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any idea of preference, where all, be the numbers small or great, are entitled to your approbation and affectionate regard, it is proposed in your annual reports to enumerate the societies and schools in alphabetical order.

[Here follows an alphabetical list of forty-eight places, where schools are established in connexion with this Union; we insert only a few of the largest, viz. In Aberdeen there are 22 Schools, 33 teachers, 992 children: the annual expense of this establishment amounts to 131 pence sterling for each scholar (about a quarter of a Dollar.)

In Edinburgh there are 72 schools, and 4880 scholars: the annual expense averages 17 pence for each child (about 31 cents.) In Glasgow there are 75 schools and 5742 scholars.]

It appears from the reports transmitted, that great as the aggregate already mentioned really is, it falls far short of that vast array which would be poured forth before you, were the whole Sabbath Schools in the kingdom to be brought into view.

Your committee hope that each year's report will introduce to your acquaintance, and to your special care, increased, and still increasing numbers, till the mental eye be fully satisfied with the interesting spectacle of the universal diffusion of religious instruction amongst the young by the assistance of Sabbath Schools, till there shall scarcely be a spot in the habitable parts of the land, where an attentive listener on the Sabbath eve máy not hear the solemn silence broken by the melody of youthful praise.

In almost all these schools, the sole object to which the exertions of the teachers are directed is the instruction of youth in religious knowledge. There are, however, a very few exceptions' where the children are taught reading and spelling on one part of the day, and their catechisin on the other. From the vast advantage always derived from simplifying the object of pursuit, your committee take this method of recommending the adoption universally of the rule, that religious instruction alone should be communicated in the Sabbath School. In England and Ireland, and in some parts of the Highlands of Scotland, where the system of education, though much improved, is still deficient, it may be necessary to allot a part of the Sabbath to the teaching of reading; but in the more highly favoured portions of the land, where daily schools are attainable by almost all the population, it appears to your committee expedient, that the whole force which can be brought into action in Sabbath Schools, ought to be brought to bear directly on the grand point-the salvation of sinners by the Lord Jesus Christ, as he is offered in the Gospel.

In aid of the teachers' exertions, the occasional visitation of schools by the magistracy, the clergy, and others of weight and influence in the country, has been found a useful stimulus; and your. committee take the opportunity of making this report to you, to repeat their hope that this stimulus, wherever. opportunity offers, will not be wanting.

Your committee have still to report the progress made in circu

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lating religious tracts by means of the schools, and in publishing tracts with a view to that circulation.

It appears from the accounts kept at your depository, that there have been sold within the year, 16,076 tracts and small books to the value of £173: 7: 11; a very large amount certainly, when remembered that it is at the very commencement of your operations. There was no point in the constitution of the society that your committee looked to with more anxiety, than that of the publication of tracts to be distributed as premiums. Had you associated yourselves for that object alone, you would, in their opinion, have had an object well worthy of your care. And were Sabbath Schools to accomplish nothing more than to open a channel for successfully distributing the Scriptures and religious tracts, that effect alone would have stamped them valuable. These impressions of your committee were strengthened, instead of being weakened, by the knowledge, that very injudicious, if not highly improper tracts, have been circulated for the use of Children. The infant mind, unhackneyed in the vices of the world, and as yet unassailed by the violence of passion, or the delusions of the imagination, is peculiarly open to receive impressions, good or evil, as they flow from a pure or a corrupt source. To introduce such,

a mind into the haunts of profligacy, and to make it familiar with the way that leadeth down to the chambers of death, cannot fail to leave a polluted stain behind; and it can be no apology for this monstrous perversion, to state, that the punishment of vice is exposed, and will afford an antidote to the poison which has been infused. It ought always to be recollected, that the mind is most pure when it is unacquainted with vice. It seems therefore to be, a matter of the first importance, to exclude from Sabbath Schools all such tracts as delineate with too minute a pencil, the features or the colouring of vicious passions; and on the same principle, it becomes the instructors of youth to put into their hands such plain, but lively pictures of religion, as, whilst they attract by their interesting character, may affect the heart with the sentiments they convey. It is not sufficient that a tract be free from vice, or even that it be sound in doctrine; it must, to be successful, speak at once to the head and the heart of the child. It must lead him on by the interest of a story. Our blessed Saviour, who knew what was in man, whose example, when he adopts human means of agency it must always be our safety to follow, aware of the difficulty of arresting the attention of his hearers, generally adopted, this principle in addressing them. And your committee, looking to this great pattern, have endeavoured, in the little progress they have made, to select such tracts as are calculated at once to interest and instruct*.

And what, it may be asked, has been the result of all these operations? Your committee have no hesitation in their replythat they have already produced much precious fruit to the glory of God, and the best interests of man. Every report decidedly

* We trust these excellent and judicious remarks will always be kept in view by those who 'seleet books for Sunday School children. EDITOR.

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expresses this cheering sentiment; and several of them contain interesting illustrations of it in the account of individual children. To enter into any detail of these, would swell this report beyond its proper bound; and it has occurred to your committee, that it may be more useful, and at the same time more interesting, to collect these little histories together; and by connecting them with the peculiar doctrines or duties they illustrate, to form a tract to be published with the other tracts of the society. In this view it is hoped, that the annual reports from societies and schools will continue to communicate such remarkable cases as occur.

Your committee, looking to the whole description contained in the different reports, do heartily congratulate you on the delightful prospect. You see nearly three and twenty thousand children gathered around you, whose general deportment, according to the uniform testimony of their teachers, is sober, and steady, and attentive; who, instead of prowling about the streets of towns, or the highways in villages, are assembled to receive the lessons of heavenly wisdom; many of whom show the distinctive marks of a renovated mind, and all of whom are acquiring that knowledge, which leads the way to the kingdom of God. Not to descend to particulars, which, however gratifying, would occupy too much of your time, your committee cannot withhold from you an intimation of the following, as some of the most apparent fruits of the Sabbath Schools; they are, of course, to be understood chiefly of the more advanced scholars. 1st, The increasing number of your communicants; 2d, The formation amongst the young of each sex, respectively, of meetings for prayer and religious conversation; and 3d, In the bosom of these schools themselves, the enlargement of the heart has introduced societies for contributing to the dissemination of those precious truths, which they, by this circumstance, prove they so highly value.

Your committee, by the judicious language used by all the teachers in their statements, are not much afraid of any delusive appearances of extraordinary sanctity being encouraged in the Sabbath Schools. No human being can, in reality, be over-religious; because the attendance on religious exercises, to the exclusion of other known and commanded duties, is not religion, but hypocrisy. The grand point is to infuse the spirit of religion into the discharge of every duty; and it is not doubted that those excellent children, whose piety is recorded in the reports of different schools, were as exemplary in their little secular occupations as in any other parts of their conduct. It is for the encouragement of those teachers who seem to regret that they have seen no such distinguishing religious appearances amongst their pupilswho, though they commend the children generally, as attentive and earnest at their tasks, and as improved in their general habits, yet see none of that fruit which is brought to maturity by the dew of heaven;-it is for their encouragement that your committee would venture to suggest, that, under such circumstances, they seem to have no ground to fear that their labours even now are in

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vain. Constitutional temperament, undoubtedly, has a great effect in moulding the features of religious character; and although, like the enjoyment of religious frames, the happiness conferred by which must always make them objects of desire and gratitude, the peculiar and marked exhibition of early devotion caunot fail to rejoice the heart of every one who loveth the Saviour, and the souls of men; yet these are not the exclusive testimonies to the working of the Spirit, which may, without such prominent displays, have made great progress in the renovation of the heart. In proof of this, it is to be remarked, that in a great number of the instances where early strong religious views have been exhibited, the children have been laid on beds of languishing and sickness. The seed which their teachers, as the husbandmen of God, had sown, and which, perhaps, was not observed whilst it was springing in the field in common with the rest; and whilst its growth also would be obscured by the playfulness and gayety of youth; this, when brought under the culture of affliction, has sprung up with increasing vigour, and has rapidly arrived at maturity. The seed, however, was sown, and took root under cir cumstances which eluded observation. And your committee, from these examples, wish to encourage those engaged in this labour of love, by communicating to them the same joyful hope which they themselves indulge,-that as the seed sown is unquestionably good, though in some cases it may afterwards be burnt up by the persecution, or choaked by the cares of the world, in others, in many others, it will, under the blessing of Him who hath given the seed, and commanded it to be sown, produce fruit thirty, sixty, or an hundred fold.

Let parents and teachers, then, unite their exertions in instructing; let the clergy inspect, and the higher classes patronise these labours, and your committee doubt not but the extensive and glorious result will well accord with the expectations of those, who look forward to the religious character of the succeeding genera tion as a harbinger of the coming of Messiah's kingdom.

ADDRESS.

Of the Executive Committee of the Education Society for People of Colour in New-England.

The responsibility resting on the Executive Committee of " The Education Society for People of colour in New-England," is cheerfully assumed at the request of those for whom they act; and, while it is felt to be no inconsiderable burden in itself, the strong hope of aiding the progress of truth in general, and the best interests of Africa and her sons in particular, will stimulate them to proceed in the execution of their trust with alacrity.

It may not be improper to state some of those facts which have given birth to this Society, and which inspire the expectation that it will meet with the patronage of an enlightened public. The number of coloured people in New-England is several thousands.

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They are less numerous indeed than in any other portion of the U. States of equal population. But they are almost without exception free. They have imbibed at an early period, the consciousness of freedom, and with it are mingled a thirst for improvement, and an ardent desire to share in the comforts of the social state without interruption from those prejudices which too often produce collisions and permanent hostility. In many instances they discover a degree of public spirit more honourable to their character, in proportion to the untowardness of the circumstances in which custom and law bave placed them. Their industry and integrity have secured to many of them a competency of wealth, together with that respect from society at large which elevates them above the sordid views usually connected with a state of servile dependence. In these circumstances, they are prepared to a good degree for receiving the seed of divine truth and bringing forth the fruits of it. If but few churches in New-England are formed exclusively from this class of society, it is. not to be attributed to a marked deficiency of piety and zeal among them, but to their dispersed and disjointed situation. Many indi viduals of them are connected with regular churches, and walk conformably to their profession. They are not, and cannot justly be expected to be distinguished by their literary acquirements. A variety of circumstances have conspired to prevent that mental improvement, of which they are naturally no less susceptible than more favoured orders of society; and if at any time their piety be less under the regulation of sound discretion than is desirable, the Charity which "thinketh no evil," will find a sufficient apology for them in the well known and incurable defects of their education.

Instances of exemplary piety frequently occur among the youth of colour. And when they are converted to God, they have sometimes strong desires to "strengthen their brethren." Why should not their desires be gratified? Cannot the embarrassments under which they lie be removed, and the evils that flow from an indiscreet zeal be obviated? Is the ministry of reconciliation confined solely to the children of Shem, and Japhet? has heaven interdicted sacred employment to the posterity of Ham? It cannot fail to occur to every reflecting mind, that people of colour, having the same native sensibilities as other men, will cherish stronger attachments to a religious instructor of their own complexion, and allow to him a greater influence over them, than to another of fairer skin. The principle of sympathy admits neither of being controverted nor ridiculed It is inseparable from human nature; and its effects are equally astonishing and salutary, in numberless instances.

Where sincere piety is connected with a vigorous intellect, and both lie concealed beneath much rubbish, it is highly desirable that they be extricated from their unfavourable situation, and brought forward to occupy some enlarged sphere of usefulness! The best talents are often buried in obscurity, because indigence; or complexion, or some other unhappy difficulty prevented them