undoubtedly the hope that concessions and fraternal intercourse in
public assemblies and in Christian work would win the confidence of the
slaveholders, and perhaps prepare the way for the gradual removal of
slavery; and above all there was the cogent plea that compromise or
division was the only present choice. The "_half-loaf_" argument was
wielded most effectually, and here, especially, the "practical men" came
to the front, while on the heads of the devoted Abolitionists were
showered without stint the epithets "fanatics" and "visionaries."

So much zeal for the slaveholders, and so much sacrifice of
self-respect, not to say of conscience, surely deserved a better fate;
but all was in vain. The slaveholders scorned the compromises, and
ruthlessly rent asunder the great national churches and missionary
societies. The Congregationalists, never numerous in the South, clung
with great tenacity to their few churches, but at length surrendered
them.


ECCLESIASTICAL COMPROMISES ABOUT CASTE.

So ended the first chapter of humiliating and fruitless Church
compromises; but a new chapter has begun to be written, and so far
promises to read just as the other did, both as to the facts to be
recorded and the end that will be reached. Slavery is dead, but the son
and heir and legitimate representative, _race prejudice_, arises to take
its place. This does not propose to remand the colored race back into
slavery, but to hold them as inferiors, to be discriminated against as
to equal rights and to bear with their color the perpetual ban of
separation and degradation. This might be expected in the political
world, but not in the Church where "_all are one in Christ Jesus_." And