the most wonderful of all, there is no protest, or dignified remonstrance, or sorrowful lament, coupled with the above allusion by the dignitary aforesaid with the outrage on civilization and prostitution of Christianity perpetrated by the above-named class of

men!

A high eulogium is given by President Thornton on the Bishops of the Methodist Episcopal Church— men who, for a quarter of a century, had squelched out the fires of abolitionism in the above denomination of Christians, and acted as pointsmen to shunt off from the track of the General Conferences all questions that came with the velocity of an express on that subject! We are now gravely informed, however, by the President referred to, "that the report of the bishops was remarkable as declaring that the time had come to draw the anti-slavery line, and exclude from the Church all who would not liberate their slaves!"

Here is an extraordinary concession! It has not always been the time for the Methodist Episcopal Church to draw the anti-slavery line, and exclude from the Church all who would not liberate their slaves! This is the Church which the editor of the Methodist Recorder, April 25th, 1861, says, "Has ever held high principled views on the subject of slavery;" which the Rev. G. B. Macdonald, in a letter to the London Star, Dec. 1860, called "a protesting anti-slavery church;" and which Bishop Simpson

and Dr. M'Clintock, on a visit to England a few years ago, maintained was "anti-slavery!"

Anti-slavery when it had got to draw the line in the Philadelphia Conference of 1864 for freedom, and resolve to exclude from the Church all who would not liberate their slaves !

But now the set time has come, the grand era has dawned upon our world, the great epoch of time has arrived when the pious slaveholders, so-called, are to be lifted over the stile of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and excluded from its "pastures green," and bounds fixed, over which they are prohibited from coming but not a word is said about the exclusion or prohibition of the dense multitudes of Methodists. who have thrust out from their communion and fellowship as members and ministers persons who wear a colour not their own! We are quite aware that a deputation of five coloured ministers were introduced from what President Thornton calls "African Methodist Churches!" African, to distinguish them from American churches, although not a single member in those churches was probably born in Africa! But the name in America serves to build the wall of caste between the black and white churches, the same as in the case of black and white regiments on the battle-field-to keep alive the stubborn and cruel prejudices of the more favoured classes against the outcasts and down-trodden, and to make the former look big with an inflation of vanity, as they give a tremendous flourish with their trumpets when they go

out from the portals of the white churches on errands of mercy to their sable brethren, penned up in the folds of so-called "African Churches," or when they allow coloured deputations to visit them, on their Annual or General Conferences! Then their virtues, graces, and worth are sometimes discovered; and, although the images of Christ are encased in the darkest ebony, they are pronounced "as eloquent as Punshon!"

At the Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church recently held in Philadelphia, President Thornton says, "It was his responsible duty to address the Conference, and in the name of British Methodism he endeavoured to make his address Wesleyan, Christian, pacific, and anti-slavery." All who are acquainted with the sad history of the Methodist Episcopal Church in America, must honestly confess that there was a needs be for Christian, pacific and anti-slavery addresses in the Conference referred to and we are glad to perceive that for once a British delegate has felt his responsibility, and inade it his duty to call attention to the "sum of all villanies," like the venerable founder of Methodism, John Wesley, on the platform of a New World Conference; as it is a great improvement on the policy adopted by previous delegates from Wesleyan Methodism to America, who have been so peaceful on antislavery questions, as to resemble dumb dogs that could not bark! But if the "few words, guarded, Christian, and unpolitical," which the correspondent

of the Mercury says, "he addressed to President Lincoln," be a type of the pacific words which he uttered in the presence of the assembled delegates in Philadelphia, coupling as they do the bursting of the fetters of the slave with the hostilities of the Federal armies, and the providence of God, otherwise than overruling the designs, plots, schemes, and intrigues of wicked men; and making them subservient to accomplish his gracious purposes; in such a case we may determine the character of his peace principles, and peace words; and may safely class him with the Methodist American peace editors, ministers, and people who maintain the “absolute and most perfect justice of the present war," although associated with the most diabolical barbarities and cruelties, commenced and maintained for the restoration of the Union, which had filled up the measure of its iniquities to the brim, and called down the avenging justice of the Almighty in punishment for its sins.

Mark his doubly guarded language, "Sir, there are many thoughtful and praying men in England who are praying daily for the cessation of hostilities, for the bursting of the fetters of the slave, and who hope and believe these two results will, in the providence of God occur together." Together, as if the deliverance of the slave could not have been accomplished without the present war; as if our Northern people were the friends of the negro, and had taken up the sword to burst the fetters of the slave; as if Christian men could promote the attainment of a righteous

end by the use of diabolical means; and as if the providence of God favoured or sanctioned our Federal government, churches, and people in their present course of blood-thirstiness and blood-guiltiness. The thought is abhorrent to every feeling of humanity, repugnant to every principle of reason, and opposed to every precept of Christianity; and should President Thornton and the men who are uttering his prayer think or believe to the contrary, all we can say is that they are blinded and bound fast with the most terrible delusions, clearly manifest in their withholding of all censure and reproof from their brethren who are crying blood and thunder, and their absence of all condemnation of our horrid demoniacal war.

Since writing the above, we have met with the following resolution which was unanimously agreed upon by the members and delegates of the Wesleyan Conference, of which Mr. Thornton is honorary President. It is dated Bradford, Aug. 13th :

:

"Our brethren in the United States have been comforted by the expression of our sympathy in their sorrows and difficulties; and our old and unalterable testimony against slavery has been repeated in circumstances which encourage the hope of a speedy termination of that which our venerable founder has justly designated as the execrable sum of all villanies.""

Comforted by the expression of our sympathy in their sorrows and difficulties! Comfort for men who are full of unreasoning hate towards each other—