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JUBILEE MEMOSIAL 
 
 AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY: 
 
 BEING A KEVIEW OF ITS FIRST FIFTY YEAES' WORK. 
 
 Prepared by appointment of the Anniversary Committee, and preached in parts, 
 6th May, 1866, in Presbyterian Church corner 19th Street and Fifth Avenue, 
 
 BY ISAAC FBERIS, D.D., LL.D., 
 
 CHANCEJiLOR OP THE UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK CITY. 
 
 PBINTEB ST VOTE OF THE BOABD OF MANAGERS. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, 
 
 BIBLE HOUSE, ASTOK PLACE. 
 1867. 
 
JUBILEE nSIEMORI^L 
 
 OF THE 
 
 FIRST FIFTY YEARS 
 
 OP THE 
 
 AMEEICAT( BIBLE SOCIETY, 
 
 How intense and how wide spread was the interest of the 
 Jubilee year to the Jewish people ! and what a thrill of joy per- 
 vaded the masses, as the dawn of such year brought with it 
 releases, restorations — liberations — over the whole land, with 
 all the attendant blessings connected in the Divine arrangement 
 with this remarkable season ! 
 
 It is not precisely such a year we enjoy ; but ours is a year 
 of joy over work accomplished ; over blessings diffused through 
 a vast field of want ; over spiritual emancipations from the gall- 
 ing yoke of sin ; over the shedding of a flood of heavenly light 
 on the sad condition of millions of the benighted, and furnish- 
 iug to men ready to perish the means of relief. And what has 
 added to the interest of our Jubilee, is the wonderful and long 
 prayed for emancipation of millions living in a state of literal 
 bondage in our land, and the removal for ever of the yoke of 
 slavery, which has distinguished this year. 
 
 Its coming has awakened peculiar feelings among our 
 friends over the land, and it is pleasant to note by what appro- 
 priate exercises they have commemorated the happy season. 
 At this centre of operations, it has been our privilege to hear 
 from the lips of honoured men, representing various branches of 
 the Christian family circle, of " the advantages of a written rev- 
 elatiorH'' — of " the jpwrity of that revelation^'' — of " the inspira- 
 tion of the Bihli'' — of " the hvrniam, am,d divine in the jBiile" — 
 of " the Bible and Cvoil government^'' — of it " as a look for 
 mankind" — and of " what it has done for the world the past 
 
6 JTTBILBE MBMOEIAL. 
 
 century.''^ "We come now to the closing exercises of the con- 
 templated series — which is intended to he occupied with the 
 work done; or, a historical review of the first fifty years of 
 our great itational Institution. Though this be not a field for 
 much beside the statement of facts (and hence, perhaps, to the 
 general hearer, of little special interest), yet from that circum- 
 stance it has much to interest every friend of the Bible cause. 
 The business aspect of such a great movement must embrace 
 matters of detail; and these illustrate the vitality, the power 
 and efficiency of the Institution — its adaptedness for the great 
 work for which established ; the manner in which it has real- 
 ized the hopes of its founders ; but above all, the wisdom and 
 beneficence of the organization— and clearly prove it to have 
 occurred in the fulness of time and under the Divine auspices. 
 
 It is recorded, that at the time of the organization, an em- 
 phatic voice from the midst of the attending audience cried out 
 aloud : " This is none other than the work of the Lord." That 
 which was said then has been often repeated ; for every step of 
 our advance shows the Divine hand which laid the foundation; 
 and this, it is thought, we shall see on the present occasion. 
 
 The want of a supply of Bibles was deeply and widely felt 
 in the earlier days of our republic, in the midst of its struggle 
 for national life, and various remedial measures were adopted. 
 It is a striking circumstance, that while our fathers were press- 
 ed with the burdens and hardships of war, they felt the need of 
 the Bible, and sought to have the people supplied with this best 
 of guides and comforters, and this safest of instructors on their 
 rights and their duties. What a lesson to their descendants ! 
 In 1777 a memorial came before the Congress of the Revolution 
 (which had adopted the Declaration of Independence), seeking 
 such relief of the public want at their hands as their wisdom 
 might devise. The application was not flouted at, as if we were 
 a nation without a religion, but proper attention was given to 
 it, and a reference was made of the subject to a committee, who, 
 while they Could not provide for the printing, recommended 
 that the government take immediate measures to secure 20,000 
 copies from Holland, Scotland, or elsewhere, at the expense of 
 Congress. 
 
JTJBILEE MEMOEIAL. T 
 
 In 1781 — as, itt consequence of the war, the English Bibles 
 could not be imported, and when none could tell how long the 
 wai' might, last — on another memorial, a committee reported 
 a recommendation of a Bible printed by Robert Aitken in Phil- 
 adelphia ; on which, the resolution in the following ever mem- 
 orable words was adopted : 
 
 " Resolved,. That the United States, in Congress assembled, highly approve 
 the pious and laudable undertaking of Mr. Aitken, as subservient to the inter- 
 ests of religion ; and being satisfied of the care and accuracy of the execution 
 of the work, recommend this edition to the inhabitants of the United States." 
 
 As one well says, ""What moral sublimity in this fact, 
 as it stands imperishably recorded and filed in the national 
 archives! — the Jirst Congress of the tJnited States assum- 
 ing the rights and performing the duties of a £iil6 so- 
 ciety, long before such an institution had an existence in the 
 world! P^ 
 
 It was in 1804 when that grand and most memorable event 
 took place, the organization of the British and Foreign Bible 
 Society, concerning which our first Secretary, Dr. John M, 
 Mason, said it was " ten thousand times more glorious than all 
 the exploits of the sword;" and of which Dr. Spring has since 
 said, " Old England has no brighter jewel in her crown." The 
 Christian world joins to-day in thanksgiving to God for the 
 worldwide blessings it has diffused and is diffusing. We are 
 happy that her representatives are with us to-day, to participate 
 in our joy, while they bring her most cordial greeting, and that 
 among them is the countryman of him whose earnest appeal for 
 the .Scriptures for the Sunday schools and the destitute in the 
 principality of "Wales, in 1802, first moved the British heart to 
 the great work which has been accomplished. 
 
 The Bible-diffusion spirit was developed early in this cen- 
 tury in this country, and with great rapidity after the British 
 movement. The first organization was that in Philadelphia, in 
 1808 ; the second, that of the Connecticut State Society in May, 
 1809 ; the third, that of the Massachusetts Society in July, 
 1809 ; the fourth, that of the New ■ Jersey Society late in the 
 same year ; and the fifth, that of the !N"ew York (City) Society 
 in 1810. At the commencement of 1816 there were one hund- 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 ,ed and thiHy-two societies i-» -uj^J-'"* '"'"'"'"' '" 
 
 its work ..d entirely loci; <= -"""^ "» j ,„ ^„,,. ; 
 
 In Pennsylvania. ... 15 l" ^^^.^^ 7 
 
 Delaware Kentucky 3 
 
 Maryland 
 
 Dist. Columbia . 
 
 Virginia -■ 
 
 North Carolina . 
 
 South Carolina 
 
 5 
 1 1 
 
 1 
 
 2I 
 
 Tennessee 1 
 
 Louisiana 1 
 
 Mississippi ..... 1 
 
 Indiana. ....... 12 
 
 In New Hampshire. 
 Massachusetts 
 Rhode Island . 
 Connecticut. . 
 Vermont. . . • 
 New York . . • 
 New Jersey ■ ^., _ . ,. 
 
 Besides these, there were numerous Bible associations. 
 
 The supply of the destitution within their own range was all 
 that these societies aimed at, and this was very imperfectly met. 
 It is matter of history, that the Christian heart of our own coun- 
 try was first effectively moved in behalf of the multitudes per- 
 ishing in the newly and sparsely settled West and South-west, 
 through the agency of one of the devoted band of young men 
 who, in the shadow of the haystack in the meadow near Wil- 
 liams College, planned the Foreign Missionary movement (and 
 gave themselves to it), whose results have been most blessed. 
 Samuel J. Mills, whom we refer to, having completed his theo- 
 logical studies at the Andover Seminary in 1812, was moved, in 
 his large benevolence, at once to undertake a tour of investiga- 
 tion into the spiritual condition of the western and southern 
 parts of the land. He made two tours— the first in 1812 and 
 1813, in company with the Kev. John F. Schermerhorn, a minister 
 of the Eeformed Dutch Church ; the second in 1814 and 1815, in 
 company with Eev. Daniel Smith, of the Congregational Church. 
 The correspondence which followed, and the report which was 
 given to the public, of " the nakedness of the land," as regarded 
 the supply of the Sacred Scriptures, awakened the deepest feeling. 
 Mr. Mills, on his return North, visited various cities, and pleadpd 
 the cause of the destitute with influential laymen as well as minis- 
 ters at the most important centres. Very earnest appeals were 
 made in the Panojplist (a religious monthly published at Andover, 
 Mass.), at the same time, in behalf of a union of effort in what 
 could only be done by such co-operation ; while at the same time 
 urgent exhortations to the same effect came from England, with 
 most glowing accounts of thesuccess of the work in the fatherland.* 
 
 * See Appendix (A.) 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. » 
 
 Early in 1816 the practicability of a great catholic union was 
 illustrated by the organization of two Sunday school Unions in 
 the city of IlTew York — one, in January, of Christian ladies of 
 six or more denominations, under the leadership of Mrs. Divie 
 Bethune, the daughter of Mrs. Isabella Graham ; the other of 
 gentlemen, in February, on the same catholic ground, through 
 the influence of Mr. Eleazar Lord. 
 
 The excellent Elias Boudinot, then president of the ISTew 
 Jersey Bible Society, made a public communication about this 
 date in favour of a national Bible movement. The New York 
 Bible Society was the first to follow it with formal action, 
 early in the same year, in the adoption of the following resolu- 
 tions : 
 
 " 1. That it is highly desirable to obtain, upon as large a scale as possible^ 
 a co-operation of the efforts of the Christian community throughout the United 
 States for the efficient distribution of the Holy Scriptures. 
 
 " 2. That as a means for the attainment of this end, it will be expedient to 
 have a convention of delegates from such Bible societies as shall be disposed to 
 concur in this measure, to meet at on the day of 
 
 next, for the purpose of considering whether such a co-operation may be effected 
 in a better manner than by the correspondence of the different societies, as now 
 established ; and if so, that they prepare the draft of a plan for such co-opera- 
 tion, to be submitted to the different societies for their decision." 
 
 These resolutions were transmitted to the president of the 
 New Jersey Bible Society, to be brought before the public if 
 deemed proper. 
 
 It was on the 17th of January, 1816, that Mr. Boudinot, then 
 a resident of Burlington, JST. J., issued a call, in which he uses 
 this language : 
 
 " After mature deliberation, and consulting with judicious friends on this 
 subject, I am decidedly of opinion that the most suitable place for the proposed 
 meeting is in the city of New York, and the most convenient time the second 
 Wednesday of May next, and I do appoint and recommend the said meeting to 
 be held at that time and place." 
 
 The Convention accordingly assembled in New York on the 
 8th of May, 1816, in the consistory or lecture room of the Col- 
 legiate Dutch Church, then in Garden Street (where now stand 
 Nos. 60, 52 Exchange Place), under the same auspices which 
 have furnished a place for and established the Fulton Street 
 
10 JUBILEE MEMOBIAIii 
 
 Prayer Meeting of our own time, of such blessed miemory over 
 the Christian world. 
 
 The Convention was composed of sixty members, who repre- 
 sented twenty-eight Bible societies, and were of the Congrega- 
 tional, the Presbyterian, the Protestant Episcopal, the Methodist 
 Episcopal, the Reformed Protestant Dutch, the Baptist churches, 
 and the Society of Friends ; and from various sections of our 
 country, east, middle, southern, and western. 
 
 They were men of character and of position, every where 
 looked up to with respect and confidence — appreciating deeply 
 the responsibility of their place— entering fully into the work for 
 which they were convened, and taking large views of the results 
 likely to flow from their action — realizing vividly the import^ 
 ance of a truly catholic action. The feeling of interest in their 
 deliberations beyond their circle was intense, and was expressed 
 at the mercy seat in earnest prayer that the Divine Spirit would 
 be their guide, in meetings over our whole country. The occa- 
 sion was momentous, the scene most solemn. The interchange 
 was free and fraternal. Differences tliere were, as was to be 
 expected in so novel a movement ; but they were happily ad- 
 justed, and the result was the adoption of the Constitution pre- 
 pared by their own committee, by a unanimous vote, and the 
 full organization by the choice of a Board of Managers, and 
 subsequently of the officers, according to the Constitution, at the 
 head of whom was placed the venerable man whose call had 
 convened them, and who regarded the whole action as the most 
 blessed event of his long life.* 
 
 "Well might the venerable men who took part in these pro- 
 ceedings look back with gratitude on the work done, and rejoice 
 in it in their departing moments. They performed a good serv- 
 ice for us and for all coming after us, as they erected a platform 
 on which we may all stand in love and harmony, from whatever 
 tribe of the Christian Israel we come, and may work in unison 
 for the highest good of our common humanity, and prepare for 
 a more blessed co-operation and union in higher services in a 
 better world. How appropriate and how noble the sentiments 
 expressed in the address to the country !— " JSTo spectacle can be 
 
 • See Appendix (B.) 
 
JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 11 
 
 SO illustrious in itself, so touching to man, or so grateful to God, 
 as a nation pouring forth its devotion, its talent, and its treas- 
 ures, for that kingdom of the Saviour which is righteousness 
 and peace." All Bible-loving hearts throughout the country 
 were looking anxiouslj for the final action ; and when it came, 
 there ascended the sweet incense of praise from many an altar, 
 and soon there followed large accessions of auxiliaries from all 
 quarters of our la;nd. Thus, the period from the 8th to the 11th of 
 May inclusive, 1816, has become memorable in the annals of the 
 Church of Christ and of the world, as opening an era for good 
 whose range only the revelations of the last day can fully exhibit. 
 
 Fifty years have now completed their rapid flight since that 
 memorable occasion, and we have come together to " remember 
 all the way which the Lord our Cod has led us." 
 
 I have assumed that my hearers would desire me to submit 
 to them a view of the principles which from the first home gov- 
 erned, and still govern, this great National Instit/ution ; of the 
 work which has been accomplished ; and of the agencies and 
 auspices securing these gram,d results under God ; and what are 
 the prospects for the period to the portals of which a gracious 
 Providence has brought us. 
 
 According to this natural and just expectation, I have 
 arranged the facts I have to submit ; and yet I am deeply con- 
 scious that the work has been of such vast dimensions, and the 
 interesting details so numerous, that I can furnish mainly sum- 
 mary statements in the time allowed for such an exercise. 
 
 M.J topics are these, viz. : 
 
 I. The Principles which have governed and still govern our 
 proceedings. 
 
 II. The Work which has been accomplished. 
 
 III. The Instrumentalities and Co-operating Agencies which 
 have been enjoyed. 
 
 TV. The Prospects which at this point open upon us. , 
 
 I. The peinciplbs by which we have been and aeE still 
 
 GOVEENED IN OUE WOEK. 
 
 Let me give these in the simplest form of statement. 
 1. That which is fundamental and primary is, that the Bible 
 is a most precious boon to our race. 
 
12 JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 It is a most remarkable book, and acknowledged to be sucb 
 by the ingenuous infidel himself. We join with the historian, 
 the rhetorician, the poet, the painter, and the philosopher,^ in 
 admiration of this volume as the treasury of what each prizes 
 highly in his special department ;* but that on which we fix as 
 making it the most precious boon to mankind, is, that it is the 
 revelation of a Divine provision for the moral exigencies of our 
 race. 
 
 Two passages of the Sacred Volume sum up the whole: 
 " God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, 
 that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have 
 everlasting life." " This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all 
 acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sin- 
 ners, of whom I am chief." 
 
 Man is guilty, and the curse is on him ; and destined as he 
 is to another, an eternal state of existence, if he remain as he is 
 morally and spiritually, that curse will abide on him for ever. 
 Hence, the most momentous of all questions are : how shall he 
 obtain pardon ? how shall the curse be removed ? how shall his 
 immortal state be made one of joy ? how shall he be fitted for it 
 and instated in it ? The vital value of the Bible is in its answer 
 to these questions ; and here is the key to all we have done and 
 would do for its multiplication and diffusion. Can any thing 
 else so worthily occupy the first place in our aflFections, or more 
 appropriately command all our energies and labours ? In man's 
 hopelessness, God has undertaken for him ; He " has given his 
 only begotten Son to be the propitiation for our sins ; and not for 
 ours only, but for the sins of the whole world." " He who knew 
 no sin was made sin for us, that we might be made the right- 
 eousness of God in him." " He suffered, the just for the unjust, 
 that he might bring us to God." " With him is forgiveness of 
 sins and plenteous redemption." "He bore our sins in his own 
 body." " He purged our sins by his own blood ;" " and him 
 hath God exalted with his right hand, to be a Prince and a 
 Saviour ; to give repentance to Israel, and forgiveness of sins." 
 " There is now no condemnation to them that are in Christ." 
 
 • See Eclectic Magazine for July, 1865. 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 13 
 
 " Being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our 
 Lord Jesus Christ." 
 
 Is there any thing in the whole range of objects which 
 occupy the human mind, or gain the human heart, to be com- 
 pared with this ? 
 
 But this is not all. Suppose the guilt be removed; man is 
 unholy ; his heart is the seat of low and vile affections. Unless 
 he be cleansed, he is unfitted for fellowship with a holy God, or 
 to enter a holy heaven. The Divine provision meets this aspect 
 of the case ; for " the blood of Christ cleanseth us from all sin." 
 "God according to his mercy saved us, by the washing of 
 regeneration and renewing of the Holy Ghost." In the Divine 
 economy, it is this Holy Ghost who awakens, enlightens, takes 
 away the stony heart, subdues the pride, implants holy princi- 
 ples in the heart, quickens the soul to the exercise of pure affec- 
 tions, and makes the new creature. Thus begins the meetness 
 for the fellowship with all holy beings and for the coming glory. 
 Thus the blessed Volume presents the good work, which shall 
 be carried forward through the life journey, and it assures us 
 that God is more ready to give his Holy Spirit to them that 
 ask Him than parents are to give good gifts to their children. 
 What can come with sweeter power to the soul struggling with 
 sin than this ? 
 
 Nor is this all. Man is an infirm creature ; he is utterly 
 insufficient to make his way onward. The good word for him, 
 accordingly, is : " If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, 
 who giveth liberally, and upbraideth not." "I will guide thee 
 with mine eye." " As for the upright, he directeth his way." 
 " To the upright there ariseth light in the darkness." The broad 
 promise is : "I will bring the blind by a way that they knew 
 not ; I will lead them in paths that they have not known : I will 
 make darkness light before them, and crooked things straight. 
 These things will I do unto them, and not forsake them," saith 
 the Lord. Is man a feeble creature, unable to cope success- 
 fully with the evils, and temptations, and adverse influences 
 which are to be encountered? The provision is : "I will never 
 leave thee, nor forsake thee ;" " My grace is sufficient for thee ;" 
 "My strength is made perfect in weakness;" " As thy days, so 
 
14 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL, 
 
 shall thy strength be." So that he may go on cheerily singing: 
 " The Lord is my shepherd ; I shall not want : yea, though I 
 walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no 
 evil : thou art with me ; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me." 
 " The Lord will perfect that which concernetli me." 
 
 Nor is this all. Man h poor and miserable; he can bring 
 no price ; personal macerations will be nothing, pilgrimages will 
 be nothing — all manner of penances will be nothing. But the 
 heavenly provision is brought down most happily to his cireum- 
 stances — all is the gift of infinite love: "(rod so loved the 
 world, that he gave his only begotten Son;" "and with him," 
 the greatest gift, " shall he not freely give us all things ?" for 
 these are to Him the smaller gifts. 
 
 What a boon is this precious Volume ! revealing a provision 
 covering all wants, meeting all exigencies, spreading over all 
 time — all tendered to the guilty, the polluted, the erring, the 
 wretched — of all times and nations — without money and with- 
 out price. This is our primary principle. 
 
 2. The second is this : that it is God's purpose that 'this hoon 
 should he given to every creature. If we have examined Dr. 
 Paley's beautiful argument showing design from intelligent adapt- 
 ation, we cannot but have felt it to be irresistible, as much so as 
 if uttered by an audible voice from heaven. It is so here ; there 
 is no chance in the wonderful adaptations of the Book God has 
 given us. There is a purpose in its whole, and in its parts 
 and its every provision. He who knew what man needed has 
 formed it to meet his case. It i« clearly for man every where, 
 for he is every where the same guilty, the same helpless, the 
 same polluted, self-destroyed sinner. It matters not what his 
 temporal condition may be, nor in what clime he lives, nor what 
 his relations may be — opening this Book, he finds it a book for 
 him ; exposing his heart, arraigning him at the bar, warning 
 him of his danger, insulating him in the crowd around him, 
 holding him firmly to his duty; seemingly written for him 
 specially, and fastening its arrow in his heart. Nothing from 
 human pen is fitted to be so universally a blessing. How can 
 we but conclude it was intended to be such— to go forth as the 
 light, the joy, and the life of the world ? The pious heart rejects 
 
JUBILEE MEMOBIAJ... 15 
 
 with korror as a.blasphemy tliat it could have been made to be 
 the book of only a class, or a nation, or an age. It is the Book 
 of the racfii 
 
 Besides, how clearly is this contemplated in the Volume 
 itself! Did not the command to preach the Gospel to every 
 creature carry with it the written word, as well as the oral 
 communication, in the necessities of the case? Did not our 
 blessed Lord have this in his mind when he said, " Where- 
 soever this Gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there 
 shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memo- 
 rial of her?" Did Luke write only for his most excellent 
 Theophilus? Did not all Christians of the early ages so under- 
 stand it, as they multiplied copies as far as their circumstances 
 allowed ? Did not the enemies of Christianity so understand 
 and fear it, as they sought to; make Christians give up the 
 sacred books that they might be burned? Yes; the answer to 
 the inquiry. What was the Divine purpose ? is found in the use 
 God has been pleased to make of it^n the remarkable efficien- 
 cy He has given to it. Where can we look, as we trace the 
 diffusion of the Sacred Word, that we do not see it made the 
 power of God unto salvation ? The promise long since given 
 was : " My word shall not return unto me void, but shall accom- 
 plish that, whereto I sent it." Through this the blind eyes are 
 opened, the deaf ears are unstopped, the hard heart is melted, 
 the life is reformed, the lost one is recovered, the dead one is 
 brought to newness of life, the servant of sin becomes a child of 
 God, the outcast is made the heir of " an inheritance incorrupt- 
 ible, undetiled, and tliat fadeth not." The Christian heart is 
 filled with adoring gratitude, as it notes how these blessings 
 confirmatory of his will and desire are multiplied in our day. 
 We are constrained to say. How wonderfully God works ! 
 
 3. Another. grand principle governing our action is, "that 
 this precious boon should be given to men in its integriiy and 
 purity.'''' It is, as it is in its parts and as a whole, God's Book ; 
 and the responsibility is most solemn to give it as God has given 
 it.- Modifications, additions, diminutions, destroy this charac- 
 ter. The reasoning here is very simple. We owe it to Ood to 
 preserve and diffuse it in its integrity. His honour, his truth, his 
 
16 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 purposes concerning it, are all involved here. If we give what 
 He has not given — if we teach what He has not taught — ^if we 
 claim as his what He has not authorized, we deceive at the 
 expense of his glory and honour ; we place ourselves under the 
 condemnation of the false prophets. On the other hand, we owe 
 it io our fellow men to maintain its integrity. Their dearest 
 interests are involved here. Can we conceive of any thing 
 more horrible than to delude by giving to the guilty and the 
 dying, as coming from their Maker, what is human — pledging 
 Him to what He has not warranted — raising hopes He has never 
 encouraged — sending them to his bar with a falsified record ? 
 How could they guilty of such a course meet God in the judg- 
 ment, or meet their fellow men at his bar? Will any visitation 
 be too heavy for those who are unfaithful in such circumstances ? 
 Those are fearful words with which the Sacred Volume closes : 
 " If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto 
 him the plagues that are written in this book : and if any man 
 shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, 
 God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of 
 the holy city, and from the things which are written in this 
 book." It is true the reference is here specifically to John's 
 prophecy, yet the reason for it applies to all which God has 
 spoken. 
 
 4. A fourth principle is this : this blessed boon must, by 
 price and gift, he 'brought within the range and circumstances 
 of all. 
 
 Eemembering how various are the conditions of men, how 
 vast the proportion unable to buy, how multitudinous the youth 
 whom especially we should seek to guide into the path of truth 
 by an infallible light, how would any other policy have become 
 us, if our aim was to confer the greatest blessings on the great- 
 est number ? This is and has been our groTxnd. The Ameri- 
 can Bible Society is strictly a henevolent Institution. It manu- 
 factures and disposes of the Scriptures, in no case for the sake 
 of profit, but solely for a philanthropic and Christian object. 
 The Society owes its origin not only to the desire of cheapening 
 the Scriptures, so as to bring them within the reach of all classes 
 of persons who possess ability to purchase them, but also to 
 
.JUBILEE MEMORIAL, 17 
 
 the desire of carrying the Scriptures into retired and destitute 
 pafts of the country, where they otherwise never would hare 
 been carried ; so that all descriptions of persons and all varie- 
 ties of households might become possessed of them by purchase 
 or hy gift. In all cases, where the Society sells the Scriptures, 
 it does so at simple costj and in all cases, where individuals are 
 destitute; and at the same time are either unable or unwilling to 
 purchase, it furnishes them " without money amd without priceP 
 5. The last principle governing us which I mention is, that 
 we have been, and are in our work only stewards cmd almoners 
 for others. "While our post is one of honour and high privilege, 
 it is one of great responsibility. We are, in all this, in trust for 
 all those who seek by our hands to give the Word of Life to the 
 benighted and the perishing. We are occupants of a peculiarly 
 solemn position. All our distinctions are merged in that high- 
 est of all — we are Bible men. Away from this association we 
 may belong to the various tribes of the Christian Israel, but 
 here we are one in our work, in our aim, in our desire. On 
 broad Bible ground we plant ourselves, and for simple Bible 
 ends we labour. The living look to us as their agents, and com- 
 mit to us their liberal gifts. . As such, the widow sends her mite, 
 and the new convert his consecration thank offering ; and the 
 churches give, some in their poverty and others of their abund- 
 ance. But how does this stewardship rise in the solemnity of 
 its character, as we think of the pious dead! Among the last 
 acts of life, ere they passed away to their rest, they remembered 
 the preciousness of God's Word, and they could say, " Thy stat- 
 utes have been my songs in the house of my pilgrimage," and 
 they recalled how many are without it; they placed in our 
 hands the means of making such happy also— of widening to 
 the world's circumference the circle of human comfort and bless- 
 edness by their testamentary acts. Every month there comes 
 to us some touching memento of their regard for the Bible, and 
 new proof of their confidence in our work. It is required of 
 the steward that he be faithful ; especially in the stewardship of 
 the mercies of God should it be so. We cannot but heed the 
 voice coming to us from our hosts of living benefactors, of all 
 Christian names and interests ; especially can we not be heedless 
 
18 JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 to the monition coming from the tomb of the deceased — " Be ye 
 fa!thfal." 
 
 "With this rapid review of principles, we pass — 
 
 II. To a consideration of the work aceomplished. Clear- 
 ness of presentation leads ns to notice here two aspects 
 of the work, viz., production cmd distribution ; the former 
 embracing the versions or translations produced in the English 
 and in other tongues ; the latter, the diffusion over the home 
 and the foreign field. 
 
 1. Our work has had to do with the English version, 
 " that grand old version," as some one enthusiastically and 
 truly calls it. In speaking particularly of this, I will avail 
 myself of the statements made by the Committee of revision 
 in their report, printed 1851 : 
 
 Besides the translation of Wiokliffe, completed about A.D. 1380, but exist- 
 ing until quite recently only in manuscript, six Protestant English versions 
 had been printed and circulated, anterior_to the one now in use. 
 
 The earliest published English Bible was that of Tyndale. The New Test- 
 ament was printed in Holland, in 1526, and several times afterwards; the 
 Pentateuch at Hamburg in 1530. This version was followed in 1535 by 
 Coverdale's translation of the whole Bible; which was twice republished, in 
 1550 and 1553. Matthew's Bible, so called, was printed in 1537, in Hamburg 
 or some other part of Germany. The name Thomas Matthew is understood 
 to be fictitious ; and the work seems to have been mainly made up from the 
 translations of Tyndale and Coverdale. According to some, the real editor 
 was the martyr John Rogers. 
 
 In 1539 was published Crammer's or the Great Bible, in folio, printed at 
 London by Grafton and Whitchurch, king's printers; and hence sometimes 
 known also as Whitchurch's Bible. This was a revision of Matthew's version ; 
 and mea*ares were taken to hare it kept in the churches and publicly read. 
 Other editions appeared in 1540. 
 
 The Geneva Bible, so called, was translated at Geneva by English scholars 
 who had taken refuge there during the reign of Queen Mary. The New Test- 
 ament was printed at Geneva in 1557 ; and the whole Bible in 1560. This 
 version was reprinted at London in 1572, and often afterwards. 
 
 In 1568 appeared the Bishops' Bible, so called, in folio. It was a revision 
 of Cranmer's or the Great Bible, by archbishop Parker and other bishops ; and 
 took the place of Cranmer's Bible as the authorized English version. 
 
 At the accession of king James I., in 1603, the two versions last named, the 
 Bishops' Bible and the Geneva Bible, were those mainly in use in England • 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 19 
 
 the former authorized to he puhlicly read in the churches, and the latter mostly- 
 used in private families. 
 
 The immediate oeoasion of the present translation was the celehrated 
 Hampton Court Conference, held before the king, Jan. 12th, 1604. On the 
 second day. Dr. Reynolds, the leader of the Puritans, proposed to the king that 
 there should be a new translation of the Bible, because of the imperfections of 
 the former versions. The king entertained the proposal ; with the understand- 
 ing, that the new version should " last of all be ratified by his royal authority, 
 and so the whole church be bound to this translation, and not to use any 
 other." Accordingly, before the middle of the same year, 1604, the king com- 
 missioned a large number of scholars of both the Universities and elsewhere 
 to meet, and consult together, in order to make a new and more correct trans- 
 lation of the Bible. These were divided into six classes, comprising forty-seven 
 persons, whose names are given; who were to meet at Westminster, Cambridge, 
 and Oxford, two classes in each place. The original Scriptures, including the 
 Apocrypha, were in like manner divided into six portions ; one of which was 
 assigned to each class for translation. Certain rules, prescribed by the king, 
 were transmitted to the translators by the bishop of London, at midsummer, 
 1604. Among these the following serve to mark definitely the character of the 
 translation and the manner of proceeding : 
 
 " 1. The ordinary Bible read in the Church, commonly called The Bishops' 
 Bible, to be followed, and as little altered as the original will permit. 
 
 " 14. These translations to be used when they agree better with the text 
 than the Bishops' Bible, viz., TyndaWs, Govevdale' s, Matthew's, Whitchurch' s, 
 \i, e. Cranmer's,] Geneva. 
 
 " 6. No marginal notes at all to be affixed, but only for the explanation of 
 the Hebrew or Greek words, which cannot, without some circumlocution, so 
 briefly and fitly be expressed in the text. 
 
 " 7. Such quotations of places to be marginally set down, as shall serve for 
 the fit references of one Scripture to another. 
 
 " 8. Every particular man of each company to take the same chapter or 
 chapters : and, having translated or amended them severally by himself where 
 he thinks good, all to meet together, to confer what they have done, and agree 
 for their part what shall stand. 
 
 " 9. As any one company hath dispatched any one book in this man- 
 ner, they shall send it to the rest, to be considered of seriously and judi- 
 ciously." 
 
 Besides these forty-seven translators, it appears that " three or four of the 
 most eminent and grave divines of each university " were appointed to be over- 
 seers of the translations ; and these with the others probably made up the 
 number of fifty-four mentioned in the king's letter of July 22d, 1604. 
 
 After the work was actually commenced, more than three years, or, as the 
 original Preface has it, " twice seven times seventy-two days and more," were 
 
20 JUBILEE MEMOKIALi 
 
 spent by the several companies in completing the first draft of the new 
 version. When thus far finished, three copies of the whole Bible were sent to 
 London; one from Cambridge, one from Oxford, and one from Westminster. 
 From the companies in these several places, two persons were now selected 
 from each place, six in all, who met in London to review the whole work, and 
 prepare one copy from the three, to be committed to the press. Their labours 
 extended through three quarters of a year. " Last of all, Bilson, bishop of 
 Winchester, and Dr. Myles Smith, afterwards bishop of Gloucester, again 
 reviewed the whole, work, and prefixed arguments to the several books ;" by 
 which "arguments" are probably intended the contents of the chapters, 
 etc. Dr. Smith also wrote the Preface. The translation thus labo- 
 riously and faithfully prepared, was first printed and published in A.D. 1611, 
 in folio, and in the old black letter. 
 
 In the Preface the translators say : "We never thought from the begin- 
 ning, that we should need to make a new translation, nor yet to make of a 
 bad one a good one ; but, to make a good one better, or out of many good ones 
 one principal good one, not justly to be excepted against, that hath been our 
 endeavour, that our mark." This is doubtless a true and appropriate statement 
 of the object and iiiotives which these eminent persons had before their minds, 
 in executing the great work thus solemnly conimitted to their charge. They 
 claimed no infallibility for themselves, nor for their labours. The work 
 assigned them was strictly a revision of the Bishops' Bible ; which itself had 
 grown up out of all the preceding versions. But they everywhere took the 
 original Scriptures as their basis ; diligently comparing likewise all the former 
 translations. In this way they certainly succeeded in making " one principal 
 good translation, not justly to be excepted against." Yet notwithstanding all 
 their care and diligence, their own first edition exhibits some grave errors of 
 the press; most of which were speedily corrected in subsequent editions. 
 
 Such was the origin of this venerable and truly national work ; which 
 immediately became the Standard English Bible, and superseded all the other 
 versions. Confined at first to the limited territory of the British Islands, and 
 intended only for a population of a few millions, it had the efiect at once to 
 develope and fix the structure and character of the English language ; and with 
 that language it has since been borne abroad even to the ends of the earth. 
 And now, during the lapse of almost two and a half centuries, it has gladdened 
 the hearts, and still gladdens the hearts, of millions upon millions, not only in 
 Great Britain, but throughout North America and India, in portions of Africa 
 and in Australia. At the present day, the English is probably the vernacular 
 tongue of more millions than any other one language under heaven; and the 
 English Bible has brought and still brings home the knowledge of God's 
 revealed truth to myriads more of minds, than ever received it through the 
 original tongues. 
 
 The translators little foresaw the vast results and immeasurable influence 
 of what they had thus done, both for time and for eternity. Venerated men ! 
 
 .Mfiuo. 
 
JUBILEE MEMOKIAL. 21 
 
 their very names are now hardly known to more than a few persons ; yet, in 
 the providence of God, the fruits of their labours have spread to far distant 
 climes ; have laid broad and deep the foundations of mighty empires ; have afford- 
 ed to multitudes strength to endure adversity, and grace to resist the temptations 
 of prosperity ; and only the revelations of the judgment day can disclose, how 
 many millions and millions, through the instrumentality of their labours, have 
 been made wise unto salvation. 
 
 The English Bible, as left by the translators, has come down to us unaltered 
 in respect to its f rat ; except in the changes of orthography which the whole 
 English language has undergone,' to which the version has naturally and 
 properly been conformed ; and exceptiiig also the slight variations and dis- 
 crepancies, which in so long an interval must necessarily arise, by reason of 
 human imperfection, in the preparation and printing of so many millions of 
 copies. 
 
 The exposure to variations from this latter source is naturally greater, 
 Wherever the printing of the Bible is at the option of every one who chooses to 
 undertake it, without restriction and without supervision; as in this country 
 since the Revolution. In Great Britain, where the printing has been done only 
 under royal authority, by the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford, and the 
 king's printers in London and Edinburgh, the like exposure does not exist in 
 the same degree ; although, even there, slight variations are continually mani- 
 festing themselves between the copies bearing these different imprints. This 
 will appear more fully in the sequel. 
 
 In respect to the accessories of the text, comprehending the contents of the 
 chapters, the running heads of the columns, the marginal readings and referr 
 ences, and the chronology, the Bibles of the present day are much less con- 
 formed to the original edition. The translators, as we have seen, were to 
 append " no marginal notes at all, but only for the explanation of the Hebrew 
 or Greek words ;" and also " fit references of one Scripture to another." To this 
 requirement the early editions were entirely conformed; and the marginal 
 references were very few. In the lapse of time, however, extensive changes 
 and additions have been made in most of the above particulars. The contents 
 of the chapters only have been preserved in the editions of larger |ize, without 
 very great variation ; while in copies of a smaller form, these likewise have 
 been frequently and variously altered and abbreviated. 
 
 The following is a brief summary of the periods and editionsj in which 
 these changes seem to have been first made : 
 
 An edition of king James' Bible was printed in octavo at Amsterdam, in 
 1664, with a preface by John Canne, a leader of the English Brownists. His 
 purpose was to make Scripture the interpreter of Scriptwre, by the addition of 
 important marginal references " so .far as the margin could contain." This 
 edition, with the preface and references of Canne, was several times reprinted 
 by the king's printers in Edinburgh and Loudon. There were editions by them 
 in 1696, 1698, 1701, 1762, 1766, etc. . 
 
22 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 In England "many parallel texts" were added by Dr. Seattergood, in an 
 edition published at Cambridge in 1678. 
 
 Two years later, 1680, an edition was issued at Oxford, with the insertion 
 of Usher's chronology. . 
 
 More important was the Bible published in folio and quarto m 1701, under 
 the direction of Dr. Tenison, archbishop of Canterbury. In this edition Dr 
 Lloyd, then bishop of Worcester, added the chronological dates at the head of 
 the columns, and a further collection of parallel Scriptures. At the end were 
 also appended tables of Scripture measures, weights, and coins, by Dr. Cumber- 
 land, bishop of Peterborough. 
 
 This edition was disfigured by typographical errors to such a degree, that 
 the lower house of Convocation, in 1703, made representation on the subject to 
 the archbishops and bishops. But the careless printing of the Bible still con- 
 tinued, and was carried to such a height, in respect both to correctness and 
 paper, that at last complaint was made to king George I. That monarch in 
 consequence issued an order to the patentees for printing Bibles, dated April 
 24th, 1724, directing that," they shall employ such correctors of the press, and 
 allow them such salaries, as shall be approved from time to time by the. arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury and the bishop of London for the time being." * 
 
 At a later period, in an edition published at Cambridge, Dr. Paris made 
 large corrections in respect to the words printed in Italic. This fact is men- 
 tioned by Dr. Blaney ; but we have seen no further account of the edition. 
 
 The most complete revision of the English Bible was that undertaken at 
 Oxford by Dr. Blaney, about A. D. 1767, under the direction of the Vice 
 Chancellor and other Delegates of the Clarendon Press. According to his 
 instructions, the Oxford copies were carefully collated with the folio edition of 
 1611, that of Dr. Lloyd in 1701, and two Cambridge editions of a late date. 
 The work occupied between three and four years; and in 1769 both a quarto 
 and a folio edition were, published at the Clarendon Press ; of which the folio 
 was supposed to be the most perfect. The editor remarks, that "many errors 
 found in former editions have been corrected, and the text reformed to such a 
 standard of purity, as, it is presumed, is not to be met with in any other 
 edition hitherto extant." The points upon which particular attention was 
 bestowed were the following : 
 
 1 . The punctuation was revised, in order to express the true sense, and 
 also to insure uniformity, as far as possible. 
 
 2. As to the words printed in Italie, the Hebrew and Greek originals were 
 compared, and many alterations made. These changes were all submitted 
 previously to the Select Committee, and especially to the Vice Chancellor of 
 Hertford College and Mr. Wheeler, Professor of Poetry. 
 
 3. In the heads or contents of the chapters, likewise, considerable altera- 
 
 • Thus far the facts respecting the origin and history of the authorized Version 
 have been mainly drawn from Lewis' History of the several Translations of the Bible into 
 English, second edition, London, 1739, 8vo. See also the authorities there cited. 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. *2S 
 
 tions were made. On these much labour was expended by the editor ; as also 
 by the two gentlemen above named, and by Mr. Griffith, of Pembroke College, 
 and the (then) late Warden of New College ; by whom the suggestions of the 
 editor were corrected and improved. 
 
 4. The running titles over the columns had to be adapted to editions of 
 different size. 
 
 5. The Hebrew proper names, where the text contains an allusion to their 
 meaning, were n»re fully translated in the margin. 
 
 6. Obvious and matepial errors in the chronology were rectified. 
 
 7. The marginal references were carefully compared and corrected, and 
 many new ones added, particularly from what is mentioned as a 'i Scotch 
 edition." The new references are said to have amounted to the number of 
 30,495, or about thirty to each page on an average. * 
 
 This edition of the Bible by Dr. Blaney has been regarded, ever since its 
 publication, as the standard copy, to which all subsequent issues in England 
 have been conformed. A beautiful edition in quarto was published in London 
 by Eyre and Strahan, printed by Woodfall, in 1806, and again in 1813. In 
 carrying this copy through the press, it is said that one hundred and sixteen 
 errors were detected in Blaney's edition ; one of them an omission of some 
 importance. 
 
 Your Committee are not aware, that any later general revision or collation 
 of the English Bible has taken place in Great Britain., About twenty years 
 ago, the public mind, in that country and in our own, was for a time agitated 
 by the charge openly made against our present English Bibles, that they had 
 been greatly corrupted from the original edition ; and that what we now have 
 is not the English version as prepared by king James' translators. In conse- 
 quence of this charge, the Clarendon Press issued in 1833, in quarto, an exact 
 reprint in Roman letter of the folio edition of 1611 in black letter. "The 
 reprint is so exact, as to agree with the original edition page for page, and 
 letter for letter ; retaining throughout the ancient mode of spelling and punc- 
 tuation, and even the most manifest errors of the press." 
 
 The publication of this reprint tranquillized the public mind ; for it pre- 
 sented ocular demonstrations, that, with the exception of typographical errors, 
 and of the changes conformed to, and required by, the progress of orthography 
 in the English language, the text of our present Bibles remains unchanged, and 
 is without variation from the original copy as left by the translators. 
 
 Appended to this reprint is a collation made with one of the copies of the 
 year 1613, two years after the original edition. The variations are about 375 
 in number, exclusive of the Apocrypha. Whether the editions of 1613 were 
 
 * The preceding details are taken from Dr. Blaney'e Report to the Vice Chancellor 
 and other Delegates of the Clarendon Press, dated Oct. 35th, 1769, and printed in the 
 (4rMtleman.s' Mat/aiine for Nov. 1769, Vol. XXXIX. p. 517 sg. The number of new 
 marginal references is given in the Uncyclop. Metropol:, art. Mbk. 
 
24' JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 printed under the supervision of the translators probably cannot now be known. 
 The variations may be divided into three classes, viz., Manifest errors of the 
 press in the copy of 1611 ; manifest errors of the press in the copy of 1613 ; 
 other variations from the reading of 1611 ; but whether with or without design 
 is not always certain. 
 
 It was natural, it was an imperative duty, for the Society to 
 secure for its use and publish a Bible as near as ^ssible in con- 
 formity with the best, or most correct, English copy. And it 
 was the more necessary that some responsible body should have 
 this in charge, as there was a liability if in the hands of the 
 ordinary printer and publisher, from the very magnitude of the 
 work, to sufferj^errors to creep in. Some of our American edi- 
 tions from private hands have been sadly defective, while some 
 from high sources should have been more rigidly watched. 
 There is a place here for all the punctiliousness which distin- 
 guished the transcription of the Jewish text. Having the best 
 translation extant, it would have been unpardonable to be care- 
 less in reproducing it. Ours have not been the times or the 
 facilities requisite to do any thing beyond securing the correct- 
 ness of the text. Some tyros, with a smattering of linguistic 
 skill, thrust forth their improvements of the translation, as if to 
 impress their hearers with their superior^ wisdom ; and some 
 older heads seem to think their work is to show up the defects 
 of the translation on all occasions, as if they were glaring and 
 numerous ; becoming thus auxiliaries of the adversary in under- 
 mining the confidence of the plain reader in his Bible. The 
 men who gave us our English translation were giants in their 
 department ; their race has not been surpassed, if in individual 
 and rare cases equalled. The distinguished Dr. Guthrie has 
 said : " Our version of the Bible, like the men who made it and 
 those also who use it, is not faultless. It cannot be so; for 
 'who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean?' The web 
 must ever, more or less, partake of the loom. Still, the good 
 and learned men to whom King James committed the work of 
 translation, take it altogether, have done it well— so well, that 
 all succeeding attempts to produce a better have failed. 'And 
 perhaps the time and labour which some authors have spent in 
 detecting and exposing the small faults of our version would 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL, 25 
 
 have been as well employed in correcting the large faults of 
 their own creed and conduct." 
 
 Our Society has from the first been jealous on the subject 
 of a correct text, and has employed every means to secure it. 
 In 1847 the Yersion Committee undertook the most careful 
 revision of our English text in order to secure its conformity 
 to the best British, so as to make what should be a standard 
 edition. This comniittee consisted of the following gentlemen, 
 viz. : Kev. Dr. Spring, Eev. Dr. Turner, Kev. Dr. E. Eobin- 
 son, Rev. Dr. R. S. Storrs, Eev. Dr. T. E. Vermilye, Eev. Dr. 
 James Floy, Thomas Cock, M. D. Tears of labour and pains- 
 taking were devoted to the work; reports of progress were 
 made from time to time, and their final report in 1851. The 
 work at first met with universal favour, and was unani- 
 mously approved by the Board ; but exceptions having arisen, 
 with considerable excitement, in quarters which the Board 
 felt bound to hear, it was decided to reconsider and modify 
 some things which had been done, and the subject was refer- 
 red to the same committee; but, in view of all the circum- 
 stances, they begged to be excused from the work.* A new 
 committee composed of the following, viz. : Eev. Dr. Spring, 
 New York, Eev. Dr. John N. McLeod, New York, Eev. Dr. H. 
 B. Smith, New York, Eev. Dr. Wm. H. Campbell, New Jersey, 
 Eev. Dr. H. J. Schmidt, New York, Eev. Dr. "Wm. E. Williams, 
 New York, Eev. Dr. Lot Jones, New York, Eev. Theodore D. 
 "Woolsey, LL.D., Connecticut, Eev. W. J, Lindsay, New York, 
 was appointed for the purpose, and their work, as reported and 
 approved by the Board, is now our standard. Many were satis- 
 fied with the fii'st, and all are disposed to yield their confidence 
 to the present. 
 
 A by-law of the Board requires that a copy of the first edi- 
 tion of every book it publishes, and a copy of every other edition 
 thereof in which material alterations have been made, shall be 
 placed and preserved in the Library of the Society. The cata- 
 logue gives the list of these down to and including 1862 ; and it 
 thus appears, that of the whole English Bible, seventy-three 
 
 * Dr. Spring, in his recent work, " Life and Times," devotes a chapter to this 
 subject. See also Annual Report, 1858. 
 
26 JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 kinds* have been printed ; of the New Testament, thirty-four 
 kinds ; of N"ew Testament and Psalms, twelve kinds ; of Psalms, 
 three kinds; of portions, viz., of John, one; of Proverbs, two 
 kinds — -the differences being in size, in style of type, in the 
 use of references, in marginal readings, in the use of stereo- 
 type or electrotype plates, some from plates derived from differ- 
 ent sources, and others which are merely technical with the 
 printer — all, however, conformed to the best English text of the 
 date when produced. 
 
 Among the facts to be noticed in the production of Bibles in 
 our own tongue, one of the most delightful is that of providing 
 the Sacred Yolume in raised letters for the blind. Cut off as 
 they are from innumerable sources of enjoyment which give a 
 zest to life to the seeing, and until our own time from intel- 
 lectual culture to any great extent; living in perpetual dark- 
 ness — life a continual night — ^blessed day was it to them when a 
 Christian humanity discovered a means by which the fields of 
 general culture were opened to them, and especially access was 
 opened to all the riches of the Word of God. Can any one con- 
 ceive the comfort of one who, with his Bible before him and 
 ability to read it, lives in daily fellowship with all the past, and 
 though the world is shut off from his visual organs, has a world 
 of his own, in which his association is with all that is excellent, 
 in all elevating as well as satisfying themes, and fellowship with 
 the Father and his Son Jesus Christ ? How rich such an one 
 now in perpetual day ! The printing of the Bible for the blind 
 is one of our most blessed works, costly though it may be. He 
 who doubts it must take his place by the side of the pious blind, 
 and hear the outgushing of his happiness. It has been our 
 delightful privilege to extend this precious boon to the blind in 
 Arabia, Egypt, and Syria. 
 
 As to the languages of Europe, the provision of French, 
 Spanish, Italian, German, and Portuguese Scriptures has been a 
 special object. A constant and increasing demand for those at 
 home received very early attention. The standards used have 
 been those deemed in sound judgment to be the most reliable. 
 
 Uto, four; 8to, twenty-three; ISmo, twenty-three ; 18mo, thirteen; 32mo, six, 
 and 16mo, four — none in folio. 
 
JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 27 
 
 In the Spanisli, we have reason to believe we have the best ver- 
 sion in use, prepared by careful revision at our expense by the 
 hand of a most cultivated native of Spain,* who under our roof 
 has devoted years to its preparation. But in our work on the 
 continent, most has been and must be accomplished by subsidies 
 of money to native societies and agencies. It is to us a pleasant 
 fact, that the new world is thus reflecting to the old countries 
 the light which came from them ; and the land which has most 
 successfully perfected the printing press sends back its bounty 
 to the land in which the art of printing was invented, and the 
 Bible in Latin was first printed. 
 
 One of the efforts of our first year was to provide for the 
 wants of the aborigines of our country, and it has always been 
 kept in view. In the course of years, portions have been fur- 
 nished for the Mohawks, the Delawares, the Senecas, the Ojib- 
 was, the Dakotas, the Choctaws, the Cherokees, the Shawnees. 
 
 As we proceed to speak of the Scriptures (in whole or in 
 part) in Eastern and African tongues, it is becoming to note 
 emphatically our indebtedness to missionaries, without whose 
 aid nearly two thirds of the human family must have been left 
 without the "Word of Life. These noble, self-sacrificing men, 
 selected for their work with great care by the Church, well fur- 
 nished by literary training, have performed a service in the 
 departments of ethnology, philology, and geography, involving 
 the physical, civil, and social condition of the people of other 
 lands, which has made general science very much their 
 debtor.f Their circumstances constitute them the best author- 
 ities in all these matters. Not travellers, and thus almost con- 
 stantly in transit, and only seeing the outside of things, or the 
 mere dioramic, swiftly passing scenes of life — ^but living among 
 the people in familiar, intimate, confiding intercourse— they are 
 qualified both to know the wants of the people, in religious 
 things especially, and to learn the best mode of meeting them. 
 Acquiring living tongues among the people who use them, 
 they early feel the need of the printed Volume, and are the 
 
 * Professor De Mora, of the University of the city of New York, 
 t Since the above was written, an able article on this subject has appeared in the 
 Princeton Review for October, 1866. 
 
28 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 men to prepare it. With all their previous careful preparation 
 in the best literary and theological institutions of Christian 
 lands, who rather than they can be coniided in ? 
 
 That noble institution, the British and Foreign Bible Soci- 
 ety, has published the Bible in one hundred and sixty-nine lan- 
 guages and dialects, and for the larger proportion of these is 
 indebted to English and American missionaries. 
 
 That is a most memorable record given by the venerable 
 secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign 
 Missions of the work of its missionaries in the department of 
 Christian literature and Bible translation in pagan tongues. 
 He says : " The number of languages in which books have been 
 printed at the presses owned by the Board is forty-three, viz. : 
 the modern Greek, Hebrew, Spanish, Armenian, Turkish, Bul- 
 garian, Arabic, Syriac, Mahratta, Gujerattee, Sanscrit, Hindus- 
 tanee, Portuguese, Persian, Tamil, Telugu, Siamese, Malay, 
 Bugis, Dyack, Chinese, Japanese, Hawaiian, Marquesas, Micro- 
 nesian, Grebo, Mpongwe, Dikele, Zulu-Kaffir, Cherokee, Choc- 
 taw, Creek, Osage, Ojibwa, Ottawa, Seneca, Abenequis, Sioux 
 or Dakota, Pawnee, three in Oregon." 
 
 Our Board early understood the value of missionary aid, and 
 adopted resolutions encouraging the preparation of versions by 
 missionaries in all fields. To the various missionary stations 
 these were their expressions : " The Managers look with pecu- 
 liar satisfaction on the efforts of American missionaries, of dif- 
 ferent religious denominations, in translating the Scriptures into 
 the various tongues and dialects used at their respective sta- 
 tions ; that they hope to receive intelligence whenever the Old 
 Testament, or the New Testament, or any one entire Gospel or 
 other book of the Bible, is correctly translated and ready (with- 
 out note or comment) for the press ; and that the missionaries 
 be encouraged to expect that, on giving intelligence, they shall 
 receive the aid requisite for the publication of the same." Thus 
 have we been furnished with a variety of translations, in a num- 
 ber of cases where, previous to the labours of the missionaries, 
 the languages had not been reduced to writing, the general rule 
 governing the preparation of such versions being, " that they 
 should conform to the common English version ; at least, so far 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 29 
 
 as that all religious denominations represented in the American 
 Bible Society can consistently Use and circulate said versions in 
 their several schools and communities." 
 
 This was the great foundation principle of our Fnion, put 
 into written form, without which it could not have been formed, 
 and now could not exist. This met the decided approbation of 
 all the denominations in the Bible Society compact; excepting a 
 portion of the Baptist brethren, from two of whose mission 
 versions help was withheld in consequence of their denomina- 
 tional character. The action gave offence to those brethren, 
 and they separated from us ; while some notable representative 
 brethren of the same communion aided in shaping the final 
 action of our Board in the circumstances, and have always main- 
 tained that the course pursued was the true and only one for 
 the National Institution under its Constitution. Let me say, by 
 the way, time works material changes ; and when excitements 
 die out, and calm revision takes place, it is pleasant to know 
 that the place at the common board is kept unoccupied, and the 
 door to its occupancy stands open, on the ground of the catho- 
 licity of 1816, overarched by the inscription, 
 
 "Welcome all who love cub Lord Jesus Cheist." 
 
 Under this policy the Board have been enabled to furnish 
 the Scriptures, in whole or in part, in the following languages 
 and dialects beyond the limits of our own land, arid among 
 pagan people : to the Arrawack in South America, to the Ha- 
 waiian Islands, the Hindu, Hindi, Urdu, Zulu, the Shikh, the 
 Hindustanee, the Tamil, the Telugu, Greolese, the Syriac, thfe 
 Arabic, Micronesian Islands, the Esthonian, the Benga, the 
 Grebo, Fuh-Chau Colloquial and Mandarin Colloquial, the Ar- 
 meno-Turkish, and now it has in course of preparation the Sla- 
 vonic and, the Bulgarian. That which is destined to become 
 the great foreign work of the Board, and is already in progress, 
 is the production of the plates for printing the Scriptures for the 
 vast Arabic-speaking people — "a population extending from 
 Morocco and Timbuctoo on the west, beyond Calcutta on the 
 ea,st, and numbering at least one hundred and twenty millions." 
 It is an interesting fact, that in the Bible House, in the heart 
 
30 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL.- 
 
 of this busy, bustling city, not noticed by the passing throng, 
 this work of preparation is noiselessly going on, and the instru- 
 mentality is daily advancing, which shall be a guide and a 
 comfort to our fellow men over a field almost parallel to the 
 English-speaking area in extent, and embriacing miUions more 
 than speak any one tongue. From missionary hands we receive 
 it, and by missionary hands it is to be accomplished. 
 
 Of that version it is proper to add, its preparation occupied 
 sixteen years of almost consecutive labour. The Syrian Mission 
 of the American Board of Commissioners set apart for its 
 accomplishment its best men, and to these were added the best 
 native talent which could be procured, in order that it might be 
 conformed to the native style of expression, and to the highest 
 standard of literary taste. Eev. Dr. Eli Smith, regarded as a 
 master of the Arabic, began and advanced the work so far as to 
 complete the translation of Genesis and Exodus, and prepare 
 the basis of a translation of the New Testament, the balance of 
 the Pentateuch, and several minor prophets ; and his compeer 
 of equal scholarly rank, Eev. Dr. Van Dyck, completed it. To 
 test its excellence and unsectarian character, each sheet of the 
 translation, before being finally printed, was . submitted to the 
 careful scrutiny of every member of the mission, to interested 
 native scholars of all sects, to other American missionaries, to 
 English, German, Scotch, and Irish missionaries of different re- 
 ligious denominations and in different parts of the empire, and 
 finally received the warm and unqualified approbation of all. 
 
 Its style of execution is that of a perfect transcript of the 
 Arabic ealigraphy of the Koran, according to a mode designed 
 by Dr. Eli Smith, and executed by Mr. Homan Hallock, of the 
 Mission — so delicate, so distinct, so beautiful, that the most cap- 
 tious Mohammedan who regarded with prejudice and as a prof- 
 anation the printing of sacred books receives it with delight. 
 
 Highly is our Board honoured by having charge of the pro- 
 duction of this great work, which is destined to produce effects 
 in the Mohammedan world, no one can calculate. It is delight- 
 ful to see here the American Bible Society linked in " with the 
 grandest operations and results of missionary enterprise." Next 
 in urgency to the supply of our home want will come the 
 
JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 31 
 
 widest diffusion of the Arabic version in our next semi-century. 
 But here we shall have co-labourers, in the British and Foreign 
 Bible Society, to whom a set of the plates will be sent, and the 
 vastness of the work will be worthy of both.* 
 
 It should be stated that the American Bible Society, in its 
 work of production of books, has not been restricted to plates of 
 its own preparation, but uses those also produced by foreign 
 Bible societies, and especially the British and Foreign Bible 
 Society — presenting thus a union of effort for an end truly 
 common to all and worthy of all. As in union there is strength, 
 with God's blessing we anticipate a much more efficient per- 
 formance of the work. 
 
 To the Arabic, it is to be hoped may soon be added as per- 
 fect a version in the Chinese — that a purer light may be shed on 
 that remarkable and multitudinous people, and all may unite 
 in its diffusion. 
 
 2. The, distribution which has been made after this prepara- 
 tion naturally follows. Its beginning was small, very small. 
 Three sets of plates, octavo, and three in 12mo, were donated to 
 the Society by the 'Eew York Bible Society and the ISTew York 
 Auxiliary Bible Society, and with these in use, 10,000 of the 
 12mo were printed, and '6,000 sold, and a further impression 
 of 2,500 8vo and 7,500 of the 12mo ordered, an unusual 
 movement then ; but it was the rill which has become a vast 
 river. 
 
 Our city has been designated a distributing reservoir, our 
 Institution has been so in the pouring out of the precious "Word 
 of Life. In this respect, a reservoir of pure water — ^most abund- 
 ant, refreshing, free, adapted to purify, to nourish and strength- 
 en, to allay the thirst of the parched heart — to quench the fire 
 of sinful passion — to cure the sorroM's of the soul, and through a 
 thousand ramifications to convey its blessiugs to every house, to 
 every condition of life, to every age, to all where needed free, 
 and -in all its supply increasing as years have passed on. Could 
 they who were constrained to declare their inability to meet the 
 demands of a score of societies in 1816 now hear the Jubilee 
 report, amazement would fill their hearts. 
 
 * See Appendix (D.) 
 
33 
 
 JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 Let me present this great work by decades ; 
 
 Vols. 
 1st year. 8,410 
 
 Vols, 
 nth year 71,621 
 
 Vols. 
 31st year 206,240 
 
 2 
 3 
 4 
 5 
 6 
 7 
 8 
 9 
 10 
 
 17,594 
 31,118 
 41,513 
 . 43,346 
 . 53,470 
 . 54,805 
 . 60,439 
 . 63,851 
 . 67,134 
 
 439,580 
 
 13 
 13 
 14 
 15 
 16 
 17 
 18 
 19 
 30 
 
 134,607 
 .. 300,123 
 ,. 238,583 
 .. 242,183 
 .. 115,802 
 .. 91,168 
 .. 110,832 
 .. 123,236 
 .. 231,694 
 
 1,549,848 
 
 33 
 23 
 24 
 35 
 36 
 27 
 28 
 29 
 30 
 
 1.58,298 
 ..134,937 
 ,. 157,261 
 ,. 152,203 
 .. 257,066 
 .. 216,605 
 . . 314,582 
 .. 439,093 
 .. 483,873 
 
 2,510,156 
 
 31st year 637,764 
 
 655,066 
 
 33 
 34 
 35 
 36 
 37 
 38 
 39 
 40 
 
 .. 564,726 
 .. 633,395 
 .. 592,432 
 ,. 666,015 
 .. 799,380 
 .. 815,399 
 .. 749,896 
 .. 668,265 
 
 6,772,338 
 
 41st year 770,057 
 
 .... 712,045 
 .... 731,095 
 .... 753,772 
 ..... 721,878 
 .... 1,093,842 
 .... 1,259,117 
 .... 1,425,147 
 .... 1,530,563 
 .... 1,150,528 
 
 43 ■ 
 
 43 
 
 44 
 
 45 
 
 46 
 
 47 
 
 48 
 
 49 
 
 50 
 
 Totals. 
 IstlOyrs 439,580 
 
 1,549,848 
 
 " 2,.510,156 
 
 " 6,772,338 
 
 " 10,138,044 
 
 21,409,966 
 
 10,138,044 
 
 The British and Foreign Bible Society, organized 1804, has 
 issued 47,989,579 volumes. 
 
 The most interesting of questions is, how. have these produc- 
 tions of the Bible press been dispensed — by what channels have 
 they been conveyed to their destined fields ? 
 
 The auxiliaries of alt grades have borne the principal part. 
 It has been the preferred policy of the Board to secure their 
 organization over the whole country, even to the hamlet, the 
 boarding school, and the juvenile association, embracing both 
 sexes and all conditions of social life. The grand principle in- 
 volved, is that of bringing home to the heart of every locality 
 over our land the wants of those around it, and to cherish the 
 feeling of responsibility in reference to the improvement of 
 their moral condition, and binding their own atttachment to the 
 Word of Life. It has been found most happy, and has diffused 
 the life of the centre to the extremities. The work in the hands 
 of these auxiliaries has been primarily local, but beside this, 
 many have helped on the effort to give the "Word to the desti- 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 tute in other fields. In dealing with the auxiliaries, the practice 
 has been to encourage all possible energy by selling to them at 
 cost, and when needed, to add a grant or gratuity which might 
 more effectually secure the accomplishment of their plans. The 
 invariable practice is, to honour the auxiliary by putting into 
 its hands every call for books from its region, and to make it 
 the agency for any general work it may be able to perform. To 
 secure vitality and call out energy, and make the auxiliary a 
 constant blessing, are ends gained, while the poor have the 
 sacred volume more certainly placed in their hands through 
 their friends and neighbours. These organized channels, with 
 the branches and various forms of association, these conduits of 
 blessings, have risen to the number of 5,232, and last has been 
 added to them two auxiliaries of coloured persons in Tennessee. 
 Sometimes, at the extremes of our population, the Bible Com- 
 mittee, consisting of several trustworthy persons, is the tempo- 
 rary substitute for the auxiliary, and does its work until a more 
 permanent organization occurs. 
 
 In dispensing the gratuities of the Society, the Committee of 
 Distribution has a most blessed part to perform — one which con- 
 stitutes its service a source of positive Christian enjoyment. It 
 is its province to look carefully into every application and 
 recommend the donation which may be needed. Its monthly 
 record discloses the channels through which our benefactions 
 ilow forth. Beside the work by the auxiliaries, now the appli- 
 cant is the Christian traveller, who is about to go forth over a 
 wide and new field, who would take a supply which he may 
 dispense; and then, it is the commercial agent who, while 
 moving variously on his secular work, would do a work for the 
 souls of the strangers with whom he may be thrown. ifTow, it 
 is the Christian female on the borders of the land who sees many 
 doors opened for Christian usefulness, and earnestly calls for the 
 Bible or portions of it. Then it is the clergyman who is about 
 to try the dangers of the deep and seek a foreign land — who 
 would have the means of doing good to the sturdy mariner on 
 his voyage, and also carry the Scriptures to benighted popula- 
 tions where the light is excluded ; then, it is the public func- 
 tionary going abroad, who, with a warm Christian heart, would 
 
 3 
 
34 JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 have the means of putting into the hands of his wandering 
 countrymen the Eible, which shall remind them of home, 
 while he may help also the stranger. The invalids seeking 
 health in a Southern clime have carried with them many a 
 Bible to the destitute. The pious sea captain has considered it 
 indispensable to take his Scriptures in various languages to 
 deposit at the points where they may do good, and set up in some 
 hearts the fear of God. The Christian family in its summer 
 wanderings has been cast into neighbourhoods where sad desti- 
 tution prevailed — or where a struggling Sabbath school effort 
 was in progress — or where a feeble Church could, only with 
 great individual sacrifices, sustain the public worship of God ; 
 and their appeal must be met. These are the smaller channels ; 
 but how pleasant, and often touching ! 
 
 But on a broader scale ; The Tract Society with its vast and 
 most useful colporteur system has been made the conveyancer 
 of many thousands of copies where no other Christian visiter 
 had come. The Parent Sunday School of our country, in its 
 care for the interests of the children, and especially in our newly 
 settled country and where it has often preceded the Church, 
 makes its annual appeal ; and no less earnest are the denomina- 
 tional Sunday school unions. The supply of Sunday schools 
 every where among the poor has been an object very near to the 
 heart of the Bible Society. The appeals from the Orphan Asy- 
 lum, the Penitentiary, the Prison,' the Hospital, the Soldiers' 
 Home, the Home of the Friendless, have been promptly heard 
 and answered. 
 
 Some periods of revived Bible effort have occurred, which 
 have imparted new energy to our work. In 1825, the Monroe 
 County Eible Society, in our State, solemnly resolved to supply 
 within a year all the destitute families within its limits ; and the 
 pledge was redeemed. Many other county societies caught the 
 same spirit and followed the example, and thus, in the progress 
 of a few years, a vast diffusion occurred. But our home supply, 
 in consequence of the rapid changes constantly taking place, 
 and the coming in of new populations, can never be complete, 
 or remain so; hence, many auxiliaries have repeated once and 
 again their good work. 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 35 
 
 A fe-w years after the county movement, which illustrated 
 what could be done where there was a union of will and effort, 
 the supply of the whole country in two years was undertaken. 
 It was a great national movement, and in the lapse of the time 
 specified, from which the supply was undertaken at differing 
 pointSj a fair accomplishment *Df the resolution was publicly 
 announced. 
 
 But it was left for the closing five years of our half century 
 to witness the mightiest achievement in the way of home distri- 
 bution. The unhappy civil strife still fresh in our memory, 
 and whose sad mementos are every where, called our hundreds 
 of thousands from their homes over our whole land. Every 
 feeling of humanity and religion pleaded for every care and 
 provision for their welfare, and especially that they might have 
 the "Word of Life. Our auxiliaries did a noble work in their 
 fields — ^but the needs often exceeded their ability — whence, they 
 appealed for help, that every soldier might carry about him a 
 spiritual comforter and guide. The appeals were heard, the 
 grateful pressure increased, and it was found desirable to adopt 
 a system which should both facilitate the supply and distribute 
 it most wisely. Points were selected to which Bibles and Testa- 
 ments should be sent, and from which responsible hands should 
 carry them to the army and navy. The system was of such a 
 character and proved so successful as a basis, that it deserves a 
 place here : 
 
 I. To the Washington City Bible Society, for the army in Virginia, hos- 
 pitals, camps, prisons, and within their range of general operations. 
 
 II. For St. Louis, for use of the Christian Commission, and for distribution 
 from that point. 
 
 III. To the Louisville, Ky., Bible Society, to be distributed, under the 
 supervision of Mr. W. H. Balkley, its depositary, from that point down into 
 Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama. 
 
 IV. To the Maryland State Bible Society, for the army hospitals, forts, and 
 ships of war, in and around Baltimore, in Maryland, at Fortress Monroe, and 
 in adjacent parts of Virginia. 
 
 V. To the New York Branch of the Christian Commission, for a similar 
 distribution at and near Newbern, North Carolina, and parts adjacent. 
 
 VI. To the same, for' distribution in the same way at and near Beaufort, 
 South Carolina, and other parts of that State. 
 
36 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 VII. For New Orleans, to be tinder the charge of a special Agent to be 
 appointed, who shall supervise the distribution from that great centre, and 
 who shall, as far as may be practicable, co-operate with such gentlemen of the 
 Southwestern Bible Society as may be disposed to act in concert, and the Chris- 
 tian Commission. 
 
 Immediately liberal appropiSations were made. The first 
 under the arrangement amounted to 475,000 volumes. From 
 that time every power of our producing department was placed 
 under requisition, and kept so for three full years in succession. 
 "We look back with astonishment on the capabilities of our 
 arrangements for furnishing the supply required. The follow- 
 ing general statement will aid in the formation of a fair concep- 
 tion of them. During the pressure of 1863, 1864, and a part of 
 1865, we were enabled to produce, ready for distribution, an 
 amount which was equal to ten volumes per minute, embracing 
 all sizes and parts. The Society enjoyed the hearty co-operation 
 of its friends, whose liberality abounded ; its agencies were 
 happy to do the work with which they were charged. It was 
 unparalleled in the history of wars, as was that of the Sanitary 
 and Christian Commissions. To the Christian Commission 
 composed of volunteer labourers from the ministry, the col- 
 lege fraternity, the theological seminary, the counting room 
 the home circle, the sons' and the daughters of the Christian 
 family, we and our country cannot be too emphatic in bur 
 thanks, as theirs was a work of the highest Christian benevo- 
 lence, ministering to the bodily comfort of our brave soldiers 
 but especially to their soul's welfare, in circumstances of great 
 danger on the battle field, and under various exposures and 
 hardships, in the camps and hospitals, on the land and on the 
 sea. Through this channel were distributed 1,466,748 volumes 
 valued at $179,824 99. Theirs and ours has been the joy to 
 know that the most blessed fruits accompanied and followed the 
 united Christian services. The whole constitutes a model chap- 
 ter in the history of evangelical benevolence. The wise order- 
 ing of Providence enabled us thus to reach many a man who 
 had not been within our reach before, to revive the heart of 
 many a true Christian soldier, to impart comfort to many a 
 dying brave, and with the survivors, to send many a copy of 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 37 
 
 the Scriptures to liomes in the wilderness, and these made dear- 
 er by the circumstances in which obtained. 
 
 But it was not alone our army which was supplied. Large 
 appropriations were cheerfully made to those in conflict against 
 us. And, we are happy to record that our proper authorities 
 unhesitatingly and cheerfully allowed our Bible benefactions to 
 cross the lines to their destinations, and granted liberal use of 
 various public means of transportation. 
 
 Closely in connexion with these, where our arms were suc- 
 cessful, the Scriptures were sought for and sent through various 
 missionary societies to the freedmen of the South, whose thirst 
 for the precious Word was one of the happiest comments on 
 their appreciation of their changed situation. 
 
 It is pleasant to note here, that while our own armies at 
 home were receiving the Scriptures so eagerly, our Agent in 
 Germany was widely distributing them among the Austrian 
 army in the war with Denmark; following thus the example of 
 the lamented Righter, who, in time of the Crimean war, was 
 greatly successful in giving the Scriptures to portions of the 
 British army. 
 
 The missionaries of the several foreign missionary organ- 
 izations of our country have constituted another most important 
 channel of distribution. Having furnished in many cases the 
 translations required, they have become the means of supply to 
 vast multitudes who were without the Sacred Word. In many 
 cases, the entire work of preparation and printing has been done 
 abroad on appropriations by our Board; while in others, the 
 Scriptures have been sent from this country. Though distinct in 
 our organizations, the missionary and Bible societies of Christen- 
 dom become thus by mutual, and we may say, necessary co- 
 operation in the grandest efforts of Christian philanthropy, a 
 WoELD moving agency for good. In the use of this agency in 
 distribution as well as preparation, the Board have been govern- 
 ed by the following views : 
 
 1. They can pay for printing and binding of the Scriptures. 
 
 2. They can pay for storage of books when needful, and also for their 
 transportation to places of distribution. 
 
 3. They can pay for such native colporteur service by believers in the 
 
38 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 Bible as they may from time to time authorize and appoint, and as is confined 
 to the distribution of the Scriptures, and when the missionaries have not time 
 to perform this -work for themselves. 
 
 4. They may appoint, to aid in making and correcting foreign translations, - 
 persons of competent learning and skill ; such translations or corrections, when 
 prepared and made, to be subject to the action and decision of the Committee 
 on Versions and the Board, as is required by our by-laws. 
 
 What, then, is the sum of this half-century diffusion? 
 TJpon our own land our abundance has been poured out freely 
 and liberally, and constantly flows on. The aborigines of our 
 country, so rapidly pdissing away, hare been cared for. They 
 who go down to the sea in ships, and do business on the mighty 
 deep, have received the Word at our hands, and been made our 
 carriers of blessed treasures to the islands of both the great seas 
 on the east and west of us. We have planted ourselves on the 
 great continental peninsula south of us, and occupied posts in 
 'New Granada and "Venezuela on the north; at Eio and Euenos 
 Ayres on the east, sending the Scriptures up the mighty Ama- 
 zon, and the Lesser Orinoco, and the La Plata, into the interior 
 of Brazil and Buenos Ayres and Argentine Eepublic ; on the 
 west, at Yalparaiso in Chili, and at Lima in Peru. Soon may 
 the converging lines meet on the great central plateau ! With 
 hearty co-operation we have sent our aid to Bible brethren in 
 sunny France, and multiplied the sources of healthful Christian 
 life among the millions of disenthralled Italy. We have been 
 repaying the Keformation debt to the masses of Germany, sadly 
 corrupted by an infidel virus. Early we sent to Eussia the tes- 
 timonials of our interest in her vast populations. In Greece, 
 over Turkey in Europe, and in Asia, where American mission- 
 aries have gone, have they diffused the Scriptures, in whole 
 or in part, which American piety furnished. Down the West 
 African coast, and to various interior tribes, and around to the 
 Natal country, the printed message of mercy has been sent in 
 their own tongues. Over India have our brethren, in our 
 name, dispensed the precious substitute for the Shasters and 
 Zendavesta in various tongues. China, with her dense masses, 
 has to a degree received the Word in her own tongue, while 
 at the door of Japan the missionary is watching the opening, 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 39 
 
 to take in witli him at every commercial port his recent trans- 
 lation. 
 
 Truly the sun does not set on the immense area to which, 
 and through which, the American Bible Society, as the distrib- 
 uting reservoir of one form of American Christian liberality, is 
 sending the pure water of life to the millions upon millions of 
 immortal men. " Not unto us, Lord, not unto us, but unto 
 thy name be all the praise, for thy mercy and thy truth's 
 sake." 
 
 III. Let me ask your attention now to a third important 
 point, viz.. The facilities and co-operating agencies which have 
 teen enjoyed. 
 
 "Where so great a work has been accomplished, we naturally 
 decide there must have been instrumentalities adapted to secure 
 the results reported, and these a gracious Providence has fur- 
 nished us. 
 
 1. In the enumeration here to be made, a_;??'s^and special 
 place must be given to the form and cha/racter of our organi- 
 zation. Ours is a catholic institution ; and this has imparted to it 
 a special charm and attractiveness. Ours is a union of interests 
 and feelings and efforts. We occupy the ground common to all 
 who love our Lord Jesus Christ. We have no Shibboleth in 
 our relations here. On our frontal is the whole Bible — the open 
 Bible — the unshackled, free Bible. How this at once shuts 
 out agitations, anticipates and prevents jealousies, secures con- 
 fidence, developes love, gives power, and wins for it a way 
 among all, and a place in the hearts of all! We often hear 
 brethren in public remark and dwell on the catholicity of our 
 platform. We wonder not ; for there is a charm in it. Our Divine 
 Master has taught us all a most blessed lesson hereby — that 
 we are one in the same Saviour, and can walk together in the 
 same consecrated way. We are not parted off into narrow 
 in closures; we are like society itself, where there are family 
 interests and acts separate and peculiar, but where the aggrega- 
 tion constitutes a united whole, and all co-operate for the innu- 
 merable common interests in which we are alike sharers. Our 
 union has thus been a most persuasive appeal — a most elo- 
 
40 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 quent and moving fact; it has been a moral lever; it lias been 
 a key to unlock hearts ; and it must ever be so. 
 
 It is written indelibly on our Constitution, as expressed in 
 one of the Annual Reports : " We superintend the concerns, not 
 of a party, but of the whole body of Christians, who are united 
 in the National Institution for the sole purpose of distributing 
 the Bible without note or comment." While this has been such 
 an arm of power in " Bible work," it is a delightful thought 
 that its influence has been most widely felt in other relations. 
 There has been a growing feeling of regard towards each other 
 among Christian bodies, and efforts for closer union are the 
 happy characteristic of our times. Where now are those bitter, 
 acrid, injurious, unkind presentations of the opinions of others, 
 which in days past have been so common, and which gave the 
 world only the ideas of contention and sectarian hatred, to the 
 prejudice of piety as being both unlovely and undesirable? 
 Men have learned to respect each other more, and to estimate 
 at a proper value both the points in which they agree and in 
 which they disagree, and to recognise in each other, notwith- 
 standing various differences, followers of the same Saviour, and 
 co-workers in the same great Cause. May the blessed influence 
 go on, until we shall all feel how truly we are one ! 
 
 2. I mention as a second most important agency, in our suc- 
 cessful and advancing work, tlie obtaining of a local habitation. 
 We look back, and note with surprise how the conception and 
 plans for a National Institution were in contrast with the means 
 at hand. There was here an infancy which feels its way to 
 strength and progress. It is recorded, that " our Board com- 
 menced its work without a home ; it lived on hospitality. It 
 expresses its gratitude to the governors of the New York Hos- 
 pital, and also to the mayor of the city of New York, for their 
 kindness, promptly tendered, in granting them the use of rooms 
 in which for some time- they transacted business," and at the 
 time of this expression was accommodated by the New York 
 Historical Society. Its first place of deposite for books was in' 
 the office of its Agent, John E. Caldwell, Esq., at the corner of 
 Nassau and Cedar Streets ; then in a rear room, seven feet by 
 nine, in the printing office in Cliff Street; then in a building in 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 41 
 
 Sloat Lane, now Hanover Street, adjoining tlie Merchants' 
 Exchange, in a rear room twenty feet square (which it was 
 hoped, as a great point, would at length be filled) ; and then 
 its work and depository were in different places. As labour 
 increased, it was felt to be exceedingly inconvenient, and a bar 
 to progress, to have work done in different buildings, and with 
 little security, and an increased risk of incorrectness. The 
 fourth year foiind the Board necessitated to seek a building 
 which should supply the accommodations requisite for the sev- 
 eral departments, and entirely under the oversight of the Gen- 
 eral Agent. Soon after the sixth anniversary, a proper site was 
 secured in Nassau Street (now Nos. 115-119), and the building 
 was completed by the ensuing winter. Its internal arrange- 
 ments were well adapted to the purposes of the Society ; it was 
 three stories high and fifty feet front, and ran back to Theatre 
 Alley a depth of one hundred feet, contracted at its west end to 
 a width of thirty feet. Air the business of the Society was done 
 there, and for the time being it was practicable to carry on the 
 growing business with greater regularity and system, and main- 
 tain the proper supervision of each branch of work. Imme- 
 diately new tone was imparted to every form of work, and 
 greater interest given to the meetings of the Board in a capa- 
 cious hall. Such was- the inflowing prosperity, however, that in 
 1830 two additional lots adjacent were bought and occupied by 
 buildings, making a front of ninety-four feet on Nassau Street. 
 Here was a property, devoted exclusively to Bible work, worth 
 over $30,000, which private Christian liberality had erected and 
 paid for. It was at the time the most noble benefaction which 
 could have been made. The influence was felt throughout the 
 whole circle of our Bible friends, stimulating to new effort on 
 their part. 
 
 Great as was this work then, the enlarged blessings vouch- 
 safed in the lapse of twenty-four years constrained the Board to 
 make an effort for accommodations for operations bearing some 
 proportion to the calls for the "Word of Life. 
 
 After much inquiry and numerous discouragements, the 
 most desirable spot, where now stands the Bible House, was 
 purchased (containing three quarters of an acre), and the build- 
 
42 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 ing erected ; an object of increasing interest ttroughout our 
 land. Simple in its style, yet imposing in its noble dimensions, 
 looking over this vast city and central to its teeming population, 
 it cannot but be admired, every inch of it admirably adapted 
 to its purposes, and reflecting the greatest credit on the Commit- 
 tee charged with its erection, and so constructed as to become 
 a large annual contributor to Bible work. While we admire 
 this noble edifice for its architectural beauty and its benevolent 
 aim, we are not to forget that it is also the result of the gifts of 
 private munificence, costing over a quarter of a million, and 
 now estimated as worth more than $350,000.* It stands a glori- 
 ous testimonial of the largeness of views and wise estimation 
 of the immense uses for which it was to be employed. Its erec- 
 tion is a beautiful illustration of a far reaching faith, whose 
 correctness every year is confirming. After being paid for, the 
 rental of parts not needed for our work yields to the general 
 income of the Society a sum sufi[icient to pay the salaries of the 
 executive officers. Without the first building, the Society's 
 work must have been sadly dwarfed, and increased callscould 
 not have been encouraged ; and yet that building, so valuable in 
 its erection, in our progress proved very deficient. Without the 
 present house, or one equivalent, the work of the last five years 
 could not have been undertaken. Overwhelmed by the press- 
 ure, we must have given up in despair of ever meeting the most 
 remarkable opportunity of Bible circulation, providentially fur- 
 nished at our door, which will scarcely offer again. For the 
 future, we have in it a most suitable preparation. Trusting and 
 believing that God has still greater designs to accomplish by 
 the Society, we may rejoice that our noble House will be ready 
 for them. 
 
 3. That the Board have been able to avail themselves of 
 every typograjphical advantage, we mention as a thi/rd notable 
 circumstance in helping on the Bible work. 
 
 The printing of the Sacred Scriptures for our use was done 
 
 for a number of years by contract, and with the exception of 
 
 two years, by one house. This system was after the usage of 
 
 the British and Foreign Bible Society, and has its advantages 
 
 • See Appendix (D.), description of building. 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 43 
 
 and serious disadvantages. When the time of renewal of the last 
 contract had arrived, the whole policy was referred to a Special 
 Committeej composed of the most practical men in the Board. 
 The decision was not arrived at in haste. Every proper inquiry 
 was made ; printing and publishing firms were consulted ; the 
 report submitted presented the merits of the question fairly, and 
 was adopted by the Board of Managers, January, 1844. The 
 general views of the report deserve a place here, as the whole 
 mode of proceeding by the Society was altered from this 
 date. The conclusions were : " That the Society can do the 
 press work at one half the present prices. There will be a sav- 
 ing over the present system in paper. Having the printing 
 under our own control, we should avoid all collisions with the 
 printer as to the quantity of paper required for a given edition ; 
 as to the character of the ink, the manner of pressing the sheets, 
 of the delivery of the work and other minor matters, about 
 which such collisions have not been unfrequent, and which are 
 very unprofitable. 
 
 " We should be free from all ground of complaint of paying 
 extravagant prices to our printer, with which some portions of 
 our community have ever abounded, to the injury of our Bible 
 cause, and which our agents are now constantly meeting; for 
 whatever money might be saved by adopting this course would 
 be directly for the advancement of the great cause of the Bible, 
 and not, as now, for the benefit of the individual. This with 
 your Committee is a consideration of great moment." This 
 formed an epoch in the career of the Society, the wisdom of 
 which the successful course of twenty years has most satisfac- 
 torily manifested. The Managers were happy in obtaining a 
 suitable superintendent of its printing department, and it at 
 once introduced such improved processes as the advance of the 
 art brought within its reach. 
 
 Of the great arts of life, scarcely any branch has been more 
 improved than printing ; in the machinery employed, in typog- 
 raphy, the saving of composition by the use of plates, while 
 the capability and rapidity of production have increased many 
 fold. Of all this the Managers have been enabled to avail 
 themselves in their former house to a degree, but especially 
 
4:4 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 in the present. The use of simple type, of the hand press, 
 has been a marvel in its day, and so was the stereotype. The 
 facility of taking impressions, and of multiplying them to 
 many thousands, and still keep the face of the plates perfect, 
 enabled the printer to meet almost any demand. In our own 
 case, it enabled the Board always to keep in advance of all 
 demands, or meet them at short notice. From a set of stereo- 
 type plates, the large number of 350,000 impressions could be 
 taken before they were considered unfit for use. 
 
 In 1854, that greatest marvel of printing plates, the electro- 
 type, was first used in the Bible House. Since which, 36,000 
 electro plates have been made. The amazing fact has been 
 given me, that since April, 1856, three sets of pocket Testa- 
 ment electro plates have been worn out in the service, from 
 which 4,632,000 impressions have been made, being an average 
 of 1,544,000 copies from each. 
 
 The Printing Press has also reached a point of almost vital- 
 ized power. There are in the press-room fifteen (Adams') power 
 presses, capable of printing nearly 2,000,000 of the Scriptures in 
 a year, while provision has been made in the construction of the 
 press-room to increase the capability of printing one third.* 
 
 Let one look at the issues, and. he sees the result of the work, 
 and says. How can this be ? Let him look at these electrotj'pes 
 and steam presses, and he can answer his question, but it will 
 be with a feeling of surprise at the wonderful combinations 
 involved. What ability lies here to meet any amount of requi- 
 sition ! Some one has said : " No family in the land need be a day 
 without the Bible, if the auxiliaries are faithful." Happy day 
 will it be when this Society is put to the test of supplying the 
 Scriptures to meet such a movement. The history of the past 
 clearly shows how it will come up to such a new but most 
 desirable condition of circumstances. 
 
 4. A constant and increasing supply of ^pecuniary aid by 
 the lovers of the Bible is to be gratefully mentioned as a vital 
 agency in the work accomplished. 
 
 Money has been called the sinews of war ; so is it of every 
 
 » Provision has been made for the introduction of four additional power presBes 
 of the largest size. These have been ordered, and two are already in operation. 
 
JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 45 
 
 practical business operation of life. Armies cannot be raised 
 and sustained without it ; the affairs of commerce cannot be 
 carried on without it; the State cannot be maintained without 
 it ; no more can the great operations of Christian benevolence 
 be carried on without it. Some seem to think that prayer is all 
 that is necessary here, and their means are saved for other pur- 
 poses. Blessed be prayer ; but especially blessed in the divine 
 record is the case of him whose prayers and alms, or practical 
 benevolence, came up in unison before God. We have reason 
 to believe that this union has existed in many a case in our his- 
 tory. While the sincerity of the prayer has been attested by 
 the gift, the efficacy of both has been attested by the crowning, 
 responding blessing which has been poured out. 
 
 During the first year the Board, if not startled, were much 
 moved by the rush of calls for the Scriptures while their treasury 
 was low. Accordingly, in addition to all the circulars issued 
 over the land, arrangements were made to have this city dis- 
 tricted, and collectors go from house to house, to solicit contribu- 
 tions. If there were any fears for the incoming of means, they 
 were soon allayed ; for men's hearts and purses were opened, 
 and thousands were emulous to give something for the diffusion 
 of this best of books. The venerable bowed down with years 
 gave, and the cliild emptied his box of savings. There have 
 been many noble benefactors, to whom it has been a delight to 
 contribute of their abundance ; and the widow's mite, all her 
 living, has been also meekly deposited. The recent convert has 
 brought his thanksgiving offering ; and he rescued from the 
 borders of the grave has added his memorial. The father whose 
 prayers have been answered in the conversion of his children 
 has laid his gift upon the altar, with the outpourings of a full 
 heart ; and he whose children have been snatched from the 
 grave has linked them, by his benefactions, to the Bible cause. 
 Many in pity for the destitute, and many. from simple convic- 
 tion of obligation, have cast in their gifts. The living have 
 bestowed freely, and reaped the joy of the incoming harvest; 
 while others have provided for an effective remembrance of 
 their love for the Bible and deep interest in the perishing when 
 they have been gathered to their rest, and may watch at the 
 
46 
 
 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 heavenly portals for the coming converts. Large benefactions 
 have come ; so have many a thousand-multiplied farthings of 
 the little ones. The illustrations have been beautiful and con- 
 stant of what Dr. Chalmers designated "the power of littles." 
 I shall never forget the emphatic statement of Mr. John L. 
 Nitchie, long the General Agent, made many years ago at a 
 Bible Anniversary we attended by appointment, that "our 
 Bible work is sustained by the sixpences and the shillings." 
 Our auxiliaries see this constantly. The flowing in of these 
 streams — these many, many streams — ^has done for us wonderful 
 things. Let us look at the footings presented by decades : . 
 
 1st year 
 2d " 
 3d " 
 4th " 
 5th " 
 6th " 
 7th " 
 8th " 
 9th " 
 10th" 
 
 1816-17 
 
 1817-18 
 
 1818-19 
 
 1819-20 
 
 1820-21 
 
 1821-22 
 
 1822-23 
 
 1823-24 . 
 
 1824-25 , 
 
 1826-26 , 
 
 $37,779 35 
 . 36,564 30 
 . 53,223 94 
 . 41,361 97 
 . 47,009 20 
 . 40,682 34 
 . 52,021 75 
 . 42,416 95 
 . 44,833 08 
 . 53,639 85 
 
 
 
 
 $449,532 73 
 
 21st 
 
 rear 1836-37 . . 
 
 . $83,259 79 
 
 22d 
 
 " 
 
 1837-38 . . 
 
 . . 91,904 57 
 
 23d 
 
 
 1838-39 . . 
 
 . 79.545 24 
 
 24th 
 
 ^L 
 
 1839-40 . . 
 
 . . 94,880 24 
 
 25th 
 
 n 
 
 1840-41 . . 
 
 116,485 05 
 
 26th 
 
 ii 
 
 1811-42 . . 
 
 132,637 08 
 
 27th 
 
 11 
 
 1842-43 . . 
 
 124,728 77 
 
 28th 
 
 u 
 
 1843-44 . . 
 
 153,678 05 
 
 29th 
 
 " 
 
 1844-45 . . 
 
 159,738 68 
 
 30th 
 
 (( 
 
 1845-46 . . 
 
 196,182 48 
 $1,233,039 95 
 
 41st year 1856-57 . . 
 
 $441,805 67 
 
 42d 
 
 " 
 
 1857-58 . . 
 
 390,759 49 
 
 43d 
 
 u 
 
 1858-59 . . 
 
 415,011 37 
 
 44th 
 
 11 
 
 1859-60 . . 
 
 435,956 92 
 
 45th 
 
 il 
 
 1860-61 . . 
 
 389,541 52 
 
 46th 
 
 (( 
 
 1861-62 . . . 
 
 378,132 08 
 
 47th 
 
 (( 
 
 1862-63 . . . 
 
 422,588 00 
 
 48th 
 
 u 
 
 1863-61 . . . 
 
 560,578 60 
 
 49th 
 
 » 
 
 1864-65 . . : 
 
 677,851 39 
 
 50th 
 
 u 
 
 1865-66 . . . 
 
 642,625 64 
 
 11th year 1826-27 . . $60,194 13 
 
 12th " 1827-28 . . . 75,879 93 
 
 13th " 1828-29 . . 101,426 72 
 
 14th " 1829-30 . . 143,449 81 
 
 15th " 1830-31 . . 116,900 74 
 
 16th " 1831-32 . . . 86,875 18 
 
 17th " 1832-33 . ; . 83,556 03 
 
 18th " 1833-34 . . . 86,537 63 
 
 19th " 1834-35 . . . 98,306 29 
 
 20th " 1835-36 . . 101,771 48 
 
 $954,897 94 
 
 31st year 1846-47 . . $203,494 63 
 
 32d " 1847-48 . . .251,804 68 
 
 33d " 1848-49 . . 236,428 94 
 
 34th " 1849-50 . . 284,459 59 
 
 35th " 1850-51 . . 276,882 53 
 
 36th " 1851-52 . . 308,744 81 
 
 37th " 1852-53 . . 346,542 42 
 
 38th " 1853-54 . . 394,340 50 
 
 39th " 1854-55 . . 346,767 09 
 
 40th " 1855-56 . . 393,167 25 
 
 $3,042,632 44 
 
 1st decade $449,532 73 
 
 2<i " 954,897 94 
 
 3d " 1,233,039 95 
 
 4'h " 3,042,632 44 
 
 5* " 4,754,850 68 
 
 Total, $10,434,953 74 
 
 $4,754,850 68 
 
JtTBILEE MEMOEIAL. 47 
 
 Here you see the agency which has set up the printing press, 
 multiplied our electrotype plates, and has sent out millions of 
 volumes on a life giving errand. Can this he lost ? Ahjitisall 
 committed to the gracious One, who has moved the hearts of 
 the people, and who has said, " My word shall not return unto 
 me void, but it shall accomplish that whereto I sent it." 
 
 ?). The Christian countenance and co-oj>eraUon enjoyed is 
 to be mentioned as one of the special sources of animating 
 power. How trying and how painful is it to work alone! 
 How the heart sinks when without sympathy, without a word 
 of good cheer! How hard has it been found to persevere, even 
 in a right and good cause, without some favouring on-looker 
 and ally! This has not been our case. Opposition there has 
 been, and Bible burning there has been, by the blind followers 
 and tools of antichrist. Infidelity has sneered or amused itself 
 with our Bible fanaticism, as it would call it. But from a cloud 
 of witnesses, of men honoured and revered in the records of the 
 good, the great, the talented, and the useful, have come the 
 words of good cheer. Ours have been a John Quincy Adams, a 
 Kichard Yarick, a De "Witt Clinton, a Chancellor Kent, a Judge 
 M'Lean, a Bayard, a Yan Eensselaer, a Murray, an Irving, a 
 Butler, a Woodworth, and a galaxy of others, who on our pub- 
 lic occasions have borne strong and animating testimony in 
 behalf of our great enterprise. Over our whole land the voices 
 of representative men have given timely impetus to the work 
 in the fields occupied by our auxiliaries. While the clergy 
 might be expected to throw their influence into the Bible cause, 
 which is in its turn their most eificient ally, and have been our 
 warm and earnestly co-operating friends, from all the professions 
 have come the same strong notes of encouragement. From the 
 highest positions in the army and navy, from the professoral 
 chairs in our colleges and universities, from the counting room 
 and the shop, from the bench and the bar, from all classes and 
 conditions, there has been but one strain — " Go forward ; the 
 work is of Grod." We are not an ecclesiastical organization, 
 and propose in no way to mingle in ecclesiastical aifairs as a 
 society. Our prayer is for the prevalence of our common Chris- 
 tianity over the whole earth. Whatever may be our private 
 
^8 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 relations, our work here is of such a character, that we cannot 
 but be affected by the approbation and commendation of the 
 brethren of the denominations represented among us. We 
 record it frankly, that we and our co-labourers are moved to 
 greater effort by the favouring action of General Assemblies, Syn- 
 ods, Councils, Conventions, and Associations. We feel a greater 
 confidence in our Cause; our hearts are bound more firmly to- 
 gether in its promotion ; we tread more firmly over the path of 
 difficulty: we rise above discouragements more easily, as the 
 fathers and brethren are with us. 
 
 From abroad also has come to us the warm greeting and 
 hearty Christian salutation. Our Board in its first Eeport rec- 
 ognises the fact, that the British and Foreign Bible Society first 
 called attention to the importance of an American National 
 Society. When it was organized, their early gifts were most 
 opportune, and their cordial expressions of satisfaction in our 
 expanding operations have been uniform and often repeated. 
 In the time of our civil strife, apprehending some pressure on 
 our means of usefulness and the possible curtailment of plans, 
 they generously proffered a liberal pecuniary gift. Their kind 
 countenance has combined with their liberality in brightening 
 and strengthening the golden links of union. Co-labourers on 
 the continental field echo the Jubilee song and bid us " God 
 speed." All this and such as this along our entire pathway, 
 how can it but exhilarate, and give new energy, and call out 
 gi-eater effort ? 
 
 6. Our Agents through the country have claims on our 
 notice, in this connexion, of no ordinary character, as they have 
 been eminently an arm of power, and vigilant watchers over 
 Bible interests every where. The questions have been earnestly 
 discussed in various directions, whether agents were not instru- 
 ments who could be dispensed with, costing more than they 
 were worth — mere sinecures. It is true, any good plan may be 
 abused ; an agent may be a burden instead of a blessing, and 
 there may be an unwarrantable multiplication of them ; and of 
 course, then, the money paid them is wasted. So there may be 
 cases where they are not needed, other instruments and motive 
 powers being properly within reach, as is the case in strictly 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 49 
 
 denominational societies and boards. But with all deference 
 we say, in the general benevolent organizations they are neces- 
 sary. In such cases, there is nothing like the denomination tie 
 to employ. Every thing is on the broad ground of usefulness 
 and taking men as they are, and not as they should.be, which 
 we must do. JSTo general cause can flourish without carefully 
 selected agents. There is groat force in the adage we have- 
 heard from childhood, "What is everybody's business is no- 
 body's." The wise and right minded, earnest Agent is the arm 
 of a society, felt at the most distant parts of a field ; he is a con- 
 stantly acting spring ; he is a living mnemonic to faulty mem- 
 ories ; a moral express, conveying the last intelligence concern- 
 ing want and work; he is the substitute for many good men, 
 who are so pressed with other matters, yet loving the good 
 Cause, that they are ready to give their means when they can- 
 not give their time ; he is the ally of the pastor ; his office is the 
 opposite of a sinecure ; he holds all the social and domestic ties, 
 with all their tendernesses, at bay for his work's sake. In 
 many a section pf our country, in the transition from the wil- 
 derness state, he goes with his life in his hand. The societies 
 never pamper him; and hence he is, in effect, not unfrequently 
 the largest contributor to a good cause ; for he sustains it by the 
 greatest sacrifices. 
 
 Our Society has had and still has its Agents. The system 
 grew up under the necessities of the case, and it has thrived 
 through their services. Take them away, and the good Cause 
 would immediately languish, and the rapidity of the decline 
 would be in proportion as its parts were distant from the 
 centre of interest and of activity. It must be said, and it is said 
 with confidence, concerning our Agents as a body (for it is only 
 as such that we can on this occasion speak of them), they have 
 done a great and good work ; they have built up the Bible cause 
 in many a place, where previously not a movement had been 
 made ; they have kept alive interest and effort when they began 
 to decline ; they have revived societies which seemed ready to 
 die. Theirs it has been to investigate wants and bring home 
 appeals which have brought out the needed supplies. The plan 
 on which our agency department is organized is very simple ; is 
 
 J 
 
60 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 guarded at all points ; is economical ; is effective. "We owe it, 
 morally, every thing. Let us look at one month's report ; for a 
 faithful record of work done is kept, and has been from the 
 beginning. Let us take the stormy month of February as our 
 specimen : 
 
 During the month of February, reports were received froni thirty of the 
 Agents of this Society, and the following are the results of their labours : 
 Agents reporting, 30; auxiliaries and committees visited, 111 ; meetings held, 
 191; anniversaries attended, 46; auxiliaries and committees organized, 33; 
 sermons and addresses delivered, 230; letters and circulars sent, 8,656; miles 
 travelled, 12,562; amount of donations collected by the Agents, $7,797 65; 
 amount received by them from the sale of books, $4,061 06 ; amount remitted 
 by them to the Parent Society, $17,021 31 ; amount paid by them into the treas- 
 uries of auxiliaries, $2,465 78; amount of subscriptions secured, $2,092 95; 
 number of families visited in their fields, 24,001 ; number of destitute families 
 found, 1,046 ; number of destitute families supplied, 810 ; number of destitute 
 individuals supplied, 115 ; Sabbath schools supplied, 41 ; volumes circulated by 
 sale, 3,349; by donation, 2,068; value of volumes sold, $3,687 70; donated, 
 $1,065 64. Total receipts from sales and donations, $14,192 78. 
 
 Y. To the Board of Managers we give a special place in this 
 enumeration. 
 
 The provision of the Constitution is : "A Board of Managers 
 shall be appointed to conduct the business of the Society, con- 
 sisting of thirty-six laymen," etc. With these, various clergy- 
 men are associated in most of the Standing Committees, the 
 Constitution giving ministers who are life members " the same 
 power as the Manager himself." 
 
 The clerical representation in the Committees of the Board 
 has been taken from all the denominations participating in the 
 Society, and has been composed of the most active and influen- 
 tial men. Their time and attention and co-operation have been 
 most cheerfully given, and their wisdom has aided much in 
 shaping the business of the Board, and giving life and energy to 
 the whole working of the Institution. The speaker may say of 
 his brethren, that in the whole onward progress of the Society 
 they have constituted an indispensable agency for good. 
 
 The Lay Managers can scarcely be presented too strongly in 
 a fair account of the instruments which have built up the Nation- 
 al Bible Society. One wlio has been in the midst of them for 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 51 
 
 years, and has known many of them personally, and attended 
 their deliberations often through a range of some thirty years, 
 may speak of what he knows and has seen. They will excuse 
 me for saying what I deem due without asking their permission, 
 and of course, without previous knowledge of my purpose. 
 
 The Society was very happy in the selections of its first 
 Board, as all will say who knew the men. They were men of 
 practical wisdom ; loving the Cause for its own sake. Intelli- 
 gent, able, of known integrity, and selected for the service and 
 having the confidence of all. , They did a good work in carrying 
 the infant institution through its weak state and all its attend- 
 ant perils, to a condition of maturity and of strength. They 
 have gone to their rest and their reward, not one remaining to 
 be present with us this Jubilee. But they bequeathed their 
 precious charge to worthy hands. In the construction of the 
 Board of Managers, there has always been the wisdom of age 
 mingling with the earnestness of vigorous manhood ; they have 
 been men of various professions, pursuits, and conditions, 
 acquainted with the world, understanding thoroughly the com- 
 plications of business, intrusted with other interests of high 
 moment, men of principle, of character, of piety, placed in com- 
 mittees for which their pursuits fitted them. They have been 
 charged with heavy responsibilities — most momentous issues 
 were pended on their deliberations — their haU of meeting has 
 been a Senate Chamber. 
 
 The business of the Society very early developed itself in 
 such forms as . to require modifications of the first plans, and 
 there was necessarily a division of labour. The Committees are 
 as follows, viz. : on Publication, on Finance, on Distribution, 
 on Agencies, on Anniversaries, on Yersions, on Legacies, an 
 Auditing Committee, and one on Nominations. 
 
 By the plan adopted, every subject to be acted on passes 
 through the careful examination of its appropriate Committee, 
 and is then brought before the whole Board, and is again con- 
 sidered fully, if deemed necessary, and passed upon. When 
 difiicult and delicate questions are to be considered, they are 
 examined by larger committees, and by them recommended to 
 the Board or disapproved. Calmness, thoroughness, impartiality. 
 
52 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 intelligence, courtesy reign. In the Committee, -wliose meet- 
 ings are monthly, and oftener when required, the same fidelity 
 has reigned, and hours have been necessary to do the work. 
 
 For this work all the affairs of a man's own business were 
 laid by for the time — it was felt to be a solemn while it was 
 regarded as a pleasant duty thus to be engaged. Thus, men 
 have been occupied year after year, and the grand consideration 
 has been, to be useful in the cause of the Bible and of humanity, 
 and to voluntary services they have liberally added of their 
 means to the Bible Treasury. They have been and are the 
 main spring of action, while they are ever watchful guardians 
 and conservators of right action. Without such a Board of 
 Managers, so constituted, so animated, the great work never 
 could have reached its present magnificent dimensions. They 
 are the men under God who have made us what we are as an In- 
 stitution. I beg they will pardon me while I say, Noble men ! 
 you are the benefactors of millions ; we honour your principles 
 and your practice in this behalf : we ask for you the richest of 
 blessings. 
 
 8. The Presiding a/nd Executive auspices, under which our 
 onward course has been pursued, claim a special notice at this 
 point, may I not say, a crowning place in my narrative ? 
 
 How much depends on having a proper head — how much on 
 having a presiding mind — clear, well balanced, intelligent, 
 decided, and yet complaisant, possessed of sharp discriminations, 
 a breadth of view equal to the actual field of labour, and a just- 
 ness of estimation of both difiiculties and encouragements and 
 of the means of adaptation to each ; such a head a great enter- 
 prise demands. 
 
 It is matter of grateful note, that God both' raises up men 
 and fits them for exigencies. This was eminently verified in the 
 organization of this Society, the men who were active in the 
 work being the men for the time and for the great enterprise 
 to be undertaken. Their high character gave interest and tone 
 to the movement. All this was especially true of the men who 
 have successively presided over and occupied executive places in 
 the Board. 
 
 All eyes and hearts were turned to Elias Boudinot as the 
 
JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 53 
 
 first President, and he brought to the office a mind well stored 
 with various attainments — an eminently matured character — a 
 reputation, acquired in offices of high trust and responsibility 
 interwoven with our country's most critical period, without a 
 stain, and as wide as our country, and a depth and warmth of 
 piety which' was as characteristic as his integrity and intelli- 
 gence. Trained to the law, admitted to and presiding over 
 Congress in the final act which gave peace and an acknowledged 
 separate nationality to our country, and, having served his 
 country well, he gave the mellowness of his life to the direct 
 promotion of the spiritual interests of his fellow men. He had 
 already been long in the fellowship of the First Presbyterian 
 Church of Elizabeth, N. J., and for many years an active 
 Trustee, and at twenty-five years of age made its Treasurer. 
 
 On retiring from civil life, he took up his residence at Bur- 
 lington, N. J. " His heart expanding with the noblest principles 
 of Christian benevolence, he contributed liberally to institutions 
 whose objects were the* extension of literature and religion, and 
 his name is cherished among them as a munificent benefactor." 
 In his relation as President of the New Jersey Bible Society 
 (organized in 1809), he had seen the efficiency of united efibrt, 
 and longed and laboured most earnestly to see one grand cen- 
 tral movement, which should combine all the separate organi- 
 zations in the country. The organization of the American Bible 
 Society was one of the happiest events of his life. When he 
 was chosen to be its first President, he felt that he had received 
 the highest honour of an honoured life. 
 
 His liberal donations to the Society when in its weakness 
 placed it on a firm foundation. It has been well said : " This 
 splendid moral structure, the monument of the Protestant Chris- 
 tianity of the nation, is also in a special sense his monument. 
 A nobler one no man can have." Distinguished as a philanthro- 
 pist, a scholar, a patriot, and a Christian, he passed to his heav- 
 enly rest, after a pilgrimage of fourscore and one years. 
 
 The venerable Chief Justice, John Jay, the First Vice Presi- 
 dent, succeeded to the Presidency, and it may be truly said, his 
 name was a tower of strength. He was devoted to his country, 
 but even more devoted to the cause of Christ. It was in the 
 
54 jtfBILEE MEMOEIALi 
 
 time which tried men's souls that he entered upon public life, 
 and though not mingling in the conflicts of the field, he won 
 renown in the equally important field of Congressional action, 
 where he became the presiding mind, and with a noble band 
 gave form and shape to its deliberations and acts. Wise in coun- 
 sel, clear, sound, discriminating, among the most accomplished 
 civilians of his time,' he was the man to represent his country 
 abroad at any of the courts of Europe, and take an active, yes, 
 a leading part in the most delicate missions. A native JSTew 
 Yorker, he had at heart the interests of this commonwealth, and 
 sought her welfare and gave the form of her first Constitu- 
 tion, whose principles it were well if now in many respects 
 possessed. Descended from the persecuted Huguenots, as 
 was Boudinot, he drank in the spirit of liberty and a free 
 Christianity with his earliest breath. Having served his country 
 well, he retired to the quietness and simple charms of rural life 
 at Bedford, "Westchester County, N. T., and to religious culture 
 in the bosom of the Protestant Episcopal Church. We Cannot 
 but think of him as the Christian Sage, as in his retirement he 
 gave himself to the study of God's Holy Word, which had 
 been his "songs in the house of his pilgrimage," and in his 
 golden evening of a varied life was his chief comfort and joy. 
 His infirm state of health prevented his attendance at the anni- 
 versaries, but his addresses sent from his Patmos (I had almost 
 said), full of love, breathing the true Christian spirit, minister- 
 ing the soundest counsel, were inspiriting. There was a moral 
 power in his character which gave power to his words. 
 
 The year of his resignation, in consequence of his advanced 
 age, was one of solemn monition and bereavement to the Bible 
 cause. Yice Presidents Tilghman, Worthington, Phillips, and 
 DeWitt Clinton, whose great infiuence was given to the Cause 
 were gathered to their fathers. Had the last survived he 
 would probably have succeeded Mr. Jay in the chair which he 
 occupied with dignity and eloquence at the Anniversary of 1827. 
 
 But the same Providence which gave the first and second 
 Presidents gave us Eiehard Varick as the third, who had been 
 our first Treasurer and the first President of the New York Sun- 
 day School Union, one of the most honoured and honourable 
 
JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 55 
 
 men of our day. It deserves our special notice, that our first 
 three Presidents were heroes of the Eevohition— one in civil life, 
 two in connexion with the army, and one of these (the last) a 
 participant in the hard service of the battle field. It is true 
 then that the distinguished soldier may be also the distinguished 
 Christian. 
 
 Colonel Varick was of Holland descent, a stock which knew 
 the horrors of persecution for conscience' sake, and learnt in the 
 death of an army of martyrs, as the Huguenots did, the value of 
 a free Gospel and an open Bible. Colonel Varick early entered 
 the army as Captain of the First New York, and was advanced 
 rapidly to positions of responsibility, and became and continued 
 for years a most beloved member of "Washington's military 
 family. He was a man of great dignity of person, with great 
 kindness of manner, of marked business and executive ability, 
 of large heart, of firm purpose, of the sternest integrity, of strong 
 and controlling love for the cause of piety and of all good men. 
 He gave the whole weight of his social position, of his character, 
 of his liberality, and of his piety, to the advancement of the 
 Bible cause. He died in the occupancy of his office in his 
 seventy-ninth year. 
 
 The distinguished John Cotton Smith, of Connecticut, of 
 direct Puritan descent, one of the Vice Presidents from the 
 organization of the Society (the first President of the Connecti- 
 cut Bible Society, formed in 1809), was chosen as the fourth Pres- 
 ident of the American Bible Society. His position was among 
 the first men of the land. Esteemed one of the most accom- 
 plished gentlemen in the performance of his various public trusts 
 as adjudge, a Congressional representative, a State executive, he 
 crowned all with eminent piety. .The year 1810 witnessed the 
 organization of the American Board of Commissioners for For- 
 eign Missions, an institution whose blessed influence has been felt 
 over all lands, and is destined to be recognised as the most effi- 
 cient agency in our land in bringing on " the latter day g|ory." 
 In its success, Governor Smith felt the greatest interest. In 
 1823 he became its "Vice President, and in 1826 its President, 
 and continued such till 1841. He occupied for many years, 
 with winning grace of manner, the two positions of President 
 
56 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 of two of the most important institutions of the day. It was his 
 privilege to see both rise from small beginnings to great strength, 
 and the promise opening to both of a most snceessful future. 
 During thirty years connexion with Bible work, he had seen 
 those whose place was beside him in office pass away, and of the 
 thirty-six Managers, only a few remaining. He was spared to 
 see fourscore years and one, and to enjoy all the supports and 
 consolations of religion in his declining days. His memory is 
 tenderly cherished. 
 
 It was a kind Providence who gave us in April, 1846, as our 
 next President, the Hon. Theodore Frelinghuysen, then Chan- 
 cellor of the University of the City of J^ew York. Pew men 
 have so widely and so tenderly endeared themselves to every 
 circle with which connected as did he. Gifted with a most 
 kindly and generous temperament — intelligent, frank, confiding 
 and pure in all his principles, the friend of all ; it seemed as if all 
 were his friends. Bred a lawyer, he rose to the first rank in his 
 profession in his native State, ISTew Jersey, and representing her 
 in the Senate of the United States when it embraced a large pro- 
 portion of the greatest men our country has produced, he won the 
 highest respect for his devotion to noble causes and his marked 
 Christian character. It was his delight to be actively engaged 
 in doing good to his fellow men, and accordingly, all the great 
 institutions of the day received his warm support, while his Sab- 
 baths were given to the Bible class. It was a suitable testimony 
 to his character and his executive ability, that he was for six- 
 teen years President of the American Board of Commissioners 
 for Foreign Missions, succeeding Governor Smith ; for six years 
 (from 1842 to 1848) President of the American Tract Society, 
 and for sixteen years President of the American Bible Society, 
 and as such, closed his earthly career. For forty-five years he 
 had illustrated the excellence of the Gospel, in a harmonious and 
 beautiful Christian life, and enjoyed at its close perfect peace. 
 
 His name and character are familiar and dear in all the 
 churches of our land, and his removal was felt to be a great 
 public loss. 
 
 The Hon. Luther Bradish, connected with the Episcopal 
 Church, one of the Vice Presidents, was chosen to fill the 
 
JUBILEE MBMOEIAL. 5'7 
 
 vacancy in 1862. During several years after his predecessor 
 had removed to New Brunswick, to become the President of 
 Rutgers College, he presided at the monthly meetings of the 
 Board, and proved himself an admirable Chairman ; indeed, of 
 all the Presidents he would be called the great parliamentarian. 
 He gave hims||f most earnestly and devotedly to the business of 
 the Society, and by a most happy combination of dignity and 
 urbanity gave interest to all our meetings, and secured great 
 despatch in our business. 
 
 Less known among the churches generally than his prede- 
 cessors, he was, where known, esteemed a truly Christian man ; 
 liberal in his views and loving all good men, and freely mingling 
 in the interchange of Christian courtesies. In his political career 
 and in charge of high civil trusts, as a legislator and citizen, he 
 won the confidence of all. He has left his mark in the various 
 business interests of the Board. 
 
 He was not spared to us long as our presiding oificer. In 
 1863, in the monthly meeting of the Board in August, he per- 
 formed his last public service, and left us to close his life at 
 i!Tewport, R. I., at eighty years of age. 
 
 " It is a striking fact, in the lives of the Presidents of the 
 American Bible Society, that they all reached such advanced 
 ages with dignity and usefulness. Boudinot died aged eighty- 
 one years ; Jay, eighty-four ; Yarick, , seventy-eight ; Smith, 
 eighty-one ; Frelinghuysen, seventy-five ; Bradish, eighty ;" all 
 of them men of mark. - 
 
 But not these alone are to be regarded as our commenda- 
 tions to lovers of Bible diffusion — their moral excellence being 
 part of our capital. Close to them are to be placed the distin- 
 guished Secretaries, who have been the pilots of our richly 
 freighted craft through its onward course. The following have 
 served in that office, viz. : Eev. J. M. Mason, D.D. ; Eev. J. B. 
 Romeyn, D.D. ; John Pintard, LL.D. ; Eev. James Milner, 
 D.D.; Eev. S. S. Woodhull, D.D.; Eev. Thomas M'Auley, 
 D.D., LL.D. ; Eev. Charles G-. Somers ; Eev. ITathan Bangs, 
 D.D. ; Eev. John C. Brigham, D.D. ; Eobert F. "Winslow, Esq. ; 
 ■ Eev. Spencer H. Cone, D.D. ; Eev. Edmund S. Janes, D.D. ; 
 Eev. Noah Levings, D.D. ; Eev. S. Ireneus Prime, D.D. ; Eev. 
 
58 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 Joseph Holdich, D.D. ; Kev. . Joseph C. Stiles, D.D. ; Bev. 
 James H. M'Neill ; and Eev. Wm. J. E. Taylor, D.D* 
 
 The earliest performed their work without compensation, 
 heing pastors at the same time, but soon it was found that the 
 proper accomplishment of the rapidly growing work demanded 
 the entire time of the SecretarieSj and that they must be sustain- 
 ed by the Society. Circumstances required also that the num- 
 ber should be increased, and this was but the evidence of the 
 Society's prosperity. It is not praise, but the simple statement 
 of fact to say, they were strong men. The churches to which 
 they were attached gave them their high position before they 
 came to us, and what they had and what they were was given 
 to our service. They have pleaded our Cause through the land ; 
 they have kept a vigilant eye over all our interests at home and 
 abroad ; they have been our mediuni of connexion with all the 
 actors and co-operators in our work ; they have cheered the dis- 
 heartened, they have revived the declining; they have mapped 
 out the field of work for all; they have been always ready, 
 always pressing on, and in a sense, carrying us with them. The 
 documents prepared by them, the appeals and addresses made by 
 them, diffused every where, the various guides and manuals 
 written by them for every branch of service, the constant work 
 with all the Committees, their vast correspondence, their quar- 
 terly extracts, their monthly records of the progress of the 
 Cause, so many monthly telegrams sent through our Bible con- 
 nexions, constitute a great body of Bible Society literature. 
 Some of them have gone to their reward in the Master's pres- 
 ence, others have gone to other departments of Christian labour 
 and responsibility where blessings attend them.t Theirs has 
 been ever a great lever power. 
 
 lY. And now, standing on the verge of the half century, 
 what are our Pro ^ecfe.^ 
 
 We have reached a point of intelligent observation. With 
 all our experiences, our tests of principles, our success in over- 
 coming difficulties, our knowledge of our reliances, our multi- 
 
 * Since the Sermon was preached, Eev. T. Ealston Smith haa been chosen Secretaiy. 
 t See Appendix (E.) 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 59 
 
 plied appliances, we are qualified to make estimates for the 
 future. 
 
 To the inquiry, What are our prospects, what is before us ? 
 The outlook gives a definite, clear answer; it is that there is 
 work to be done— a great work, a glorious work, to be done. Let 
 not any be startled at this announcement. It is to be regarded 
 as a privilege, as a blessing, that there is work for us all to do. 
 Our Christian benefactions furnish the best training school for 
 all the better feelings of the heart, while they bring to us a pres- 
 ent sweet reward. Alas for us when the Master has no more 
 work for us. It will be the omen of a denial by Him ; it will be 
 the keenest rebuke to our past unfaithfulness if He refuse us a 
 place among his workers. "What a thought it would be that He 
 has no further use for us ! 
 
 In this department of Christian labour, work can never be 
 said to be done. The missionary may reach a point where he 
 may be able to retire from his labour in a given section, as he 
 may have seen his work crowned with such a succession of bles^- 
 - ings, that he may commit it to native Christians and native 
 preachers and pastors. !Not so with us; paradoxical as it may 
 be, our work is always done and always yet to be done ; that is, 
 while we satisfy present calls, others will constantly rise and 
 press us. Populations with us are constantly changing, not 
 only in the natural course of generation coming after generation 
 in the same region, but by the flowing out of multitudes over, 
 what is at^a given time, new territory. Thus new fields are 
 constantly in preparation for Bible work, and this tide of out- 
 flow through the discovery of new mineral lands is destined to 
 be greatly increased. 
 
 It is but a decade of years since the older portions of our 
 land were by one grand movement supplied, and yet from 
 the whole range of the Northern and Eastern and Northwestern 
 States, the intelligence meets us of the necessity of repeating the 
 process. "Where it would be little thought true, the number of 
 families without the Sacred Scriptures is painfully large. It 
 seems that the statements which years since stirred every heart 
 may be repeated to the letter, and be true. We cannot wonder 
 at this; new multitudes have grown to maturity and entered on 
 
60 - JUBILEE MEMOEIAIi. 
 
 family responsibilities ; accessions have come in largely from 
 other lands, and calls for these are independent of the loss of 
 the Sacred Yolume by carelessness, by wear and tear, and by 
 calamity. All this relates to a portion of the land where the 
 direct conflicts and ravages of war have not come. 
 
 "What must be the wants where war, always horrible, 
 even when just, has trodden with iron hoof and crushing 
 power ! Every traveller, every returning tourist fills our hearts 
 with sorrow and awakens our sympathy by the account of for- 
 tunes gone ; poverty and consequent distress reigning, sanctua- 
 ries burned, homes desolated. In all this, how fares the Bible ? 
 However prized, can it alone be saved ? No ; it goes in the 
 common ruin. Look every where over the Southern country, 
 and you see fields inviting most earnest labour, and hearts long- 
 ing for it and thankful for it. And this is the most uniting 
 work we can do. The Politician and the Statesman are busy 
 with the discussion of modes of reconstruction, and we are all 
 interested in it; but here we have the means of winning 
 hearts and annealing the broken parts in love ; it is a Chris- 
 tian reconstruction — not less valuable and effective, because it is 
 unostentatious and without the flourish of trumpets. 
 
 War has broken down every barrier and given us access to 
 millions to whom this Sacred Word is the most precious of boons. 
 The millions of Freedmen, made such by the results of war, 
 stretch out to us their imploring hands. Their need is urgent 
 in proportion to their former condition. Many had.> access to a 
 degree of religious privileges, but the great mass were in dark- 
 ness. Now, the way is fully open to do them good, and by 
 Christian processes flt them for the Divine will concerning 
 them. We look forward with hope concerning them ; but that 
 hope is interwoven with the fidelity of those who may bless 
 them with the means of Christian improvement and elevation. 
 
 Our Board at its recent meeting, the closing one of the 
 Jubilee year, declared its policy as to the new half century ; it 
 comprehends the full occupation and cultivation of the Ameri- 
 can field. What a glorious work it will be !* 
 
 But this is not all. We cannot intermit ; no, we must in- 
 * See Appendix (F.) ~ 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 61 
 
 crease, if possible, a hundredfold our work abroad. What has 
 been done seems but the "beginning ; it is but a mere impression 
 on the sad conditions of the pagan world. The millions we 
 speak of on our own continent are a mere fraction of needy 
 humanity in comparison with the hundreds of millions who 
 have no message of mercy, who have no Word of Life. The 
 mind is overwhelmed and the heart bleeds as we dwell on 
 the details furnished by the faithful missionary, the herald of 
 their wants. 
 
 To these millions we are most solemnly bound by the 
 pledges of the past. We cannot withdraw our hand from the 
 undertakings now in their infancy. We stand committed to the 
 Christian labourers now at the various outposts of Christian 
 civilization, and along the frontier line committed to Christian- 
 ity, committed to us by God. But there is no thought of draw- 
 ing back — if there were, the shades of our fathers in the Bible 
 work would rebuke us as unfaithful stewards in charge of the 
 highest of trusts. The keen rebuke, mingled with pity, would 
 come to us from a thousand associated Christian labourers in 
 other lands, who have followed our onward course with admir- 
 ing love, and who send us their hearty greeting at our Jubilee. 
 
 Here then is work — most blessed work. One of old wept 
 because he had no more worlds to conquer ; but ours are to be 
 tears, because they are so many parts of this vast world, after a 
 work of fifty years, which are still unblest with the Word of 
 Life; so mady worlds of difi'ering peoples for the truth yet 
 to conquer. 
 
 But here is nothing to discourage or lead us to falter a 
 moment. We are in a condition to do a greater work than 
 ever. Our facilities are many and are admirable. The manner 
 in which the pressure of the last five years has been met satis- 
 fies every one that our capabilities are equal to any emergency 
 which in almost any circumstances can occur. Divine Provi- 
 dence has fostered us and cherished us into such a degree of 
 strength, that we may be ready to respond to any call. This 
 has been his design in all He has done. 
 
 The fathers in the Bible work had, as they thought, large 
 views ; and so they had. But scarcely one probably took into 
 
62 JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 
 
 his earnest anticipation what has been done. More than ever is 
 there force in the maxim : " Expect grfeat things ; attempt great 
 things." We as the simple, natural employment of our internal 
 power cannot say what may not be done in coming years. 
 
 Add to our facilities our hea/riy co-labourers^ and what en- 
 couragement comes from this view. There is no doubt or 
 uncertainty here. It is simply a question of common fidelity, 
 not of iitniost ability. We are told of 5,232 Bible societies and 
 associations linked in common loving bonds in our Cause. 
 What an army of giving, praying hearts is here. If these do 
 their duty, is not here the arm of all moving power ? What is 
 too great a work for our National Society with such a reliance ? 
 Yes, and this co-operating army is not limited by the present; 
 instead of the fathers come np the children, born to this work. 
 But above all, who does not see that this is God^s work which is 
 before us, a work for the good of men ; but above all, a work for 
 his glory? May we not ask and look for his blessing? His 
 past kindness sheds a heavenly radiance over the future. It 
 puts into our lips the inquiry. Is any thing too hard for God? 
 Is then any thing too rich for Him to dispense, any thing too 
 rich to diffuse over the vast field from which he is gathering the 
 thronging family of the Kedeemer.? He has said, "Open thy 
 mouth wide, and I will fill it." He has not brought this Chris- 
 tian enterprise so far to forsake it. 
 
 My Brethren, ours have been contemplations of a peaceful 
 work, but we should take into our account, that we have 
 enemies to encounter in the conflict in which the Word " the 
 sword of the Spirit," is the only reliance. 
 
 There stands before us antichrist, grim, hoary, sending 
 out his emissaries" as of old, breathing the same spirit and 
 ready to imbrue his hands in blood (were he not withheld by 
 the conventionalities of a Christian civilization), as the bloody 
 scenes at Barletta in Italy, under the fierce denouncements 
 of ecclesiastical firebrands, brought to us within a few 
 weeks, attest. 
 
 It is generally believed that a trial of strength of Protestant 
 Christianity with Komanism is to be one of the great events of 
 the age, and that the encroachments of Eomanism and its aim 
 
JUBILEE MEMOEIAL. 63 
 
 at consolidation in our own country tend to hasten it. Let it 
 be so ; only let the Word of God go forth to the people ; let it go 
 unshackled, and the result will be glorious for a pure evangel- 
 ism. Popery has never been able to stand before an open, free 
 Bible. Hence the studied efforts and the exercise of a ghostly 
 authority to keep the Word of God from the people, and the 
 hostility to hear it merely read in the schools. 
 
 Some are startled by the increase of Romanists in our land ; 
 they need not be, for it can be readily accounted for by reference 
 to accessions by emigration and by natural increase. The gain 
 from Protestantism, though displayed with a flourish, is insignifi- 
 cant as a whole, and limited mostly to pupils in Papal schools 
 and various educational houses, while on the other hand, the 
 Bible has won multitudes to the true Gospel of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, whom no society record has published to the world. In 
 this conflict of trutli with error, " the weapons of our warfare are 
 not carnal," no civil enactment is asked, no pains and penalties, 
 but simply to let the Word go free and the individual conscience 
 to be unshackled. We see then what in the coming years must 
 be the work of every Bible society, and of every member of the 
 evangelical churches in our land. 
 
 But the enemy seeks to carry his unhallowed end under the 
 garb of science, and even in ofiicial religious robes to pare away 
 the carved work of the Temple of Eevelation, and undermine its 
 claim to Divine origin. Solemn obligations and subscriptions 
 are violated in the effort, and the common considerations which 
 bind men are disregarded. Let infidelity, in whatever garb, do 
 its work ; only send the simple Word of Truth abroad, and it 
 will hold its own and prevail. The Bible is its own witness ; its 
 amazing adaptations bring it very near to the hearts of a sorrow- 
 incr, sin-stricken race. There is about it, and in it and its acces- 
 sories, that which impresses the mind with the idea of its 
 divinity. 
 
 If these two forms of opposition are to contest the control of 
 the mind of the coming generations, the course of duty is made 
 very plain and urgent ; it is, to place the Bible in whole or in 
 part in every man's hand, and we need not a prophet to tell the 
 result. The past has made the record. The Word of Life has 
 
64 JUBILEE MEMORIAL. 
 
 been attacked by keen minds ; it has encountered fierce oppo- 
 sition in every age, and now, though the mode of attack has 
 assumed new forms, the Eock will be found immoveable ; only 
 let those who love the Bible do their duty. The God of the 
 Bible is with his own Word. 
 
 My Brethren: — From the morning of Thursday next, we 
 enter upon a new epoch in the history of our ITational Bible 
 Institution, and in the most favourable circumstances, with 
 every thing to encourage and call out energy. A solemn, 
 touching scene occurred at the closing meeting of the Board's 
 work on Thursday last. There stood a venerable surviving 
 clerical member of the convention which formed the Society 
 (one of the last two). Dr. Gardiner Spring. There were gath- 
 ered about him many impressing circumstances ; advanced 
 far on in his journey to the better land, a most faithful friend 
 of the Cause — infirm, his heart overflowing with Christian 
 love, standing where he had often stood, in tender tone he 
 told us of those who were gone with whom he had laboured ; he 
 uttered himself as feeling as if this were his last meeting with 
 the Board ; it was the half centwry just ending, giving its last 
 counsel to the half century gust entering ^ its plea was for the 
 work to be done. Touching, solemn appeal ! shall not we hear 
 it whose heads blossom with the evidences of threescore years ? 
 Shall not the mature and vigorous hear it ? Shall not they 
 just putting on the harness of labour hear it ? Before God are 
 we not ready to say. We hear it, we will heed it? In a few 
 days the Jubilee call will gather in solemn meeting a great 
 assemblage of friends and co-labourers, who will come from the 
 JSTorth and the South, from the East and the West, to bear their 
 gladsome testimony to the kindness and abounding blessing of 
 the God of the Bible, and shall it not be also for solemn conse- 
 cration to the work now so widely inviting our efforts ? God 
 grant it may be so, and add his crowning blessing,* and 
 To Him shall be all the Glory. 
 
 ' See Appendix (G.) 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 (A) Samuel J. Mills was a remarkable man, and was made in the 
 providence of God a most honoured instrument in the advancement of the 
 Redeemer's kingdom, and thereby blessing his fellow men. He was born in 
 1783 of pious parents (his father being a clergyman), at Torringford, in Con- 
 necticut. He enjoyed the faithful instruction and pious care of his excellent 
 parents for some sixteen years, when he left home for the purposes of edu- 
 cation. In his fifteenth year, he was awakened to a proper consideration 
 of his condition as a sinner in the time of a wide spread revival, and for 
 two years was the subject of a most unhappy state of mind. When he 
 " found peace in believing " and " rejoiced in hope of the glory of God," 
 his feeling, as expressed to his father, was, " that he could not conceive of 
 any course of life in which to pass the rest of his days, that was so pleas- 
 ant as to go and communicate the Gospel salvation to the poor heathen ;" 
 and this was in harmony with his pious mother's aim concerning him from 
 his birth. From that hour, his whole life had one direction, as was shown 
 in his studies, his associations, his reading, his labours. God honoured him 
 early as an instrument of good to his fellow men, as when in college a 
 precious visitation of mercy was granted in connexion with his Christian 
 faithfulness and prayers. He soon unbosomed himself to his fellow students, 
 who became distinguished missionaries afterwards : Gordon Hall and James 
 Richards, for many years in India. Soon others joined the little group, 
 and by the hay stack, in a meadow near Williams College, in prayer and 
 fasting they prepared for their life work. The result in Divine providence 
 was the formation of a society of Inquiry in their own college, and similar 
 societies in other colleges and in theological seminaries, and at length, the 
 formal, solemn offer of themselves to be sent to the heathen, by the General 
 Association of Massachusetts Proper, in June, 1810. Very soon this was fol- 
 lowed by the formation of the American Board, and a goodly company, 
 influenced largely by the earnest appeals of Mr. Mills, embarked under its 
 auspices for the highest work of the Church, bearing the Gospel of salva- 
 tion to the perishing. 
 
 After his licensure, Mr. Mills mingled largely with Christian men, 
 clergymen, and laymen, in every proper form, and with earnest, winning, 
 and simple manner urging on various forms of Christian effort. Dr. Griffin, 
 President of Williams College, said : " I have been in situations to know, 
 that from the counsels formed in that sacred conclave (referring to the meet- 
 ings of Mills and his little company for prayer and conference), or from 
 
 5 
 
66 APPENDIX. 
 
 the mind of Mills himself, arose the American Board of Commissioners for 
 Foreign Missions, the American Bible Society, the United Foreign Mission- 
 ary Society, and the African School, under the care of the Synod of New 
 York and New Jersey, besides all the impetus given to the Domestic 
 Missions, to the Colonization Society, and to the general cause of benevo- 
 lence in both hemispheres." He then adds : " If I had any instrumentality 
 in originating any of these measures, I here publicly declare, that in every 
 instance I received the first impulse from Samuel John Mills." 
 
 To the interests of Africa he gave himself finally. On the 16th of No- 
 vember, 1817, he left his home as an Agent of the American Colonization 
 Society, and when arrived at his field of labour, he was occupied with un- 
 wearied efforts in the way of freq^uent and protracted conferences with the 
 native kings along the coast to accomplish his object — that of opening a 
 way for the settlement of coloured emigrants from this country. 
 
 It was his last work. Having fully prepared the way for the Coloniza- 
 tion Society, he left Sierra Leone on his return voyage; was taken ill 
 while at sea, and after a conflict of nearly a fortnight with disease, he 
 was called home. He gently closed his hands on his breast as if to en- 
 gage in some act of devotion, and while a celestial smile settled upon his 
 countenance, and every feature expressed the serenity and meekness of 
 his soul, he ceased to breathe. "No monumental marble records his worth;" 
 his monuments are the great and blessed agencies he was so largely instru- 
 mental in organizing, and while they live, his memory lives. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 67 
 
 (B) MEMBEES OF THE CONVENTION 
 
 ■WHO FORMED THE AMflRICAN BIBLE SOCIETY ; CONSTITUTED, BY THE BOAKD OF 
 MANAGERS, DIRECTORS FOR LlFE. 
 
 Basset, Eev. John, D.D., Bustiwick, Long Isl- 
 and, N. Y. 
 
 Bayard, Samuel, Princeton, N. J. 
 
 Beecher, Eev. Lyman, D.D., Secretary of the 
 Convention^ Cincinnati, Ohio. 
 
 Biggs, Rev. Thomas J., Cincinnati, Ohio. 
 
 Blatchford, Rev. Samuel, D.D., Lansingburgh, 
 N.Y. 
 
 Blythe, Rev. James, D.D., South Hanover, In- 
 diana. 
 
 Bogart, Eev. David S., New York. 
 
 Bradford, Eev. John M., D.D., Albany, N. Y. 
 
 Burd, William, St. Louis, Missouri. 
 
 Caldwell, John E,, New York. 
 
 Callender, Levi, Greenville, N. Y. 
 
 Chester, Eev. John, D.D., Albany, N. Y. 
 
 Clarke, Matthew St. Clair, Washington, D. C. 
 
 Oooley, Eev. Eli F., Monmouth, N. J. 
 
 Cooper, James Fehnimore, New York. 
 
 Day, Orrin, Catskill, N. Y. 
 
 Eddy, Thomas, New York. 
 
 Ford, Eev. Henry, Elmira, N. Y. 
 
 Forrest, Eev. Eobert, Eoseville, N. Y. 
 
 Griscom, John, LL.D., Trenton, N. J. 
 
 Hall, Eev. James, D.D., Statesville, N. C. 
 
 Henshaw, Et. Eev. J. P. K., D.D., Providence, 
 E. I. 
 
 Hornblower, Joseph C, LL.D., Newark, N. J., 
 Vice President. 
 
 Humphrey, Eev. Heman, ;D. D., Pittsfleld, 
 Mass. 
 
 Jay, William, Bedford, N. Y., Vice President. 
 
 Jones, Rev. David, Holmesburgh, Pa. 
 
 Lewis, Eev. Isaac, D.D., Greenwich, Ct. 
 
 Linklaen, Gen. John, Cazenovia, N. Y. 
 
 M'Dowell, Eev. John, D.D.,'.PhiladelpMa, Pa. 
 
 Mason, Eev. John M., D.D., New York. 
 
 Milledoler, Eev. Philip, D.D., New York. 
 
 Morse, Eev. Jedediah, D.D., New Haven, Ct. 
 
 Mott, Valentine, M.D., New York. 
 
 Mulligan, William C, New York. 
 
 Murray, John, Jr., New York. 
 
 Neil, Eev. William, D.D., Philadelphia, Pa. 
 
 Nott, Eev. Eliphalet, D.D., Schenectady, N. Y. 
 
 Oliver, Eev. Andrew, Springfield, N. Y. 
 
 Piatt, Eev. Isaac W., Athens, Pa. 
 
 Proudflt, Eev. Alexander, D.D., New York. 
 
 Eice, Eev. John H., D.D., Virginia. 
 
 Eichards, Eev. Jas., D.D., Auburn, N. Y. 
 
 Eomeyn, Eev. John B., D.D., Secretary of the 
 Convention^ New York. 
 
 Sands, Joshua, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 Sayres, Rev. Gilbert H., Jamaica, N. Y.' ' 
 
 Sedgwick, Eobert, New York. 
 
 Skinner, Ichabod, Washington, D. C. 
 
 Spring, Eev. S., D.D., Newburj-port, Massa- 
 chusetts. 
 
 Spring, Eev. Gardiner, D.D., New York. 
 
 Swift, Gen. Joseph G., Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 Taylor, Eev. N. W., D.D., New Haven, Ct. 
 
 Van Sinderen, Adrian, Brooklyn, N. Y. 
 
 Vroom, Guysbert B., New York. 
 
 Wallace, Joshua M,, President of the Conven- 
 tion^ Burlington, N. J. 
 
 Warner, Henry W., New York. 
 
 Williams, Eev. John, New York. 
 
 Williams, William, Vernon, N. Y. 
 
 Wilmur, Eev. Simon, Swedesboro', N. J. 
 
 WoodhuU, Eev. George S., New Jersey. 
 
 Wright, Charles, Flushing, L. I., N. Y. 
 
 EIBST BOABD OF HANA6EBS. 
 
 HENRY EUTGEES. 
 JOHN BINGHAM. 
 EICHAED VAEICK. 
 THOMAS PAEMAE. 
 STEPHEN VAN EENSSELAEE. 
 SAMUEL BOYD. 
 GEOEGE STICKLEY. 
 DIVIE BETHUNB. 
 WILLIAM BAYAED. : 
 PETEE M'CAETEE. 
 THOMAS SHIELDS. 
 ROBERT EALSTON. 
 JOHN E. B. EODGEES. 
 DE. PETEE WILSON. 
 JEEBMIAH EVAETS. 
 JOHN WATTS, M.D. 
 THOMAS EDDY. 
 WILLIAM JOHNSON. 
 
 ebbnezee bheeill. 
 andrew giffoed. 
 geoege gosman. 
 thomas carpenter, 
 leonaed blbekee. 
 john caldwell, 
 ehfus king, 
 thomas stokes, 
 joshua sands. 
 6e0ege waenee. 
 de witt clinton, 
 john waedbe. 
 samuel bayaed. 
 duncan p. campbell, 
 john aspinwall. 
 john mueeay, jun. 
 charles weight, 
 coenelius heyer. 
 
68 APPENDIX. 
 
 OFFICEES OF THE AMEEICAN BIBLE SOCIETY. 
 
 President, 
 HON. ELIAS BOUDINOT, New Jersey. 
 
 Vice Presidents, 
 HON. JOHN JAY, New York. 
 MATTHEW CLAEKSON, Esci., New York. 
 HON. SMITH THOMPSON, New York. 
 
 JOHN LANGDON, New Hampshire. 
 " CALEB STRONG, Massachusetts. 
 " WILLIAM GRAY, Massachusetts. 
 
 JOHN- COTTON SMITH, Connecticut. 
 " JONAS GALUSHA, Vermont. 
 
 WILLIAM JONES, Rhode Island. 
 ISAAC SHELBY, Kentucky. 
 GEORGE MADISON, Esq., Kentucky. 
 HON. WILLIAM TILGHMAN, Pennsylvania. 
 BUSHEOD WASHINGTON, Yirginia. 
 WILLIAM WIRT, Esq., Virginia. 
 HON. CHARLES C. PIfrCKNEY, South Carolina. 
 " WILLIAM GASTON, North Carolina. 
 
 THOMAS WORTHDSfGTON, Ohio. 
 " THOMAS POSEY, Indiana. 
 " JAMES BROWN, Louisiana. 
 JOHN BOLTON, Esq., Georgia. 
 HON. FELIX GRUNDY, Tennessee. 
 ROBERT OLIVER, Esq., Maryland. 
 JOSEPH NOURSE, Esq., District of Columbia. 
 
 Secretary for Foreign Correspondence. 
 REV. DR. J. M. MASON. 
 
 Secretary for Domestic Correspondence, 
 REV. DR. J. B. ROMEYN. 
 
 Treasurer. 
 RICHARD VAEICK, Esq. 
 
 (D) ARABIC SCRIPTUEES, 
 
 THE ACTION OF THE BOARD OF MANAGERS. 
 
 The Board of Managers, at its regular meeting, on the third day of 
 November, 1864, unanimously adopted the following report, which was 
 first presented unanimously by a Committee consisting of the Standing Com- 
 mittees on Distribution, Publication, and Finance : — 
 
 Having beard all the correspondence in the hands of the Secretaries in 
 reference to it, and had a free interchange of views, they are constrained 
 to regard the electrotyping of the Arabic Version of the Scriptures by the 
 Syrian Mission, as one of the most important undertakings which can 
 claim the aid of the American ' Bible Society. The version, it appears has 
 been most carefully made, and by the most competent scholars on the field 
 
APPENDIX. 69 
 
 wheTe it is first to be used; and has been approved by the Missionaries of 
 various evangelical bodies represented therein. The statement made by the 
 Mission in their last communication is worthy of note : " As touching the 
 fidelity, excellence, and unsectarian character of the translation, it is import- 
 ant to notice that this has been the work of the Mission — not of an individ- 
 ual or individuals. It is not of yesterday, but has occupied sixteen years 
 of almost consecutive labour in preparation and execution. The Mission 
 set apart to it those who by endowment and by study seemed pre-eminently 
 fitted for its prosecution." 
 
 The names of the translators — of Dr. Eli Smith, to whom it was given 
 to lay the foundation of the work, and of Dr. Van Dyok, by whom it has 
 been completed — are ample guarantee to all linguists conversant with the 
 facts of the case, that both with respect to conformity t6" the original 
 tongues and in rendering into Arabic, as excellent and faithful a translation 
 has been secured as could be secured in any language. Besides these trans- 
 lators, chosen from their own number, the Mission has employed the best 
 native talent that could be procured in the country to make the translation 
 elegant as well as faithful, that it should conform to the native style of 
 expression and to the highest standard of literary taste, and they believe that 
 they have been peculiarly favoured in securing coadjutors of so high repute 
 from both Christian and Mohammedan scholars. A still further guarantee 
 to the fidelity of the translation, and one which applies also to its unsec- 
 tarian character, is that each sheet of the translation, before being finally 
 printed, was submitted to the careful scrutiny of all the members of the 
 Mission : to interested native scholars of all sects ; to other American Mis- 
 sionaries besides themselves; to English, German, Scotch, and Irish Mission- 
 aries of diiFerent religious denominations and in different parts of this 
 empire (these proof-sheets being about thirty in number) ; that criticism has 
 been freely invited and courted, has been offered and duly weighed, and 
 from all these quarters have come warm and unqualified expressions of 
 approbation and confidence. 
 
 The field to which this version is adapted is vast, embracing the Ara,bic- 
 speaking population, extending from the Straits of Gibraltar to Peking, 
 from the Caspian to the interior of Africa, numbering from one hundred and 
 twenty millions to one hundred and fifty millions of immortal beings. 
 
 Taking these circumstances into account, the Committee agree that 
 while it is important, it is desirable that the work solicited by the Mission 
 should be accomplished. 
 
 While viewing the matter thus, the Committee are met by the fact that 
 the present financial condition of the Society does not seem to warrant the 
 assumption of the responsibility involved in undertaking the entire work at 
 once but warns us to proceed cautiously by arrangements for electrotyping 
 such portions or forms as may be most urgently called for, to such extent 
 as the means of the Society will allow, trusting and believing that the 
 
YO APPENDIX. 
 
 friends of the Society, bo soon as the subject can be brought before them, 
 will supply the means for completing the whole, as recommended by the 
 Syrian Mission. 
 
 The Committee accordingly recommend the adoption of the following 
 resolutions : 
 
 1 Resolved, That the completion of the version of the sacred Scriptures 
 In the Arabic tongue by the American Missionaries m Syria, and widely 
 app*ved by tie S scholars in the East, is a subject for universal thanks- 
 giving among the friends of Bible circulation. 
 
 2° Resolved, That the electrotyping of this version in the fornis recom- 
 mended by the Syrian Mission is a work in the highest degree important 
 and desirable, and may well be undertaken by the American Bible Society. 
 
 3 Resolved That while the present condition of our Treasury does not 
 encourage the assumption of the responsibility involved in attempting at 
 once the whole series desired by the Mission, the Secretaries, General 
 A"ent and Publication Committee be, and are hereby authorized to make 
 the necessary arrangements for electrotyping four sets of plates which the 
 Committee on Versiofis may regard as most proper to be first undertaken. 
 
 4 Resolved, That the Secretaries of this Society be, and are hereby au- 
 thorized to ask of the American Board of Commissioners of Foreign Mis- 
 sions the release of Dr. Van Dyck from their service for the time necessary 
 to superintend the work. . 
 
 5 Resolved, That if such release be granted. Rev. Dr. Van Dyck be in- 
 vited to come to this country, at the expense of the American Bible Society, 
 bringing with him his son to act as his assistant in superintending the 
 electrotyping in the Bible House. 
 
 6. Resolved, That as for the completion of this great work, as recom- 
 mended by the Syrian Mission, this Society must rely on the liberality of 
 the friends of Bible circulation, the Secretaries be, and are hereby requested 
 to present it in all its importance to the Christian Churches and our Auxili- 
 aries as far as practicable throughout our country, in such modes as may, 
 with the Divine blessing, secure all needed funds. 
 
 I. EXTRACTS FROM THE REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON MAKING DUPLICATE 
 PLATES OP THE ARABIC BIBLE FOR THE BRITISH AND FOREIGN BIBLE 
 SOCIETY. 
 
 " Let us furnish to our British friends all the plates they require, and 
 let us accord to them the largest liberty to print and to circulate wherever 
 there are human hands to receive them, or souls to be saved by their bless- 
 ed truths. This will, we think, be the performance of only a sacred duty — 
 the discharge merely of a sacred trust. But will it not be something be- 
 sides ? will it not be another recognition of that sacred brotherhood in our 
 glorious Bible work, of which our British brethren were so generously and 
 so promptly mindful in those dark days as we were entering upon the strug- 
 gle for' our nation's life?" 
 
 ' J* , . • * ■ * * * 
 
APPENDIX. Tl 
 
 "These are the views which the Committee think have a bearing upon 
 the particular question referred to them by the Board; but they likewise 
 feel that there is one broad and comprehensive fact which underlies and 
 controls this entire subject. It is this : 
 
 " That God in his providence has committed the guardianship and circu- 
 lation of his Blessed Word to the two great Protestant nations of the earth 
 and to the two national Societies as the instruments of carrying out this 
 purpose. Our field is the world. ' The seed is the Word of God.' No 
 particular part of this broad work belongs of right to either Society exclu- 
 sively, except so far as God in h's providence may afford to one a more 
 ready access and greater facilities than to tho other. But in this great 
 work of evangelizing the world we shQuld press forward side by side, 
 with one heart and one purpose. Neither should they 'call aught of the 
 things they possess their own;' but all things should be in 'common,' 
 and all for the Master's use. Translations should be used interchangeably, 
 and any advantage or facility secured by one Society should be a gain to 
 the Cause and to all who love it. In this way alone can we accomplish 
 most for the salvation of a dying world, and in this way best secure the 
 blessing of Him whose truths we both desire to spread, and whom we 
 both desire to serve." 
 
 The following are the resolutions of the Board of Managers on this 
 subject : 
 
 Resolved, That we most cordially accede to the request of the British 
 and Foreign Bible Society, and will make for them duplicate electrotype 
 plates of such editions of the Arabic Scriptures now in course of prepara- 
 tion by us as they may designate, without charge. 
 
 Resolved, That our compliance with this request of the British and 
 Foreign Bible Society be accompanied by the largest liberty for the free 
 and unrestricted use of these plates, with their own imprint, conditioned 
 only, that no alteration be made in the plates without the consent of this 
 Society. 
 
 11. RESPONSE OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE BRITISH- AND FOREIGN BIBLE SO- 
 CIETY, DATED LONDON, APRIL 16, 1866. 
 
 Resolved, That the committee have received with peculiar satisfaction 
 the noble offer of the American Bible Society to present, to this society, 
 frefe of charge, duplicate electrotype plales of such editions of the Arabic 
 translation of the Scriptures prepared by the Rev. Dr. Van Dyck, as the 
 committee may select from the series which it is intended to issue in con- 
 nexion with the Jubilee of the American Bible Society; and ihe commit- 
 tee, while accepting the liberal proposal, desire heartily to reciprocate the 
 kind and Christian sentiments by which it has been dictated, and to convey 
 to the Board of the American Bible Society the assurance of their waimest 
 gratitude for the generosity evinced in. regard to the work in question, and 
 trust that the transaction, so honourable to those with whom it originates, 
 may tend to strengthen the many friendly ties which unite the two Societies 
 in their great enterprise of Scripture circulation throughout the world. 
 
A Specimen of the Type used pok the JSew Aeabic Bib3,e, translated by the 
 Kev. Doctors Eli Smith and C. V. A. Van Dtck, of the Syria Mission, 
 A B.C.F.M. Begun by De. Smith in 1847, and finished by Db. Van Dtce, 
 August, 1864. Punches, matrices, types, and electrotype plates, made by the 
 American Bible Society, at the Bible House, Astor Place, New York. This 
 ■work commenced August, 1865. First plate electrotyped March 15, 18bb. 
 Gen. xxxi. 3a-33. 
 
 -i 
 
 . .iVJo Vo- (i ■0;3\i . x\j\ 4jtj.*- SJ-;-^ 0'^])^ iJ^J '*•'" 'CjpA 
 
 . JVx.^ S^ j<-*^ lP-^" f^j ""^ • ^.^i^ ^^'^. ci'^V^ ^ v. d\L^ 
 
APPENDIX. T3 
 
 (D) THE BIBLE HOUSE. 
 
 "In 1851 the inability of the Managers tQ enlarge their operations so as 
 to meet the increasing demands for the Scriptures induced them to appoint a 
 special committee for the purpose of procuring suitable grounds for a new and 
 larger edifice. This Committee consisted of Pelatiah Perit, Norman White, 
 Charles N. Talbot, George D. Phelps, and A. Robertson Walsh, Esqs. As 
 a number of contiguous lots were required, and in an accessible locality with 
 an abundance of light and air, the Committee for a time were baffled in 
 their efforts, and not a little disheartened. At length their attention was 
 called to a plot of ground near the now central part of the City, which 
 seemed to be peculiarly adapted to the object they sought. The same im- 
 pression was made on the minds of the Board generally, and indeed, on all 
 friends who gave the matter an examination. As another has observed : 
 ' Thrice had this site been appropriated to other a,nd far different uses, 
 and thrice had the arrangements signally failed on consummation. An 
 overruling Providence seems to have reserved it for its own present and 
 higher purposes.' 
 
 " The entire plot was purchased, consisting of nearly twelve lots, or three 
 quarters of an acre, and the Building Committee appointed to arrange without 
 delay for covering the whole with a substantial house. This Committee 
 consisted of George D. Phelps, Norman White, Charles N. Talbot, A. Rob- 
 ertson Walsh, and James Suydam, Esqs., Managers, with the Hon. Luther 
 Bradish, one of the Vice Presidents. 
 
 " On the 29th June, 1852, the corner stone of the new building was laid in 
 the presence of a large assembly. Prayer was offered by the Rev. Nathan 
 Ban"s D.D. ; portions of the 119th Psalm were read by Rev. Dr. Ferris, 
 and addresses delivered by the President, the Hon. Theodore Frelinghuysen, 
 Rev. Dr. Spring, Hon. Luther Bradish, and the Rev. Dr. Stiles. The follow- 
 in" books and documents were deposited in the corner stone : 1st, copy of 
 one of the first Bibles published by the Society in 1817 ; 2d, copy of the 
 last Bible published in 1852; 3d, the thirty-six Annual Reports of the 
 Society in four volumes ; 4th, the Bible Society Record of the last three 
 years • 5th, catalogue of the Society's Library; 6th, Report of the Committee 
 on Versions in relation to the late collation of the English Bible; 7th, 
 Report of the Board in regard to the principles of making translations ; 
 8th a programme of the exercises of this occasion, with a copy of the Presi- 
 dent's Address." 
 
 DESCRIPTION OF THE BUILDIUe. 
 
 " The Building Committee thus describe : It is bounded by the Fourth Av- 
 enue, Astor Place" Third Avenue, and Ninth Street, and is six stories high, 
 with cellars and vaults. 
 
 " The front on Fourth Avenue is one hundred and nmety-eight feet nine 
 inches ; on Astor Place, two hundred and two feet, ten inches; on the Third 
 
li APPENDIX. 
 
 Avenue, seventy-six feet, eleven inches, and on Ninth Street, two hundred 
 and thirty-two feet, sii inshes, and fifty feet in depth, having a large area 
 in the centre. The cellars are eight feet six inches high; the first story, 
 twelve feet ; the second story, thirteen feet ; the third story, eleven feet ; the 
 fourth story, ten feet four inches ; the fifth story, ten feet ; the sixth story, 
 nine feet four inches ; all in the clear between floors and ceilings. 
 
 " The fronts on Fourth Avenue and Astor Place are divided into five 
 sections each. The two ends and centre sections have a projection of twelve 
 inches in front, and also extend above the intermediate sections ; and there is 
 also a centre section to the front on Ninth Street, with a projection of twelve 
 inches. The principal entrance on Fourth Avenue is decorated with four 
 round columns with Corinthian capitals and moulded vases resting upon 
 panels, and moulded pedestals and semi-circular arches are placed between 
 the columns to form the heads of doors, etc., and all surmounted with a 
 heavy cornice and segment pediment. 'The whole of the building is faced 
 with Philadelp'jia pressed brick, and surmounted by a cornice formed with 
 ornamental trusses, blocks, panels, etc. The centre section on Fourth 
 Avenue and also the centre section on Ninth Street and Astor Place have 
 segment pedestals. There are four principal entrances to the building, be- 
 sides others for the operatives. A portion of the first, second, and third 
 stories is arranged to be let for offices and stores until the Society may need 
 them. The Managers' Room is located on the second story on Fourth Av- 
 enue, and is thirty feet wide by fifty feet deep, perfectly fire-proof, and 
 lighted by a dome. The room is twenty-five feet high. Immediately under- 
 neath is the room for bound volumes of letters and library, also perfectly 
 fire-proof.* 
 
 " The boilers are placed in the inner area or yard, so as not to expose the 
 operatives to danger in case of accident. The press room occupies the fifth 
 and sixth stories on Ninth Street, and is one hundred and nineteen feet long 
 by forty-one feet in width. The whole establishment is so planned that" 
 from the delivery of the paper in Ninth Street, it proceeds regularly through 
 its various stages of manufacture until it arrives in books in the Deposi- 
 tory, with but very little labour in hoisting from one story to another. Great 
 attention has been paid to the subject of heating and ventilating the various 
 departments.! In this respect, as well as in all others, the Committee have 
 aimed to erect a building adapted in all its parts to the purposes for which 
 it is wanted, and worthy of the Holy Book for whose universal* dissemina- 
 tion the American Bible Society is labouring. 
 
 " This noble edifice, erected for the best of 9,11 purposes and at a consid- 
 erable expense (some $300,000 with the ground), has not, as the Mana-'ers 
 
 . Underneath this room are two strongly built arched vaults, one of which is used 
 as a workshop by the engmeer, the other as a depository for stereotype and electro- 
 
 f To accomplish the former purpose, there are throughout the building more 
 than ten miles of steam pipe. ° uujiuiug moic 
 
APPENDIX. T5 
 
 would emphatically state, been put up at the cost of those in city or country 
 -who gave their funds for Bible distribution."— Dr. Striekland's History. 
 
 (E) EXECUTIVE OFFICERS. 
 
 The Society, since its organization, has had seven prey/i'ents, to wit: in 
 1816, Hon. Elias Boudinot; in 1821, Hon. John Jay; in 1828, Hon. Richard 
 Varick: in 1831, Hon. John Cotton ^mith; in 1846, Hon. Theodore Freling- 
 huysen; in 1862, Hon. Luther Bradish ; and in 1864, James Lenox, Esq. 
 
 It has had seventy-five vice presidents in different periods of its history, 
 comprising some of the most distinguished laymen of the country. 
 
 The following have acted as its secretaries, to wit : Eev. J. M. Mason, D.D. ; 
 Rev. J. B. Romeyn, D.D. ; John Pintard, LL.D. ; Rev. James Milnor, D.D.; 
 Rev. S. S. WoodhuU, D.D. ; Rev. Thomas M'Auley, D.D., LL.D. ; Rev. Charles 
 G. Somers: Rev. Nathan Bangs, D.D.; Rev. John C. Brigham, D.D. ; Robert 
 F. Winslow, Esq. ; Rev. Spencer H. Cone, D.D. ; Rev. Edmund S. Janes, D.D. ; 
 Rev. Noah Levings, D.D. ; Rev. S. Ireneus Prime, D.D. ; Rev. Joseph Holdich, 
 D.D.; Rev. Joseph C. Stiles, D.D. ; Rev. James H. M'Neill; Rev. Wra. J. R. 
 Taylor, D.D.; and Rev. T. Ralston Smith. 
 
 The treasurers of the Society, in their order, are as follows: in 1816, Hon. 
 Richard Varick; in 1820, Wm. W. Woolsey, Esq. ; in 1828, John Adams, Esq. ; 
 in 1832, Garret N. Bleeker, Esq., for five months; in 1832, Hubert Van 
 Wagenen, Esq. ; in 1836, John Nitchie, Esq.; in 1838, Abraham Keyser, Esq.; 
 and in 1840, William Whitlock, Jr., Esq. 
 
 In the year 1839, Joseph Hyde, Esq., was appointed the Society's General 
 Agent and Assistant Treasurer. 
 
 In the year 1853, Mr. Henry Fisher was appointed Assistant Treasurer j 
 and in 1854, Mr. Caleb T. Rowe was appointed General Agent. 
 
 Of these ofiioers a marked proportion have passed to their eternal rest. To 
 those clerical Brethren known to me and with whom I have had relations 
 more or less particular, it is decorous that I pay my tribute of respect and 
 affection in this connexion. 
 
 The Rev. John M. Mason, S. T. P., stands out with special prominence 
 as one of the strongest men our country has produced. Blest with unusual 
 powers of mind, and enjoying every facility for their cultivation in this country 
 and abroad, as he entered on his ministerial work he called out universal 
 admiration as the successor of a venerated father in the pastoral office. As a 
 pulpit orator he has had no superior; as a Professor of Theology he possessed such 
 a faculty of condensing thought, and a clearness and precisiori of statement, and 
 power of argument with a wide range of view, that his instructions were 
 esteemed invaluable. As a college instructor in the higher classics, both Latin 
 and Greek, he was unrivalled : for to thorough scholarship and the nicest ap- 
 preciation of the characteristics of each author read by his classes, he added a 
 remarkable power of illustration. He was of a warm, generous, confiding na- 
 ture ready always to sympathize with sorrow, although his noble form and 
 the dignified movement which his Maker had given him led some to think he 
 
16 APPENDIX, 
 
 was cold and haughty. He -was truly a laborious man (his friends thought 
 unwisely so) ; at the time the Bible Society was formed he was the pastor 
 of a large church and congregation, and conducted his two Sabbatical services ; 
 he was a Theological professor, and was punctually in his placp ; and in the 
 office of Provost of Columbia College he had charge of the senior class in 
 Latin and Greek, and was rarely a moment out of time: and these were his 
 sei-vices for years, while besides he had all the usual duties of a pastor out of the 
 pulpit, wdth many engagements and calls incidental to his high position. If 
 pleased God to spare him for years to see the increasing prosperity of our 
 Society, whose powerful and matchless appeal to the Christians of our country 
 came from his pen. At length his system gave way under the pressure on it, 
 his mind was impaired, though he to the last was able to bear his testimony to 
 the truth, and died in the bosom of his family. 
 
 Rev. John B. Romeyn, D.D., the first Recording Secretary, was the beloved 
 pastor of the Cedar Street Church, the parent flock of the Church on University 
 Place and 10th Street, and that of the Church on 19th Street and 5th Avenue. 
 In 1816 he was in his prime, being one of the most animated and captivating 
 preachers in the city, around whom numerous young men of New England 
 origin gathered, and known in his Pi-esbyterial relations as a man of great 
 executive ability and business tact, and promptness. He was regarded as one 
 of the most influential clergymen in the Presbyterian Church in our country. 
 His family was of Holland origin, and himself one of a succession of ministers 
 in a family, which at the present time in its branches has a strong representa- 
 tion in the pulpit of the fourth or fifth generation. He is especially remembered 
 as the author of a Report to 'the General Assembly of his church, which is to- 
 day quoted as authority on the duty of the Church to her children. He was a 
 man of great activity of mind, as well as of personal habits, and was a most 
 important man to the Bible Society. 
 
 Rev. Dr. Thomas M'Aulet, D.D., LL.D., came to the pastoral office in this 
 city from the Professorship of Mathematics in Union College, enjoyin" a high 
 reputation for varied scholarship and success as an instructor, and great elo- 
 quence as a preacher. Soon his power was felt, and he was honoured not only 
 with a densely crowded audience, but with large increase to the communion of 
 his church. He was indefatigable in all the details of pastoral work and 
 especially in the successful maintenance of a large Bible class for adults. The 
 Bible Society had no warmer or more untiring friend, or one more ready for 
 any emergency than he. For years he stood in the foreground of active work- 
 ers, and as a representative of our Society was warmly greeted wherever he 
 went to plead our Cause. In his latter years he was a subject of great infirmity. 
 
 The Rev. Selah S. "Woodhull, D.D., was connected with the Reformed 
 Protestant Dutch Church, and a pastor in Brooklyn, L. I., at the time of his 
 
APPENDIX. 17 
 
 • 
 appointment as Secretary. He ranked with the foremost in his denomination, 
 and for some time occupied a place in the service of the General Synod, which first 
 called out his admirable administrative abilities, and proved him a capital bus- 
 iness man. As a preacher he was clear, precise, and pointed, and won for him- 
 self the confidence of some of the best men in Brooklyn, who personally or 
 through their families to a degree became in time the nucleus of the great 
 church expansion which has occurred in Brooklyn. He brought his methodical 
 excellence into his Secretaryship, and carried the work to a still higher degree 
 of success. His reports were clear, suggestive, and always attentively heard. 
 The General Synod of his church, estimating highly his ability, appointed him 
 its Professor of Pastoral Theology in the Seminary at New Brunswick, N. J. 
 He entered on his new work with great earnestness, and was beginning to 
 realize a proportionate success, when the Master took him to himself. 
 
 The Rev. Nathan Bangs, D.D., was one of the leading spirits of the 
 Methodist Episcopal Church, in which he filled some qf the most responsi- 
 ble pos/tions. For several years he was one of the chief Managers of the 
 Publishing House in Mulberry Street, and successively editor of the Chris- 
 tian Advocate and Journal, the chief ofiicial organ of his church, and of the 
 Methodist Quarterly Review; for several years Corresponding Secretary of 
 the Missionary Society, and finally, President of the Wesleyan University. 
 He was one whom his own denomination delighted to honour for his fidelity 
 to its interests and the good service he rendered, while at the same time he 
 delighted to behold and to acknowledge Christian character and action in 
 other churches, and to contribute his portion in doing good in any department 
 of Christian effort. Few men have commanded a wider influence or have 
 been more extensively known. His Christian character grew in interest, 
 and matured more and more with advancing age, until he was gathered 
 into the heavenly garner like a shock of corn fully ripe. From his long 
 residence in this City and his marked appearance, he was very generally 
 recognized, and few men have been more missed in our community. He 
 died on the 12th day of April, 1862, aged eighty-four yeai-s. 
 
 In the month of June, 1844, the Rev. E. S. Janes having been elected 
 Bishop in the Methodist Church, the Rev. Noah Levings, D.D., was elected 
 in his place Financial Secretary. He was very highly esteemed, not only 
 in his own denomination, but by the Christian public generally. He pos- 
 sessed a warm Christian heart, a fertile mind, a vivid imagination, and a 
 natural eloquence that rendered him always welcome and generally effec- 
 tive in advocating the Cause of the Society. He travelled very extensively 
 in all parts of the country on his ofiicial business, making mbre than one 
 extended journey to the West and South. In the Autumn of 1848, he made 
 his last tour, travelling nearly four thousand miles over very bad roads and 
 through much exposure to the weather and other inconveniencies. Under 
 the pressure his health gave way, but he still persevered in his mission 
 
78 APPENDIX. 
 
 until the 24th of December, -when he preached his last sermon in the 
 Pi-esbyteriau Church at Natchez. From this he endeavoured to reach 
 home, but he was able to get no further than Cincinnati. Here, at the 
 house of a kind friend, he breathed his last on the 9th day of January, 1849. 
 It is not undeserving of notice in this place, that when some one in 
 the course of his illness placed a large Bible under his pillow to raise his 
 head, observing the letters on the back, he exclaimed : " Thou blessed book ; 
 lamp to my feet and light to my path ; thou guide of my youth, director of 
 my manhood, and support of my declining years ; how cheerless would this 
 world be were it not for thy Divine revelations and Christian promises." 
 Thus died Noah Levings, in full faith of the Redeemer whom he loved 
 and served, and to the circulation of whose Sacred Word he had devoted 
 his last years. The truths he had promulgated with ability and success, 
 sustained and cheered him in his final honrs. 
 
 The Rev. John-C. Bhigham, D.D., was the first Corresponding Secre- 
 tary whose entire time was given to the ofiice, all his predecessors, having 
 sustained pastoral responsibilities, and necessarily dividing their time be- 
 tween the two offices. 
 
 The change was indispensable both as regarded the men themselves, 
 pressed with heavy pastoral duty, and the rapidly expanding work of the 
 Society, which has indeed so increased, that three Secretaries find their 
 hands fall, and the calls of duty multiplying. 
 
 Dr. Brigham came into the ofiice with all the qualifications which a care- 
 ful and extended education could give him, to which was added a large ac- 
 quaintance with the wants of our field, both in the United States and the 
 South A erioan Peninsula, and a very extended acquaintance with the 
 clergy. Few men will be found in any department of life of greater, far- 
 seeing wisdom and more thoroughly balanced mind than he possessed. He 
 was especially skilled in the knowledge of men, and would succeed where 
 difficulties and entanglements and opposition would discourage ordinary men. 
 
 Long was he spared to us, though being tried in his last year by infirm 
 health, his work was limited mostly to consultations and advice. His loss 
 was deeply felt, though his influence and faithful work will continue to 
 bless men. 
 
 Rev. James Milnor, D.D., was invited in the summer of 1816 to be- 
 come the rector of St. George's Church in this City, and in September 
 entered upon his parochial duty, and soon connected himself with the 
 various benevolent societies which began their work about that time. His 
 parish and he were animated with the same spirit of liberal action and stood 
 with t e foremost in the Sunday school work, then enlisting- the interest 
 and energies of the churches in the City. He became the second President 
 of the New York Sunday School Union, and for a number of years occupied 
 
APPENDIX. T9 
 
 that place to the satisfaction of all. As a preacher, he was distinguished 
 for the highly intellectual as well as truly evangelical character of his 
 services, and was heard with great gratification by multitudes beside his 
 immediate parishioners. From the organization of the American Tract So- 
 ciety, in which he took a leading part, he occupied for a long period the 
 chairmanship of its executive committee, and down to his death that of its most 
 important committee on Publication, where soundness of judgment was espe- 
 cially required. With warm preference for his own form of church order, he 
 was of most catholic spirit, and always maintained intimate Christian fellow- 
 ship with clergymen of other churches. He became connected with the 
 American Bible Society, directly after removed to this City, and after 
 serving for one year as Secretary for Domestic Correspondence, succeeded 
 Dr. Mason as Foreign Corresponding Secretary, and occupied that responsi- 
 ble place in connexion with his pastoral duties for twenty years. For many 
 years he was chairman of the Committee on Versions. His removal by death 
 created a deep sensation throughout all the churches, for all felt that he 
 belonged to the cause of piety. 
 
 The Rev. Spencer H. Cone, D.D., of the Baptist Church, must be pro- 
 nounced a rare man, whether his breaking away from the fascinations of a 
 highly successful stage career for the Gospel of Jesus Christ, or his careful and 
 thorough self-tuition in theology, or his eloquence in the pulpit and on all pub- 
 lic occasions be considered. It is not too emphatic to say he stood with the 
 strongest men of his denomination at the time of his official relation with us, 
 and in his work as a minister was blest with seeing church after church built 
 up through his instrumentality. He felt it his duty to separate from our ranks 
 in consequence of the action on the versions made by geveral of his mis- 
 sionary Brethren in the East, which all his fellow labourers with whom 
 he had often taken sweet counsel regretted, but in their obligation to the 
 catholic principles of our Constitution could not remedy. His personal friend 
 and brother in the Baptist faith. President Wayland, of Brown Univer- 
 sity joined in that regret, while he expressed fully his agreement with the 
 course of action adopted. 
 
 Dr. Wayland's account closes thus : 
 
 Dr. Milnor's preamble and resolutions, with the addition suggested by Dr. 
 Sharp, were passed by the Board, and to the best of my knowledge, form at 
 present the rule of its proceedings in respect to versions of the Scriptures in 
 foreign languages. They are in these words : 
 
 " By the Constitution of the American Bible Society, its Managers are, in 
 the circulation of the Holy Scriptures, restricted to such copies as are without 
 note or comment, and, in the English language, to the version in common use. 
 The design of this restriction seems to have been to simplify and mark out the 
 duties of the Society, so that all the religious denominations of which it is 
 composed might harmoniously unite in the performance of these duties. 
 
80 APPEITDIX. 
 
 "As the Managers are now called to aid extensively in circulating the 
 Sacred Scriptures in languages other than the English, they deem it their duty 
 in conformity with the obvious spirit of their compact, to adopt the following 
 resolutions as the rule of their conduct in. making appropriations for the circu- 
 lation of the Scriptures in foreign tongues : 
 
 "1. Resolved, That in appropriating money for the translation, printing, 
 and distribution of the Sacred Scriptures in foreign languages, the Managers feel 
 at liberty to encourage only such versions as conform, in the principles Of their 
 translation, to the common English version, at least so far that all the religious 
 denominations represented in this Society can consistently use and circulate said 
 versions in their several schools and communities. 
 
 "2. Resolved, That a copy of the above Preamble and Resolution be sent 
 to each of the Missionary Boards accustomed to receive pecuniary grants from 
 this Society, with the request that the same may be transmitted to their several 
 missionary stations where the Scriptures are in the process of translation ; and 
 also that the said several Missionary Boards be informed that their application 
 for aid be accompanied with a declaration that the versions which they propose 
 to circulate are executed in accordance with the above resolution." 
 
 I close with the declaration that I cannot perceive how, consistently with 
 the principles of its Constitution, the Bible Society could have adopted any other 
 rule. It is equally required by the dictates of justice and of common sense, and 
 it breathes the spirit of fraternal equality and Christian courtesy. It has there- 
 fore my cheerful and unwavering support. 
 
 F. Watland. 
 
 With all this, we give Dr. Cone the meed of high praise in his able and 
 eminently useful ministerial work. 
 
 (F) RESUPPIY. 
 
 The resolutions of the Board marking out the labour to be entered on in the 
 new half century, which Dr. Spring seconded, and in behalf of which he made 
 his most touching speech, which has been referred to, were as follows : 
 
 Whereas, God in his gracious providence has conducted this Society from 
 small beginnings to a degree of strength and capability which fit it for accom- 
 plishing a greater work than ever, and has signalized our Jubilee year as a 
 year of peace and universal freedom throughout our land : and 
 
 Whereas, it appears, from the correspondence of our Secretaries, that mul- 
 titudes throughout our older States are found destitute of the Word of Life : and 
 
 Whereas, through the desolations of war, great want of the Scriptures 
 exists in the South and Southwest, and the means of supplying it by former 
 Bible organizations there existing have been swept away : and 
 
 Whereas, millions of freedmen, now thrown upon their own efforts and 
 passing through a most critical formative state, need the great charter of duty 
 and privileges, and are anxiously asldng for it : 
 
 • Resolved, That while this Society feels deeply its obligations to the world 
 and will go on in its work abroad, it is clearly the duty of the American Bible 
 
APPENDIX. 81 
 
 Society and its mimerous friends to respond to these indications of what God 
 ■would have us to do, by at once entering upon the supply of this vast field 
 of want. 
 
 Resolved, That it is highly befitting that this should be the first work of 
 our second semi-century. 
 
 Resolved, That with the aid of the gracious Head, which has done so much 
 for us in the past, we will without delay undertake this truly American work, 
 and call upon all lovers of the Bible and our country to unite with us. 
 
 At the late Jubilee Anniversary of this Institution, which was held in the 
 Academy of Music, May 10th, 1866, the following resolution was unanimously 
 adopted by the Society : 
 
 Resolved, That, relying upon the providence and grace of the Almighty 
 God, this Society hereby approves the resolutions adopted by the Board of 
 Managers at their last meeting, to undertake without delay a third general 
 supply of the whole country with the Word of God — a work which is eminently 
 befitting us as an acknowledgment of Divine goodness in the past, and a proper 
 beginning of our second half century. 
 
 At the regular meeting of the Board of Managers, held July 2d, 1866, they 
 adopted unanimously the subjoined plan for accomplishing this great work : 
 
 1 . Resolved, That it be earnestly recommended to the local Bible societies 
 throughout the country to adopt measures for supplying with the Bible, as 
 early as practicable, all destitute families within their respective limits. 
 
 2. Resolved, That, in prosecuting this work, regard should also be had to 
 children and youth, who have great need of the Scriptures for Sabbath school 
 and other purposes, and who should be furnished with the New Testament, at 
 least, as far as possible. 
 
 3. Resolved, furthermore. That seamen, boatmen, railroad handsj stag(j 
 drivers etc., who are favoured with few Sabbath privileges, have increased 
 necessity for the written Word of God, and should be furnished with it ; and 
 that special attention should be given to the supply of the freed people of the 
 South, in their schools, families, churches, etc. 
 
 4. Resolved, That in entering on the proposed undertaking, it will be for 
 the benefit of all concerned, that a portion at least of the funds required for the 
 purchase of books be raised and forwarded when orders for books are made. 
 The Parent Society will thus be furnished with ready means for preparing books 
 with economy, and the auxiliaries saved from a protracted, disheartening debt. 
 
 5. Resolved, That in effecting the proposed supply by the auxiliaries, it is 
 desirable that the work be performed, as far as possible, by self-denying volun- 
 teers each taking an assigned district ; and that when hired labourers are 
 necessary, they be sustained, as far as practicable, by the local societies ; and 
 aid from the Parent Society, when needed, be sought in the way of books, 
 rather than funds, for colportage. 
 
 6. Resolved, That the various auxiliaries, as they enter on the proposed 
 supply be requested to inform this Board when they commence their labours, 
 and also furnish the results when the work is completed, that the same may 
 be published in the Bible Society Record and Annual Reports. 
 
 7. Resolved, That in portions of the country where auxiliaries cannot be 
 found or relied on for supplying the destitute, the Committees on Distribution 
 and on Agencies be instructed to adopt such other methods for securing a sup- 
 ply as may be deemed most expedient and eifeotive. 
 
(G) ANNIVERSARY ADDRESSES. 
 
 JUBILEE! YE^R. 
 
 The Aitierican Bible Society held its Fiftieth Annual Meeting at the Bible 
 House, in Astor Place, on Thursday, May 10, 1866, at nine o'clock, A.M. 
 
 James Lenox, Esq., President, in the chair, assisted by the following Vice 
 Presidents: Hon. Peter D. Vroom, of New Jersey; John Tappan, Esq., of 
 Massachusetts; Hon. A. B. Hasbrouek and William Whitlocfc, Jr., Esq., of 
 New York; Hon. Robert C. Winthrop, of Massachusetts ; Norman White and 
 Frederick S. Winston, Esqs., of New York ; Gen. William Williams, of Con- 
 necticut ; and James Suydam, Esq., of New York. 
 
 The Rev. J. T. Peck, D.D., of California, read the 111th Psalm, and oiFered 
 prayer. 
 
 Caleb T. Rowe. Esq., General Agent, read the Minutes of the previous meet- 
 ing of the Society, and they were approved. 
 
 He then reported the names of nine Managers, composing the' fourth class, 
 whose term of office expired at that time, viz. : ■ 
 
 Frederick T. Peet, Edward J. Woolsey, 
 
 Isaac Wood, M. D., Robert Carter, 
 
 Cornelius Du Bois, Marshall S. Bidwell, 
 
 Washington R. Vermilye, Chandler Starr, 
 
 Richard P. Buck. 
 
 A Committee, composed as follows, was appointed by the Chair to nomi- 
 nate suitable persons to fill vacancies : Charles Tracy, Esq., Rev. Dr. Rodders 
 of N. J., Rev. Dr. Butler, of Mass., Schureman Halsted, Esq., and Theophilus 
 A. Brouwer, Esq. 
 
 The Committee, after due consideration, reported for re-election those vrhose 
 term of ofHoe had just expired. 
 
 The report was adopted, and the gentlemen named were declared duly 
 elected Managers for four years, ending May, 1870. 
 
 On motion of the Rev. Dr. Canfleld, of Brooklyn, it was 
 Resolved, That the new Board of Managers be directed to meet at the Bible 
 House, in New York, on the third Thursday in this present month, for the pur- 
 pose of organizing for the ensuing year. 
 
 On motion of Chandler Starr, Esq., of Conn., it was 
 
 Resolved, That when the Society adjourn, it do adjourn to meet at the 
 Bible House, in New York, on the second Thursday in May, 1867 at nine 
 o'clock, A. M. ' 
 
APPENDIX. 83 
 
 The following delegates from foreign countries, and from our auxiliary so- 
 cieties, were reported as present : 
 
 Rev. Thomas Phillips and Rev. Thomas Nolan, from the British and 
 Foreign Bible Society ; Rev. Cesar Pascal, from the Bible Society of France ; 
 Rev. Lachlin Taylor, D.D., and Rev. William Ormiston, D.D., from the Bible 
 Society of Upper Canada; Rev. Benjamin P. Stone, D.D., from the New 
 Hampshire Bible Society ; Rev. Daniel Butler and the Hon. Robert C. Win- 
 throp, from the Massachusetts Bible Society ; Rev. Dennis Piatt, from the 
 South Norwalk Bible Society, Conn. ; Theophilus A. Brouwer, Esq., President 
 New York City Bible Society ; Archibald M'Clure, Esq., President, Rev. David 
 Dyer, and Rev. Alfred A. Farr, from Albany County Bible Society, N. Y. ; 
 James Rider, Esq., and Rev. J. M. Van Buren, Long Island Bible Society; 
 Rev. A. B. Lambert, President, and Dr. James Savage, from Washington 
 County Bible Society, N. Y. ; John Lyon, Esq., President, and Rev. E. W. 
 Bentley, Secretary, from Ulster County Bible Society, N. Y.; Rev. L. H. Van 
 Dyck, from Montgomery County Bible Society, N. Y. ; Rev. Robert Everett, 
 from Remsen and Steuben Welsh Bible Society, N. Y,; Ira H. Cobb and 
 Timothy Hough, Esqs., from Onondaga County Bible Society, N. Y. ; Rev. Dr. 
 Paddock, from Broome County Bible Society, N. Y.; Rev. Thomas Jenkins, 
 from Utica Welsh Bible Society, N. Y. ; Hon. R. H. Cuyler and Hon. Charles 
 Hathaway, from Delaware County Bible Society, N. Y.: Rev. Wilson Phraner 
 and Rev. S. I. Prime, D.D., from Westchester County Bible Society, N. Y. ; 
 Rev. R. K. Rodgers, D.D., from Somerset County Bible Society, N. J. ; Hon, 
 B. F. Randolph, President, and Rev. B. C. Taylor, D.D., from Hudson County 
 Bible Society, N. J. ; Rev. D. L. King and Rev. R. T. Middleditch, from Mon- 
 mouth County Bible Society, N. J. ; D. C. English, Esq., from Middlesex 
 County Bible Society, N. J. ; Rev. S. M. Hammill, D.D., from Laurenceville 
 Bible Society, N. J. ; Rev. J. V. R. Hughes and Wm. French, Esq., from Nassau 
 Hall Bible Society, N. *; Rev. S. W. Hilyard and R. T. Haines, Esq., from 
 Union County Bible Society, N. J. ; Rev. A. M. Palmer and William Rankin, 
 Esq., from Essex County Bible Society, N. J. ; Adam Stiger, Esq , from Hun- 
 terdon County Bible Society, N. J. ; Rev.' J. M. Ogden, from Morris County Bible 
 Society, N. J. ; Rev. I. H. Torrence and Willard Hall, Esq., from Pennsylvania 
 Bible Society ; Rev. D. H. Emerson, from Delaware State Bible Society ; Rev. 
 T. V. ]\Ioore, D.D., from Virginia Bible Society ; Rev. J. T. Peck, D.D., Presi- 
 dent California Bible Society. 
 
 The Society then proceeded to the Academy of Music, corner of Fourteenth 
 Street and Irving Place, to celebrate its Fiftieth Anniversary and Jubilee year. 
 James Lenox, Esq., President of the Society, took the chair at ten o'clock. 
 
 The Rev. E. P. Rogers, D.D., of New York, read the 148th Psalm, and 
 offered prayer. 
 
 The President delivered a brief and eloquent address. 
 
84 APPENDIX. 
 
 The Rev. Gardiner Spring, D.D,, of New York, moved the adoption of 
 the first resolution : 
 
 Resolved, That the Report, an abstract of which has been presented, be 
 printed and circulated under the direction of the Board of Managers. 
 
 I should be ashamed of myself, Mr. President, and I am sure I should 
 deserve the reproaches of this Christian assembly, notwithstanding the unex- 
 pected welcome with which they have greeted me as I rise to my feet, if I 
 should occupy time which will be so much better employed by gentlemen 
 whose voices are not so familiar to this auditory as mine. 
 
 Fifty years ago I stood as the youngest member of those who formed the 
 American Bible Society. That has been a remarkable providence by which 
 my own poor and, unworthy life has been conducted up to the present hour ; 
 and I desire to give thanks to the God of heaven that I am permitted to pay 
 this tribute at the footstool of his throne. Were I to utter any prolonged 
 remarks, I would select for my text the words which Moses called the people 
 of Israel to remember : " And thou shalt remember all the way which the 
 Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble Ihee, and 
 to prove thee, to know what was in thy heart," and " to do thee good at thy 
 latter end." 
 
 But, sir, I am not to deserve your reproach for continuing these remarks. 
 I have but a single thought ; it is my earnest desire that the God of the Bible 
 shall be honoured in your future career as He has been in some measure in the 
 past. 
 
 May God be first, God last, and God every thing ! All glory, as it was in 
 the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. 
 
 The Rt'. Rev. Charles P. M'Ilvaine, D.D., of Ohio, made the following 
 remarks : 
 
 I have one request to make of this assembly, smce the affectionate and 
 solemn words which our most venerated father has uttered, in all probability, 
 have not been heard by the greater portion of the audience, in consequence 
 of the feebleness of so advanced a period of life. 
 
 Our venerated father is one of only two survivors of the founders of the 
 American Bible Society. He is the only one of the survivors capable of being 
 present on this occasion. "We are exceedingly happy that God has spared*him 
 to be present, and has giveh us the privilege of his presence, and to hear these 
 devoted and solemn words from his lips. We know not what we shall be on 
 the morrow at so advanced a period of life as our venerated father has attained. 
 
 It is hardly to be expected that when another anniversary of this Society 
 shall occur, we shall have the privilege of thus meeting him, especially of 
 hearing his words. We may therefore suppose that on this occasion, as on 
 another, he has made his farewell address; and perhaps it is a little appro- 
 priate that I should say these few words, and make the request that I am going 
 to make, because in all probability there are very few besides myself who 
 
APPENDIX. 85 
 
 although not present at the formation of the American Bible Society, hecause 
 too young to be in the ministry, were cognizant of all the events connected 
 therewith. I saw the coming away from my native town in New Jersey of the 
 Hon. John M. Wells, who presided over one of the first meetings, and the Hon. 
 Judge Boudinot, one of my neighbours, who was the first President of the 
 Society. Remembering those times, I may be permitted to mention the first 
 occasion on which I ever saw or heard the voice of this our venerated friend. 
 Just about that time, when I was a student in Princeton College and was 
 attending the evening prayers (very likely Dr. Spring don't recollect it), at a 
 time when there was a very great seriousness and religious impression in 
 college, the president, the Rev. Dr. Greene, introduced to us one who seemed at 
 that time in such feeble health that it could ^hardly have been expected he 
 could have attained to so great an age. 
 
 He stood up before the students, and said these few words, which made a 
 great impression on my mind, and always remained stereotyped on my memory. 
 Said he : " Young gentlemen, I was present when I saw you to-day go to the 
 refectory for your mid-day meal. I saw the greater number enter. By and 
 by those who had lingered behind entered with difficulty ; presently a few more 
 straggling ones came, and the door was shut, and it was not opened to them, 
 and they entered not in," and that shut door was the text of a short but 
 exceedingly impressive discourse to ua at that time. It has never passed, even 
 the words of it, away from my remembrance. 
 
 Now, my dear friends, since we all are in these circumstances which I have 
 just related, it does seem to many of us who have conversed one with another 
 on this platform, that we should do something more to testify our respect for 
 our valuable friend and father than simply to be silently the hearers of the 
 words he has addressed to us, and spectators of his presence ; and therefore, 
 before the resolution is seconded or another word is heard, I request, and the 
 request will be met with joy by all of us, that this audience rise in testimony 
 of respect to Dr. Spring. 
 
 Immediately the vast audience rose, and remained standing for some time, 
 in silence and in tears. The scene was most impressive. 
 
 The Rev. J. T. Peck, D.D., President of the California Bible Society, said : 
 
 Mr. President : In the name of one of the youngest, and I may venture to 
 
 say one of the most vigorous of our auxiliaries, I rise by request to second the 
 
 resolution ofiered by our venerated friend and father. I do it, sir, without 
 
 remark. — The resolution was adopted. 
 
 The Rev. Rufus Anderson, D.D., of Massachusetts, moved the adoption 
 of the second resolution. He said: 
 
 I have been requested to speak of the Bible in its connexion with the 
 unevangelical world, having the following resolution to propose — 
 
 " That the Society acknowledges the goodness of God in the vast acces- 
 
86 APPENDIX. 
 
 sion, during tlie past half century, to the means of Scriptural knowledge in 
 the uncTangelized portions of the woi-ld." 
 
 Mr. President : It is a grand peculiarity in Protestant missions, that in 
 them preaching and the Bible go hand in hand. And since the Bible must 
 be read in order to be useful, there is a third important element in our for- 
 eign missions, inseparably connected with Bible distribution, and that is 
 education. The people must all be taught to read God's blessed Word. 
 The Romish missions in China, Japan, and the African kingdom of Congo 
 ■were conducted on a very extended scale, and for a time had proportionate 
 results. But they withheld the Bible from the people ; and their missions, 
 not being founded on that rocJc, but on the sand of human tradition and 
 authority, fell ; and great was the fall thereof. And so it must be with 
 every mission in which God's Word is riot one of the primary agencies. 
 
 So deeply imbedded is this truth in the Protestant mind, that I some- 
 times have feared there may have been an undue proportion of our ablest 
 missionaries employed heretofore in Scripture translations. But though 
 Protestant missions may now have somewhat fewer converts, churches, and 
 native preachers than if there had been more of preaching and familiar inter- 
 tjourse with the people, we have, nevertheless, this glorious result to rejoice 
 over — worth more than a hundred millions of dollars — that the Inspired 
 Oracles have been translated, transfused, during the past fifty years, into 
 languages spoken over niore than three fourths of the une.vangelized world ! 
 To speak with more precision, the entire Bible, during this period, has been 
 translated into thirty-nine languages, outside of Christendom, embracing 
 nearly all the more extensive and important ; the New Testament into 
 thirty-five other tongues ; and portions of Scripture into still forty-eight others : 
 making one hundred and twenty-two languages, in the great field of Chris- 
 tian missions, that have been enriched and ennobled with portions at least 
 of the Word of God, since the American Bible Society commenced its opera- 
 tions. And not a few of these languages had first to be reduced to a written 
 form. These translations have been wrought out more especially by mis- 
 sionaries and missionary societies. 
 
 And we come now to the department of printing and circulation, which 
 is almost exclusively the province of Bible societies. I find that the Ameri- 
 can Bible Society has placed more than $250,000 at the disposal of mis- 
 sionaries of the American Board alone, for printing and circulating the 
 Scriptures, for which those missionaries and that Board are profoundly thank- 
 ful. I have not the means of knowing how mufth it has placed at the 
 disposal of missionaries of other societies ; but I find that the sum total 
 of your grants for foreign distribution, to a large extent in languages be- 
 yond the limits of the Christian world, falls but little if any short of 
 $800,000. The appropriations by the British and Foreign Bible Society for 
 giving the Scriptures to the unevangelized nations, during the past balf 
 century, I have estimated at $2.375,000 ; making a sum total for both so- 
 
APPENDIX. 87 
 
 cieties of more than three millions. And it should be borne in mind that 
 this is for countries beyond the bounds of Christendom, and since the origin 
 of this Society. 
 
 How many volumes, of Scripture, in whole or in part, have been printed 
 in these languages and circulated during the time now under review is an 
 inquiry to -which I have not been able to find an answer entirely satisfactory. 
 But this I know, that more than 1,600,0' )0 copies -were issued, in the languages 
 of India alone, in the short space of ten years previous to 1862. I sup- 
 pose that of the more than 80,000,000 of copies which have been issued by 
 Bible societies since 1804, not less than 6,000,000 have been distributed among 
 the nations lying outside of Christendom. And it is worthy of note, that this 
 number is double the number of the Bibles believed to have existed in Chris- 
 tendom during the more than three centuries from the printing of the first 
 Bible, in 1460, down to the era of Bible societies. And it is a far greater num- 
 ber than were in the hands of mankind, through all the centuries, from the 
 time of Moses down to the Reformation ; thus giving us a most impressive 
 illustration of accelerated progress, in these modern times, in filling the nnevan- 
 gelized world with the means of Scriptural knowledge. 
 
 And what has been the influence upon the benighted nations of thus trans- 
 fusing the Word of God into their spoken languages ? It has been, sir, just 
 what the lighting up of your "Central Park" is in a dark night. Night is not 
 thereby converted into day. The distant looker-on sees no perceptible impres- 
 sion made upon the darkness. But the traveller in the Park finds his path 
 illuminated, and goes on his way rejoiciiig. Precisely such is the influence of 
 the Bible and of Christian missions in the benighted regions of heathenism — 
 a light shining in the darkness, illuminating the pathway to heaven. There 
 is no help like a good version of the Scriptures for a new missionary in 
 acquiring a language. There is no argument so efiective as the Scriptures for 
 educating the masses. For every man, whatever his condition, has the same 
 right to be taught to read, the inspired Volume that he has to own it. The 
 emancipated slaves, with the New Testament in their hands, may claim it as 
 their chartered right from heaven to have schools for themselves and for their 
 children. Every volume of Scripture is, indeed, an appeal from high Heaven 
 in favour of universal education. 
 
 While experience has shown that the Bible and the preacher must ordi- 
 narily go together, in the enterprise for reclaiming the heathen world, now and 
 then we light upon a fact which shows that the Holy Spirit sometimes operates 
 on the pagan heart by the printed volume alone. Quite recently a well authen- 
 ticated case of this kind has come to my knowledge. It was that of a young 
 man at Yeddo, the capital of Japan, who seems never to have come in contact 
 with a Christian missionary. This young Japanese somehow acquired a long- 
 ing for foreign knowledge. His first book was an atlas of the United States, 
 in the Chinese language, prepared by an American missionary, and he thus 
 became greatly interested to know more of the institutions of our country. 
 
88 APPENDIX. 
 
 One day, while examining the library of a friend, he found a small Chinese 
 Bible, which he borro'wed. He at once cordially received the Scripture account 
 of creation, and of the coming of the Son of God into our world as the Saviour 
 of men. He then resolved, if possible, to get possession of a Bible in the 
 English language, and began the study of that language with a Japanese 
 teacher, and his prayer to the God of the Bible was, that he might go where 
 that language was spoken. Breaking away at length from the paternal home, 
 on the plea that he belonged to the Heavenly Father and must believe Him, 
 he got on board an American ship bound to Boston, and came to that port, 
 His prayer on his arrival, as he has stated' it, was in these words : " God, 
 if thou have got eyes, please look upon me ! God, if thou have got ears, 
 please hear me ! I long to read the Bible, and to be civilized by the Bible." 
 
 The prayer of this Bible convert — this trophy (as I doubt not) of your own 
 Society — was heard and answered ; for he received the generous patronage of 
 the owner of the ship which brought him to our shores, and is now, I am happy 
 to say, a student in one of our best New England academies ; hoping one day 
 to become a messenger of salvation, through the blood of the Lamb, to his 
 benighted countrymen. And how natural to suppose that the same leaven 
 may now be working in many a thoughtful mind, among the myriads in those 
 crowded portions of the Eastern world ! 
 
 But I must close. This So,cie'y is now electrotyping the Bible in the lan- 
 guages of the Sandwich Islanders and of the Arab race. How different those 
 two peoples in point of numbers ! the one having as many millions as the other 
 has thousands. Yet I hardly know which of these two enterprises mo.st inter- 
 ests my own mind. It is not long since thousands of the poor people of those 
 far off Western isles grasped this hand of mine, in my progress through the 
 islands, in token of their Christian fellowship ; and be assured, sir, that they 
 will joyfully receive the beautiful volume of God's Word you are preparing to 
 send them. As for the version in the Arabic language — now, or soon to be, in 
 the process of electrotyping in as many as ten different forms — when the vol- 
 umes shall all be laid upon your table, at a future meeting, in the reformed 
 Arabic printed letter, emulating the most beautiful Arabic manuscript, they 
 will justly be regarded as among the moral wonders and glories of the age. 
 
 Hon. Peter D. Vroom, of New Jersey, said : 
 
 I rise simply for the purpose of seconding the resolution which has been 
 offered and so ably advocated. I second it with the prayer that the efforts 
 which have been made for the circulation of the Scriptures will be successful. 
 
 Address of Hon. Robert C. Wintheop, of Massachusetts, before offering 
 the third resolution. 
 
 I know too well, Mr. President, the value of time on such an occasion as 
 this to allow myself to trepass long on yoar indulgence this morning. I could 
 not find it in my conscience, however, to decline altogether the repeated re- 
 
APPENDIX. 89 
 
 quests of your Executive Committee that I would take some part in these An- 
 niversary exercises. Indeed, I should have felt myself quite unworthy of being 
 numbered among the Vice Presidents of this noblest of all Societies, had I will- 
 ingly absented myself from your Jubilee to-day. Why, what a Jubilee it is, 
 my friends, and how eminently worthy of observance by all who take an in- 
 terest in the welfare of mankind ! What other Jubilee — moral, social, literary, 
 political, national — ^what otherWubilee is there to be compared with it, in view 
 of the enduring influence and far-reaching extent of the work which it com- 
 memorates ? What other association of men has a right to indulge in the same 
 measure of joy and exultation which belongs to those who can look back on 
 fifty years of laithful and successful labour, in publii-hing and circulating the 
 Word of God ? 
 
 I have often before, Mr. President, been deeply impressed with the doings 
 of this Society, even in a single year, as I have found them described in some 
 one of its Annual Reports, and as I have reflected on the influence which must 
 have been produced by the thousands and tens of thousands of Bibles which 
 have been distributed through its agency during a single revolution of the sea- 
 sons. But as I contemplate to-day the aggregate results of the full half cen- 
 tury which has elapsed since its original institution ; as I look at the state- 
 ments which have been made up fo n by your faithful Secretaries, and mark 
 the grand sum tot of the facts and figures ; as I think of more than twenty- 
 one millions of volumes, containing a part or the whole of the Holy Scriptures, 
 scattered broadcast 0V3i the world, wherever there was an eye to read them, a 
 hand to receive them, or a heart to understand them, I confess I can conceive 
 of nothing in the whole range of human effort or human accomplishment more 
 worthy of being the subject of grateful acknowledgment to God, and of triumph- 
 ant celebration among men. Oh, my friends ! if we could ascertain at this 
 moment something of the secret history of those tweuty-one millions of vol- 
 umes ; if we could trace them back to the hands into which they first fell, and 
 follow them down through all their successive uses and ownerships ; if we 
 could track them wherever they have gone, over sea and over land, many of 
 them into the abodes of want and wretchedness, many of them into remote and 
 barbarous lands, not a few of them into scenes of peril on the stormy deep, 
 many of them into scenes of conflict and carnage on the battle fields of our own 
 land, in that great struggle which, we thank God, has resulted in the rescue 
 of our Union ; if we could gather all the facts into a single focus, and perceive 
 at a glance how many hearts they have gladdened and elevated, how many 
 homes they have cheered and blessed, how many souls tl^y have lighted and 
 lifted on their way to th^ skies, how many noble lives they have inspired and 
 animated, how many heroic deaths they have consoled and comforted — what a 
 sublime record would be presented to us ! What is there in all the regions of 
 romance, or in the whole compass of the drama, that would equal it in inter- 
 est ? What is there in all the boasted achievements of real life that would 
 approach it in importance ? . 
 
90 APPENDIX. 
 
 Beyond all doutt, ray friends, we are dealing here to-day with the great 
 enginery of the world's progress, with the greatest. of all instrumentalities for 
 social advancement as.well as for individual salvation. Personally or politi- 
 cally, whether as States and nations or as individual men and women, we can 
 do without any thing and without every thing hetter than without the Bible. 
 We could spare Homer from ancient literature ; we could spare Shakspeare, 
 and Milton too, from modern literature, and fcere would still be something, 
 there would still be much left. But what an eclipse would be experienced, 
 what an aching void would be felt, were there no Sermon on the Mount, no 
 Gospel by St. John, no Psalms of David, no Prophecy of Isaiah, no Epistle to 
 the Corinthians ! Where would this world of ours have found itself by this 
 time, had those Divine and matchless voices never been vouchsafed to ns ? 
 Into what lower deeps, beyond the lowest depths which have ever yet been 
 imagined, of superstition and sensuality, of vice, and villany, and barbarism, 
 would it have been plunged! How should we have realized in such a case 
 the full import of that agony which one of the old prophets intended to portray 
 in those memorable words : " Behold, the days come that I will send a famine 
 in. the land, not a famine of bread, nor a thirst for water, but of hearing the 
 word§ of the Lord : And they shall wander from sea to sea, and from the north 
 even to the east, they shall run to and fro to seek the word of the Lord, and 
 shall not find it !" God in his mercy spare our own land from such a famine 
 as that ! Better were it for us to endure war, or pestilence, or any other vari- 
 ety of famiue, than a famine of the Word of the Lord. 
 
 Why, there are single be oks of the I ible — there are single chapters of the 
 Bible — ^nay, there are single verses of the Bible, which are worth all that was 
 ever written or uttered, before or since, by human pens or human lips. How 
 well did the poet Cowper say, in one of his charming familiar letters — ^it was 
 to Lady Hesketh, I believe — " 'He that believeth on me is passed from death 
 unto life,' though it be as plain a sentence as words can form, has more beau- 
 ties in it than all the labours antiquity can boast of !" " Read me, read me," 
 said Oliver Cromwell on his death-bed, " those verses from the fourth chapter 
 of the Epistle to the Philippians, in which the apostle speaks of having learned, 
 in whatsoever state he was, therewith to be content, for he could do all things 
 through Christ who strengthened him. That Scripture," said the dying hero, 
 " did once save my life, when my eldest son died, which went as a dagger to 
 my heart ; indeed it did." And each one of you, my friends, I doubt not, will 
 readily recall other texts with which there are similar associations. Indeed, 
 there is hardly any Ape to whom the Bible is at all familiar or at all precious, 
 who has not some favourite chapter or verse which (g the very life and joy of 
 his soul. 
 
 But I may not detain you a moment longer with these general remarks. 
 Let me only express the hope, that in some degree commensurate with the 
 value we place on our own Bibles will be our willingness to contribute towards 
 sending the Bible to others. I rejoice, Mr. President, that your Jubilee is not 
 
APPENDIX. 91 
 
 to pass off in mere empty words of congratulation and compliment, but that 
 you have resolved to signalize it by at least two works of the highest interest 
 and importance— one of them, the sending of the Bible to the freedmen of our 
 own land, and the replenishing the supply of Bibles throughout the whole des- 
 olated and famishing South ; the other, the publication, by a process than which 
 there is nothing in the " Arabian Nights " more marvellous or more magical, of 
 that Arabin version of the sacred Volume, by which it is to be brought home 
 to one hundred and twenty millions of people, in those very regions of the 
 earth in which its great scenes were originally transacted. And now, if there 
 are men, or women, or children, within reach of my voice, who have not 
 already contributed something— it may be of their abundance, or it may be of 
 their penury, their two mites, if nothing more— towards these noble ends, I 
 trust that this occasion will be the means of calling their attention to what 
 ought to be regarded as alike the privilege and the duty of us all. 
 
 Let me hope, too, that when another Jubilee anniversary shall be cele- 
 brated, long after most of us shall have gone to our account, it may prove that 
 the next h^lf century will have been even more abundant in labours in this 
 great Cause than that which has now closed, and that the whole Christian peo- 
 ple of our land will see to it that those labours are not restrained or restricted 
 by any deficiency of means in your treasury. I would not under- estimate the ' 
 importance of other societies — the Tract Societies, and Sunday School Unions, 
 and Domestic and Foreign Missionary Boards, which are engaged in kindred 
 efibrts to hasten the coming of the glorious day when the knowledge of the Lord 
 shall cover the earth as the waters cover the seas. God bless and prosper 
 , them all ! But even as the Bible stands alone, in measureless superiority, in 
 peerless pre-eminence, above all other books, so have the societies which are 
 devoted to its publication and distribution, pure and simple, without note or 
 comment, a paramount claim upon the support, the sympathy, the cordial 
 co-operation of all who profess and call themselves Christians. 
 
 It only remains for me to say, my friends, in fulfilment of the agreeable 
 duty which has been assigned to me on this occasion, that we do not forget 
 to-day, that during the whole existence of this Society, it has enjoyed the con- 
 stant and friendly ooperation of that great British and Foreign Bible Society 
 which was the immediate forerunner and exemplar of our own, and whose 
 labours and accomplishments have been far greater than those we are assem- 
 bled to commemorate. Whatever other bonds of sympathy between us and our 
 old mother country may have been weakened or sundered — and we trust they 
 will all be restored in their full strength at no distant dasy — let us rejoice that 
 we still read and circulate the same Bible, in the same noble tongue, in the 
 same majestic version. And most gladly do we hail the presence, on this occa- 
 sion, of the delegates from that mother land and that mother society. There 
 are delegates here, too, from the neighbouring British colonies. And I am glad 
 to know that there is at least one delegate also from that sunny land from 
 which came the precious Huguenot blood, which so many of us are proud to 
 
92 APPEliTDIX. 
 
 feel miugling at this moment with other currents in our own veins, and which 
 quickened the pulses of the first two illustrious Presidents of this Society, 
 Elias Boudinot and John Jay. I am sure you are all eager to manifest your 
 gratification at the presence of these honoured and welcome guests, and that 
 you will adopt by acclamation the resoluti;n which it is now, in .conclusion 
 my privilege to ofier : 
 
 Resolved, That we welcome to our Jubilee; with warm hearts and 
 with cordial greetings, the representatives of sister institutions from Eng- 
 land, France, Canada, and elsewhere; and that they be requested to com- 
 municate to their respective societies this assurance of our Christian fel- 
 lowship and international efforts to send abroad the Bible " for the healing of 
 the nations." , 
 
 The delegates from the foreign Bible societies responded to the resolution in 
 the following order : 
 
 Rev. Thomas Phillips, delegate from the British and Foreign Bible 
 Society, spoke as follows : 
 
 Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : Having the high honour of appear- 
 ing among you this day as one of the representatives of the British and Foreign 
 Bible Society, I must be allowed to say at the outset, and I do it without the 
 least afiectation, that while I greatly value the privilege, I am at the same 
 time deeply sensible of the responsibility attached to the position in which, 
 through the kindness of our committee, I have been placed. 
 
 '• Twelve years ago we celebrated the Jubilee of our society in England ; and 
 amongst the many delightful reminiscences of that year, we shall always think 
 with pleasure of the visit paid us by your able delegates. The appointment of 
 such men as the Rev. Dr. M'livaine and Dr. Vermilye on that important mis- 
 sion conveyed to us the pleasing assurance, that on your side of the Atlantic a 
 deep interest was felt in the world-wide operations of the great Parent Bible 
 Society. My esteemed fiiend and myself are here to return that pleasant visit, 
 arid to convey to you, in the warmest and most expressive terms which we can 
 find within the limits of language, the very sincere congratulations of our 
 society on this interesting Jubilee occasion. We are here, sir, to unite with 
 you most heartily in thanksgivings to Almighty God for the manifold blessings 
 vouchsafed to the American Bible Society during the first fifty years of its 
 existence and labours. 
 
 Without pretending to take the Jewish Jubilee as a model, it must be 
 right and proper to take advantage of an opportunity like this, which may 
 only ' occur once in a lifetime, for the purpose of carrying out practically 
 certain high and holy and useful objects. I can testify from official knowl- 
 edge and personal knowledge and personal observation, that our Jubilee year 
 was one of the most hallowed and blessed seasons we have ever known. It 
 seemed to be the right time to review the past, and to set out afresh and 
 
Appzxrwx. 93 
 
 with redoutled zeal oa a career of future usefulness. We can look back to 
 the year of Juhilee as the commencemeut of a new era in our history, and 
 the impulse given to the good Cause at that time is felt to this day. 
 
 "We invited our Christian friends throughout the world to umle with us 
 in commemorating the Divine goodness so abundantly vouchsafed to the so- 
 ciety in its remarkable origin, early history, and rapid progress. We asked 
 them to thank God with us for raising up such an institution when it was so 
 much needed, for preserving it when it was so fiercely assaili d, and for the 
 marvellous success which accompanied its efforts in various departments 
 of labour both at home and abroad — success beyond, very far beyond the 
 most sanguine expectations of its founders and early supporters. For the 
 purpose of awakening and strengthening this feeling of gratitude, we called 
 attention to the simple historical fact that the cry for Bibles from the mount- 
 ains and valleys of my native principality of Wales led, in the providence 
 of God, to the formation of a society which should supply the land which gave 
 it birth, and largely contribute towards the supply of other lands, and all 
 lands, in all languages, as far and as fast as possible. 
 
 Bnt we had another Jubilee object — ^it was to bear a renewed public testi- 
 mony to the Divine character and claims of the Bible, and to the right of 
 every individual of the human famUy to posses it, and to read it in his own 
 vulgar tongue. From a thousand pulpits and platforms, the threefold truth 
 was uttered with no uncertain sound, " The BiWe is fTOm God ; the Bible 
 is for man : the Bible is sufficient." Subsequent events proved that this 
 part of our Jubilee programme was most providential; for when the enemy 
 came in upon us, from a quarter and in a form least expected, the Ion" 
 and loud Jubilee testimony still reverberated in the ears and thrilled in the 
 hearts of mnltitades of our people. The sermons and speeches delivered at 
 this time, the numberles jubilee papers scattered broadcast throughout 
 the length and breadth of the land, and it is but just that I should add, " the 
 Book and its Story," also did good service at this important crisis. 
 
 What did Jannes and Jambres gain by vrithstanding Moses in old times, 
 and what has been gained by their imitators in our day? Let them say 
 what they wUl, the people who read Holy Scripture in an humble and 
 prayerful spirit have said, and EtUl say, " Mosis is right " — bright in his 
 history, right in his chronology, right in his genealogy, aye, and right in his 
 geology. The people, the multitudes of Christian people, do not hesitate to 
 go a little further, and say with one breath, " Moses is right, and Colenso 
 is wrong.'' Yes, sir, we feel assured that the Bible wOl outlive this re- 
 newed attack, unscathed by the arrows of sarcasm and the shafts of infidelity ; 
 uninjured by the severest ordeal of honest criticism ; benefited by the discov- 
 eries of modem science ; confirmed in its statements by the testimony of the 
 rocks and the stones, which are prying out in that land rendered so sacred 
 by its glorious narratives and events. 
 
 I am persuaded that after attending the Jubilee meetings so generally 
 
94: AP.PENDIX. 
 
 held, and reading the books and papers prepared for the occasion, many 
 persons, being enlightened and reassured, were ready to say or sing ; 
 
 " Shoi]ld all the forms that men devise 
 Assail my faith with treacherous art, 
 I'll call them vanity and lies, 
 And biud the Gospel to my heart.'^ 
 
 But we had in England, as you also have, a third Jubilee object. We 
 did not confine ourselves to thanksgiving to God and testimony in behalf 
 of the good old Book, for we thought it was the right time to give an oppor- 
 tunity to all who were Bible lovers to become Bible givers. We told them 
 that we intended by new and vigorous measures to effect a wide circulation 
 of the Scriptures both at home and abroad. The people generally entered 
 heartily into the Jubilee celebration. The pulpit, the platform, and the 
 press greatly helped us. While the warm heart thi-obbed with love, and tl^e 
 opened lips sent forth songs of praise, the open hand placed liberal thank- 
 offerings on the Jubilee altar. Never was there a more striking illustration 
 of the well-known lines : 
 
 " WJiat great results from small beginnings spring I" 
 
 The very first contribution received towards the Jubilee fund was an old guinea 
 sent me by post by a widow lady living near London. It was on this golden 
 foundation that a noble edifice was raised; around this small coin a largo 
 heap was gathered, amountfeig in the Whole to upwards of £110,000 sterling 
 and exceeding, considerably exceeding, half a million of your dollars, and 
 all this without any diminution in the ordinary annual receipts of the society. 
 
 As you may suppose, the possession of so large a sura involved a heavy 
 responsibility, and the committee besought the Lord's help and guidance 
 so as to be able to spend this money properly and profitably for the good 
 of men, and the glory of Him who redeemed us, not with corruptible things 
 such as silver and gold, but with his own precious blood. 
 
 Relying Ihen upon the Lord for his guidance and blessing, we hastened 
 to convert our Jubilee gold into that which is "better than gold yea 
 than much fine gold," and to adopt such special measures as seemed 
 necessary to carry out our practical objects. Special deputations were sent 
 to the British provinces of North America, arid the colonies of Australia. 
 New agencies were established or projected with a view to extend the circula- 
 tion of the Scriptures in various foreign countries. India and Ceylon largely 
 shared in our liberality; and as the Million Testament scheme dovetailed 
 into our Jubilee work, the immense empire of China became an important 
 field of labour. The continent of Europe, more especially Holland Beloium 
 and Germany, received large grants of the Sacred Volume. Ireland, always 
 treated as a part of ourselves, received a considerable share of attention and 
 the grants of Jubilee Bibles and Testaments to societies and schools involved 
 an expenditure of many thousands of pounds. Nor were the claims of home 
 neglected. Colportage was established in rural districts, and in crowded 
 
APPENDIX. 95 
 
 mannfacturing cities and towns; thus supplying by a new agency the valu- 
 able services of our auxiliary societies, an to meet the wants of those 
 who could not be reached by the existing plans of operation. Various city 
 and town missions, with all kinds of benevolent, educational, and religious 
 societies, largely participated in the benefits of the Jubilee fund. It seem- 
 ed to be the right time to make special grants to hotels, boarding houses, 
 asylums, hospitals, infirmaries, railway and police stations, and the union 
 houses, for the use of the inmates. Nor should I omit to state that advant- 
 age was taken of the willingness of the people to contribute to originate a 
 Benevolent Fund, with a view to administer in some degree, when circum- 
 stances demand it, to the relief and comfort of such as have become old or 
 disabled in the service of the society. 
 
 It may be added, and I do it with peculiar satisfaction, that it was 
 daring the Jubilee season that other and special modes of circulating the 
 Scriptures amongst the very poorest classes were originated. jWho has 
 not heard of the "Bible women" of London? This work also may be 
 regarded as a fruitful ofiishoot of our great Jubilee tree. It was in the 
 spirit of the Jubilee that a lady well known in Bible society circles as 
 L. N. R., the author of the " Book and its Story," originated a system which 
 she has well described as the " Missing Link" in the chain of Christian 
 benevolence — a system which has worked admirably, and is still carried on 
 most efficiently in the metropolis of England, under her able superintendence. 
 
 I have already remarked that the Jubilee year gave an impetus to our 
 work which is still felt. It is a gratifying fact that the yearly receipts 
 and expenditure, and the annual issues of the Sacred Volume, have been 
 gradually but steadily increasing ever since that memorable year. A week 
 ago our anniversary was held at Exeter Hall ; and at that great meeting it 
 was the pleasing duty of the secretary to report that the total receipts of 
 the year had amounted to £171,375 10s. id., and the distribution to 2,296,130 
 copies of the Sacred Volume ; bringing up the grand total to 50,285,709 
 Bibles and Testaments, or integral portions, in upwards of 170 of the world's 
 languages and dialects. 
 
 Before I proceed further, let me say that it affords me the greatest pleas- 
 ure to find that my countrymen spread over the " States" are amongst the 
 most liberal supporters of the Bible Society. They have been trained to it 
 in the old country, and they carry with them to this land their old Bible 
 society love, and hence the establishment of fifty-seven Welsh branch socie- 
 ties in different parts of this great country. I hope to be able to visit many 
 of these before I return home, and to address the people in their own lan- 
 guage — a language which they love, and which I also love as much as 
 any of them. It will afford me the greatest delight to remind them of our 
 well-known Bible society motto, " Bibl i bawb o bobl y byd ;" which being 
 interpreted means, a Bible for all the people of the world. 
 
 And now, what shall I say in conclusion? Although the British and 
 
9b APPENDIX. 
 
 Foreign Bible Society may claim precedence in point of age, extent of 
 labour, End amount of expenditure, you may feel assured that we look with 
 no jealous eye upon the efforts of other societies having the same or similar 
 . objects in view, but on the contrary, we rejoice in their success, and may 
 it please God to bless them a thousand-fold ! But there are special reasons 
 why we should sympathize with the American Bible Society. Had I ad- 
 dressed you some years ago, I might have called you a child of our own ; 
 but now that you have reached the respectable age of fifty, we shall re- 
 gard each other as sisters — affectionate and beloved sisters in the great and 
 honourable though not very ancient Bible society family. 
 
 And at the present time — when both societies have grown great, when 
 their ability to do good is rapidly increasing, when facilities for widely 
 extended operations are multiplying on every side, when from many a 
 distant Macedonia the cry is heard, " Come over and help us !" addressed 
 perhaps to both societies simultaneously — what shall I say ? Shall I take 
 up the language of Abram to Lot, " Let there be no strife between me and 
 thee, between my herdmen and thy herdmen ; for we be brethren ?" The 
 world is before ns ; there remaineth yet very much laud to be possessed. 
 Is not the land of promise Immanuel's land ? In his name, therefore, and 
 in his strength, let us go up and possess it. 
 
 It is my heart's desire that the star-spangled banner of the United States 
 of America and the old union jack of the United Kingdom of Great Britain 
 
 and Ireland may henceforth wave together on the world's ramparts recog- 
 
 nised every where as symbols of all that is noble in enterprise, honourable 
 in commerce, just in legislation, powerful in union, and sacred in religion. 
 More than Wl, it is my prayer to God that these two great Societies, 
 the greatest Bible societies in the world, may always proceed hand , in hand 
 and work side by side, adding translation unto translation, sending forth 
 edition after edition of God's holy Word, and thereby become the instruments 
 of spreading the blessings of peace, and truth, and freedom, and holiness 
 and happiness, to earth's remotest bounds. 
 
 One word more, and I have done. In the review of past success in the 
 enjoyment of present prosperity, and in the prospect of still greater achieve- 
 ments, we will not forget to say : " Not unto us, Lord, not un^o the 
 British and Foreign; not unto the American Bible Society; not unto any 
 individual man, or set of men ; not unto our Charles, or Hughes, or Steinkopff 
 or Ov\ren, or Wilberforce, or Teignmouth, or Bexley, or Shaftesbury; not 
 unto your Boudinot, or Mason, or Jay, or Bradish, or Frelinghuysen or 
 Lenox ; not unto any of these, or all these put together, but unto the Divine 
 name be all the praise. "For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the 
 glory, for ever and ever." And let all the Christian people on both sides 
 the Atlantic say, Amen, and Amen. 
 
 The Rev. Thomas Nolan, B. D., the other delegate from England, a 
 
APPENDIX. 97 
 
 minister of the Episcopal Church in London, then rose, and spoke nearly as 
 follows : 
 
 Mr. President : The terms of the resolution you have just heard, the 
 welcome to your Jubilee that it offers, the " warm hearts" and cordial greet- 
 ings that it mentions, must needs awaken deep emotions within the breasts 
 of those who are embraced within its range ; and you may be sure we will 
 "communicate to our several societies your assurance of Christian fellow- 
 ship and international efforts to send abroad the Bible for the healing of 
 the nations." And yet, when I consider the grandeur of the occasion and 
 the momentousness of the interests that have brought us together to-day 
 from the uttermost parts of the earth, to be present at your Jubilee and to 
 take part in its proceedings, I feel that any allusion merely personal must 
 be altogether beneath the dignity of that occasion and the greatness of those 
 interests. Still, I cannot but recall the thrill of association than ran through 
 me when the proposal was first made to me to undertake a part in this 
 honourable and onerous mission. The prominence of American affairs for 
 the last few years more especially, the portion they must occupy of the 
 world's history for that period, and the influence they must exercise upon 
 its destiny, have directed public attention to them with an intensity, and 
 have drawn out your national characteristics into a boldness of relief, that 
 might have been wanting under ordinary circumstances. 
 
 Your interminable territory, your teeming population, your limitless re- 
 sources, that astonishing resiliency of character, whereby you rise at once 
 above disaster, and regain, as it were, with a bound, even more than your 
 former elevation — these all evoke feelings of overwhelming intensity, before 
 which the prospects of other countries pale in their lustre, and their pigmy 
 proportions are dwarfed into comparative littleness. But when, beside all this, 
 you are enabled to add, as the present occasion invites us to do, an acknowl- 
 edgment of God in all his ways, with the encouraging assurance that He will 
 direct your paths, then the picture is complete. That which was grand be- 
 comes enduring also ; that which was full of hope for the country to which it 
 belongs appears likewise fraught with the seeds of blessing to the nations of 
 the earth, and of peace to the family of man. Truly the associations and 
 suggestions of such a meeting as this are among the most sublime and inspirit- 
 ing of which the human mind and heart are capable. That feeling is acknowl- 
 edged ; its spirit is evidently shed abroad ; its influence is felt. I believe and 
 am sure that a blessing is with us. 
 
 It has been our lot in England, during the last twenty years, to celebrate 
 the jubilee of more than one of our great religious societies, and it seems natu- 
 ral upon such occasions to go back to their first origin, and all the more because 
 of its calling up the names of the great and the good who have passed away 
 from us who have, however, bequeathed to us their example, and thus, though 
 dead still speak. My colleague, Dr. Phillips, has already mentioned some 
 honoured names in coimexion with our British and Foreign Bible Society ; and 
 
 7 
 
Vo APPBliTDIX. 
 
 on Sunday evening last, when it was my privilege to hear the reverend and 
 learned Chancellor Ferris, of your University, on this subject, he too unfurled 
 the roll of worthies that belong to your own American Bible Society, and did 
 honour to the mighty dead, as he recalled their names and recorded their serv- 
 ices. In particular (and I am reminded of it by the manner in which my dear 
 and right reverend friend Bishop M'llvaine has borne testimony also to the 
 only survivor from 1816 now present) did Dr. Ferris, with a voice trembling 
 from emotion, and in terms touching and tender, that did hojiour to his own 
 heart also, bear witness to the lifelong services of his friend and pastor, the 
 venerable Dr. Gardiner Spring. 
 
 In reviewing the early struggles and the matured success of great works of 
 this kind, one must be struck with the hand of God, made manifest upon occa- 
 sions with Divine interpositions, for they are nothing less, without which they 
 could not, humanly speaking, have held on their way or accomplished their 
 object. Such, for example, was the discovery of stereotype printing, that pre- 
 ceded by a little the formation of the British and Foreign Bible Society in 1804. 
 By means of this discovery two objects were rendered feasible, without which 
 the work of Bible circulation would have been all but impossible; I mean the 
 power of multiplying copies and of reducing the cost of publication. Is not 
 this Jubilee similarly signalized? and shall we not acknowledge the same 
 merciful hand as the bestower of the gift ? The superb appliances that belong 
 to your magnificent Bible House are at this moment busily employed, under the 
 experienced and accomplished guidance of Dr. Van Dyck, in electrotyping a 
 copy of the Arabic Scriptures. And the indispensable importance of this ap- 
 plication of science to this purpose — a result as much in advance of the ordi- 
 nary stereotyping as that was in advance of any thing that had gone before 
 
 will be obvious from the fact stated by Dr. Van Dyck, that with all the appli- 
 ances available at Beirut and Smyrna, it would take six thousand years to 
 pl?.c3 a copy of the Arabic Scriptures in the hands of each of the one hundred 
 and twenty millions of human beings, who are accessible through no other 
 channel ; and that even with all the advantages of electrotyping now at work 
 it will require six hundred years to do the same. But you are rising to thfe 
 greatness of the Macedonian cry sent forth' to you. There is work for all the 
 presses that can be set to work to hurry on such a desirable consummation. 
 And this American Bible Society has most cordially acseded to the request of 
 the committee in London, and will make for them duplicate electrotype plates 
 of such editions of the Arabic Scriptures now in course of preparation as they 
 may designate, without charge, the only stipulation being that no alterations 
 be made in the plates without the assent of the American Bible Society. To 
 this the committee in London returned the following reply, which it is niy de- 
 light as well as my duty to read to this n^eeting : 
 
 Resohed, That the committee have received with peculiar satisfaction the 
 noble offer of the American Bible Society to present to this society free of 
 charge, duplicate electrotype plates of such editions of the Arabic translation of 
 the Scriptures, prepared by the Rev. Dr. Van Dyck, as the committee may 
 
APPENDIX., 99 
 
 select from the series -which it is intended to issue in connexion with the Jubi- 
 lee of the American Bible Society ; and the committee, while accepting the 
 liberal proposal, desire heartily to reciprocate the kind and Christian sentiments 
 by which it has been dictated, and to convey to the Board of the American 
 Bible Society the assurance of their warmest gratitude for the generosity evinced 
 in regard to the work in q[uesiion, and trust that the transaction, so honourable 
 to those with whom it originates, may tend to strengthen the many friendly 
 ties which unite the two Societies in their great enterprise of Scripture circula- 
 tion throughout the world. 
 
 Surely, sir, it is a token for good that these two great Boards in America 
 and in England are animated with this feeling of mutual respect and generous 
 confidence towards each other ? Is it not from Him who causeth men, and 
 boards, and nations, to be of one mind ? 
 
 If time allowed, it would be both interesting and instructive to trace the 
 hand and favour of God similarly manifested in the events that were over- 
 ruled at the period of the Reformation for the furtherance of his purpose and 
 the spread of his Word. The discovery of printing by Gutenberg and SohoBfTer, 
 of the mariner's compass, and of the great continent of America in 1492, were 
 all subsidiary to the great purposes of God, and intensified the power and 
 preeiousness of the Reformation. We might go back also to the rise of 
 Christianity itself, and we might in the triumphs of Alexander the Great find 
 an unconscious preparation for -the great event that was impending. The 
 Ptolemies, the Alexandrian library, the Septuagint translation of the Old 
 Testament Scriptures, the ascendency of the Greek language and literature at 
 the time, were all overruled as disciplining the mind of man for what was 
 about to take place, and prepared many beforehand to receive the tidings of " a 
 Saviqur, Christ the Lord." Is it too much to say that there was a previous 
 training of the children of Israel, during their long bondage in Egypt, for the 
 great work for which God designed them ? " Ye are ray witnesses, saith 
 the Lord ;" '' this people have I formed for myself; they shall shew forth my 
 praise." And is it not of God also, this concurrence of many things with this 
 your year of Jubilee, which seems to place an open door before you, and to bid 
 you to enter upon it ? Is it not of God that the blessings of peace and union 
 should have been restored to you, just as your Jubilee was completed — that the 
 South should be opened to your Christian efforts, and Ethiopia, as it were, 
 stretching out her hands to you for the Word of God ? You have already 
 proved yourselves capable of rising to any emergency. You leave a glorious 
 past behind you, only to enter upon the still more glorious future that, by 
 God's blessing, awaits and invites you. 
 
 It is hard to pass by the many aspects of this " holy and beautiful " work 
 that might well demand a notice ; but the number of the speakers and the con- 
 venience of the meeting render it impossible. I should like to have remarked 
 upon the noble catholicity of your constitution, as well as of our own, that has 
 been tested by the experience of more than half a century, and that has gone 
 far to realize the fond aspiration of Lord Bexley many years ago, when he 
 said in reply to some opponent, "If we cannot reconcile all opinions. Ictus 
 
-j^QQ APPENDIX- 
 
 ■i 11 v.o„^t= " T ■should like to have dwelt for a little upon 
 endeavour to unite all hearts. I stioum iiKe i . . . . .j^ ti Word 
 
 the nobleness of the simple object aimed at by both fr'Z'''^^''^^.^°^^l 
 of the Lord should have free course and be glorified " Oh sir what is there 
 01 tne i^oru suu ^^ ^j. ^^ ^j^g benefit and 
 
 that in any degree so --t^f^'- ^^f ^Xnc, of God's Word giveth light." 
 blessings of the human race? Jh^; J^ ^^^^j^ It is able to make wise 
 
 r tirr \^ r prfitble^ "very thiiig-that the man of God may 
 be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works. If one of the grea 
 orators of antiquity still stirs our hearts with his matchless appeal on behalf 
 of science and polite literature, beginning with, "Hoeo studia juventutem 
 alunt senectutem obleetant," etc.— I won't trouble you with the quotation- 
 how much more are the Scriptures of truth, God's revealed will and inspired 
 Word deserving of such commendation ! " When thou goest, it shall lead 
 thee ■ when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall 
 talk with thee." The Hon. Mr. Winthrop has told us that we might part 
 with Shakspeare from our literature, or even with Homer from antiquity ; but 
 he is not prepared to give up a book, a chapter, or even a verse of God's 
 blessed Word. Oh, no, sir ! to deprive us of that, or to weaken our full confi- 
 dence in it, would be to rob the young man of his guide, the matured man 
 of his companion, the rich man of his counsellor, the poor man of his stay, 
 tlie old man of his consolation, and the dying man of his hope. Oh, my 
 friends, bind it for ever to your own souls ; prize it more and more, in your 
 closets, in your families, in your churches ; lose no opportunity of extending 
 it to, and of sharing it with others ; and in so doing you will multiply its 
 abundance and enhance its preciousness to yourselves. All the blessings you 
 possess are contemporaneous with your possession of the Word of God, and 
 their "continuance with you depends upon the extent to which you cherish and 
 obey it. 
 
 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from God ; and the title, as it 
 were, by which we hold it is the honour we do to his Word. In this land,' 
 where liberty is so valued and freedom is cherished, as it is in my own, let it 
 never be forgotten that every kind of freedom comes from, and is strengthened 
 by, the free use of the Word of God. Neither your social, your intellectual, or 
 your political freedom were worth a year's purchase unless, in connexion with 
 spiritual freedom first. Political freedom is the ow^n child of religious freedom. 
 Look back to the Reformation. Was not the experiment then tried and the 
 principle established ? Europe then was a vast prison house, of which the key 
 was at Rome, and the jailer the accomplished Leo X. But the Bible was 
 emancipated ; the great prisoners went forth — apostles, prophets, and evangel- 
 ists. Luther gave free course to the Word of God, and the tribes of Ger- 
 many were enabled to hear, in their own tongue in which they were born, the 
 wonderful works of God. The Reformation was won, and the foundation was 
 therein laid for all the triumphs that freedom hath ever since achieved. But 
 you will observe the order and the connexion. Religious freedom first, then 
 the others followed in her train. Religious freedom awoke first, as it were 
 
APPENDIX. 101 
 
 from the long trance of the dark ages ; she aroused her slumbering sister and 
 bade her follow in the resurrection. 
 
 Was it not something of the same that took place in England towards the 
 close of the last century? When the church missionary, and the religious 
 tract, and the British and Foreign Bible Societies were called into existence, 
 darkness might be said to have covered the earth, and gross darkness the peo- 
 ple ; when God mercifully interposed again, and rolled back the clouds, and 
 said, as it were, "Let there be light; and there was light"— even "the light of 
 the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Oh yes, sir, 
 Jesus Christ is the " All in all " of the Bible : it is his finished work, redemp- 
 tion completed in his blood, that makes the Bible precious. The spirit of it all 
 is the testimony of Jesus. To you that believe it He is precious. This is 
 what Dr. Chalmers called the " portable evidence " to the truth of God, or 
 what a greater than Chalmers called the witness of God's Spirit "bearing 
 witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God." Oh, I beseech you, 
 rest not satisfied with any thing till you have arrived at this — the " Spirit of 
 adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father." 
 
 This is a glorious and inviting theme, and boundless is the prospect that it 
 opens before us. But I must deny myself, and come in conclusion to the object 
 for which I have been delegated here — to acknowledge the welcome with which 
 you have introduced us to this great meeting, and to discharge, " pro virili 
 mea," the commission with which I and my colleague have been charged — to 
 express to the American Bible Society the heartiest congratulations of the com- 
 mittee at home upon this auspicious occasion ; and to assure them of the high 
 and unalloyed respect that they entertain towards them, as well as of the deep 
 sympathy and the congenial interest that is felt in all their difiiculties and in 
 all their successes. A community of object and an identity of means, in a case 
 like ours, are the most reliable grounds of mutual respect and lasting friend- 
 ship ; and in this matter nothing can be nearer nor closer than ours. We 
 serve the same Master, we rely upon the same blessing, we are met by the 
 same difiiculties, we look for the same reward ; and this over a field so wide 
 that it renders rivalry impossible, except that holy one, as to who shall love 
 the Saviour most and serve Him best. 
 
 I was invited to attend a meeting of our committee, held on the Monday 
 before I left home; all was conducted in the same manner and spirit that 
 characterized the proceedings of your own Board on Thursday last, when I had 
 the honour to be present. All was sanctified, as with yourselves, by the Word 
 of God and by prayer. When they commended my colleague and myself to 
 God for our journey and our mission, every expression was full of brotherly 
 •love, of sympathy and joy, rejoicing in your joy, and giving God praise and 
 thanksgiving for his goodness to you ; and you may rest assured that it will be 
 our delight, no less than our duty, faithfully to report, on our return, the cor- 
 dial and generous response on your part with which their greetings were met, 
 as well as our debt immense of personal kindness to ourselves. 
 
102 APPENDIX, 
 
 Why should it not he so ? Why should any root of hitterness be allowed 
 to spring up to mar the harmony that ought to subsist between the two com- 
 mittees, societies, nations ? Sir, the man that would foment discord between 
 us is not the friend of either, but the enemy of both. I do believe that the 
 Jiearts of the two countries are, in the main, right with each other. Great 
 occasions, suddenly arising, stir up the very depths of the soul, and expose 
 what lay concealed there. When the dreadful news of the assassination of 
 President Lincoln reached us, at which humanity stood aghast, and freedom 
 turned pale, the heart of England was appalled and trembled as instinctively 
 as of America herself. Even small occasions also afford reliable indications of 
 popular feeling, as the floating straw shows the direction of the mighty current. 
 When one of your war steamers — I can't pronounce the name — put into Belfast 
 last month, the commander and officers were received, as they should be, by 
 the mayor of that great city, the New York of Ireland. I remember the toast 
 at the banquet, to which your officers were called upon to respond — " Unbroken 
 friendship between the United Kingdom and the United States." When I read 
 that in London, I was so much pleased with it, that I put it down in my com- 
 monplace book, little imagining that such an opportunity as the present would 
 be afforded me of referring to it. Again, it was my good fortune to make the 
 acquaintance, on my voyage out, of that eminent philanthropist, your distin- 
 guished countryman, George Peabody, Esq. He showed me the autograph 
 letter of the Queen of England, in acknowledgment of his munificent and 
 unparalleled liberality to the poor of the metropolis — a liberality that, if report 
 be true, he is about to repeat in the loved land of his birth. Our noble queen 
 admired him all the more for the tenacity with which he adhered to his citizen- 
 ship of the United States, for which he respectfully declined the highest honour 
 that her majesty was willing to confer upon him. In his reply he gracefully ex- 
 pressed the high value he set upon the letter, as testifying to " the kindly feel- 
 ing between the Queen of the United Kingdom and a citizen of the United 
 States." Another instance occurs to me that I cannot forbear to mention : Ten 
 or twelve years ago, when his Excellency the lamented Abbott Lawrence was 
 your Representative at the Court of St. James, I had the honour to meet him at 
 th0 annual breakfast of the Young Men's Christian Association, held at a 
 quarter before six o'clock in the morning, over which the Earl of Harrowby 
 presided. His excellency, in addressing the young men, remarked, talking of 
 his own country, that America and England united in friendship might defy 
 the world. Suddenly pausing, he added : " No, I recall the word ' defy ;' this 
 is no occasion of defiance ; but rather let me wish thit England and America 
 united upon the basis of the Bible, may become a blessing to the world." 
 
 One word more, and I trespass no longer upon this most indulgent meeting. 
 By an undesigned coincidence, this day of your Jubilee celebration is Ascension 
 Day— fraught with hopes and associations most precious to the Christian heart, 
 and always observed in the Christian Church. Upon this day the top-stone 
 was placed, as it were, upon the work of redemption, as far as it has been 
 perfected hitherto. By the incarnation He took manhood into God, and capaci- 
 
APPENDIX. 103 
 
 tated himself for death. By death He destroyed him that had the power of 
 death, that is, the devil. By the resurrection He "declared himself to be the 
 Son of God with power." By his ascension, He took his place at the right 
 hand of the Father, to wait until his enemies should be made his footstool. 
 Upon this part of his purpose He is pausing still ; but God's longsuffering is 
 salvation may we not add, in a certain sense, and that through us ? Great 
 privileges, in connexion with great opportunities, always bring with them 
 tremendous responsibilities. America and England are placed in the forefront 
 of the battle. God grant they may both be found faithful to their high trust ! 
 England's prosperity and England's religion have always advanced hand in 
 hand together. It cannot be otherwise with America. The fondest wish of 
 ray heart for both may be expressed in words familiar to most of us — that 
 " peace and happiness, truth and justice, religion and piety, may be established 
 in both for all generations." 
 
 In the absence of full reports of the addresses of Drs. Taylor and Ormiston 
 of Canada, we take the following brief notice from the columns of the New 
 York Observer : 
 
 Rev. Lachlin Taylor, of Canada, after a pleasing reference to the previous 
 speakers, conveyed Canadian salutations. He regarded this as a providential 
 occasion in the political and national history, for the Jubilee celebration of a 
 Society that scatters " the Book" broadcast over all the world. In the Jewish 
 year of jubilee the trump of freedom sounded for all, and it was fitting that 
 the emancipation of millions and this celebration should occur together. He 
 offered a sincere and poetical tribute to the memory of President Lincoln, and, 
 after a brief speech, gave way to the Rev. Dr. Ormiston, of Canada, who 
 heartily concurred in the expressions of sympathy and congratulation which 
 had been offered by the other delegates ; and as he first saw the light in the 
 land of the mountain and the flood, of the heather and the broom, where he 
 first learned at a mother's knee to read the Bible, and where he learned from 
 it the way of salvation through Jesus Christ, he would bring also a voice of 
 greeting and good will from the banks 'of the Clyde as well as from Canada. 
 The Bible cause is commended by its catholicity to all; its work is to give the 
 Holy Word to every human being. God has given resources of mind and ma- 
 terial enough to give the Bible to every creature within the next fifty years. 
 Has God created mouths for which He has not created food ? And has He not 
 created material enough and mind, that, inspired by Him, shall develope this 
 material for the multiplying and spreading of his Holy ViTord ? Is it said tliat 
 there are not agencies enough to do this work ? Agencies ! why, what are all 
 our congregations about? Poor, withered, rusting souls, all through the land, 
 are liter°ally dying for want of something to do. As he came to this city a year 
 aco he stopped at the house of an aged woman who long years ago found her 
 Sa-Aour in the blessed Bible ; and having found Him, she at once asked what 
 she could do for Him. It seemed natural that, as the Bible had led her to 
 
104 APPENDIX. 
 
 Christ, she should devote her energies to spreading the Bible. And from that 
 day she had devoted all that she could spare from the labour of her hands to 
 send Bibles to others ; and he saw the channel worn in her a,ged hands by the 
 needle, which ceased not to ply while she told him of her love and work for 
 Christ, and that by God's help she had been able thus to earn $1,000 for the 
 Bible cause. And this same woman, during one year, earned a Bible a day — 
 365 copies during the year," by her consecrated industry. Dr. Ormiston made 
 most telling and practical application of this and other facts to the Marys and 
 Marthas in the assembly, urging all to distinguish this Jubilee year by per- 
 sonal effort. The audience united in singing, " The year of Jubilee is come." 
 
 Plcv. Cesar Pascal, delegate from the Bible Society of France, said : 
 
 Christian Friends: When I ask myself what entitles me to represent at 
 this great Jubilee gathering the Bible Society of France, I find no other title 
 to this flattering distinction but my sympathy with the Biblical work and the 
 noble and glorious republic of the United States. It would have been easy 
 for my brethren in France to find a delegate more authorized by age, talents, 
 or services rendered, but it was impossible for them to send you a more sincere 
 friend. I will even say that by selecting me they have found the man in 
 whom are embodied the feelings of fraternity and devotedness they have ever 
 cherished toward you. Hence I have not hesitated to accept the important 
 and distant mission offered me, assured as I was, by sympathetic presentiments, 
 that you would receive me with a cordiality equal to that which I was to 
 bring in your midst. 
 
 And now, American brethren, I am happy to meet you under these pleasant 
 and solemn circumstances. I gladly stand before you to offer you the tribute 
 of sympathy, of gratitude, and of congratulation, which the " Bible Society of 
 France " has commissioned me to bring you from across the waters. 
 
 You have extended to it a fraternal invitation to take part in these Jubilee 
 exercises, and it has hastened to choose a representative who would mingle his 
 thanksgivings with yours, and his petitions with those you address to heaven 
 for the prosperity of your country and your Society. For we, too, evangelical 
 Christians of France, are thankful to God for the signal protection He has ever 
 vouchsafed to America, and particularly for the happy issue to which He has 
 brought the long and terrible crisis through which you have just passed with a 
 devotedness, a courage, and a firmness which. have justly earned for you the 
 admiration of the civilized world. And why should not our hearts be filled 
 with gratitude as well as yours ? What God has caused to triumph on this 
 new continent is not simply the cause of the United States, but that of 
 humanity itself^-the holy cause of liberty and justice, for which you have had 
 the triple glory of struggling, of suffering, and overcoming. Nor have the 
 Protestant churches of France ever offered so many fervent prayers for you as 
 during the past five years. Your great trial has revealed to them the strength 
 of the bonds of sympathy which unite them to you ; and the proofs they have 
 
APPENDIX. 105 
 
 given you of their lively interest have been so diverse and so expressive, that 
 we can say in truth that they have morally shared your vicissitudes — your 
 sadness, your mourning, your tears, as well as your gratitude, your joys, and 
 your thanksgivings. 
 
 To these feelings which you have called forth as a nation, and which are 
 common to all Protestants in France, the Bible Society of France adds aflfeotion- 
 ate feelings of Christian brotherhoo toward the American Bible Society ; for 
 the two Societies are bound together by those sweet and powerful ties which 
 spring out of a perfect oneness of faith, of spirit, and end. Our Bible Society 
 is, like yours, founded upon a belief in the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, 
 which it recognises and proclaims as the infallible and sovereign rale of doc- 
 trine and life. Like your Society, ours labours with a truly liberal spirit; 
 rising above ecclesiastical differences, it admits among its members indiscrim- 
 inately the faithful of any evangelical denomination, and distributes to all the 
 Word of Life ; to those of Independent, Wesleyan, Baptist, and Lutheran 
 churches, as well as those of the venerable French Reformed Church. Finally, 
 like your Society, its aim is to place the Bible in every family, that it may be 
 as a domestic altar, sanctifying the trials and joys of home ; and to scatter the 
 Sacred Sheet wherever the Lord shall present an open door and furnish the means. 
 
 From this ensemble of similarity and fraternal relations results, for the 
 Bible Society of France, that sympathy, already of long date and deep, which 
 it cherishes for you, and of which my presence among you must be a certain 
 pledge. Hence you will not wonder that our society has seen with a joy that 
 can be equalled only by yours, the enlarging from year to year of the means 
 and the influence of your powerful Association, which numbers already by 
 millions the sacred volumes it has distributed. We remember with emotion 
 the beautiful spectacle your Society offered during the years of fratricidal 
 struggle which still saddensmany hearts. Whilst such a variety of interests 
 suffered ; whilst the financial crisis weighed heavily upon all citizens, and the 
 national debt ceased to be computed by millions, the American Bible Society 
 had means in such abundance that it increased its operations, established new 
 and numerous auxiliaries, and enlarged by thousands its circulation of the 
 Scriptures. Ah ! you are right, dear brethren, in saying that the smile of 
 God has been upon your work as well as your country. The protection of the 
 Almighty has kept pace with your difficulties ; so that, far from hiding it from 
 human view, perils have only made it the more ftriking. You have under- 
 stood, honoured friends, that such blessings imposed upon you the duty of 
 greater efforts, more zeal and activity ; and with joy and unanimity you have 
 resolved to consecrate yourselves more fully and generally to your great task, 
 so that no part of it could be neglected. Your rich country invites evermore 
 the children of men, without distinction of race or nationality, to share its 
 abundance. To all those who, through the holy path of labour, seek to reach 
 a better condition, it offers precious resources, whose efiicacy is certain with 
 the blessing of God. This is what your Society aims to do for the eternal 
 
106 APPENDIX. 
 
 treasures of which the Bible is the inexhaustible mine. It -will offer to all, 
 without exception, the precious means of securing a moral and spiritual con- 
 dition better already in this world, and in the world to come a place in the 
 eternal habitations. This is, brethren, fulfilling at once the duties of the 
 Christian and the citizen, and this country must be grateful to your Society for 
 all it will do in this direction. For if there is a well-established fact in the 
 history of the United States, it is, that to the Bible the country owes its 
 powerful institutions, its fruitful liberty, which excites the jealousy of many 
 nations, its wonderful prosperity, and its numerous works of evangelization 
 and benevolence. The Bible has given it its prominent place in the world. 
 It is with reason, American friends, that you consider your fidelity to the Word 
 of God as the safeguard of all your liberties, and the source of all your pros- 
 perity. If ever (forbid it, God !) this Bible, which it is your mission to give to 
 the whole world, were taken away from you, and human traditions of any kind 
 were substituted in its place, I assert, with all the authority which history 
 gives me, it would be the downfall of the greatness of the United States. 
 They would decline by degrees, and their decay, though perhaps slow, would 
 be none the less sure and deep. Looked at from this high standpoint, the des- 
 tinies of your country rest to a great e tent, under God, with societies like 
 this. How noble is your task; but how heavy your responsibility! May 
 God, without whose blessing all efforts are powerless, give you to rise more 
 and more to the height of your mission ! May your country and your Bible 
 Society continue to enjoy his favour, and may both be led to the high destinies 
 He has in store for them ! 
 
 The Rev. Isaac G. Bliss, of Constantinople, offered the following : 
 
 Resolved, That we celebrate this Jubilee with gratitude to God for his 
 favour in the past, with hope for- the future, with love for all who love his 
 Word, and with enlarged purposes for its wider circulation. 
 
 Mr. President : I am most happy to move this resolution, for I am con- 
 fident that the heart of each person responds most joyfully to the sentiments it 
 contains. The Jews of old hallowed the fiftieth year, and caused the trumpet 
 of jubilee to be sounded throughout the land. I think, sir, that the Treasurer 
 would have been sustained by this Society if he had authorized me to bring 
 from Egypt or Judea a genuine ram's horn trumpet, with which to sound forth 
 our praise to God and our gratitude for the success with which He has crowned 
 the past efforts of this Society, both at home and abroad. But, sir, without 
 ram's horn or trumpet, we will praise the Lord for his mighty acts ; we will 
 praise Him for his excellent greatness. The resolution says that we celebrate 
 this Jubilee vnth hope for the future. Every day the work spreads, and the 
 Master is true to his promise. But we say we celebrate this Jubilee with love 
 for all who love his Word. Yes, sir, with love for all who love his Word, of 
 every family, of every sect, of every nation, of every kindred, on the face of all 
 the earth ; for love is the fulfilment of the law. The resolution so says that 
 
APPENDIX. 107 
 
 we celebrate this Jubilee -with enlarged purposes, for the wider circulation of 
 the "Word of God. Yes, sir ; with these purposes, every one of them riveted in 
 the centre of each heart, we propose to control all love, all ambition ; to con- 
 trol all selfishness, that we may not fail to accomplish just that which our 
 Master wishes us to accomplish, not only in this good native land of ours, but 
 in all the earth. 
 
 I cannot but feel honoured with the position assigned me as the representa- 
 tive of the American Bible Society in the Levant — an area of more than 
 1,200,000 square miles, and equal to the United States of America, exclusive 
 of the territories. It contains a population of more than 50,000,000, made up 
 of ten distinct classes, or I may say races of men, using a vaHety of languages 
 and dialects, which I presume can be found in no other portion of the world. 
 Is it not strange, sir, that the land where was the first home of our race, where 
 was our earliest civilization, where our Saviour lived and died, where the 
 Bible originated, is at this day, in this eighteenth century, so destitute of the 
 Word of God ? There have not been circulated as yet, in all that broad land, 
 half a million copies of the Scriptures. Within the past eight years, during 
 which I have been the representative of this Society in the Levant, we have 
 been permitted by this Society, in conjunction with the British and Foreign 
 Bible Society of England, to put into circulation by sale, at fully one third 
 the cost, nearly 200,000 copies. Sir, the American Bible Society have gone 
 through all the length and breadth of that land, opening there 71,000 Bibles; 
 the rest belong to our fund across the ocean. We have received into' the 
 treasury of New York, through my hands, more than $22,000, and more 
 than $28,000 have gone to the treasury in London, making in all more than 
 $51,000 contributed by the people of Turkey — the poor, downtrodden people 
 of Turkey — ^for the Bibles they have received. The number of copies of the 
 Scripture thus paid for in Turkey go right where they are designed to go. If 
 you can get ten piasters out of a Turk for a pocket Testament, if you can get 
 any thing for a Bible, it makes sure that that Bible will be read, and that it 
 will be the means of the salvation, if not of the man receiving it, at least of 
 some one connected with him. 
 
 Now, sir, we have put these 200,000 copies of the Scriptures and its parts 
 into circulation, and in the face of an opposition which you can hardly under- 
 stand. I might show you in detail what this opposition arrayed against us is ; 
 but at this time I will only ask you to call to mind what Turkey is ; what 
 Mohammedan intolerance and exolusiveness is ; what the religion of Islam 
 implies, and then tell you there are 21,000,000 of Mohammedans in Turkey — 
 an empire the very laws and purpose of which are to suppress, if possible, the 
 religion of Jesus Christ. Against these Mohammedans there are arrayed 
 15,000,000 of corrupt nominal Christians, possessed of a half heathen civiliza- 
 tion, and making use of the rites and ceremonies of a half heathen religion. 
 There are monasteries by the hundred and cloisters by the thousand, all of 
 which are watching with a spirit of the intensest anxiety any feeling of unea- 
 
108 APPENDIX. 
 
 siness on the part of the people. Notwithstanding all this opposition, we have 
 done a good work in getting so many copies of the Scriptures into the hands of 
 the people. There, in the great, wicked city of Constantinople, we have sold 
 4,775 copies of the Scriptures, and have received therefor $3,000. The hun- 
 gering and thirsting for the Scriptures which is found in some parts of Turkey 
 is repressed by the cloisters wherever repression is possible ; yet in one of the 
 provinces, in the course of eight years, more than 8,O0O copies of the Scriptures 
 have been sold to poor people — to very poor people. 
 
 Now, I presume you would all like to hear some stories. We are now in 
 Turkey, but will go into Egypt. "We will go half way up the Nile, and there, 
 about twenty miles distant from the river, you will find a poor woman who 
 has been hard at work, and who walked twenty miles and back, barefoot, in 
 the sands of Egypt, in order to get possession of an Arabic Bible. After hav- 
 ing reached the missionary's house, she presented herself, and asked if Bibles 
 were sold there. When told they were, she was asked if she could read. She 
 then took up a New Testament, and being almost blind, put it close up to her 
 eyes. After having read a chapter, she told in her own words what it was 
 about. She then asked if she could not have a Bible. A Bible was given her, 
 and she immediately set out again on her homeward track over the burning 
 sands. Go with me, if you please, into Mesopotamia ; I will point you to a 
 man who has recently obtained a Bible. A few years ago he felt in his heart 
 a desire to know something more of the contents of the Bible. There was but 
 one Bible in the village, and that was in the ancient Armenian language. He 
 went to the man who owned it, and offered the entire avails of his silk crop 
 for it, and was refused. I don't suppose that the value of his silk crop would 
 compare with some of the incomes of this city, but it was all he had. The 
 man said, "I must have a Bible; I will go to Jerusalem." On his way 
 thither he came to a city called Cesarea, where he found a Bible in the ancient 
 Armenian language, which was offered him for three hundred and fifty piasters, 
 or about fourteen dollars. But thinking that he might find one cheaper, he 
 declined to take it. He reached at length a town near the place where Paul 
 was born, and found a copy of an Armenian Bible for eight hundred piasters, 
 or thirty-seven dollars. He hesitated whether to take it or not, but iinally 
 determined to go to Jerusalem. When he arrived there, he could not find a 
 single copy of the Word of God ; but he did find a few tracts designed to show 
 that the religion of the Bible was a false religion. As he could not get a 
 Bible, he was persuaded to take some three or four of these tracts. He 
 returned home. On his way back, he intended to stop tad obtain the worn 
 and torn Bible that had been offered to him for three hundred and fifty pias- 
 ters; but before he could get there he was taken sick, and he soon had no 
 money with which to buy that Bible, and so he went home to his native 
 village. After reaching home he went to see a neighbour, who had a large 
 reference Armenian Bible, published by this Society. When the owner of the 
 BibleVas asked how much he gave for it, his reply was, " Forty piasters; that 
 
APPENDIX. 109 
 
 a colporteur of a Bible Society had sold it to him, and that he would be along 
 again before many months." " Oh," said the man who had been to Jerusalem, 
 '• they asked me eight hundred piasters for one not half so good as this, and 
 this is in a language that I can understand." He took out his tracts. Eight 
 or ten of his neighbours came together to read these tracts. They did not like 
 the spirit of them. They began to compare them with what they found in the 
 Bible. The result was, that those eight or ten men were made to feel that it 
 was the Word of God. They sent a deputation, that they might purchase for 
 eight or ten men as many Bibles as they needed. From that village there has 
 gone out over the surrounding villages an influence in favour of the truth 
 which you can hardly understand here. 
 
 This man was the founder of a Bible society, the like of which is not to be 
 found in all Turkey. They became acc[uainted with the Bible, and every 
 Sunday they started out, two and two, with their Bibles in their hands, to 
 read to the people in the villages near by. In all those villages we have found 
 on examination that there are a large number of Bible readers. 
 
 Let me now take you to the region of Ararat. I have long tried to find 
 some person who would go as a colporteur into that region. During the last 
 winter we found two men, who started away with their packages of Bibles on 
 their backs. In some of the villages they sold seventeen copies of the Bible, 
 where no one would have supposed that they could sell a single one. They 
 were driven out of one of these villages, one cold stormy night, because they 
 were simply Bible colporteurs. One woman so far relented as to give them a 
 little rice. After they had finished their meals she found out .that they were 
 Protestant Bible sellers; she then took the spoon, broke it and threw it 
 into the fire, saying it could not be used again, because it had been used by 
 a Protestant. 
 
 A glorious work is being done in Turkey. Now, shall we, or shall we not 
 have a wider circulation of the Bible ? It is for you, Mr. President, and for 
 the Board of Managers to answer this question. The preparations are all 
 made for the work. Will you sustain your Agent, and allow him to have all 
 the colporteurs he wants ? If so, I shall be exceedingly thankful. 
 
 The resolution was seconded by the Rt. Rev. Charles P. M'Ilvaine, D.D., 
 of Ohio, who spoke as follows : 
 
 I should not have thought of such a thing as undertaking to say a single 
 word in connexion with this resolution, seconding the motion, had it not been 
 particularly requested of me (I say it for the purpose of excusing myself), and 
 the request laid especially upon the ground that in the year 1853, when the 
 British and Foreign Bible Society was celebrating its jubilee, I was one with 
 another venerable and beloved brother, Dr. Vermilye, of this city, who were 
 honoured with the commission of this Society to represent it at that jubilee. 
 
 I not only greet those who have been sent here to our Jubilee from Eng- 
 land and from France, and the colonies of Great Britain, but I thank them 
 
110 APPENDIX. 
 
 most heartily, in the name of this great Society, for the cheering -words, the 
 affectionate expressions of strong desire of future communion and increasing 
 love wherewith they have come to us. Allusion was made by one of the del- 
 egates from England to the mother society, although one of them said that it 
 was perhaps too late to speak of this Society as the daughter. Very well ; 
 when q^ueslions of right and enterprise come together, we stand together as 
 sisters ; but when questions of memory, and origin, and reverence, come before 
 us, then we delight to take the place of the daughter, and say to that beloved 
 and venerated society of England: "Dear mother, dear mother, we own thy 
 parentage ; we love to think of the time when thou wert the only great 
 national institution of the whole earth, and when thy example taught us our 
 duty; and we love to feel, and we always have loved to feel, in reverence and 
 thankfulness ; and we shall love to follow, counting and knowing it to be a 
 privilege to so follow, in the steps of that venerated parent to the end of the 
 world." Nothing, nothing, American brethren, can we do for the good of the 
 world so much as that we, the two great Protestant nations of the earth, 
 should stand together to the end of the world for the world's work and salva- 
 tion ; and no other instrumentality can be devised so mighty, or so certain of 
 its result to that great end, as keeping together as co-workers, and taking a 
 common interest in the circulating of our common Bible, and especially in 
 our common version. I trust our dear brethren, and especially those from 
 England, will go hack and tell them, that just as Dr. Vermilye and myself 
 received such kind greetings at their jubilee, so they received the strongest and 
 warmest exhibitions of kindred love ; and I trust that as the shuttle, of which 
 I spoke while in England, and to which allusion has been made, going to and 
 fro, weaving more and more, broader and broader, and stronger and stronger 
 the golden robe of our Christian union, so ever hereafter, not merely on Jubilee 
 occasions, but from anniversary to anniversary, that work of love, harmony 
 and union, may go forward. But to change the figure from raiment to tele- 
 graphing : Between the two great Protestant nations of the earth, down 
 beneath all the waters of strife, there lies a strong cable of golden love over 
 which travel messages of kindness, of mutual co-operation, suggestion and 
 incitement. There was a cable that the art of man laid with great expense of 
 man's means, but it broke. 
 
 The theory is with regard to any thing that man may lay down in the deep 
 that the terrors and strife of the ocean may still interfere with the communica- 
 tion desired. There is, however, a cable laid by God, down so deep that the 
 art and malice of men can never reach ; so perfect that nothing can ever add 
 to it; and over it messages of love will be continually passing. God is in it • 
 no waves of human discord can interrupt it. There it is, the strong bond 
 of Christian love between England and us. 
 
 The Bishop here narrated at much length the incidents of the first Sabbath 
 which he spent in England in 1861, when the excitement over "the Trent 
 affair" had just begun to surge over that country. He was the first to bring 
 
APPENDIX. Ill 
 
 the tidings that "our government had nothing to do with it." In three 
 churches which he visited in London on that day, the object of every sermon 
 preached and of many prayers offered was to keep down excitement, to prevent 
 war or any conflict between the two great nations. In the Baptist chapel in 
 which Gen. Havelock was formerly a worshipper, and where Sir Morton Peto 
 was an elder, the Bishop made his way to the pulpit stairs to respond to the 
 sentiments of the preacher, who said : " Pray for her Majesty, pray for the lords 
 and commons in parliament, pray for the Queen's cabinet, pray for the Pres- 
 ident of the United States, pray for the Senate and House of Representatives, 
 pray for the Cabinet, pray that peace may be kept, pray that the spirit of war 
 may be kept down in both lands." It being Communion Sunday, and the 
 ordinance of the Lord's Supper being about to be administered, there was no 
 room for the American's response. 
 The Bishop then proceeded : 
 
 In conclusion, there was not a pulpit in all England in which the same 
 sort of work had not gone on in earnest efforts to keep the two countries in 
 peace, and in the manifestation of kind sentiment towards us, except in one 
 instance, and that was in a church in London, where the congregation, sup- 
 posing that the minister iirtended to say something of a contrary kind, made 
 such a noise that he had to stop ; and he was obliged to come out in the 
 " Times" the next day, and say that he did not mean to utter any such senti- 
 ment. There is a great depth of Christian love, a strong feeling of attachment ; 
 and I believe that when these winds of passions shall have passed away, we 
 shall be found nearer together than ever before, and there we must be for the 
 good of the whole world. 
 
 I want to state what I consider to be the testimony of this meeting — what 
 I consider to be the testimony of every great meeting like this for the circula- 
 tion of the Scriptures. The two great battles to be fought are, with infidelity 
 growing under the name of rationalism and under the name of popery, each 
 "rowing with parallel power and rapidity ; and which I consider this Society 
 can successfully combat under that single verse of St. Paul to Timothy: 
 " All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for 
 reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness ; that the man of God 
 may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." 
 
 Take the first, that all f eripture, every chapter, every verse, is given by 
 the inspiration of God, that inspiration which God can only give. There is 
 our testimony against the whole world of man's philosophy and man's skepti- 
 cism. The bare fact that we come together from England and every where, 
 and are standing around the solitary Volume, and sending it abroad at such 
 expense and earnestness to the end of ihe world, is declaration of supernatural 
 inspiration and influence. It is utterly impossible that that zeal should exist 
 in the world, and especially that it should be fruitful of any such results, if in 
 our own estimation we took up with any thing else in the place of God's 
 Inspired Word as the final rule of faith and practice. Let it be in any sense 
 
112 APPENDIX. 
 
 man's work, as distinct from God's Inspired Word, bringing it down from that 
 high level of God's supremacy and sovereignty, and Bible societies dwindle 
 away to nothing, and people will be content that the world shall be without 
 the Bible. Then as to the other part of the verse — ^that it is "profitable for 
 doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness ; that the 
 man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works" — the 
 sufScienoy of the Scriptures. Let that which is the great bulwark of popery 
 nominally — necessity of tradition, the necessity of the word of the Church to 
 supplement the Scriptures, to make them sufficient — be the sentiment of Chris- 
 tendom and Bible societies, and the zeal to circulate the single Volume without 
 note or comment is at an end ; because we shall not think any thing of the 
 efficacy of that Book's circulation until we gather up the whole load of tha 
 tradition of the ages and send them together. 
 
 Now, then, when we stand with such zeal to circulate that simple Book, 
 we say it is given by inspiration of God, or we would not care any thing about 
 sending it. If it is such as that the man of God can, by the simple blessing 
 of the Spirit of God upon the teaching of that Word, thoroughly furnish and 
 make a perfect man in Christ Jesus, then we have the perfect sufficiency of the 
 Scriptures. • 
 
 Therefore let us gather together our testimony ; let us carry it away as 
 our united testimony to the perfect inspiration and the perfect sufficiency of 
 God's Holy Word. Then let me just add this : we want something after all 
 to make that Word of God sufficient. Then we go to the precincts of Geth- 
 semane, and we find our blessed Lord praying, " Sanctify them through thy 
 truth ; thy word is truth." Well, then, not only do we think that that Word 
 is God's great instrumentality for the sanctification of the world, but. that He 
 who is ever living at the right hand of God to make intercession for us is 
 interceding for the efficacy and sufficiency of the Scriptures, of the entire Word 
 of God; and therefore, when we go abroad with the circulation, it is not that 
 we rely upon that Word or any thing that we put with it, but rely, constantly 
 looking up to heaven, and thinking of the intercession of the Son of God at the 
 right hand of the Father; and there we put our trust ; such is our hope. It is 
 Jesus beginning, ending, first and last, our dear Saviour, our glorious portion. 
 In his strength we are strong, and by Him the Word is sufficient. 
 
 Remarks of Bishop Janes : 
 
 The last reverend speaker quoted this passage of Scripture, "That the 
 Scriptures are profitable for instruction ;" and one of the instructions of the 
 Bible is, in honour to prefer one another ; and I shall on this occasion prefer 
 that the succeeding speaker shall have your time and attention. I have too 
 delicate an appreciation of what is due to those who are to follow on such an 
 occasion, to encroach on their time. I will simply move the resolution. The 
 resolution will commend itself to your hearty spirit and practice ; and I am 
 persuaded that this is the best service I can render to the Cause which has 
 
APPENDIX. 113 
 
 bronght us together to-day. The light is not BufRcient to enable me lo read 
 the resolution. 
 
 Resolution read by Dr. Taylor, as follows : 
 
 Resolved, That, relying upon the providence and grace of the Almighty 
 God, this Society hereby approves the resolutions adopted by the Board of 
 Managers at their last meeting, to undertake without delay a third general 
 supply of the whole country with the Word of God— a work which is eminently 
 befitting us as an acknowledgment of Divine goodness in the past, and a proper 
 beginning of our second half century. 
 
 ♦ 
 
 Bishop Janes : I most heartily move that resolution, and yield the opportu- 
 nity to speak to a man whom we all delight to honour, both for his Christian 
 character and the high services which he has rendered his country. 
 
 Remarks of Rev. Dr. Vehmilye : 
 
 I was going to say there was little of any thing Bishop Janes could produce 
 I could not second ; that is, any thing outside of the Five Points [of theology] ; 
 but I think that this resolution is eminently befitting this public occasion. 
 
 The American Bible Society was organized after the war of 1812, and took 
 the Word of God.in hand, and rolled its peaceful offices along the shores of the 
 Atlantic ; and now at the close of another war you are required to take this 
 blessed Word in your hands and spread it faithfully over the wild prairies of 
 the West, that were scarcely known and not peopled at that time, and down 
 over our Southern States, to rejuvenate them and to proclaim to them all a 
 new day of peace, of brotherly love and Christian sympathy, of holy earnest- 
 ness in spreading the Word of our blessed Master, not only over this continent, 
 but to the utmost ends of the earth. It is eminently befitting that you should 
 realize this at this time, and crowd yourselves anew to the work, so that 
 before another fifty years have rolled away there may be a blessed record 
 given of it, not only in this land, but throughout the whole world. Go faith- 
 fully then, sir, to this work ; take that blessed Word in your hand, and it 
 will do more to reconstruct these sundered States, and to renew this society 
 that has been so dislocated, and to bring back the very spirit of brotherly 
 love, than all the legislation in the world. It is your work, it is our work, 
 to do this ; and therefore I second this resolution with all my heart. It is 
 the appropriate resolution on this Jubilee occasion. 
 
 Reference has been made to the Jubilee of the British and Foreign Bible 
 Society, when Bishop M'llvaine and I were honoured to be your delegates to 
 speak on that occasion ; and now we have representatives here. Englishmen, 
 to speak on this occasion. Do you suppose that Earl Russell has had any 
 thing to do with this delegation ? I would advise Mr. Seward to have his 
 eye upon it, because he could not, if he had sent all the diplomats in Great 
 Britain, have done more than he has done to cheat us out of our Christian 
 wrath.' I am sure there is some diplomacy in this; but, Mr. President, I 
 
114 APPENDIX. 
 
 will say this, in the spreading of that Bible, and acting upon the princi- 
 ples of mutual respect and mutual right, may these two Protestant nations 
 of the world be bound henceforth and for ever in the bonds of amity ; and, 
 sir, fulfilling our obligations as the Protestant nations of the world, may we 
 be prepared to go forth shoulder to shoulder in spreading the blessed light, 
 and truth, and principles of liberty, and the everlasting salvation, and the 
 good hope through Christ, that are contained in this Word of God, until it 
 shall bless all nations that dwell upon the face of the earth. This is my 
 sentiment, and I hope our brethren will bear it back (I think it is the 
 sentiment of this whole assembly, as I know it is of the Society) to the 
 British and Foreign Bible Society. 
 
 Major-General Howard, U. S. Army, moved the adoption of the following 
 resolution : 
 
 Resolved, That we regard with patriotic and Christian interest the supply 
 of the South with the Holy Scriptures, without respect of race or colour, and 
 that we hail with satisfaction the increasing spirit of co-operation manifested 
 by the friends of the Bible throughout that region of our common country. 
 
 The address of General Howard consisted mainly of a large mass of 
 testimony from official sources respecting the condition of the freedmen of 
 the South. The great length of this production compels us to select only 
 those passages which bore immediately upon the object and work of the 
 American Bible Society. 
 
 Commencing with a graceful allusion to his military position during the 
 war, and his being called to " bring up the rear" of the array of speakers on 
 this occasion, the general proceeded : 
 
 The grand object of this honoured Association, the American Bible So- 
 ciety, is the extension of Christ's earthly kingdom and the promotion of 
 true religion. It is found altogether practicable in the furtherance of these 
 objects to circulate the Holy Scriptures, sending them into all the world, 
 that they may preach the Gospel to every creature. 
 
 Much seed, we know, falls by the way side upon hardened ground, where 
 it can take no root; much, also, upon stony soil, where no fruit comes to 
 maturity; but nevertheless a goodly portion does fall upon good ground, and 
 bears fruit varying immeasurably in amount according to the locality and 
 the preparation of the soil. 
 
 The attention of the Society has been, of late, called to the recent slave 
 States. It is this locality, as one demanding unusual preparation and a 
 careful sowing of Bible seed, that I ask this Society to visit and most 
 thoroughly explore. 
 
 Every variety of circumstance and condition that pertains to mankind 
 will be found there— wealth, culture, taste, elegance, contentment, comfort, 
 competence, scarcity, poverty, and suffering ; every grade of intellectual devel- 
 opemeut, from the ripe scholar to the most degraded and ignorant of human 
 beings. With no disposition to awaken any old feelings of sectional pride. 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 115 
 
 but for the sake of the remedy, let me state that at the beginning of this war 
 upwards of six hundred thousand -white adults and upwards of three millions 
 of blacks in the late slave States could neither read nor write. I do not sup- 
 pose that all these people are without Bibles ; on the contrary, many of them 
 were preached to on the Sabbath, many heard the Scriptures read, and, though 
 necessarily ignorant, a large number did catch the spirit of the Gospel, and 
 exercise a simple faith and practice that may put to the blush those of us who 
 have enjoyed exalted privileges from childhood. 
 
 Yet, with all this, after you have taken a few model plantations, where 
 the master and mistress believed in the manhood of the slave, and embraced 
 all the religious instructions dealt out to the negroes — after you have carefully 
 estimated the numbers of real Christians amongst the poor and despised 
 whites, you cannot but feel that thousands of fields are still rough and stony — 
 that much soil is not yet broken up at all, or prepared for a promising seed- 
 time or a prospective harvest. 
 
 Then, after dwelling upon the fact that slavery has ceased throughout the 
 land, he gave his testimony respecting the present condition of the freedmen, 
 " under the three heads. Labour, Education, Justice." 
 
 We give the principal statements respecting education, as this subject is 
 so intimately connected with that of the cii-eulation of the Word of God 
 among the freed people : 
 
 My school inspector's report for January 1st of this year makes the whole 
 number of scholars in the late slave States, excepting Delaware and including 
 the District of Columbia, 90,589; teachers, 1,314; schools, 740. This does 
 not include the regiments of coloured soldiers, all of which were more or less 
 favoured with opportunities for learning to read while in the service. One 
 lave regiment came to my knowledge where every man learned to read and 
 
 write. 
 
 I will recite what the same inspector says of schools in Mississippi, as a 
 sample of the condition of such matters in the South : " There is a mixture 
 of good and evil to report from this State. Your officers are indefatigable 
 in their efforts. There are many good schools among the thirty-four in opera- 
 tion. Some of them have made admirable progress, and a number not in- 
 cluded have started under various auspices in diff'erent parts of the State. 
 There is every where the usual eagerness to learn. But in some sections 
 inveterate opposition among the whites is manifested towards these schools. 
 Two teachers, at the time I was there, were sent to one of the large towns, 
 twenty-five miles into the country, where there was no military, and the 
 next morning they were ordered off, and threatened if they did not go. This 
 opposition is often openly avowed, but more generally is tacit and concealed, 
 makin" itself felt every where in a sort of combination not to allow the freed- 
 men any place in which a school may be taught." A superintendent in an 
 interior town says, " The opposition to negro education is very great in my 
 town and neighbourhood." Coloured men, in some instances, have paid 
 
116 APPENDIX. 
 
 their own money to prepare and furnish a room for a school, and then have 
 been forbidden to use it, the white people taking it from them for their own 
 children. Similiar things are true of other States, though in Mississippi such 
 opposition has seemed to be more common than elsewhere ; and yet there 
 are redeeming features. Instances of planters have come to our knowledge 
 who are desirous of employing teachers for the freed people. One of your 
 officers states that "many planters are beginning to perceive that schools 
 for the children would be an inducement for labourers to engage with them." 
 General opposition is undoubtedly decreasing. We notice expressions of 
 hope from those who are labouring in the State, and it is clear that a 
 steady system of effort cannot be resisted; as I told one of the planters, 
 " They would find it harder fighting the alphabet and spelling-book than 
 they did Grant and Sherman." He made no reply. 
 
 There are now sixty-eight teachers in the State, thirty-four schools, and 
 4,310 enrolled pupils. More than half of these are considerably advanced 
 in reading, writing, and arithmetic. 
 
 In the department of Washington there are sixty-three freedmen's schools, 
 and upwards of 6,000 pupils. Some 5,000 of these are good readers, learn- 
 ing also grammar, geography, arithmetic, and sometimes higher branches; 
 2,304 are learning to write ; 825 are still in the alphabet. Besides these 
 there are sixteen night schools and a largo number of Sabbath schools. 
 
 A number of industrial schools have been started, one of which made 
 during the last month 162 garments; another, 100 articles of clothing. 
 
 With regard to the schools of the district the superintendent says, " All 
 the teachers seem to be earnest and hopeful." One writes: "I find the 
 children are very much like white ones— some stupid and others bright. 
 They are now rather more eager for learning, because it has been fruit for- 
 bidden to them." The inspector adds further, that there are large numbers 
 attending some sort of schools of a voluntary or self-supporting character 
 that are not reported. Throughout the entire South an effort is being 
 made by the coloured people to educate themselves. In the absence of 
 other teaching, they are determined to be self-taught, and every where some 
 elementary text-book or the fragment of one may be seen in the hands of 
 negroes. They quickly communicate to each other, so that with very little 
 learning many take to teaching. 
 
 A willingness, even an ambition, to bear expenses is also noticed. They 
 often say, " We want to show how much we can do ourselves, if you will only 
 give us a chance." 
 
 This may seem an overstatement to those who doubt the character of 
 the negro ; not that they are ungrateful or unwilling to be helped, but so 
 universal is the feeling I am describing, that it seems as if some unseen 
 influence was inspiring them to that intelligence which they now so im- 
 mediately need. Not only are individuals seen at study, and under the 
 most untoward circumstances, but in very many places I found what I may 
 
APPENDIX. 117 
 
 call native schools; often rude and very imperfect, but there they are, a 
 group perhaps of all ages, trying to learn. Some young man, some woman, 
 or old preacher, in cellar, or shed, or corner of a negro meeting-house, with 
 the alphabet in hand or a torn spelling book, is their teacher. All are full 
 of enthusiasm with the new knowledge the book is imparting to them. 
 
 All the statistics of this inspector's report are corroborated by the differ- 
 ent assistant commissioners and agents of the Freedmen's %ureau. The 
 educational advantages are not confined to the freedmen ; schools for the 
 poor whites have been established, though as yet there is not a very large 
 number. 
 
 The foregoing views are hopeful, sanguine ; but the number of teachers 
 must be multiplied by twenty, and the school advantages proportionably 
 increased. 
 
 The question constantly occurs. Can this be done against the prejudices 
 of the white people ? We need not stop to ask. What joy would have 
 thrilled through our churches, if at any time, in a single year, such immense 
 progress could have been recorded in any missionary field abroad. How 
 gladly they would have put a Bible or Testament into the hands of every 
 new scholar who had become able and willing to read ! 
 
 The general concluded thus : 
 
 Daring our encampment beneath the celebrated Lookout Mountain, 
 where General Hooker wreathed his brow with fresh laurels, we had op- 
 portunity to become familiar with the , state of society in that region of 
 country, where all the men remaining at home were poor whites. Just 
 opposite my headquarters was a log cabin containing two rooms. At first 
 it was occupied by a poor woman with five or six children. She was half 
 ill, unhappy, discouraged, without learning. Her husband was absent in the 
 rebel army. The cabin was falling in, crevices were open through the 
 sides, and nothing about the premises indicated the first particle of comfort 
 or of cheer. The husband finally came home, thoroughly broken down by 
 his hard campaigning. He had some little knowledge, wished to do right, 
 did not believe in the war; but his future was completely dark, and he 
 added another burden to an already desolate and overburdened household. 
 His children were shrewd, quick to catch new thoughts, but their minds 
 were undeveloped. This picture is a true one of hundreds of others in that 
 region. We established a Sunday school; old and young came to it, and 
 a fountain of joy, and comfort, and hope was found in the Bible, and Bible 
 truths conveyed to these poor people by the army chaplain, the Christian 
 Commission agents, and Christian soldiers. Frequently an old man of sev- 
 enty years crept down the winding path from the top of the mountain range 
 between us and the river, and begged some return for the corn our soldiers 
 had taken from him. He loved the country, he loved the flag, he loved the 
 Saviour; he made no complaint, but was grateful for the food that God 
 
118 APPElfDIX. 
 
 gave him in payment for his toilsome journey, and for the medicines he 
 could take to his poor, sick -wife. I visited his home. No country can fur- 
 nish a rougher dwelling place. It would have been hard for him to find 
 soil enough to plant his corn had it not been taken from him. Oh, the 
 desolation of that house ! His wife was a much younger woman than him- 
 self, but her health was gone. ; he was lying on a sort of couch, that 
 answered the^ame of bed ; her face was turned away from the door ; she 
 was so still, her hand and cheek seemed so livid, that at first I thought she 
 was dead. This bed, with perhaps -two broken chairs, constituted all the 
 furniture. The old man sat quietly in the doorway, and greeted me joy- 
 ously. He had a part of a Bible. He could not read much himself, but 
 managed to study out a few of the precious truths. His wife aroused her- 
 self from her apparent lethargy, and talked to me of Christ, and showed me 
 how some faithful messenger of the Lord had found her and opened to her 
 the wellspring of eternal life. Talk of hate of the negroes ! It was not 
 there in all that region. At least I did not discover it. 
 
 Their mountains are rich in minerals ; their valleys will one day be filled 
 ■with grain, and fruits, and flowers. That river, the beautiful, graceful, 
 winding Tennessee, -will one day be freighted with precious ores and rich 
 products of the soil. The railroad which runs over the top of the mountains 
 and curves backwards and forwards through their deep valleys and gorges, 
 and which, in war, could supply daily two hundred thousand men, when 
 it was infested by guerrillas, when train after train was obstructed, thrown 
 off embankments, broken up, burned up, or otherwise molested ; when the 
 track was often torn up, sometimes from ten to twenty miles in extent, the 
 ties consumed and the iron twisted or bent double — that same railroad 
 will one day joyously supply a teeming, thriving, prosperous people. It 
 will be when every vestige of slavery shall have disappeared, and when 
 the loyalty of the North and West shall be firmly linked to that of East 
 Tennessee ; linked together in the pursuit of moral, intellectual, and physical 
 wealth, vastly strengthened by the true linking, which is the Bible and the 
 difiusion of such Bible truths as that "love worketh no ill to his neighbour," 
 that " love is the fulfilling of the law." It will be when the Christian can 
 open his heart to the full sunlight, that his heart may expand above, 
 below, around, till he can like Christ, his Master, love man as man, and 
 be willing to protect and bless him, whether he lives in the valley or on 
 the mountain top, whether he be wise or unwise, whether he be black or 
 white. 
 
 Prejudice, passion, falsehood, malignancy, and hate, do commingle in the 
 human soul like a sea, turbulent and seething with a fearful power of fiend- 
 ish life. Thus evil spirits must be allayed ; nay, they must be expelled. 
 It can be done only by the spread of Gospel truth. This truth will change 
 the face of things completely in the Southern States. The proud will be 
 brought low, the poor whites will be raised up, the load of ignorance and 
 
APPENDIX. 119 
 
 superstition will be lifted from them and also from the negroes, and real 
 peace will follow, will be pure, and will prevail. 
 
 Rev. Dr. Jonas King, of Athens, Greece, seconded the resolution, and 
 said: 
 
 All honour to such a noble and splendid general. As for me, I am 
 simply a soldier. I have been a soldier for nearly fifty years. I have 
 been in some battles, and fought in Egypt near the pyramids, and in 
 Palestine and Asia Minor. I was once a missionary in South Carolina 
 and know something of the blacks. I have had a chance to know some- 
 thing of the influence of the Word of God, not only among the poor slaves, 
 but also in the palaces of the kings of Europe. To say that it is a happy 
 influence is to say what every one must know to be true. I consider that 
 the Bible is the centre of the moral world, as the sun is the centre of 
 the natural world. The missionary societies are as the moons, and the 
 tract societies as the stars, of this grand and moral universe. The Queen 
 of England was once asked by some African prince, to what England owes 
 her greatness and prosperity. In answer she showed him the Bible. The 
 longer I observe its influence, the more thoroughly am I convinced of the 
 importance of the Bible. It is enough ; it is sufficient. Let us then do all 
 that can be done to put a Bible in the hands of every man, woman, and 
 child in the whole world. 
 
 The Rev. Makk Hopkins, D.D,, of Mass., pronounced the benediction, 
 and the Society adjourned. 
 
OFFICERS OF THE AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY 
 
 President. 
 
 JAMES LENOX, E Q., New York. 
 
 Vice Presidents.' 
 
 HON. HEMAN LINCOLN, Massachusetts. 
 
 " JOAQUIN MOSQUEEA, New Granada. 
 THOMAS COCK, M.D., New York. 
 HON. PETER D. VROOM, New Jersey. 
 JOHN TAPPAN, Es(!.,|Massaohu«etts. 
 GEN. JOHN H. COCKE, Virginia. 
 ARISTAEOHUS CHAMPION, Es5 , Now York. 
 HON. ALLEN TRIMBLE, Ohio. 
 FREEBORN GARRETSON, Esq., New York. 
 HON. W. W. ELLSWORTH, Connecticut. 
 
 " EDWARD M'GEHEE, Mississippi. 
 
 " A. B. HASBRO trCK, New York. 
 R. H. WALWORTH, New York. 
 FRANCIS HALL, Esq., New York. 
 MYRON PHELPS, Esq., Illinois. 
 JAMES A MAYBIN, ESQ., Louisiana. 
 H N. DAVID L. SWAIN, North Carolina. 
 
 " JOSEPH H. LUMPKIN, Georgia. 
 JOSEPH A. WRIGHT,:indiana. 
 
 •' JACOB SLEEPER, Massachusetts. 
 FREDERICK T. PRELINGHUYSEN, Esq, New Jersey. 
 WILLIAM WHITLOCK, JK., Esq,, New York. 
 HON. ROBERT C. WINTHROP, Massachusetts. 
 
 WILLIAM A. BUCKINGHAM, Connecticut. 
 
 " SALMON P. CHASE, Ohio. 
 NOEMAN WHITE, Esq., New York. 
 FREDERICK S. WINSTON, Esq., New York. 
 GEN. WILLIAM WILLIAMS. Connecticut. 
 HON.: GRANT GOODRICH, Illinois. 
 JAMES SUYDAM, Esq., New York. 
 GEORGE H. STUART, Esq., Pennsylvania. 
 
 Secretaries. 
 
 REV. JOSEPH HOLDICH, D.D. 
 WM. J. K. TAYLOR, D.D. 
 " T. RALSTON SMITH. 
 
 Treasurer. 
 
 WILLIAM WHITLOCK, JE. 
 
 Assistant Treasurer, 
 
 HENRY FISHER. 
 
 General Agent. 
 
 CALEB T. EOWB. 
 
MANAGEES. 
 
 rirst Class. 
 
 Third Class, 
 
 TERM— 1866 to 1870. 
 
 TEBM— 1864 to 1668. 
 
 FBEDEHICK T. PEET. 
 
 RALPH MEAD. 
 
 ISAAC WOOD. M.D. 
 
 JAMES W. DOMINICK. 
 
 CORNELIUS DU BOIS. 
 
 ARCHIBALD RUSSELL. 
 
 WASHINGTON R. VERMILYE. 
 
 FREDERICK H. WOLCOTT. 
 
 E. J. WOOLSEY.; 
 
 WILLIAM E. DODGE. 
 
 ROBERT CARTER. 
 
 HENRY J. BAKER. 
 
 MARSHALL S. BIDWELL. 
 
 WILLIAM H. CROSBY. 
 
 CHANDLER STARR. 
 
 NATHAN BISHOP. 
 
 KICHABD P. BUCK. 
 
 HENRY DICKINSON. 
 
 Second Class. 
 
 Fourtli Class, 
 
 TEEM— 1865 to 1869. 
 
 TEHM— 1863 to 1867. 
 
 RICHARD T. HAINES. 
 
 JAMES L. PHELPS, M.D. 
 
 JAMES DONALDSON. 
 
 GEORGE D. PHELPS. 
 
 CHARLES N. TALBOT. 
 
 CHARLES TRACY. 
 
 A. P. CUMINGS, 
 
 G. P. DISOSWAY. 
 
 WM. H. ASPINWALL. 
 
 A. ROBERTSON WALSH. 
 
 JOHN DAVID WOLPE. 
 
 ALFRED EDWARDS. 
 
 SCHUREMAN HALSTED. 
 
 ALEXANDER VAN RENSSELAER. 
 
 E. L. FANCHER. 
 
 JONATHAN STUH6ES. 
 
 WM. a. LAMBERT. 
 
 HIRAM M. FORRESTER. 
 
STANDING COMMITTEES 
 
 AMEEICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, FIFTT-FIRST TEAK. 
 
 Versions, 
 
 REV. JOHN N. M'LEOD, D.D., New York. 
 
 REV. HENRY B. SMITH, D.D , " 
 
 REV. WM. H. CAMPBELL, D.D., New Brunswick, N. J. 
 
 REV. HENRY I. SCHMIDT, D.D., New York. 
 
 REV. WILLIAM R. WILLIAMS, D.D., " 
 
 REV. THEODORE D. WOOLSEY, LL D., New Haven, Conn. 
 
 REV. WM. G. T, SHEDD, D.D., New York. 
 
 REV. ARCHIBALD POSS, New York, 
 
 REV. ALEXANDER H. VINTON, D.D., New York. 
 
 I'inance, 
 
 FREDERICK S. WINSTON. 
 NORMAN WHITE. 
 A. P. CUMINGS. 
 W. R. VERMILYE. 
 WM. G. LAMBERT. 
 WM. H. CROSBY. 
 HIRAM M. P0RBE3TER. 
 
 Fablication. 
 
 FRANCIS HALL. 
 FREDERICK T. PEET. 
 RALPH MEAD. 
 A. ROBERTSON WALSH. 
 ROBERT CARTER. 
 CHARLES N. TALBOT. 
 ALFRED EDWARDS. 
 
 Distribution, 
 
 REV. ISAAC FERRIS, D.D. 
 
 JAMES L. PHELPS, M.D. 
 
 FREDERICK H. WOLOOTT 
 
 MARSHALL S. BIDWELL. 
 
 REV. JOHN COTTON SMITH, D.D. 
 
 REV. CHAS. F. E. STOHLMANN, D.D. 
 
 REV. WILLIAM ROBERTS, D.D. 
 
 Agencies, 
 
 REV. THOMAS DE WITT, D.D. 
 REV. JOHN M. KREBS, D.D. 
 JAMES W. DOMINICK. 
 REV. WILLIAM R. TOMPKINS. 
 REV. THOMAS S. HASTINGS. 
 NATHAN BISHOP, LL.D. 
 REV. ALBERT S. HUNT. 
 
 Legacies, 
 
 CHARLES TRACY. 
 
 ISAAC WOOD, M D. 
 
 JAMES SUYDAM. 
 
 ALEXANDER VAN RENSSELAER. 
 
 WM. H. ASPINWALL. 
 
 HENRY DICKINSON. 
 
 SCHUBBMAN HALSTED. 
 
 Nomination, 
 
 JAMES SUYDAM. 
 
 NORMAN WHITE. 
 
 ISAAC WOOD, M>D. 
 
 E. L. FANCHER. 
 
 RICHARD P. BUCK. 
 
 REV. HENRY E. MONTGOMERY, D.D. 
 
 CHARLES N. TALBOT. 
 
 Anniversaries. 
 
 REV. EDMUND S. JANES, D D. 
 
 REV. WILLIAM ADAMS, D.D. 
 
 REV. M. S. HUTTON, D.D. 
 
 REV. W. I, BUDINGTON, D.D. 
 
 REV. ALEXANDER H. VINTON, D.D. 
 
 EBV. N. L. RICE, D.D. 
 
 REV. PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D. 
 
 Auditing Committee, 
 
 FREDERICK T. PEET. 
 RICHARD T. HAINES. 
 SCHUREMAN HALSTED. 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY. 
 
 ARTICLE I. 
 
 This Society shall be known by the name of the AMERICAN BIBLE SOCIETY, of which the sole 
 object shall be to encourage a wider circulation of the Holy Scriptures, without note or comment. 
 The only copies in the English language, to be circulated by the Socie.ty, shall be of the version now in 
 common nse. 
 
 AUTICLE II. 
 
 This Society shall add its endeavours to those employed by other societies, for circulating the Scrip- 
 tures throughout the United States and their Territories ; and shall furnish them with stereotype 
 plates, or such other assistance as circumstances may require. This Society shall also, according to 
 its ability, extend its influence to other countries, whether Christian, Mohammedan, or Pagan. 
 
 ARTICLE III. 
 
 All Bible Societies shall be allowed to purchase, at cost, from this Society, Bibles for distribution 
 within their own districts ; and the officers of all such Bible Societies as shall hereafter agree to place 
 their surplus revenue, after supplying their own districts with the Bible, at the disposal of this Society, 
 shall be entitled to vote in all meetings of the Society. 
 
 ARTICLE IV, 
 
 Each subscriber of three dollars annually shall be a member, 
 
 ARTICLE V. 
 
 Each subscriber of thirty dollars at one time shall be a member for life. 
 
 ARTICLE VI. 
 Each subscriber of one hundred and fifty dollars at one time, or who shall, by one additional pay- 
 ment increase his original subscription to one hundred and fifty ^dollars, shall be a director for life. 
 
 ARTICLE VII. 
 
 Directors shall be entitled to attend and vote at all meetings ^of the Board of Managers. 
 
 'ARTICLE VIII. 
 
 A Board ofManagers shall be appointed to conduct the business of the Society, consisting of thirty- 
 six laymen, of whom twenty-four shall reside in the city of New York or its vicinity. One fourth part- 
 of the whole number shall go out of office at the expiration of each year, but shall be re-eligible. 
 
 Every Minister of the Gospel, who is a member for life of the Society, shall be entitled to meet and 
 vote with the Board of Managers, and be possessed of the same powers as a Manager himself. 
 
 The Managers shall appoint all officers, and call special general meetings, and fill such vacancies as 
 may occur, by death or otherwise, in their own Board. 
 
 ARTICLE IX. 
 
 Each member of the Society shall be entitled, under the direction of the Board of Managers, to pur- 
 chase Bibles and Testaments at the Society's prices, which shall be as low as possible. 
 
 ARTICLE X. 
 
 The annual meetings of the Society shall be held at New York or Philadelphia, at the option of the 
 Society on the second Thursday of May, in each year ; when the Managers shall be chosen, the ac- 
 counts presented, and the proceedings of the foregoing year reported. 
 
 ARTICLE XI. 
 
 The President, Vice Presidents, Secretaries, Treasurer, Assistant Treasurer, and General Agent, for 
 the time being, shall be considered, ex officio, members of the Board of Managers. 
 
124: APPENDIX. 
 
 ARTICLE XIL 
 
 At the general meetings of the Society, and the meetings of the Managers, the President, or, in his 
 absence, the Vice President first on the list then present, and in the absence of all the Vice Presidents, 
 such member as shall be appointed for that purpose, shall preside at the meeting. 
 
 ARTICLE XIII. 
 
 The Managers shall meet on the first Thursday in each month, or oftener if necessary, at such place 
 in the city of New York as they shall from time to time adjourn to. 
 
 ARTICLE XIV. 
 
 The Managers shall have the power of appointing such persons as hare rendered essential services 
 to the Society, either members for life, or directors for life. 
 
 ARTICLE XV. 
 
 ' The whole minutes of every meeting shall be signed by the Chairman. 
 
 ARTICLE XVI, 
 
 No alteration shall be made in this Constitution, except by the Society at an annual meeting, on the 
 recommendation of the Board of Managers. 
 
 ARTICLE XVII. 
 
 The President, or, in h^is absence, the Vice President first on the list in the city of New York, may, 
 and on the writtefi request of six members of tlie Board, shall call a special meeting of the Board of 
 Managers, giving three days' notice of such meeting, and of its object, 
 
 ARTICLE XVIIL 
 
 The Board of Managers may admit to the privileges of an Auxiliary any society which was organized, 
 and had commenced the printing, publication, and issuing of the Sacred Scriptures before the estab- 
 lishment of this Society, with such relaxation of the terms of admission heretofore prescribed, as the 
 said Board, two thirds of the members present consenting, may think proper. 
 
 Notices to Auxiliaries. 
 
 The American Bible Society is now in a situation to furnish all their Auxiliaries, and other Bible 
 Societies, with any quantity of well printed and well bound Bibles and Testaments at the shortest 
 notice. 
 
 Auxiliaries are requested to be very particular in sending their Annual Reports, names of Oificers, 
 etc., etc. 
 
 Whenever a new society is organized, notice of the event should be given immediately to the Parent 
 Society, so that it may bo recognised. The names of its officers and their post-oflice addresses should 
 also be given. 
 
 *** Particular care should be taken to send the information requisite to their being recognised ; 
 for which see the cover of Annual Report, head, " New Auxiliary Societies;" 
 
 Correspondence, etc. 
 
 Pecuniary Remittances, and letters in relation to the accounts of Agents, Auxiliary and other 
 Societies and persons, and legacies, should be addressed to Henry Fisher, Assistant Treasurer Bible 
 House, Astor Place, New York. 
 
 Letters relating to Travelling Agencies, to Delegations for Auxiliary Anniversaries, and inquiries 
 as to the mode of raising funds, requests for donations of books, inquiries as to the general policy of the 
 Society, notice of new Auxiliaries formed, reports of those already recognised, and communications for 
 the Record, should be directed to "Secretaries of the American Bible Society," Bible House Astor 
 Place, New York. 
 
 Orders for Books, and letters in relation to the transmission of Reports and Records should 
 he directed to Caleb T. Rowe, General Agent, Bible House, Astor Place, New York. ' 
 
 The Board . of Managers beg leave to state that it is very desirable that orders for hooks should be 
 accompanied WITH PAYMENT, it being understood that the moneys are usually collected by socie- 
 ties previous to their purchasing books. Such is the demand upon the Depository, that long credits 
 prevent the Parent Institution from receiving the benefit of the DISCOUNT allowed for prompt pay- 
 ment in the purchase of PAPER and other materials. 
 
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