During my stay at this time in New York, there died in that city the Rev. Theodore Sedgwick Wright, a Presbyterian minister of colour. His attainments and talents were very respectable; and for fifteen years he had been the successful pastor of a church of coloured people in the city.

Before you accompany me to his funeral, listen to his voice. Though “dead, he yet speaketh.” He had felt this cruel prejudice against the colour of his skin as iron entering his soul. Here is his touching testimony on the subject, delivered in a speech at Boston eleven years before his death:—

” No man can really understand this prejudice, unless he feels it crushing him to the dust, because it is a matter of feeling. It has bolts, scourges, and bars, wherever the coloured man goes. It has bolts in all the schools and colleges. The coloured parent, with the same soul as a white parent, sends his child to the seats of learning; and he finds the door bolted, and he sits down to weep beside his boy. Prejudice stands at the door, and bars him out. Does the child of the coloured man show a talent for mechanics, the heart of the parent beats with hope. He sees the children of the white man engaged in employment; and he trusts that there is a door open to his boy, to get an honest living, and become a useful member of society. But, when he comes to the workshop with his child, he finds a bolt there.