An agreement was made between the two societies when this question came before them, which provides temporarily and tentatively against the repetition of any such interferences as that which started this discussion. Both societies have agreed not to enter into any field occupied by the other without mutual consultation. But this agreement provides no permanent basis for a settlement of the question which field each society shall occupy. It only insures Christian co-operation and forbearance until a settlement be made. What that settlement shall be is for the constituency of our societies to determine, and to them we must leave it. The American Board and the Association have made a harmonious arrangement of their respective fields of labor, and it is to be hoped that an adjustment equally satisfactory may be reached with the American Home Missionary Society. In view of all this several questions ought to be considered. 1. What is the field open before us among the white population of the South? It is not the extent of the territory, nor the number of millions of white people that are in the South, nor even the number that need our school and Gospel advantages, but it is: _How many of them can be reached by an anti-caste Gospel?_ It is not enough to say that we are to preach the Gospel, and if people are converted the caste question will take care of itself. Well do I remember when that plea and policy were in vogue in regard to slavery. The Gospel was preached, churches were formed, and the denominations were happy in their enlargement. Slavery also did take care of itself, and good care, too, for it found snug homes in these very churches. And well do I remember when these same denominations cast slavery away from them and the coveted churches along with it! The American churches cannot afford to repeat that experience in regard to caste. What was done then in comparative innocence, because done in ignorance, cannot now be done without great guilt in the light of that experience. We must remember that it is more important to destroy caste than to found churches that will sustain caste. No work can be done by our churches among the white people of the South that will stand the test, that does not proceed on the avowed and practical repudiation of caste; no school opened that does not welcome the colored child; no church formed that does not present the open door, the open hand and the open heart to “Our Brother in Black.” There are Congregationalists in the South that are ready to welcome again the polity of New England and at the same time welcome among them the colored races, and there are native Southerners ready for our schools and churches, and also ready to make no distinction on account of color, and to all such we ought to carry with joyful hearts and ready hands the institutions we so much cherish. But we ought not to enter upon the effort under a misapprehension. The number of openings for this kind of labor is not great.