“New York, 6th Month 30th, 1841.”

The Baptist Convention alluded to in the foregoing letter was one whose proceedings I regarded with considerable interest, for it had been generally understood that the ministers delegated from the South, as well as some of those from the Northern States, intended to exclude abolitionists from every office on the missionary board, and especially to remove my friend, Elon Galusha, a distinguished Baptist minister, from the station of vice-president, for the offence of attending the London Anti-Slavery Convention, and more particularly for supporting the following resolutions of that assembly: 

“1.  That it is the deliberate and deeply-rooted conviction of this Convention, which it thus publicly and solemnly expresses to the world, that slavery, in whatever form, or in whatever country it exists, is contrary to the eternal and immutable principles of justice, and the spirit and precepts of Christianity; and is, therefore a sin against God, which acquires additional enormity when committed by nations professedly Christian, and in an age when the subject has been so generally discussed, and its criminality so thoroughly exposed.

“2.  That this Convention cannot but deeply deplore the fact, that the continuance and prevalence of slavery are to be attributed in a great degree to the countenance afforded by many Christian churches, especially in the Western world, which have not only withheld that public and emphatic testimony against the crime which it deserves, but have retained in their communion, without censure, those by whom it is notoriously perpetrated.

“3.  That this Convention, while it disclaims the intention or desire of dictating to Christian communities the terms of their fellowship, respectfully submits that it is their incumbent duty to separate from their communion all those persons who, after they have been faithfully warned in the spirit of the gospel, continue in the sin of enslaving their fellow-creatures, or holding them in slavery—­a sin, by the commission of which, with whatever mitigating circumstances it may be attended in their own particular instance, they give the support of their example to the whole system of compulsory servitude, and the unutterable horrors of the slave trade.

“4.  That it be recommended to the Committee of the British and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society, in the name of this Convention, to furnish copies of the above resolutions to the ecclesiastical authorities of the various Christian churches throughout the world.”

On entering the meeting, we found the question was already before them, previous to balloting for the officers for the ensuing three years.  The pro-slavery party were anxious to prevent all discussion, but some on the other side proposed questions which compelled their notice.  Among the rest it was plainly asked, if the southern delegates did not come pledged against