PROCEEDINGS

OF THE

PUBLIC MEETING HELD IN EXETER-HALL,

May 22, 1840,

ON OCCASION OF THE PUBLIC RECEPTION OP THE REV. WILLIAH KNIBB,

H. BECKFORD, AND E. BARRETT.

A public meeting was held at Exeter-hall, on Friday, May 22nd, to receive the Rev. Mr. Knibb, and to hear accounts of the success of missionary exertion in the West Indies. The large room was densely crowded by a highly respectable audience, and several hundreds were unable to gain admittance.

J. STURGE, Esq., of Birmingham, occupied the chair.

The business was commenced by singing; and the Rev. Dr. Cox implored the Divine presence and blessing.

. . .

Mr. H. BECKFORD, one of the deacons of the church at St. Ann's Bay, and formerly a praedial slave then rose to address the assembly, and was received with enthusiastic cheering. I heartily rejoice that the Lord God Almighty has kindly brought me to this part of the world - this country of liberty - where you enjoy

the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. I render to you the thanks which you are worthy to receive for sending that precious Gospel to us, to turn us from darkness to light. It has done wondrous things for us; it has delivered our souls from misery, and broken the chain in which our bodies were bound. Your labours in Jamaica have not been in vain. We rejoice to know that we have had tender hearted friends here; and you will rejoice to hear that, by your instrumentality, hard-hearted sinners in Jamaica are now bowing their

knee to the Lord of glory, and asking for mercy. For the last two years I have not met a man or a woman in the district where I live who has not been seeking the way to heaven - I have not met one who has been intoxicated. The poor little children who once were driven like beasts in the woods, are now gathered together by your efforts to receive that instruction which will make them wise unto salvation. We do not forget the dark benighted country of our fathers. We shall raise up missionaries in Jamaica, that Africa may have the Gospel preached to it, and that the inhabitants may cease from selling and murdering each other. They are in darkness and they need the light. My mother was sold by her own brother for a gun, that with it he might go and murder others. The slave-trade will not be abolished till Africa receives the Gospel: but by the assistance of Almighty God we will send it to them. I would rather endure any punishment than again return to slavery. I recollect one day seeing my poor mother flogged and afterwards put in the stocks,

but I dared not speak a single word to her or I should have received ten times more punishment. Our chapels were formerly pulled down, but new ones are erected three times their size, and still there is not room for the people. Places enlarged twelve months ago are about to be enlarged again. We ask our Christian brethren to send more labourers into the harvest, and to send us the Holy Scriptures. I have been instructed a little by our missionary that I may instruct others; and I have 110 children under my care. They can now read for themselves, and they learn to pray. I hope to receive further instruction from you, so that I may be enabled to instruct others. When I left, the children shed almost as many tears as would drown me in water.

the worthy frog

  Joy Lumsden 2007