls, but that we train them in Christian work also. All other points being equal, the trained soldier is the man to trust with the battle. The Sunday school work and the young people's unions are very available as training institutions. May God put it into the hearts of the leaders of this new day and new chapter in our history to see to it that these organizations shall serve the ends for which they are so well suited. May their hearts wholly enter into the possibilities and purposes of every sacred organization!

I take courage, and there arises in my mind glorious prospects coming down the future, as I see the faith and push of our Sunday school and our women's conventions. If our present Sunday school leaders should succeed in wrapping their mantles about men who will be as faithful under the midday light as they have been in the dawning, the future must find an ever broadening compass of Bible influence, and an ever-increasing beauty in our words and lives.

The Women's State Convention organized in 1886, marks a new era in the history of our denomination. The present brick building on our school grounds owes its existence chiefly to this organization. They came into the field in a dark time, and at a time when the wheels of the school dragged heavily. The circumstances which sent Miss S. A. Stone before the people of the State seemed a providence. The time, the conditions, needed the heart of a woman to control them. And the Women's Convention conquered the hardness of heart and the division of opinion, prevailing among the people, by sending Miss Stone among them. Most grandly did she conquer. Well, what is the lesson here? It is this: let the women still be encouraged, let them continue to operate. We need all our forces in line.

Too much praise cannot be bestowed upon Mesdames G. J. Brooks, R. T. Pollard, C. J. Hardy, A. A. Bowie, W. R. Pettiford. A. J. Gray, M. Tyler, S. H. Wright, E. W. Armstead, J. A. Craig and the other noble women associated with them, for the services they have rendered the state in the support they have given their Convention. The times demand that this work shall still be faithfully continued. I am glad that we are up in our ideas of woman, and the fact that we are argues progress on our part.

It is a praiseworthy fact that we colored Baptists occupy advanced ground with regard to the questions which involve the powers and rights of women. I remember that upon one occasion just after the close of the war, my mother returned from church rather disgusted because a woman had been called upon to lead in public prayer. Now, too, the singing, the reading and the praying in our congregations, are assuming forms suited to our advanced or advancing state of mind. The song is suited to the text and fewer stanzas are sung. The music is not so slow and is rendered with more harmony and life. In the sermon, the preacher aims to give his audience thoughts rather than feelings, and longs to make his hearers wiser rather than happier. He who reads the Bible to others, whether he reads in family or church, reads by paragraphs—taking in a single thought or fact at the time—in place of the old custom of reading a whole chapter in connection with which no one idea was raised into prominence. In short our gospel reformers seem now to realize that saving faith in the truth is that exercise of soul regarding truth that satisfies the intellect, impresses the sensibilities and bows the will beneath the gospel forms and gospel spirit. Of course this is not true of all our teachers, but it is true of many of them; and the tendency upon the part of the whole people is in this direction. Individual human essence leavened with the Divine essence, is the goal in the eye of the representative leader of our people. Largely we have attained to the confidence of our white brethren. In the union conference of the white and the colored ministers of Birmingham, recently held, I plainly saw that the white Baptist ministers were more at ease with the colored brethren than the white ministers of other denominations, except perhaps, the Presbyterian brethren. And I think they were not so much disturbed about the social question. I call attention to this fact in order to say that their joint work with us has enabled them to see our good qualities and concede to us the claims which belong to intellectual and moral culture. And as our Christian culture shall widen its radius and deepen its impressions upon all who may be touched by us, the prejudice and barriers incident to our color must retire behind the curtains of the past.

I delight to record that we are attaining to humility as a Christian grace. This is the crowning grace. Some years ago the writer called at the home of Dr. J. M. Pendleton, in Upland, Pa. The doctor was upstairs. A servant answered the door bell, and the visitor was conducted to the parlor to await the famous man's entrance. As the visitor was in every way a very little man, and as he thought of Dr. P. as being in every way a very large person, he feared the sound of every footstep. He expected to be over-awed by the majesty and dignity of the great man. As the door knob turned he was almost annihilated. But how different the