Rev A Brandram No. 45[1]
Spanish Town, 14th December 1835
My Dear Friend,
I begin this letter with the pleasing announcement to you of the safe arrival of Mr. Wheeler. The Planet cast anchor late on the 8th current, and on the following day our dear friend and fellow labourer set foot on this our Island of Jamaica. In a few hours after his landing I had the pleasure of saluting him, and of welcoming him as your messenger, to this field of evangelising operations: a blessed field it is, and I trust the Lord will bless him in the West Indies, and make him a great blessing to all its inhabitants. – I met with Mr. Wheeler, I may say, half accidentally, as I went from Spanish town to Kingston to attend only to the cases of books come by the Stately; but when I arrived there the first thing I learned was, that the Planet had come in, bringing Mr. Wheeler, and many other passengers. Not knowing where our dear friend might be, I went first to one house after him, but there I found nobody at home; I then went to another, which I found in the same circumstances: but on returning from these empty abodes, and passing the Church Missionary Rooms, I stepped in, if perchance he might be there, and there I found him. He has had a short and the pleasant passage in the company of many fellow voyagers where all were very cordial with each other. He is now, as you see, here, and entered on his labours; and I do earnestly pray for him in his great undertaking. I pray that he may be a good and faithful servant in the sight of Jesus Christ in the commission which he has received to serve among the troops of the Lord in this West India detachment of the Army of Christ, an army whose object is to overrun and to conquer the whole earth from the hands of Satan, and to bring back the King, the Lord of glory, to his house, and to put the uttermost parts of the earth into his possession, that our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ may reign over this world which he made by his power, and redeemed with his most precious blood. Blessed is He, let us all say, who cometh in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest.
I now leave Mr. Wheeler for a little to rest himself after his voyage, and proceed to tell you of my own little movements since I last wrote to you. – My last letter was dated in Falmouth on the 14th of last month. That letter was accompanied by a newspaper containing a painting, if I may so speak, of our cordial, harmonious, gratifying public meeting in the Court House in Falmouth in the formation of a Bible Society for that place and parish. After this public meeting was over, my business in that quarter was nearly finished. What only remained was, to have the Committee brought together, and to get it initiated into business. You know I am your faithful registrar, and give you the bad weather as well as the good. This compels me to tell you that Satan came also among us at our Committee meeting in spite I suppose for his enchainment during our public meeting. In other words some little personal discord arose which hindered us for a little time, but which I saw, as I conceived, healed up and covered over with the veil of peace and friendship before I left. We must, my dear friend, in all our operations, strive directly and indirectly to destroy the works of the devil, for he is ever throwing stumbling blocks in our way. Here, it is mercy to give us no quarter.
Leaving Falmouth I proceeded to the parish of St. Ann's, the first part of which that I touched upon was a place called The Retreat. It is a beautiful spot, and one of its chief beauties is a school nicely conducted. The Honourable S.M.Barrett to whom this property belongs, and who supports this school entirely at his own expense, has long been friendly to the education and religious instruction of his people theoretically and practically. I examined the school, and was much pleased with the advances made by the children in the reading and understanding of the Scriptures. In the evening the school room was filled with adults, to whom I spoke of the glorious gospel of Christ, of the duties incumbent on them in the sphere in which Providence has placed them, and of their duty to learn to read that they might peruse God's holy word for themselves, which book I strongly recommended them now to get individually for themselves in the terms of my printed address which by this time I suppose you have read; and further, I stirred them up to come forward now or soon to help on the great cause of circulating the Scriptures over the whole world.
Leaving The Retreat I came, three miles further on, to the residence of the Rev. Mr. Rose, one of the Curates of St. Ann's Parish. I always make a point of calling officially on all the Ministers from place to place in my course as I move along. On reaching Brown's Town where Mr. Rose lives, I was about to call on him, but learned he was [away] from home. Five miles farther on my way, I came to the house of the Rev. Mr. Alloway one of the missionaries from the London Missionary Society. With him I stopped till next day, and of course found no difficulty in enlisting him on the Bible Society side and cause. From his residence I passed on to Dry Harbour, and on calling on a gentleman there to whom Mr. Alloway introduced me, I found him most ready to lend his aid to a St. Ann's Bible Society when it should be formed; and he further added, which pleased me much, that should no society be formed for that parish he wants to subscribe to some of the Bible Societies formed elsewhere in the island. From Dry Harbour I came next to St. Ann's Bay which may be called, such as it is, the metropolis of the parish. Here I called on the Rev. Mr. Johnson who is at present acting as Rector in the parish in the absence of the incumbent. Mr. Johnson I found friendly to our objects, and ready to give them his aid. The same was the case with the Rev. Mr. Williams the Wesleyan Minister resident there, and who has very recently arrived from England. Nine miles or ten from this, and right on towards the mountains, I came to the residence of the Rev. Mr. Coultart who is one of the Baptist Missionaries. Mr. Coultart is an old friend, for I found him in the island and became acquainted with him on my very first visit to Jamaica ten years ago on my way from Carthagena to England. He is very friendly to our objects, and will help them forward all he can. I addressed the people who assembled at his place on the Sunday I was there, and told them, among other things of their duty to get the word of God, and to learn to read it. The Rev. Mr. Clark, Mr. Coultart's colleague, lives also here, and was fully with us. Pursuing my course on still neither to the mountain ridge which divides the island, I came, after traveling seven miles, to the Rev. Mr. Whitehouse's. Here also I find myself quite at home, for Mr. Whitehouse till lately resided in Kingston where we often met on Bible Society business, and indeed almost all our Committee meetings were held in his house. To this I need not add, what you will easily suppose, that he was our friend and ready coadjutor to circulate the Scriptures.
Thus closed my visitations in St. Ann's, and though all were friendly whom I visited, nevertheless no Society was formed, and for three reasons. The first, because I thought it would be better to wait till the return of the Rector who was daily expected, and also from the absence of some other persons of influence in the parish to whom we looked for encouragement. My second reason was, my desire to return soon to Kingston to receive Mr. Wheeler, and to make arrangements for the reorganisation and extension of the Jamaican Bible Society by a public meeting, after due preparatory steps should be taken. Shall I tell you the third reason? It was in truth, that I felt paralysed by the arrangements you have come to in regard to your West India operations. By the plan you have fixed on, it will be impossible, as I suppose, to keep up a system of Bible societies in this island to any considerable extent. On this account therefore I think it better to give my attention during my time here, to the strengthening of the Societies already formed, rather than to the formation of new ones, which would do little more I fear than come into existence to die. For the above reason then the St. Ann's Bible Society was left unformed; and from another reason besides, namely that it could easily be visited on a future occasion should it be judged proper owing to its comparatively short distance from the place where I now write you.
After leaving our kind friends Mr. Whitehouse and his family I crossed Mount Diablo, and entered the parish of St. Thomas in the Vale. The Rev. Mr. Clarke, another Baptist Missionary of this name, has his chief mission establishment here, and at his house I passed the night. Mr. Clarke will be our warm friend, whenever it shall be judged proper to form a Society for the parish in which he lives and labours. I did not call on the Rector as his house lay out of the way, and because I hoped to visit him more at leisure when I should next be passing that way. The following day I passed through the Bog Walks the most romantic road in the island, and came to Spanish Town, the next day the 28th ultimo I reached Kingston, and saluted some of our Bible friends there. I was sorry to find the Rev. Mr. Tinson in very poor health and just recovering a little from a severe attack of fever. Owing to his illness it was necessary to wait some time before our Bible Society business there could be attended to, as he has been and is the chief active friend and business secretary of the Institution. I returned then to Spanish Town where I wished to be for some time that I might see those gentleman who had befriended our cause in the country and who are now attending their duties in the session of the Legislative Assembly. Here then I have been for these ten days past, with the exception of my going into Kingston, where I met with Mr. Wheeler who is now with me in this place, where we are paying visits to our Bible Society friends in company, and talking much together about Bible Society concerns, in these colonies, in Earl Street, and in all the world. We pray for you, and you all, and for all the Bible circulators and readers every where. Do pray for us in return, and for each, and for both.
Thus have I brought down my journal to the day on which I write. And now to say a few words prospectively. The day after tomorrow we return again to Kingston where and when we are to have a meeting of the Committee of the Jamaica Bible Society, as Mr. Tinson is now happily restored in a good measure and increasing in strength daily. At that meeting I intend to lay before our friends and necessity of having their Society remodeled in some measure and fitted better than it is for acting the part of the central and uniting Society in and of the island. I have hinted that there is what I may call a necessity for this remodelation, and I say so now more than I could have said before I performed my tours through the country, for in my movements I have learned that there is a considerable unwillingness on the part of many in the out parishes to join themselves even at all with the Society in Kingston, and a determination not to join it as it is. I hope and trust our friends will have wisdom given them to act with all prudence and judgment so as to be approved by the country societies, and thus to benefit and extend the great cause in which we are all engaged. May none of us seek our own things, but may we all seek the things of Jesus Christ, and thus at once adorn and extend the glorious gospel of our Blessed Redeemer. Should our Committee meeting be propitious in the ways mentioned, we shall call a public general meeting in order to form in due order, and to sanction and make known the remodelation in question.
Soon after this public meeting Mr. Wheeler and I intend to take a tour into the country together for the purpose of revisiting some of the societies lately formed. This we have resolved on after taking into due consideration the letter and the spirit of the instructions you have given us. It will be well for Mr. Wheeler actually to see operations, and in different places, as this will be evidently preferable to any verbal directions. The time we may occupy in our tour will of course depend a good deal on occurrences that may happen as we move along. As you have given us a sufficient latitude in the rules laid down for us, we shall interpret them to our convenience, or rather to what is most likely to produce the effects desired, and to meet with your approbation under all our and your circumstances. Our course will be nearly that which I have just gone over, and three months may be probably required from our starting to our return. We go cheerfully, knowing that you are fully with us, and disposed to put the best construction on all our deeds. We go as the Lord's reapers, and believe that the Lord of the harvest is with us. And O may we returned richly laden, not with the fruits of the earth, but with the fruits of heaven, to your full satisfaction, and to ours. Our Bibles are now happily and abundantly come, by which a very great facility is given to our operations, and many joyful faces and hearts do we hope to make and to see, by the filling of the hands with the word of God, in a kind of holy consecration. May God Almighty be with us, and may his most blessed name be magnified in us in his son Jesus Christ.
The two cases 19 and 20 are come along with the rest by the Stately. Their contents will greatly facilitate our work. Many thanks, and thank you again, for the pretty and the many Bible Association cards you have sent us. They are most acceptable, and nicely done every way. They quite surpass, I assure you, the Ladies Bonnet articles which we got up in our necessity. I am sure they will please the Negroes, and I hope they will profit both them and you. The other articles in the cases are also all well done every way; so thank you over again for them all, and for the very kind manner in which you have attended to all the requests of your poor petitioner.
I should say too in respect to our perspectives, that we wish to obtain a public meeting in this town of the St Catherine's Bible Society. There are, further, two openings that have presented themselves since I began to write, as better prepared for forming in them Parish Bible Societies than I had supposed, and with the prospect of continuance under the direct and indirect guardianship of our good Barbados friend Mr. Edmondson and some others. It is uncertain how far these operations mentioned, and openings noticed, may affect the before projected to her that I have noticed. Should Mr. Wheeler have seen what we may consider a sufficient specimen of our West India plans and operations previous to the prospective setting out the referred to, he will of course not go, whether I should or not. He must not of course stopped too long here, as it is a kind of defrauding of the Leeward Islands of his expected services. But you know it was your particular wish that he should come here, and your reasons were assigned. When he goes, he will go direct to St. Thomas's, and will make his tour just the reverse of what I sketched before, that is, the beginning and the ending will be interchanged, but the line gone along will be the same. I shall endeavour to furnish him with a bag-ful of letters to our numerous friends in those quarters, who I am sure will all be glad to see him. – As to myself, I know not well what to say, but I shall think a little more, and shall then be able to speak. I am a little disposed to believe that I am wiser than you as to matters and arrangements regarding ourselves and this place. I feel therefore somewhat inclined to be disobedient, but in the meantime until further notice, I remain as before,
Your very obedient Servant,
James Thomson.
P.S. Your letter of the 30th October has come to hand today during the writing of this sheet.
I found in Kingston the other day, the two cases of Old Test. extracts, and learned that they arrived in March. The Bookseller is very culpable in not having sent with them a letter of advice. It was by mere chance that they were at all landed from the packet, and of one of the cases the books are greatly damaged by the salt water which somehow got into them.
[1] Following the sequence from the previous letter, this should be numbered '46'.