regeneration of the millions of the African race on this continent. But men say that is the business of the government. Government has emancipated them and enfranchised them, and now it must do the rest. Yes, if it could; but it is simply impossible. It is an utter misconception of the functions of government which would lay that burden on its shoulders. You cannot legislate righteousness. You cannot compel morality and religion by reënacting the Ten Commandments and the Golden Rule at each session of Congress. The Fourteenth Amendment fourteen times amended and improved would secure nothing beyond the form of civil liberty and equality. Where alien races occupy the same soil, even justice and mutual consideration can only be established by working the temper of justice and the spirit of consideration into the very fibre of the popular feeling, and that is to be done, and it only _can_ be done through the good offices of unselfish and impartial friends, by the elevation of the lower race to the level of the higher, by the agency of wise instruction and helpful sympathy and the culture of those moral and spiritual capacities which, when in full flower in either African or Caucasian, make a man confessedly a man, and the equal of any other of any race or blood. And no existing organization can do that work better, not to say as well, as this Association. It has the advantage of acknowledged position. It is widely and affectionately known among the people for whom it labors. In the earlier days, when the wondering Negroes asked who sent these teachers and preachers among them, they were answered, "The Congregational churches;" but the lengthy adjective choked them, and they invented a title of their own, and called them "God's people," which, if we only deserved it, I submit, would be a more pleasing appellation even here in New England than our six-syllabled denominational name, "God's people." It is a significant and suggestive phrase. It voices the unquestioning faith and affection of the needy race in those who have hitherto helped them, and while other agencies can render efficient aid in completing the unfinished task, none so well as "God's people" can carry on the good work unto perfection.