once by the rule of common equity, and the call of spiritual need, in expending a certain portion of our funds upon this metropolis, from which we draw so large a part. There are thousands of our people in the environs of this city, who dwell in their crowded districts, more in number than the inhabitants of some counties; and more ignorant of the faith of this Christian land than many Mahometans of their Koran. Such regions have been explored by your missionaries, and flourishing churches now stand where cursing and intemperance recently rioted on the Sabbath-day. But it has been our endeavour to turn away no applicant for aid; and having in peculiar prospect the rapid growth of our country, and the fact that this Society was formed by Delegates from various districts, for our general necessities, we have sought to establish a minister of Christ in each village which could designate the man of their choice. By dividing our funds, into very small portions, our influence has been scattered over a very large surface, and yet, according to the plan of our operations, unlike other little portions of aid, it is all permanently perceptible.

General Plan of Operations.

Strictly speaking, this Society sends out no missionaries-it encourages ministers to follow the tokens of divine providence where a door is opened; but it is not so much them, as the people who are aided. We usually require the application to come from the people themselves we learn that they are in earnest, because they are willing to contribute two or three times as much as they ask from us; and when we find that the $100 or $150 will be as the cup of water to him, who is furnished with shoes, and raiment, and staff, and an authentic commission to preach the Gospel-will be what he cannot live without, and what you have put

into our hands to bestow-we grant it, and pray that God may speed him in his labour.

By adhering to the plan detailed, as we think, with much perspicuity in our first Report, we have found the greatest source of benefit result to the various Churches which have come under our inspection. Edifices of public worship are built for a regularly established minister, when none would have been provided for an itinerant preacher; the vision helps the faith of him who saw no Church in the occasional assembly, in the school or court-house, or the forest

-the atmosphere of moral influence which is around a settled minister and his organized Church operates gradually upon the diseased systemthe graves clustering fast around the village spire which points to heaven

all unite to prove that a town may better be without a seat of judicature, than an altar to the Lord.

It will be difficult to impress upon the minds of those who are not already in some measure acquainted with the fact, an idea of the fearful obstacle which has been thrown in the way of the progress of the gospel, by the countenance which the system of itinerancy has obtained from the devout and zealous in our land. The ignorance, and in a few instances even the immorality of some who have dared to assume the guise of ministers of Christ, and thus fit themselves for the deepest perdition which the next world containshave created prejudices against ministers and their message, which nothing can eradicate but the permanent system we would introduce. The missionary must locate himself, he must be known, he must be tried, he must win his way to general confidence-he does not deserve it if he cannot gain it; but once thus established, his light enlarges; he is no longer a lamp in a dark place; he becomes a star, and a little sun, in the region where the forest-trees are

'falling on every side, and the daylight of knowledge is exchanged for the darkness of atheism.

Your committee believe, that in order that the gospel may flourish in our land, it will be necessary to return to the example of the Apostles in the primitive age. Peter, John, and James, abode chiefly at Jerusalem; at a time when the whole world was to be evangelized-there were "certain prophets and teachers," in the church at Antioch-Paul ceased not for three years to warn the people of Ephesus, and thus it becomes apparent that their system was to hold fast to the spot where Providence opened a door, and by persevering exhortation and prayer, to try the power of their spiritual weapons; they never gave over in despair, for God was their strength; they never confessed, by flight, that the grace of God in them could not subdue the principalities of darkness; they left not ground which they had indented with their knees, and watered with their tears, till they founded a church there on the rock of salvation; and so they erected their chain of posts from Jerusalem to Byzantium, and from Byzantium to Rome, and so they brought the knowledge of God even into Cæsar's Palace. They ever planted ministers as they advanced, and the ordinances of Christ, and taught men "to do all," whatsoever he commanded. The popular mode, on the contrary, criminally separates what God has joined, the ordinances of the Church from a preached gospel.

We believe that if preaching should have the power of the sermon at the first Christian Pentecost, and a revival of religion as effective as that glorious one ensue-yet without the sacraments, and church order and discipline, all would pass away as the early dew. The church is the Lord's body-his temple-he vivifies every part of his external machinery-and preachin is but one

of the means for the conversion of the world: the exemplification which each professing member is bound to exhibit of the prevalence of faith, hope, and charity, is to shed light upon those who walk in darkness, and cheer and guide them, as does a city set upon a hill the wanderer in a dangerous valley.

Necessity of Missionary Efforts.

The general want in our country of preaching, and all the ordinances of the gospel, must deeply impress those who believe that there is but "one name given under heaven whereby men can be saved." Whole districts in our land are fallow-ground, where there are none to sow or reap for the Lord,-where, on the contrary, even the moral influence of Christian institutions is unknown. Those who have seen, as we have done with our own eyes, the farmer guiding his oxen over his plough-field on the Sabbath, quite as regardless as his cattle of God's commandment and the Saviour's commiseration, will earnestly deplore the ravages of profaneness and impiety in our fertile soil. We believe that in the next half century our very political institutions will not be safe. if our fellow-citizens be not Christianized-that the law will not be enforced in our wide-spreading regions without military aid, unless our people are retained in that subjection of conscience in which a good man holds himself to God. We ever observe, that of all heathen, the white one, who has reverted into savagism from aversion to better training and example, is the worst; and we ask assistance in our arduous efforts to send messengers of truth to and fro, that knowledge may be advanced.

"How can they preach except they be sent ?" Unless some such plan be pursued as the one we commend, it will be too late some half centuries hence to seek to lay hold of a population grown up to the manhood of impiety. And there is every

reason why we should bind down our labours to these United States. All the world, in the amazing missionary excitement which has roused the Churches of each hemisphere, is on the look-out for a field of enterprise. We cannot expect, indeed we would not endure that they should count us heathen, and send their ministers hither. Let us, then, do that for ourselves which we will not have others do for us. Your committee are far from pleading the cause of domestic missions in opposition to that of foreign missions-we believe that the causes are indissolubly united -we expect little help from those who do not feel this-we believe that the missionaries who go out from us to distant lands, excite others, perhaps less enterprising, to labour nearer home. But we ask how are foreign missions to be supplied with preachers, without such revivals of religion as we hope for from the labours of our home-preachers? How are they to be sustained, unless we keep up life at the heart, which may send its vivifying fluids to the remotest extremities. The order of nature, and charity, and of God, is to supply our own wants, to provide for those of our household, and to cherish the stranger. We begin wrong when we commence with the outermost circle -we do wrong when we confine ourselves to the innermost ring-all our wants are not to be provided for before we pity and aid the strangerthe stranger is not to have the provision before the children are fed.

The commendation which we have received, not only from innumerable individuals, and from towns actually profited by our exertions, but from Presbyteries, and classes, and Synods, has greatly animated us, and we have a growing confidence that the number of subscribers, and general supply of money to our treasury will increase as our field of labour widens. The calls of such an institution as ours are urgent as the souls of

men are valuable, and our cause is as extended as our vast Republic..

Deficiency of Missionaries.

It remains for your Committee to repeat what was reported last year, that the want of suitable missionaries is as great as the claims of our people are pressing. They hope, therefore, that the patrons of this Society will not fail also to aid the various institutions in our land, whose object is to prepare pious youth for the gospel ministry. These Education Societies are a chief ornament in the crown of the church's glory; and by their help it is that the high places of wickedness are to come down. They provide for us the instruments which we trust the Lord hath afore provided for them and us--for the edifying of saints, and the conversion of sinners. The need of such instruments already mounts up to hundreds for each state in our Union--they are counted by thousands when we survey the extended desolations.

The encouragements for young men to settle in our western towns deserve a remark. In their growth, the minister grows also; in their strength, he strengthens-he be comes the column for support and ornament to all the literary, moral, and religious institutions of the vicinity fast-peopling; and he gains a present reward in his happy establishment and increasing respectability, as well as lays up, if he be pious and zealous, a reward which the Lord will keep for him unto the day of his coming.

Conclusion,

The Committee now conclude their Report with a consideration which has in itself the most vivid excitement to stimulate us to incessant action. It is that our Society is that portion of the great machinery, which the providence of God has created for the glory of our day, and which Christian benevolence moves-which

after all, comes mainly and extensively into immediate contact with hearts of men, and works out their salvation. What are Bible Societies without the living Apostle? what Education Societies, if he who would go and labour in the vineyard have none to feed him? what other institution of Christ hath the Great Head of the Church ever substituted in place of preaching face to face, and exhorting men with all long-suffering and doctrine? Our Society is as the die at the mint, upon which, and by which, all other parts of the machine work, and which, by the help of the

Holy Spirit, strikes the inuring image of the truth, as it is in Jesus, into the immortal substance of the soul.

It was the vow of David, for which he was blest-" surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house, nor go up into my bed; I will not give sleep to mine eyes, nor slumber to mine eyelids, until I find out a place for the Lord, an habitation for the mighty God of Jacob." It is our prayer, and the aim of our labour, that an ark of God may be found in every "field of the wood," and every city of the plain, and every island of the sea.

UNION MISSION.

EXTRACTS OF LETTERS.

Rev. Mr. Vaill to the Domestic Secretary.

May 15, 1824.

DEAR SIR, The great pressure of secular business, at the present time, leaves but very little room for writing. By seizing every spare moment for the week past, I have been able to prepare the Journal for April. The events which have transpired during the past month, in relation to the removal of the Garrison, are truly interesting to us at Union, and they will by no means fail to interest our friends in New-York. Great has been the change in our prospects as well as feelings since last December, when we had reason to apprehend an immediate rupture between our go

vernment and the Osages, and the consequent breaking up of the Mission, with a suspension, if not the entire termination of our usefulness. Our fears were then greater than we disclosed to the public. But Jehovah, our Saviour, has been better to us than our fears. Having obtained help of God, we continue in our work. We have never been more prospered than since this dark cloud arose.

Since I commenced this letter, two children have been received into the family, which increases our number to twenty-one. These two are boys of a suitable age, and will receive the names given in your instructions, in a late communication.

May 17.-We have just received an infant female child, about four months old, brought here and given

to us by an Osage, in consequence of its having been forsaken by its parents. It is adopted by brother and sister George Requa. We have taken a few little ones of this description from compassion to the children, and with a desire to bring them up in the way they should go.

JOURNAL FOR APRIL.

Irregular Conduct of a Young Indian. Friday, April 2.-Another of our cattle has been shot by the Indians. The leader of the hunting party, who called on us this morning, seemed to regret the act, and ascribed it to some thoughtless young man. We intend to lay our grievances before the Chiefs for their consideration. Some efficient measures to regulate the Osages, are becoming indispensable. It is to be hoped, that our government will do something in a short time for their benefit.

Visit to the Trading House.

Monday, April 5.-Brother Palmer left us this morning with the view of going down the river to meet our boat from Cincinnati, and perform

business for the mission on the Arkansaw. Brother Vaill accompanied him to Mr. Chauteau's Trading House, for the purpose of meeting the Indians who have engaged at this time to take the leaders in the late outrage upon the whites to Fort Smith.

Wednesday, April 7th.-Brother Vaill, who returned to-day, informs, that the Indians had not arrived at the Trading House; and that Mr. Chauteau, who had waited for them two days, proceeded down the river with Dr. Palmer.

Death of the Sub-Agent. Nathaniel Philbrook, Sub-Agent to the Osages, was, it is supposed, drowned on the 28th ult. in attempting to cross Grand river, on his way to the Nation to discharge the duties

of his office. On that day, Mr. Philbrook left Bean's saltworks, twentyfive miles from Grand River, expecting to reach Mr. Chauteau's establishment on the Verdigris. He was alone, and the water high and rapid. Several days after, a gentleman, travelling the same road, found his horse, saddle, and portmanteau near the river. As he supposed Mr. Philbrook had succeeded in crossing on a raft, and had gone to Mr. Chauteau's for a canoe to get his horse over, he waited two days, when a canoe providentially arrived, and the fact was ascertained that Mr. P. had not been at the Trading House. He had doubtless attempted to cross the river, and was swept down by the current, and was drowned. Search was made for his body, but without success. Philbrook was, we believe, a native of New Hampshire. He has been a merchant in Boston and New-York. He came to this country in 1819, in company with Governor Miller, and was for a season a merchant at the post of Arkansas. post of Arkansas. He received the appointment of Sub-Agent in 1821. Although he resided at Little Rock, yet he frequently visited the Osages, and was particularly instrumental in bringing about the peace between them and the Cherokees in 1822. He was a gentleman in his manners, and in regard to this mission a friend particularly obliging. His death is much much lamented by both the Mission and the Osages.

Removal of the Garrison.

Mr.

On Monday evening, an express arrived at Mr. Chauteau's, bringing advices from Col. Arbuckle, commandant at Fort Smith, that he had received instructions to remove his command farther up the Arkansas, and to establish the Garrison permanently near the mouth of the Verdigris; and requesting friendly aid in selecting a suitable place. This information is of great moment to the Mission, and inspires our breasts with fresh resolution and courage.,