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a more meagre congregation. It was literally 

 " two or three gathered together," and it seemed 

 as if five or six would be too many, and forfeit the 

 promise. I cannot discover that the negroes have 

 any external forms of worship, nor any priests in 

 Jamaica, unless their Obeah men should be con- 

 sidered as such ; but still I cannot think that they 

 ought to be considered as totally devoid of all 

 natural religion. There is no phrase so common on 

 their lips as " God bless you !" and "God preserve 

 you !" and " God will bless you wherever you go !" 

 Phrases which they pronounce with every appear- 

 ance of sincerity, and as if they came from the very 

 bottom of their hearts. " God-A'mity ! God- 

 A'mity !" is their constant exclamation in pain and 

 in sorrow ; and with this perpetual recurrence to 

 the Supreme Being, it must be difficult to insist 

 upon their being atheists. But they have even got 

 a step further than the belief in a God ; they also 

 allow the existence of an evil principle. One of 

 them complained to me the other day, that when 

 he went to the field his companions had told him 

 "that he might go to hell, for he was not worthy to 

 work with them and one of his adversaries in 

 return accused him of being so lazy, " that instead 

 of being a slave upon Cornwall estate, he was only 

 fit to be the slave of the devil." Then surely they 

 could not be afraid of duppies (or ghosts) without 

 some idea of a future state ; and indeed nothing is 

 more firmly impressed upon the mind of the Afri- 



