of the church as the authoritative teacher of moral and spiritual truth. It is well to remember, also, that that which best develops and educates the moral powers is the best possible discipline for the mind itself. No subjects require clearer perception, sharper analysis and more discriminating reason than moral subjects, and no men show keener minds than those who have been trained to reason on moral questions. Illustrations of this in ancient times are found in the Jewish patriarchs, and in modern times in the people of Scotland and of New England. And yet the common schools of these latter countries, until within fifty years, were of the rudest sort, and only taught the simplest elements of an English education. But their people, trained in the sanctuary, under a ministry which was able to reason of righteousness, temperance and a judgment to come, were as strong intellectually as they were tough and clear-minded morally. Senator Hoar, in his recent oration before the law school of Yale College, asserted and proved that the best lawyers of the last generation were indebted to the strong pulpits of New England more than to anything else for their intellectual clearness, and for their judicial discrimination and force. Let there be a strong pulpit in any community, and there will be strong men around it, mentally and morally, though the schools are of the simplest. On the other hand, if the pulpit be weak and the outcoming moral influences be feeble, though the schools be ever so well equipped and endowed, the people around will lack high purpose, and scholarship itself will be frivolous and effeminate, destitute of the rugged strength which comes to natures fed from the deep roots of moral earnestness and conviction. It need hardly be said that the great need of the South, especially among the colored people, is a _strong_ church and a _pure_ church; for slavery damaged the colored man morally vastly more that it did intellectually. Indeed, his intellect was rather sharpened by the invention and craft on which it was constantly put, while the forces which strengthened the will and nourished a pure heart were the weakest possible; and yet nine persons out of ten suppose the damage was intellectual, and are greatly surprised when our teachers assure them that colored children are as bright, and learn as readily, as white children. A moment’s reflection would satisfy any one that the weakness would be on the moral side, for the reason that the life of the slave was so ordered as to ignore all moral distinctions and to violate all moral obligations. Hence, the building up should be strongest on the moral side. No greater mistake could be made than to attempt to graft on to a low moral character a high degree of intellectual culture. Should we send forth a generation of students, with sharp wits and dull moral perceptions, we might contribute to the roll of more adroit villains, but we should add little to the list of good men.