American Baptist Missionary Union membership certificate, 1846
Description:
Certificate to Rev. Samuel B. Swaim granting honorary membership in the American Baptist Missionary Society on September 25, 1846. The top half of the certificate is a black and white engraving of a person with a Bible missionizing to two tropical islanders. You can see other native people in the far corner worshiping an idol. The scene shows an idyllic tropical scene, with palms and waterfalls. It says below "The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light; they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death upon them hath the light shined," Isaiah.