INTELLIGENCER. Vol. xlii.

No. 28.

CHAP

YHAPPAQUA Monthly Meeting of the Society of Friends was established in the year 1785, and in commemoration of this a meeting was called for the 8th of Eighth month, 1885, and a large company of Friends and Friendly people gathered at the old meeting house, still in a good state of preservation, although it has been built one hundred and seven years. Whilst the monthly meeting has been held here but one hundred years, there had been an established meeting forty years earlier, and before that a meeting held for some time in the neighborhood. This we find by the old records, from which we quote as follows:

"At the Yearly Meeting held at Flushing, in 1745: "Whereas several Friends who live at a place called Shapaqua, within the bounds of North Castle, have continued for some considerable time to meet together at the house of Abel Weeks, and desire to have a meeting established amongst them. This meeting therefore, having considered thereof, desire the approbation of the Quarterly Meeting for the same."

The following is the Quarterly Meeting's minute relating thereto :

"At a Quarterly Meeting held at the meeting-house at the Purchase, the 2d of the Ninth month, 1745: "It was recommended to this meeting by the Monthly Meeting of Mamaroneck, to have its appro

bation in settling a weekly meeting at Shapaqua, in the bounds of North Castle, which this meeting having had under consideration doth approve of, and appoints the same to be held twice a week, on the First and Fifth days of the week."

In 1752, the Friends at Shapaqua requested of the Quarterly meeting a meeting-house, and the meeting appointed a committee "to view for land and other conveniences, to erect said house by and upon." They reported in favor of building a house "20 upon 26 feet," and the meeting appointed a committee to employ workmen and carpenters to complete the same; and called for a subscription from the monthly meetings for that purpose.

In 1778: "Friends of Shapaqua request an enlargement of their house at an estimated cost of £170, and have subscribed in their own meeting £61, 12s." Instead of enlarging the old meeting-house, however, they sold it and built a new one.

It appears by the Quarterly Meeting minutes that the subscriptions from the Monthly Meetings were not all paid in until 1782. This was in the time of the great poverty caused by the Revolutionary War, when it was very difficult to get money, and besides there were five meeting-houses being built or enlarged within the limits of Purchase Quarterly Meeting at the same time. The Quarterly Meeting at that time was held alternately at Purchase and Oblong, and comprised Saratoga Meeting, a Monthly Meeting of East Hoosack, (now the village of North Adams,) and covered all the meetings south, to and including Westchester meeting.

These meetings were afterward divided into the Quarterly Meetings of Nine Partners, Stanford, and Easton and Saratoga. The Purchase Quarterly Meeting held at Oblong, 28th of Fourth month, 1785, made the following minute:

A proposal came from Purchase Monthly Meeting for dividing that meeting into two, which being considered by this meeting, the following Friends are appointed to visit that Monthly Meeting and the preparative meetings constituting the same, and report their sense of the expediency thereof, and if it is their judgment that such division is necessary, that they consider in what manner to divide and how

each meeting be held, and propose the same in their report."

This committee reported at much length on the 4th of Eighth month, 1785, stating that they had visited that meeting and the preparative meetings belong thereto and that they found Friends unanimously united therewith." They proposed a line of division between the two meetings, how the poor should be provided for, and for a division of books and stock, and when and where the meetings should be held; and the meeting adopted their report.

The Centennial meeting was opened by a brief period of silence, after which John G. Whittier's Centennial Hymn was read, as in many points appropriate for the occasion :

OU

UR fathers' God! from out whose hand
The centuries fall like grains of sand.
We meet to-day, united, free,
And loyal to our land and Thee,
To thank Thee for the era done,
And trust Thee for the opening one.
Here where of old, by Thy design,
The fathers spake that word of Thine
Whose echo is the glad refrain
Of rended bolt and falling chain,
To grace our festal time, from all
The zones of earth our guests we call.
Be with us while the New World greets
The Old World thronging all its streets,
Unveiling all the triumphs won
By art or toil beneath the sun;
And unto common good ordain
This rivalship of hand and brain.
Thou who hast here in concord furled
The war flags of a gathered world,
Beneath our Western skies fulfill
The Orient's mission of good will,
And freighted with love's Golden Fleece,
Send back its Argonauts of peace.

For art and labor met in truce,
For beauty made the bride of use
We thank Thee; but, withal, we crave
The austere virtues strong to save,
The honor proof to place or gold,
The manhood never bought nor sold!
Oh make Thou us through centuries long,
In peace secure, in justice strong;
Around our gift of freedom draw
The safeguards of Thy righteous law;
And, cast in some diviner mould,
Let the new cycle shame the old!

Monthly Meeting. It will be an occasion of much interest, and I would be glad to be with you. I am pleased to see that both branches of the old Society will participate in it, and I infer from this that the old bitter feeling between them has greatly changed. The separation should never have taken place, and the results of it have been evil. Both divisions have in consequence somewhat strayed from the old paths trodden by Fox and Penn and Barclay. Let us hope that the time is coming when both will retrace their steps, and stand together on the vital principle of Quakerism, avoiding Calvinism on one hand, and "free religion" on the other.

With thanks for the invitation, I am very truly thy friend, JOHN G. WHITTIER.

James Wood, of Mount Kisco then delivered an excellent historical address, tracing Friends from their early settlement on Long Island to Westchester County, and the meetings connected with Purchase Quarterly Meeting-with some of the earlier minutes of that meeting, among which the following, with regard to human slavery, may be ranked amongst the earliest expressions of opposition thereto on record: At a Quarterly Meeting held at Oblong, 2d of Fifth month, 1767:

"In this Meeting the practice of trading in negroes, or other slaves, and its inconsistency with our religious principles, was revived, and the inconsiderable difference between buying slaves, or keeping those in slavery we are already possest of was briefly hinted in a short query from one of our Monthly Meetings, which is recommended to the consideration of next Yearly Meeting; viz: If it is not consistent with Christianity to buy and sell our fellow men for slaves during their lives, and their posterity after them, then whether it is consistent with a christian spirit to keep those in slavery that we have already in possession by purchase, gift, or any other way."

John Woolman had visited this Quarterly Meeting, the 2nd of Eighth month, 1760. Whether seed sown at that time by this heroic soldier of liberty had thus seven years later borne fruitage, perhaps none may know. It is of interest in searching these old records to find the advancing sentiment and sensitiveness upon this and other subjects of reform and advancement:

At a Quarterly Meeting held at the Oblong, in Eleventh month, 1771:—

"The state of our Monthly Meetings all came up to this, in answer to the queries, which in the main are middling satisfactory, but some complaint respectthe enslaving or dealing in Negroes; and it is earnestly prest upon our Monthly Meetings solidly to consider the injustice of such a practice or indulgence, and labor as much as possible to clear their hands of every evil of this kind, as they, according to justice and the tenor of our profession, may see their way clear so to do."

At a Quarterly Meeting held at the Purchase, the 6th day of Second month, 1773.—

'As it appears to this meeting, by the accounts from the Monthly Meeting at the Purchase, that a Friend has bought a negro, which is contrary to our Discipline, therefore this Meeting desires that Monthly Meeting to take care thereof."

First of Fifth month, 1773, the Quarterly Meeting records:

"Last Quarterly Meeting advised that the Purchase Monthly Meeting should take care with respect to a complaint in the answers to the queries that a Friend had bought a Negro, and there being no account of their proceedings therein brought to this meeting, it is desired that it be remembered to send an account to next Quarterly Meeting, how far they have put discipline in practice, in that respect of buying and selling slaves."

First of Seventh month, 1773, the Quarterly Meeting adds;

"As the Monthly Meeting held at the Purchase had omitted to send an account how far they had proceeded in dealing with those that buy or sell negroes, this meeting requests again that said Monthly Meeting do send an account of their care therein to next Quarterly Meeting."

Again, at the Quarterly Meeting held Sixth of Eleventh month, 1773:

"This meeting desires the Monthly Meeting at the Purchase to send an account to next Quarterly Meeting how far they have proceeded in their dealing with those that had bought or sold Negroes since the Yearly Meeting had prohibited the same.”

On the Fifth of Second month, 1774: "The Monthly Meeting of the Purchase informed this meeting how far they had proceeded with those that had bought and sold Negroes, (as sundry Friends were concerned therein), by ordering their minutes on that affair to be brought to the Meeting, which were read; this Meeting on consideration thereof, doth request the advice of the Yearly Meeting in respect to those that have dealt in Negroes, or shall deal in them as executors, or otherwise, how far the Monthly Meeting shall proceed with those Friends that buy or sell Negroes."

We find on the Sixth of Fifth month, 1775, in the answer to the Seventeenth Query (there were at that time Twenty Queries, and four Annual Queries to answer), which refers to Negro slavery:

"Clear of buying, selling or importing; some degree of moderation perhaps must be allowed in this answer, provided that can be done and keep them in slavery, still."

On the Third of Third month, 1775:

"This meeting appoints the following Friends a Committee on account of those that keep Negroes, agreeable to a minute of last Yearly Meeting, viz: Jacob Underhili, Robert Runnels, Solomon Haight, Paul Osborne, Timothy Dakin, Lott Tripp; and the

Monthly Meetings are desired to choose committees on account of those that have Negroes, agreeable to the direction of the Yearly Meeting, and that a report be made of their progress to the Quarterly Meeting before the next Yearly Meeting."

Answer to the Seventeenth Query, Eleventh month, Fourth, 1775:

"Clear of importing and buying Negroes as far as we know; and those that have them use in a degree of moderation by some of the answers, and by others keeping them in slavery is not deemed using them in moderation."

On the Third of Second month, 1776, the answer to the Seventeenth Query states that

"Several that were slaves are freed by a discharge from their masters."

Fourth of Fifth month, 1776:

"The Friends appointed by the Quarterly and Monthly Meeting reported that they had according to appointment visited those Friends that live within the verge of said Meeting that held Negro slaves, to the satisfaction of this meeting, their progress being encouraging, which appears, as divers are set free, although some Friends still refuse to manumit them, which is recommended to the Yearly Meeting."

These Committees continued in the service to which they were appointed, reporting from time to time, and on the Second of Third month 1778 :

"Which committees report they have visited all they knew that held them, (except one), and that Friends have all set their Negroes free, five members excepted, who decline complying with the advice of their brethren therein, and their case is still under care."

Second month Eleventh, 1781, answer to Query: "Clear of buying or selling Negroes; one instance of some being held in slavery, which is under care." Fifth month, Second 1782, the Quarterly Meeting after transacting a large amount of business, adjourned to nine o'clock the next morning, at which meeting the following minute was made:

"We are informed by four of our monthly meetings that a visit hath been performed to most of the Friends who have set Negroes free, and also to the Negroes set free, and inspection has been made into their circumstances, many of whom appeared satisfied with what their masters have done for them, though some think there is considerable due to them for their past labour, which it is apprehended is the case, and some Friends appeared willing to submit to the judgment of the committee thereto appointed with respect to a settlement between them, but there are others who object to submit to settlement of the committee appointed to that service.”

In 1783, the Yearly Meeting revised the Queries, making 14 in all, and four annual Queries. The 11th query reads:

"Are Friends clear of being concerned in Negroes as slaves, and are the youth instructed in school learning to fit them for business."

At the Quarterly Meeting held 31st of 7th mo., 1783, and adjourned to the next morning, the following minute was made:

"The Yearly Meeting also directs that a further labor with the Friends who have set Negroes free, and the Negroes set free, be extended as directed by last Yearly Meeting, in order for a just settlement between them, and that a report on this matter go up to next Yearly Meeting which the Monthly Meetings are desired to observe."

The answers to the twelfth query from this date forward are: clear of being concerned in Negroes as slaves."

At the Quarterly Meeting held 29th of Fourth month. 1784, the following minute was made:

"It further appears, by accounts from the Monthly Meetings, that they have attended to the direction of the Yearly Meeting with respect to a settlement between the Friends who have set Negroes free, and the Negroes so set free, and on enquiring they don't find but that such a settlement hath been generally made where it was necessary, three cases excepted, in one of which there was no disposition in the Friend concerned to come to a settlement. The other two were prevented from being accomplished by the remote situation of the Negroes.”

At a Quarterly Meeting held the 29th of Seventh month, 1784:

"The Yearly Meeting expresses a satisfaction that

At the Quarterly Meeting held 4th of Eighth month, 1785:

"The Yearly Meeting also requests that a continuation of care may be extended in the case brought up from Oblong Monthly Meeting to last Quarter, that appeared to be unsettled, between a Negro set free, and the Friend by whom he was set free, to which this meeting requests the attention of that Monthly Meeting, and that its exertions be used for a settlement, and report made seasonable to go to next Yearly Meeting."

At a Quarterly Meeting held 4th of Fifth month, 1789:

"No Negroes held as slaves amongst us, tho' several instances are mentioned of Friends having some of those people that are held in slavery by others of which care is taken. Oblong informs us that the case of the Negro set free by a Friend some years back, and no settlement made for past services, hath been attended to, and that matter finished as far as circumstances will admit."

It thus appears that after a kindly but persistent labor of twenty years, the Society about one century ago, was freed entirely from the curse of human slavery, without any discord, contention or loss of membership.

THE STILL, SMALL VOICE.

BY GEO. DANA BOARDMAN.

ing a settlement between the Friends who have set Negroes free, and the Negroes so set free, but also expresses a sorrow in observing the exception in the account sent from this Meeting of the want of a disposition in a Friend concerned in such settlement, and desires that a further labor may be extended to said Friend, and also that a further care be extended to accomplish a settlement in the two other cases yet remaining unsettled, occasioned by the remote situation of the Negroes, as mentioned in the report from this to the Yearly Meeting and report a state of these cases to next Yearly Meeting. And the Yearly Meeting also desires that the monthly meetings be directed to continue their care in this matter, and if any cases may have escaped their notice, that attention be paid thereto as heretofore directed, and to furnish the Negroes with such advice and assistance as they may stand in need of, both in respect to their temporal and religious welfare as they may be enabled-which this meeting also recommends to the observance of our monthly meetings; and that a report on this matter be made seasonable to be handed to next Yearly Meeting."

At the Quarterly Meeting, held 28th of Fourth month, 1785:

"Our monthly meetings further inform that only one instance remains (that has come to knowledge), wherein there has not been a settlement made between the Negroes set free, which instance hath been occasioned by some difficult circumstances attending

it."

spondent fugitive of Horeb's cave and the intrepid reformer of Carmel's altar! Recall for a moment the earlier scene-the brave encounter with the

despotic Ahab; the solemn rendezvous on Carmel; the daring challenge to a trial of power between Baal and Jehovah; the wrathful slaughter of the false prophets. And now behold this same Elijah suddenly fleeing before the vindictive Jezebel; see him sitting down under the broom-tree in the wilderness, and requesting for himself that he may die; see him taking up his gloomy abode in Horeb's cave. Who would recognize in this trembling fugitive Jehovah's dauntless prophet?

But let us not be too severe with Elijah. For he was not an angel: he was only a man, being, as James expressly tells us, of like passions with ourselves. And there were reasons for his despondency. First, Elijah was a man of vehement temperament. He felt that his mission was one of wrath and destruction. Like the desert-herald, who was, in after days, to go forth in his own spirit and power, Elijah's symbol was the axe laid at the root of the trees. When men of this fiery temperament are crossed in their purposes, they are apt to plunge from the pinnacle of confidence into the abyss of despair. Again, Elijah had been suddenly and bitterly disappointed. He believed that he had been divinely called to do the work of a reformer, overthrowing the Baalism imported by the royal court, and restoring the Abrahamic faith in the one Jehovah. He had just won a brilliant triumph over the priests of Baal. Only yesterday he had heard Israel shouting: "Jehovah, he is God!

Jehovah, he is God!" It really seemed as though his mission as reformer was on the eve of a triumphant success. But he who yesterday was a conqueror, is to-day a fugitive. It was a terrible disappointment. Few things so unnerve a great man as the sense of moral failure. Again, Elijah felt the pang of solitude. For man was made for society, and so for sympathy. A monastic life is a crime against society. Elijah, through no fault of his, was an exile. Few things are more depressing than the sense of moral loneliness. Accordingly, prophets, reformers, missionaries, idealists, are generally sad men. And despondency, let me add, often leads to egotism. Listen to our Elijah: “I have been very jealous for Jehovah, the God of hosts; for the children of Israel have forsaken thy covenant, thrown down thine altars, and slain thy prophets with the sword; and I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away." But how mistaken he was! At that very hour Jehovah had left him seven thousand in Israel, who had not bowed their knees to Baal, or wafted to him their kisses. Again, Elijah was in a state of bodily prostration. The exhausting mental and moral strain of the recent ordeal on Carmel; the awful reversal which had suddenly overtaken him; his terror, flight, fatigue, loneliness, uncertainty; all this tended to depress his bodily tone, and therefore his moral vigor. Once more, Elijah was doing nothing. Man was made for work, and when he ceases to work he loses heart. Nothing gives one such a sense of ennui as want of occupation. Here is one of the misfortunes of enforced idleness, as in the case of lingering illness, or old age! May the good Father specially help our confirmed invalids! These, then, are some of the reasons which impelled Elijah to seek a cave-life. It is one thing, and of course altogether right, when it is our Father who puts us in a cave. It is another thing, and altogether wrong, when it is we ourselves who choose a cave. Beware, then, of the cave life of the doleful Tishbite, the troglodyte life of the pagan Horite. What right have you, O member of society, to run away from duty, and mope in a cave? What doest thou here, Elijah? The trouble is that thou art doing nothing. Come out of thy hole, then, whatever that hole be--whether the cave of idleness, the den of criticism, the grot of doubt, or the cell of gloom.

And now observe the way in which God dealt with his ancient prophet. Remembering Elijah's stormy nature, how profound was God's instruction of him in Horeb's cave! Behold, Jehovah passed by; and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before Jehovah; but Jehovah was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but Jehovah was not in the earthquake: and after the earthquake a fire; but Jehovah was not in the fire: and after the fire a still, small voice" (a sound of gentle stillness). How profound the parable! It was as though God had said to Elijah: "Thou, O prophet! hast led a tempestuous life: thou hast sought to fulfil thy mission by using violent methods; thou thyself hast been to Israel an uprooting whirlwind, an engulfing earthquake, a desolating conflagration: but this is not my method; my way is as the sound of the gentle zephyr."

And God has not changed his method. He still teaches the same great lesson in the parables of his natural phenomena. The destructive forces of nature are generally noisy; for example, the deadly thunder-bolt, the bloody cannonade, the murderous dynamite. The constructive forces of nature are generally noiseless; for example, the gladdening sunshine, the growing vegetation, the healing process. The lightning that blasts is salvoed by thunder; the sunlight that heals is as noiseless as silence itself. Which thing is as truly a parable for ourselves as the vision of Horeb's cave was for Elijah. Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith Jehovah of hosts. God's Spirit oftener breathes in the zephyr than roars in the hurricane. He usually works with silent, unnoticed energy. Recall the character and method of Him who was in the eminent sense anointed with the Spirit, and concerning whom Isaiah prophesied, saying: "He shall not strive, nor cry aloud; neither shall any one hear his voice in the street." No sword propagandist was he; no bucklered Joshua, or javelined Phinehas, or fighting Cyril, or falchioned Godfrey. Upon his peaceful standard was blazoned the device of the lamb, and over it hovered the figure of the dove. No vociferous orator was he, thundering forth his glad tidings amid the blare of ecclesiastical trumpets, the clang of theological spears, or the larums of sectarian shibboleths. No; he quietly went about doing good, healing all that were oppressed of the Devil, mending bruised reeds, fanning dying sparks, and so sending forth judgment unto victory. And the Spirit and method of the risen Lord are still the same. His power still lies in his gentle unobtrusiveness. Not by the noisy drumbeat and flaunting banners of “Salvation Army" paraders, or the advertising manifestoes of sensational preaching and appliances, or the showy drill of ostentatious ritual, or the forward displays of personal "experience," does the Lord of spirits carry on his kingdom; but by the modest noiselessness of daily life, the unconscious beauty of daily character. He still disclaims the whirlwind and the earthquake and the fire; enough for him that he uses a sound of gentle stillness, whispering in the still small voice of nature, of reason, of conscience, of aspiration, of example, of memory, of God's Spirit. Unobtrusive as gravitation, he is as powerful; noiseless as light, he is as beneficent. And therefore as his kingdom, like Solomon's temple, noiselessly grows, without sound of hammer, or axe, or tool of iron, it grows resistlessly, conquering larger territories and fairer fields than Judaism in its palmiest days ever conquered, with all the blaze of its Shechinah, and pomp of its ritual and splendor of its miracle.

This is the great lesson of Horeb's cave: Not the noisy uproar of physical force, but the gentle stillness of moral sway; not the typhoon of Elijah the vengeful, but the zephyr of Elisha the gentle; not the uphurling dynamite of John the baptizer, but the inclined plane of John the apostle; not the whirlwind of an exceptional Pentecost, but the zephyr of a daily inspiration.

Friend; if thou art ever saved from thy sins, it will not be by tornado, or earthquake, or conflagration; it