CHAPTER X
The Pale Messenger
The formation of the American Colonization Society stimulated interest in Negro deportation. Both whites and blacks put many inquiries to Cuffe. He was thought of as the prospective first governor of the colony but he did not live to realize this. Near the end of his career his advice to his people was to be quiet and trust in God; be industrious and honest; such conduct is the greatest boon toward liberation. "Experience is the best schoolmaster."
He took advantage of this correspondence to exhort his brethren to improve their morals. To William Harris he wrote: "We must depart from that Monster—I mean intemperance. Examine your selves, your families. Are you clean? If not set about this work immediately.... Do not admit him into your houses in any other shape than a mere medicine. I formerly kept him company but for many years I have forsaken him and I find great consolation thereby."
About a year before his death he gave sound financial advice to Edward Cooke. In the postscript of the letter he wrote "My dear Friend Edward Cooke, if I could know that thee had given up the use of strong drink, I should feel rejoiced, and would render thee such aid, that thee could soon become a man of property."
About the same time that he gave this advice, Isaac Gifford received a "Watchword." "By experience," wrote the Captain, "I have ever found when I attended to my business I seldom suffered loss. I have found it to be good to make choice of good companions. I have ever found it not to be profitable for me to sit long after dining and make a tipling habit of wine and other liquors. These very people who adopt those practices when they see a sober, steady man will put business in his way. The surest way to conquer strong drink is to make no use of it. We are born and we must die. Amen."
He points out to Joel Rogers, chosen to represent the Gayhead people, the fields among his neighbors, "devastated either by creatures or weeds." More frugality is needed. Excessive drink and idleness are very destructive to society. These and similar truths were recommended to Rogers to guide his work for his people. When Cuffe and his wife with some relatives visited there, meeting was held, and "many lively testimonies borne to the truth of their state and standing."
The admonitions were in accord with the life of Captain Cuffe. Another lively testimony was given to young men in a meeting in Arch Street, Philadelphia. He said to the young men that "he was afraid to dignify what he had to say, by calling it a vision, but it appeared to him at a time when he was very low in mind and much cast down, and being very disconsolate, there appeared before him the form of a man, inquiring what ailed him. He said he could not tell. The Form told him the disease was in his heart, and he could show it to him. Upon his expressing submission, the Form took a sharp instrument, separated his heart from his body and laid it before him. He was greatly terrified in viewing it, it being very unclear and contained all kinds of abominable things. The Form said he could never be healed, till he submitted to have his heart cleansed. Then, said he, I fear I never shall be healed. But on the Form asking him, if he was willing to have it cleansed, and he consenting, he took a sharp instrument and separated all that was vile and closed up the heart, replaced it, and healed the wound. Thus he said he felt himself a changed man and a new creature, and then recommended the young men to that Physician who could heal them, although their state was ever so deplorable.
"In the course of his testimony he also related that when he was about twelve years of age he lived upon an island where there was no house but that of his father. Being one evening near night sent on an errand alone, he became afraid that he should meet with some wild beast that would attack him. He crossed to a fence in order to cut a stick to defend himself; but after cutting it, the thought occurred that he was not on his father's ground, and as he had no right to the stick it was not likely it would serve to defend him. On which he laid it down, near the place he had taken it from and in recrossing the fence laid his hand on a loose piece of wood which was on their own ground resting against the fence. It proved to be a club, which he took up, and went cheerfully on his way."[65]