MORAVIAN SETTLEMENT AT ST. THOMAS'S. 127 CHAP. LXXXIX. 1842. SLAVES HELD BY MISSIONARIES AT THE ISLAND OF ST. THOMAS. MONTGOMERY'S COUNSEL AND PROTEST.-KNIBB THE BAPTIST MISSIONARY. MONTGOMERY ACCOMPANIES MR. LA TROBE ON A MISSIONARY TOUR TO IRELAND. PUBLIC BREAKFAST TO THE DEPUTATION IN DUBLIN. MEETINGS AT BELFAST. ADDRESS TO THE POET IN VERSE. -SPEECHES. GRACEHILL. -LETTER TO JOHN RETURN TO ENGLAND. MOFFAT THE MISSIONARY. HOLLAND. LETTER TO JAMES EVERETT. THE exultation in which Montgomery had indulged on account of the satisfactory conduct of the negroes emancipated by Great Britain in the West Indies, was suddenly dashed from an unexpected quarter. In the summer of this year, the Rev. W. Knibb, a zealous Baptist Missionary, touched at the Danish island of St. Thomas, on his return from England to the scene of his labours in Jamaica. " At St. Thomas's," says he, "I visited one of the Moravian settlements, and went to the simple and unadorned grave-yard, where twelve missionaries, twelve wives, and eighteen children sleep till the resurrection-morn. It is a hallowed spot, and it speaks in solemn tones to us, work while it is called. to-day.' While in St. Thomas's I saw enough of slavery to make my heart bleed."* Four-and-twenty Christian men and women, devoted "to the death" in inculcating and exemplifying the religion of Jesus amidst the hor * "Hinton's Memoir of Knibb," p. 445. Second edition. rors of slavery in a foreign land for nearly a century,— what a precious memorial! But while Mr. Knibb thus saw, and thus wrote, "his heart glowed with indignation on ascertaining that the Moravian missionaries were slave-holders. He sent home an account of this fact, both to Mr. Angus* and Mr. Sturge†, pressing an immediate publication of the statement, with his name; but I believe that only a private use was made of this communication." Whatever may have been the *A Baptist minister at Newcastle, for whose monument there, Montgomery afterwards wrote the following inscription: : "To the memory of the Rev. W. H. Angus, of Newcastle-uponTyne; he was brought up to the sea, captured early in life by the French, and detained as a prisoner of war. In his confinement he was found by the gospel, and afterwards became a most strenuous, indefatigable, and faithful promulgator of it, in the East and West Indies, and throughout continental and insular Europe, as well as in his native land. "Him, both by man and Satan, seized and bound, And still, from clime to clime where'er he went, That which he bears in heaven, if thou wouldst know, For none are worthy on its leaves to look, But those whose names are written in that book." † Knibb had become acquainted with the Quaker abolitionist, during the visit of the latter, accompanied by his friend Harvey, to the West Indies, in 1836-7, with a view to ascertain the working of the negro apprenticeship system. "Hinton's Life of Knibb." MONTGOMERY'S COUNSEL AND PROTEST. 129 99 intention, the effect of this "private use' was, that Montgomery presently encountered the charge on his approach to every missionary platform, and by almost every day's post: nor was it to be palliated by the fact, that in the Danish island of St. Thomas the Moravians must use slave service, if they required any at all; that they not only treated their own negroes with kindness, but, through the exercise of a non-interreference in the secular concerns of the colony, they retained their long-valued position as Christian instructors, to accomplish which in "the islands of the West," some of their brethren had themselves been willing to become slaves! nor that, to use the words of Mr. Hinton, "for a considerable period there had existed among the [Baptist] missionary brethren a certain kind of dealing in slaves, which gave rise to considerable dissension in Jamaica, and not a little difference of opinion at home." In this crisis, Montgomery not only felt, as he had been made to feel on a similar occasion before*, that his own sincerity as an avowed abolitionist was implicated, but, what to him was a consideration of infinitely greater importance, the character and support of the Brethren's missions were endangered by the public and "private use" of the communication in question. After duly considering the matter, he determined to address a respectful caveat to his brethren on the subject adverted to by Mr. Knibb. This he did in a letter of considerable length, and deep feeling on his part. As, however, the Brethren removed, as soon as possible, the evil in question,—the power of doing so belonging not to the authorities of their church in England, but in Germany, and as it is probable the document itself was never sent,- we shall merely extract VOL. VI. * Vol. iv. p. 254. antè. K from it the opening passage, in which the writer speaks of himself in affecting terms: "REVEREND AND DEAR BRETHREN, "I feel myself not only warranted, but constrained by duty and affection to that church of Christ in which it was my privilege to be born and brought up, and to which, under Him, I owe all that is to me most valuable in life, the knowledge of the way of salvation, to call your attention to a subject in which (whatever may have been its bearings and influences in times past,) the future prosperity of that work which has been principally committed to the Brethren, and for which it might be presumed that they are, in a great measure, continued as a people, the evangelisation of the heathen, will be so much involved that, unless the hindrance which it presents be speedily removed, it seems probable that the means hitherto furnished towards it by Christians of other denominations will be greatly decreased, if not eventually so diminished as absolutely to become unavailing to enable the present stations to be maintained, or any future fields entered upon. "I this day remember the sins of my youth, which, from the first step of my open apostacy, when at the age of seventeen years I cast myself into the world, have caused my voluntary banishment from the congregation to be thus far perpetuated; for though long ago, after I had come to myself, I was re-admitted into church-fellowship, I have never seen the way opened for me to become a resident among my own people, but have lived alone in the midst of Christians of various denominations, and availed myself of the means of grace to be enjoyed among them; and only occasionally visiting Fulneck, Ockbrook, and other places of settlement, as opportunity offered. I do not here enter into particulars which might either appear to justify or to condemn me, for not devoting all my time, my powers, or my affections to the Brethren in the direct service of our Saviour, as entrusted to them. I mention these personal circumstances solely to show you, that from my peculiar LETTER TO THE MORAVIANS. 131 situation I have been able to understand much better than any resident and wholly-occupied member of the congregation can do, the character, sentiments, and conduct of the various religious bodies of evangelical professors in this country. It has pleased the Lord, since the time when, as I humbly hope, and earnestly pray that I may not be deceived, He turned my heart in some degree from disobedience to the wisdom of the just,-I say it has pleased him to afford me peculiar opportunities, not only in the town where I reside. but in many parts of the kingdom, to become intimately acquainted with eminent and excellent persons among the ministers and members of the Church of England, the Independents, the Methodists, the Baptists, and the Society of Friends, commonly called Quakers; as well as generally familiarised, both in private and public, with the manner of thinking, speaking, and feeling on religious subjects which distinguish these denominations from each other, and from all the world beside. Many providential circumstances connected with my personal history, the turn of my mind, the peculiar employment of the few talents which I hold, and even from the insulated situation with respect to my own brethren in which I have been kept,- these have gradually, during a series of years, gained me the confidence and esteem, far beyond my desert, of Christians of all these denominations, so that wherever I may be on travel, I see kindness and hospitality pressed upon me from all quarters; and I am solicited, not only to be a frequent partaker of their joy on public and festival occasions, but in the churches and meeting-halls of each of those whom I have enumerated, I have been called upon to be a helper also, and to the utmost of my ability I have pleaded the causes of Bible, missionary, school, tract, and other institutions of Christian charity; and have, out of my small means, also cheerfully contributed to their respective funds. I have felt myself not only free to do this, but not free not to do it; insomuch that I have acted on these occasions, under the conviction that the burden of the Lord was laid upon me to serve Him, and his cause, and his people thus, since, as a |