Annual Address

OF

THE BISHOP OF NEW YORK.

BRETHREN OF THE CLERGY, AND OF THE LAITY:

It is with unfeigned thankfulness to God that I see so many of you assembled together in health and cheerfulness, in this our annual Convention. With a grateful and loving heart I bid you welcome to this Holy Place-this fraternal Christian Council. As I have looked around upon the well-remembered forms and faces, drawn together from so many and so distant places, I have seemed to myself to live over again, in a few hours, all the deeply interesting days of the whole crowded and checkered year. Yesterday, when so many of you drew near to that Heavenly Feast, which makes loving hearts all one in Christ Jesus-and afterwards, when Clergy and Laity responded to their names, or appeared in various ways in the performance of their duties, it was to me a most touching spectaclefor almost every face awakened the remembrance of some act of personal kindness, revived the image of some remote scene of duty, of hospitality, or of travel, and brought

freshly before my thoughts the Christian zeal and liberality of a beloved and faithful servant of the Church!

I have no language to express the interest and affection with which I look upon you all, or the gratitude with which I remember the sympathy and kindness that surrounded me, when my daily duty had to be performed under the shadow of a recent sorrow. God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost, be with us-bless us in this Council of thy Church! Direct us with Thy most gracious favor, and further us with Thy continual Help, that in all our works, begun, continued, and ended in Thee, we may glorify Thy Holy Name, by imitating Thy Perfections, and being accepted as co-workers in the enlarging of Thy Kingdom..

And, beloved Brethren, what mercies encompass to-day! How changed are the circumstances under which we meet from those of last year! Little as we may be inclined, on occasions like the present, to enter into discussions connected with civil government, yet it would be unworthy of us as Christians and patriots to reassemble after the lapse of a year, to re-enter upon the work of an annual Synod, which so naturally carries our thoughts back to the former meeting, without a grateful recognition of the Merciful Providence which has delivered us from the horrors of civil war, shed over all our land the blessings of peace, and restored to us, as a nation, unity, strength, and honor. Only one short year ago, great armies were everywhere arrayed against each other in the field, and though the end might be anticipated, yet it was seen through clouds and darkness, blood and strife! To-day the great peril is vanished, and we see peace in all our borders. The world, too, has beheld a wonderful spectacle:-a great nation flushed with victory, girt about with fleets and armies-but putting far away all thoughts of conquest, all remembrance of wrongs, dissolving her great armaments; and sending ack to the workshop and the plough, to the busy walks of trade and

commerce, to the college and the forum, to the ten thousand peaceful pursuits of life, the heroic men who but yesterday were facing death in their country's cause, and proving themselves invincible in war. Here is a victory greater than any of the achievements of war. Among all those hundreds of thousands of hardy and impetuous men, who had become familiar with blood and carnage, who seemed and almost as if they had forgotten all but the arts of war, cared for none other-among them all we discover scarcely a sign of repugnance to the great and peaceful change. We see little evidence of what was so much feared by many-that they had unlearned the arts of peace, and become disqualified for, as well as averse to, the duties of domestic life, the dull realities of old-fashioned labor and care. Already we are indebted to many of them for assistance in the ingathering of our harvests; already we see them dispersed over our fields, busy in the crowded places of industry, and entering into every kind of civil employment. And I have known more than one household rejoicing in the recovered presence of a husband, father, brother, who seemed to have been softened and elevated by great trials, and made more tender and more dutiful than ever before. Many places have indeed been made vacant by death. Great deliverances have not been purchased but with great sacrifices. Many a shattered form, many a badge of mourning bears witness to the desperate severity of the struggle! God, most merciful, send the consolations of His grace into every bereaved and sorrowing heart! God make the nation mindful of its deliverers, and put it into all our hearts to do, according to the dictates of Christian charity, and according to our abundant resources, whatever may be needed for the alleviation of sorrow and suffering, whether it be North, or whether it be South!

Among the many happy consequences of the restoration of peace, will be, it is presumed, the speedy reappearance,

in our General Ecclesiastical Council, of the beloved Brethren, Bishops, Clergy, and Laity, who for four years have been separated from us by hindrances incident to a state of war. It will be a reunion that will arouse the tenderest sensibilities of every Christian heart. It will show that old affections have only been restrained, not extinguished, and that feelings long pent up claim a more than ordinary indulgence in demonstrations of love, respect, and sympathy. I verily believe, as I do most fervently hope and pray, that not one word of reproach or bitterness will be heard, not one look of coldness appear, to mar the dignity and loveliness of that touching scene. In that much longed-for and welcome hour, we shall need no declaration of principles, no formal vindication of the peaceful character of the Christian Ministry. Divine Providence has spoken! Any words that we can use, in reference to the past, whether persons or things, will be a mere impertinence; adding nothing to the lessons that come to us from above, and only tending to change celestial harmonies into the miserable discordant sounds of earth-born passion.

The important acts of the Southern Dioceses, done while they were in a state of separation from us, and which therefore require the sanction of the General Convention, will unquestionably be recognized and confirmed at once. They are only three in number:-the election of Bishop Wilmer by the Diocese of Alabama, the erection of Arkansas into a regularly organized Diocese, and the election of the Missionary Bishop of the Southwest, Dr. Lay, to the Episcopate of Arkansas.

These acts were eminently proper under the circumstances. The distinguished brethren selected by the two Dioceses named are universally esteemed throughout the whole Church, and there will not be a dissenting voice to the action which will promptly place them upon an equal footing with all their brethren.

What happiness and glory for the Church, which can pre

sent such a spectacle to the world immediately after the close of such a conflict! And how little to be envied would be the judgment and the feeling which could interpose with ill-timed words to break the charm of Christian unity and love, and make things, that ought to be sacred, seem common and unclean. Let us offer up our united prayers that the whole Church may rise to the height of this great occasion, and that, if unhappily any one misguided spirit should seek to trouble the peace of Israel, it may only prompt to a demonstration, still more lofty and emphatic, of that Christian sympathy which will undoubtedly animate the general mind of the Church.

Let me avail myself of this occasion to recommend to the favor of the Diocese all judicious and properly authenticated efforts which may be made to extend aid to the Church within the Southern Dioceses. Church edifices have been injured, and, in many cases, destroyed. Church property has been lost. The ability of the people to restore what has been decayed, and to sustain the ministrations of the Church, has been widely and grievously impaired, and to impart to them of our abundance, where it may be done with the sanction and under the direction of their own Bishops, a very essential condition, should be esteemed by us as one of the greatest of our privileges. It is true, the distinguished Bishop of Georgia has, in his address to his Convention, spoken to his clergy and people strongly against going abroad for exterior aid. He exhorts them to rely upon their own exertions, and to be content with such provision as they can make with the means and appliances left within their reach. And much to the same effect is the friendly response which I have received in a private letter from the excellent Bishop of Virginia, in reference to a suggestion which I had made, that assistance might be afforded, if desired, for the relief of parishes and Clergy that had suffered heavily. He thought the people were inclined to be kind, and the clergy to be content with such things as they had.