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Church, as baptism, repentance, faith, resurrection, and eternal judgment."

The essential question, however, is the use of the rite. Mr. Jackson says, "If it is not actually a means of grace; if no real communication of the Holy Ghost is an essential element of Confirmation, the whole discussion is a vain logomachy." Various quotations are adduced from the Fathers and other authorities as to the practice of the Church in all ages, and as to the significance attached to the "laying on of hands" in the act of Confirmation. In 1539, in reply to a series of questions addressed to the bishops concerning the Sacraments, the Archbishop of York adopted the sentiment: "The Holy Ghost which descended upon the waters of baptism gave full innocency at the font; but in Confirmation it gives increase to grace." Great stress is laid upon the necessity of the act of Confirmation being performed by a bishop; St. Philip, we are told, could not confirm because he was not an apostle.

Mr. Jackson discriminates between Confirmation itself, and the preparation generally insisted upon for the reception of its grace, in a manner that evokes the warm approval of the Church Times. In answer to the questions, "For what end shall Christian parents bring their children to be confirmed? And how shall the candidates be taught to regard their Confirmation?" he writes: "The solemn renewal of their baptismal promises 'in the presence of God' and 'openly before the Church' is, indeed, a very serious and important act; but essentially it is identical with what they have done every time that they have reverently and as in God's sight responded in the words of the Catechism, 'Yea, verily, and by God's help so I will.' It is the expression of a resolution which they may repeat before God with prayer for His help to keep it throughout the remainder of their lives. Moreover, this public avowal is not essential to the validity of Confirmation. No such question and answer are found in the Confirmation service of the English Prayer Book since the Reformation until the Revision of 1662. In all the earlier Prayer Books the rubric directs first that every child shall be taught his Catechism before he is brought to the bishop to be confirmed; secondly, that when so prepared that they can answer to such questions of the Catechism as the bishop (or such as he shall appoint) shall by his discretion appose them in.' But that this was only a preparation for Confirmation, and not an integral portion of the rite, appears most clearly by the rubric which immediately follows this apposing,' and which directs that the bishop shall then confirm them in this wise 'After which comes the heading

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"CONFIRMATION.

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"The same may be said of the ancient Latin servicebooks: the open and public renewal of baptismal promises is not embodied in the Confirmation service. the services of the Greek Church there is no place for such renewal, for the confirmation follows immediately after the baptism; as was also the case in the early Church whenever a bishop was present at the baptism. While, therefore, the candidates should be taught to prepare themselves, seriously and reverently, for a true and earnest self-dedication in the solemn renewal of their baptismal promises; it would be a grievous injury to their profitable reception of confirmation if they were not at the same time encouraged to expect from their Heavenly Father those abundant graces of His Holy Spirit, which will be assuredly communicated by prayer and the laying on of hands to all who come with loving faith to receive the heavenly gift.

"What are simple persons to look for when they come

to be confirmed, except those very gifts which are asked for on their behalf? The spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and ghostly strength, the spirit of knowledge and true godliness, and the spirit of God's holy fear.""

It appears to us that this rite of Confirmation is intimately associated with the doctrines of Baptismal Regeneration and Apostolic Succession. Highly esteeming the orderly arrangements for the introduction of candidates into the ministry of the New Church, we should deeply regret the introduction of any rite which would even appear to place in the hands of the ministers a vestige of supernatural power. Attendance at worship, the habitual use of prayer, the constant reading of the Holy Word, and due reverence to the divinely-appointed Sacraments, are the means of grace to the trusting children of the Lord. We should deeply regret the introduction of Confirmation, or of any rite analogous to Confirmation, into the externals of New Church worship.

W

J. D. B.

A CASUAL CONVERSATION. AITING at the city terminus of the Midland Railway, I sat down upon a bench, at the other end of which a gentleman was sitting with a fine Newfoundland dog crouched beside him. I had hardly been seated a moment, with my face turned from the dog and his master, when I was startled by something laid upon my knee, and a cold, damp substance touching my hand. Looking down I saw it was the dog, asking as plain as a dog could ask for a caress, which he obtained.

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"I perceive you are fond of dogs, sir," said the gentleman, and Toby seems to know it, for he does not usually make friends with strangers so readily."

"Yes," I replied, "I am fond of all animals that are useful to man. The variety and peculiarity of their instincts are very remarkable, approaching in some instances to the reason and thought of man, though never touching it.”

"Then I presume, sir," said the gentleman, “that you think instinct and reason have nothing in common with each other."

"Certainly," I replied, "the animal comes into existence with all the instincts connatural to it, and they may be developed and trained by man's reason to a high state of perfection, so that they may serve the purpose for which man requires them; but with all the training in the world you will never produce reason and thought.'

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"You are aware, I suppose," said the gentleman, "that your thesis is in opposition to the development theory advanced by Darwin and others. I have not given much attention to the subject, but I suppose there must be some foundation for it, as a number of learned men indorse the theory, yet there is something about it that appears to my mind to want the stamp of truth."

"Yes," I replied, "there you indicate the great want. Where can the stamp of genuine truth be obtained? It appears to me that what are called the natural sciences bear upon their face the stamp of natural truth; but when we attempt to make nature reveal to us how it came to be nature, we are asking of it what it does not contain, and therefore cannot tell us. All the progress we have made in opening out the laws by which natural things are arranged, governed, and mutually related, I grant, advances our knowledge of the beautiful order and intricate working of the finer particles of nature upon those which are more gross or external, in other words, we penetrate by our researches further and deeper into

the laws by which nature develops or works out the finished end or result; with that I quite agree. Let our men of science, therefore, discover and lay open page after page of nature's record. I go with them and admire the perseverance and thought they must bring to bear upon their subject before they can demonstrate some newlydiscovered fact; that alters, perhaps, the ideas previously entertained upon some given object, or suggests some new train of thought. Our men of science are doing a great and noble work in the world by increasing our knowledge of natural things; but all the discoveries of natural science can never reveal to us what is above or beyond the realm of nature."

"Pardon me for interrupting you," said the gentleman, "but what do you mean by being beyond nature? And I did not understand what you meant when you said we ask of nature what it does not contain, and cannot therefore tell us; how do we do that?"

"Well," I replied, "we do it in this way. There is a certain class of minds that believes only in what can be demonstrated to the natural senses, hence we have a total ignoring of any power beyond that which is inherent in nature. And because nature cannot be made to show what that power is, or how it acts upon matter, all the forms of creation, including man, are supposed to be the result of the evolution or development of matter, the affinity of one class of atoms towards another, the tendency of particle to particle, the fitness of one thing for another, in short, what is called natural selection. Thus you see all that is known, and all that we shall ever know or discover in the future, begins and ends in nature; the conclusion therefore is that there is nothing beyond nature. Some minds may be fascinated by such a theory, but to my mind such a doctrine is fatal to itself, for it makes matter produce mind, or in other words, reason and thought are only the highest development of matter called mind, and then mind turns round and says, I have searched and sifted the laws of matter down to what is denominated protoplasm, and cannot discover anything of myself or how I came into existence, yet here I am. I cannot deny my own existence, but as Nature fails to prove to me that there is anything outside or inside of herself that is not nature, I am forced to the conclusion that I must be nothing but a portion of nature. Why, my dear sir, the very fact that mind can examine into and demonstrate the laws and principles by which nature is governed is a sufficient and undeniable proof that mind must be superior to and beyond nature, and cannot partake of anything belonging to nature. Mind, therefore, must be superior to and above nature; there is no escape from this deduction, and I do not see what would be gained if it were possible to escape from it."

"Well," said the gentleman, "the only end or object, as far as I can see, is to do away with the idea that man has any existence apart from this world; for if he possesses nothing in himself but what can be traced to nature, it is evident that when he ceases to exist naturally he ceases altogether. But as you have shown, I think unmistakably, that mind is not, and cannot be matter, the question arises, What is mind, and is it possible to show what it is?"

"Well, sir," I replied, "I admit it is impossible to show what mind is from nature, and if we will not admit anything out of nature, we must leave the question what is mind unsolved for ever. But mind will not be satisfied with so disposing of itself, it keeps asking the question, What am I? whence came I? And when the answer is given, You are a spiritual existence, and belong to a spiritual creation, and there is a world of spirit as well as

a world of nature, mind will not believe it because nature cannot show it. As I have said before, how can nature show what is not in it, a thing cannot yield what it does not contain. Begin with a creator as a spiritual being, and you at once have evidence of mind stamped upon every law and production of nature; and I think no one will contend that the mind of man produced nature. What astonishes me is, that mind does not see at once that it must exist from and derive all its exalted qualities from the Divine mind that created nature; and as that Creator must be supernatural, the mind of man must consequently be supernatural, or, in other words, spiritual."

"Yes," said the gentleman, "it is indeed surprising that some men should persuade themselves that there is no spiritual creation; but I doubt whether any one really does believe it. They may profess to, and may find a delight in thus setting themselves apart from the bulk of mankind. The idiosyncrasies of the human mind are very remarkable. If we deny the existence of man as a spiritual being after he leaves this world, when he dies there is an end of him. The question therefore seems to me of no consequence at all, whether man was developed from nature or created by a superior power. If this life is the end of man's existence, it seems hardly worth while that he should have been created, for with most of us this life is a troubled and short one even if we live to old age. It is true, we read that in former times men lived for hundreds of years."

"Stop, stop, my dear sir," I said, "I suppose you are referring to the Bible record. You must remember, however, that that Book cannot be admitted by those who argue that man was developed from nature. For if that Book is admitted as a Divine revelation, it distinctly states that man is a separate creation, and has a spiritual existence, and lives after he leaves this world. Nature cannot show this to man, therefore it must be revealed to him. If he will not accept the revelation there is no other means of knowing, and he is at liberty, if he so wills it, to deny the existence of his own mind as being anything but refined matter; yet nature cannot produce to him a single particle of thinking matter, and man is a thinking and reasoning being. If he desires to know how he became so, he must accept what is revealed to him concerning his spiritual existence and the nature of spiritual things."

"But you must admit, sir," said the gentleman, "that there is much in the Bible that does not agree with the undisputed facts of science, and also very much in it that reason cannot understand."

"I am aware that such is the case," I replied, “but I question whether men have not altogether misunderstood the nature and end for which that Book was given; but that is not the question just now. However erroneous the ideas may be that unenlightened reason have formed from that Book, there is abundant evidence in it for concluding that man is a spiritual being and God is a spiritual Being. And if we start with that admission, then we have a fixed standpoint above nature, from which the human mind can go on safely, opening out the laws of nature in this world and all other worlds. And every step we take, no matter in which direction, shall only increase our perception of the Divine power that created and governs all things, and shall convince us that mind is, by its very nature, a spiritual existence, not bounded by the laws of matter. What the future state or end or beginning of man's spiritual nature may be involves quite a distinct and different train of thought.

"What I have been endeavouring to show now is, that man is a spiritual being as well as a natural one." "And yet, sir," said the gentleman, "I have no doubt

that a certain class of minds will go on disputing the fact, and that no deductions of reason will convince them to the contrary.

"I have no hope, sir," I replied, "that they will ever be convinced so long as they refuse to acknowledge anything beyond the circle of their own natural perceptions, for all such theories are born of the natural understanding, and dig their own graves in the cause that produced them."

"That," said the gentleman, "is going so far as to say that all erroneous ideas carry with them the elements of their own destruction; for, if worked out to their ends, they must at last show their own fallacies."

"Yes," I replied, "that is the idea I intended to convey. And if you follow it out, I think you will see there must be such a thing as absolute truth in spiritual things as well as in natural. But men do not seek spiritual enlightenment upon religious matters; they seem afraid. to think upon doctrinal questions."

"Too true!" said the gentleman, "men will talk with you upon politics, the state of the money market, the war, the depression of trade or any earthly thing; but what relates to the future life is as much ignored as if it had no existence except with a few enthusiastic minds whose religion consists of one or two ideas. But I am sorry we cannot pursue the subject further, for here comes our train and I am only going to the next station. I hope I may soon have the pleasure of meeting you again, for I take great interest in these subjects." T. PLUMMER.

T

FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE.

"Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas."

CHAPTER XI.

AKE next, in illustration of the general principle before us, two or three groups of words which have for their ancestors the simple ejaculations of man himself, a class of which it is easy to find examples, and in which there are none more obvious than the infantine utterances which long ago became shaped into "father" and "mother." Though denied by Sharon Turner, there cannot be a doubt that these two utterances are almost universal among mankind. They exist, at all events, throughout the languages distinguished as the Indo-Germanic: they are illustrated also in the Semitic tongues; and as our general argument is founded upon the phenomena presented in these two leading families of human speech, quite enough is furnished to sustain it. As regards Hebrew they occur in Isaiah viii. 4, which verse, though rendered in the Authorized Version very properly, "Before the child shall have knowledge to cry, My father and my mother," would be more exactly represented by using the monosyllables 'abh and 'em, the original Hebrew being and DN. The sound which naturally and uniformly escapes when the lips of infancy are opened in an endeavour to articulate is either that of the letter m, with a vowel either before or after it, or of the letter or b, also with an accompanying vowel, these two sounds being emphatically labials. For convenience' sake we shall call them pa and ma, these being now established vocables, and in their duplicated forms, papa and mama (constructed after the manner of murmur" and "Aurora"), recognised ingredients of even literary language. Lengthened forms of them appear in Sanscrit as pitri and mâtri, in Greek as Tarp and μrop, in Latin as pater and mater, in German as vater and mutter, and so on through fifty other languages, the French contracting the Latin into père and mère.

ma.

The first of them appears again in the Pehlevi or ancient Persian language as bab; in Syriac it becomes the wellknown scriptural abba; the second occurs in the Celtic tongues as mam. The origin of the variations of the spelling has already been explained: remembering the laws of permutation, there is, of course, not the least difficulty over the p, b, f, and v. As with ourselves, in ancient times there were familiar modifications of each of these tender appellatives. In the sixth Odyssey old King Alcinous' daughter, the fair Nausikaa, so delicately described as ευπεπλον and λευκώλενον, the “beautifulrobed" and the "white-armed," addresses her father in nature's own sweet and changeless language of affection as пáññа piλe, "dear papa." In Euripides, Alcestis the boy calls upon his dying mother as paîa, “dear These two little utterances are found also in modern verse. Dante, when he would describe the loftiest powers of the intellect, speaks of them as the reverse of the effort of the infant when it says only "mamma e babbo" (Dell' Inf. xxxii. 9). With the Greeks, ßaßágw, literally to say "ba," signified to speak inarticulately, and thus unintelligibly. Idle chatter and prating they called ßaßag, and a cradle they called Baßadiov. It is the same old word which exists in the French babiller, and in our own English babble, babe, and baby, the equivalent term "infant" signifying the non-speaker or the speechless one. Infancy is literally "inability to speak.' From the Latin mater we have matrimony, matron, matriculate, matrix, maternity, maternal. By another beautiful figure we speak of our native land as the mother-country, just as the ancient Hebrews called theirs 'ōm; and as the world gives and nourishes everything, our planet is figuratively "mother earth." No phrase occurs oftener in the classical poets.* We have it also in Job i. 21, and in Shelley—

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"Maternal earth, who doth her sweet smiles spread For all."

affections.

enamour,

The idea of the substance of which a thing is made is also expressed by derivatives from the infantine ma, this being the base of materia, matter, material (figuratively extended as tively extended as an adjective to the all-important), immaterial, materialism, materialize, etc. Amo, I love, though sometimes referred to a different source, would seem consistently assigned to the same prolific root. A mother's love is the type of the entire scope of the The derivatives, it is needless to say, are very numerous, including amor, amour, amative, amabilis, amiable, which last signifies not only of loving disposition, but that which is worthy of love: "How amiable are Thy tabernacles, O Lord of Hosts!" In the same list come also amicitia, amity, amicus, amenity, amateur, all the best, in a word, of the terms which refer to cordial attachment, friendship, and Several of them take a prefix implying predilection. negation, and thus still further expand the vocabulary, as exemplified in enemy, enmity, inimical, and in the Latin inamabilis, literally "the unlovely."

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"Tristique palus inamabilis undâ

Alligat, et novies Styx interfusa coercet." + From the Latin amita, through the French tante, we have "aunt," figuratively a person of loving disposition; and by a perfectly natural extension of the original word for mother, mamma," the resort of the unweaned, whence the new stream of words which includes

Pindar, Nem. vi. 3. Eschylus, Prom. 90. The Orphic Hymn to Nature. Ovid, Met. i. 393, etc.

The en of enemy, French ennemi (from which our own word is proximately derived), is the same as the Latin in, which has the double sense of in, into, or on, and of "not" or "against." Com pare enfant infant.

mammosa, one of the epithets borne by deep-bosomed Ceres, mammal, mammalia, mamelon, and mamilla. "The country," says a lively traveller, "was mamillated with little hills,"- -a metaphor which recalls the terms bestowed on gently-swelling and rounded eminences by the Greeks, by whom they were called μαστοι and τιτθοι.

Just as the above came from ma, from pa, by a similar process, have come the numerous words which have their proximate root in pater, including paternity, patrimony, patronymic, etc. Many of these are eminently figurative. A powerful friend, a defender, a protector, one who behaved, as we say ourselves, "like a father," the Romans called a "patron." Now we apply the term to one who countenances and supports, not merely persons, but principles. The senators, literally the "old men" or fathers, in ancient Rome were the "patricians." Now we apply the term to people of exalted rank. "Patriarch means chief or principal father, and "patristic" that which pertains to the first writers upon Christian doctrines. Commemorative even more directly of the primeval ab are the words abbot, abbé, abbess, abbey, abbacy, all of which are again expressive metaphors.* So are the common colloquial phrases, "a paternal government," "father of his people," "the wish is father to the thought." The atmosphere, with its showers, the fertilizing spouse of maternal earth, was called by the ancients "father Æther." The Almighty, in every sense the Creator and Sustainer, we ourselves call "Our Father," an expression to which language affords no parallel. The head of the Romish Church is its "papa," pape, or Pope. We speak, too, of our "fatherland," a man devoted to which is a "patriot." The devout man carries his patriotism a step beyond, as expressed in the sacred verses, immemorially ancient, which end with

"Quid vitam sine termino Nobis donet in patria."

The showers bestowed by "father Æther" naturally lead on to the idea of water in general, pronounced by Homer and Thales, by virtue of its fine masculine character, the origin of all things. Homer and Thales did not say this foolishly: the last things in the world to be called foolish are the metaphors employed by great poetry and lofty philosophy, which in truth cannot express itself except by means of metaphor, any more than the Christian religion can. Rivers of magnitude and perennial flow, such as give a country its life and prosperity, have in every age had the title of "father," as in the expressions "Father Tiber" and "Father Thames." For the same reason they are also personified as male"Indus or Ganges rolling his broad wave." Hence one of the earliest names applied to water, so far as philology can discover, was ab or ap, in Sanscrit apas, literally "father." Very interesting is it to find this ancient appellation still extant in the names of rivers wherever the Indo-Germanic languages, in any of their many varieties, have existed. In Celtic it became Abon, Apon, or Avon, which last is extant in the names of no fewer than ten English rivers. In France it is found in the Aube; in India in the geographical name Punjaub or Panj-ab, literally the "Five-river-land." Amnis, the Latin word for a river, likewise rests on ap and apas, by interchange of p and m, as seen in vos and somnus, and in oeuvós, reverend, from réßw, to revere. permutation of p and 7, as explained in chap. vi., ap or

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Abbot, the father or head of a monastery, was originally spelt Abbat. Flowing from this appellation came the name of his family, the "friars," literally the brethren, friar being a corruption of the French frère, constantly used in the sense of "friar" by the early English writers, as in Chaucer, Prologue, 208

"A frére there was, a wanton and a merry."

apas became transformed into aqua, the proximate root of aquatic, aquarium, aqueduct, aqueous; and which reappears in French in the abbreviated form of eau, plural eaux, which is still further contracted into Aixla-Chapelle. Thence it became a denominative for the greatest of waters, æquor, the sea, other forms of which ancient word are extant in the Welsh aig, the Icelandic agir, and several other Celtic and Gothic terms of similar import. In Anglo-Saxon it assumed the shape of egor, whence iglond or eglond = an island, literally land in the midst of the sea. LEO H. GRINDON.

on.

THE LATE REV. D. G. GOYDER.

HE Bradford Observer of July 1st has the following notice of the life of an indefatigable worker not only in the cause of the New Church, but also in many others of worth: "On Saturday morning last. this venerable old man died at his residence, Grove Terrace, Bradford. He was one of the earliest ministers of the New Church' (Swedenborgian), having been ordained in 1822; and he was greatly valued by that body both as a writer and a preacher. He was known and esteemed, however, beyond the sphere in which he or dinarily worked, notably as a phrenologist, of which science he was an earnest student and an able expositor. He was also a master mason, and lectured on Freemasonry with great acceptance. Indeed, he was a man of versatile parts and great natural force of character, and laboured through a long life for the enlightenment and welfare of his fellow-men. Every man has a history of his own, more or less instructive: the history of the deceased is written in the Autobiography of a Phrenologist,' published in 1857 by Simpkin, Marshall, & Co. It is a curious book, not merely as depicting the character of the writer, but as giving in a very homely but striking fashion a narrative of current events during the early half of the present century by an intelligent lookerFrom this book we learn that Mr. Goyder was born in 1796, and at nine years of age was left an orphan. His friends procured for him admission on the foundation of the Westminster Green-Coat School, and here he received his education. After leaving school his thoughts were turned to the study of theology, and he was led to accept the teachings of Swedenborg, and by these he held tenaciously to the end. At the same time he took an active interest in the cause of Education, and under the patronage of Lord Brougham went to Bristol to organize an infants' school upon the system of Pestalozzi. It was during his temporary residence there that he was called and ordained to the ministry; and besides preaching in the New Church pulpit of that city, he organized schools in Gloucestershire, Somersetshire, Wiltshire, and other southern counties. With the same object he visited Dublin, Liverpool, Glasgow, and London. Wherever he went he was usefully employed, and made many friends. As a Christian minister he laboured at Preston, Accrington, Hull, Newcastle, Glasgow, Melbourne, and Ipswich. The story of his life shows with Dissenting minister of those days was subjected to, from painful accuracy the kind of persecution and hardship a the intolerance and bigotry of established opinion and vested interests; and by being forced to support himself by lecturing, teaching, and other secular employments. The good man whose death we record lived to see a great change in these matters, and to feel that after all his toil and sufferings, the cause to which he devoted the chief energies of his life had prospered and become a force in the world of religious thought. Mr. Goyder

was a fluent writer, and issued several publications of varied excellence and interest. He also graduated at Edinburgh, and took the degree of Doctor in Medicine. Two sons bring his name forward with credit into another generation-the elder being Surveyor-General of South Australia, and the younger our highly-respected fellow-townsman, Dr. Goyder of Horton Road. "

THE REAL RITUAL REASON WHY.

SMALL pamphlet bearing the above title, from the pen of the Rev. Hely Smith, Rector of Tanzley, Matlock, is at present having an immense circulation. It consists of twenty-five questions and answers; its purpose being to show that the doctrines and practices of the Ritualistic party in the Church of England are the very reverse of those taught in the Scriptures. The following specimens afford an indication of the general tone of the publication :

1. Why do Ritualists despise the authority of Scripture? Because Christ and His apostles appealed to Scripture as the sole rule of faith and practice.

6. Why do they tell us the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper must be taken fasting-before breakfast? Because Christ instituted it after supper.

12. Why do they countenance private devotions being performed in public, and keep the doors of their churches. always open for the express purpose of encouraging the practice? Because Christ said, "Thou when thou prayest enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret."

CONVENTION OF THE NEW CHURCH IN AMERICA.

W

FIFTY-EIGHTH ANNUAL SESSION.

E condense the following account from the Boston Evening Traveller of May 31st, 1878: "About two hundred and fifty ladies and gentlemen assembled in the New Jerusalem Church, Bowdoin Street, this forenoon to the Fifty-eighth Convention of that church. At ten o'clock the President, the Rev. Chauncey Giles, read the fifty-fourth chapter of Isaiah, and after prayer appointed Messrs. G. W. Colton of New York, W. N. Hobart of Cincinnati, and T. F. Wright of Massachusetts, as a Committee on Credentials. "The Rev. Chauncey Giles, the President, read his annual report, from which it appeared that the state of the church is about the same. The Publishing House does not yet support itself. recommended the consideration of the subjects of missionary work. During the past year five ministers have been ordained, and none lost. The report refers to the work of the Publishing Board, and concludes by congratulating the Convention on its prosperous condition.

He

"The report of the Treasurer, Mr. Hobart, followed. He recommended that a suitable form of bequest be printed. In addition to all sums donated for immediate use, the principal of which has been expended, in England, over £46,000 (nearly one-fourth of a million dollars) was invested previous to July 1876, the interest of which is being applied as directed by the donors to missionary, charitable, and other purposes.

"In this country the evident tendency has been to devise money by will to the Convention's Publishing Board, the Tract Society in Philadelphia, and the other active New Church organizations, whose frequent reports of what they are doing show so conclusively the wonderful influence they are enabled to exert, and the good that can be done by such bequests. The aggregate sums thus given in this country perhaps equal the contributions to the English Conference.

"Without doubt, all will agree that more money is to be expected in future from bequests made by will than from all other sources combined. Very few individuals have much surplus income during life. Among other things, the great advantage of owning a building in New York city, to be used not only for printing and publication purposes, but as a headquarters for the use of the whole country, should not be forgotten.

"The seventh annual report of the New Church Board of Publica

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Arrangements have recently been made with Messrs. J. B. Lipp incott & Co. to publish a new edition of the Compendium.

"The Secretary's report showed that they had circulated a large number of books and tracts.

"The Executive Committee reported that they had adopted the amendment of the sixteenth byelaw, and that the educational amendment be not adopted. The Rice Fund should be held by the trustee, but the accrued interest should be distributed among the various Boards.

"The subject of the incorporation of the Board of Publication was referred to a Committee consisting of Messrs Albert Mason, C. W. Colton, and Horace P. Chandler.

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'At noon the Rev. Chauncey Giles delivered his annual address on 'The Doctrines of the New Church a Spiritual Science.' After referring to the miraculous age in which we live, and the wonderful changes which are being continually seen around us, he said that as New Churchmen we should heed the prophetic changes. We come together to gain new light and inspiration, and we see gradual fulfilment of the prophecies of the Bible. A few hearts already know that we are in the morning of a spiritual age. The doctrines of the New Church are scientific in their form and quality. The same conditions are essential to spiritual as to natural science. It must be based on fact, for it is impossible to construct a science without facts. Science can only be formed by insight into the intrinsic forms and qualities of isolated facts, by which their relations to other facts may be seen, and the higher laws and qualities to all the particular facts may be discovered. Swedenborg entered the spiritual world, and made a statement of things seen and heard there which are facts. The doctrines of the New Church are organized truths; they are a statement of the laws and forms and methods of man's spiritual nature, and the relations of this regeneration, spiritual culture, and growth in heavenly life as they exist in him by deviation from the Divine image and likeness in which he was created. Natural scientists find that method, order, and subordination exist in all things, great and small, immutable law governing all of the Lord's operations in nature, and they logically conclude that the same principles and methods rule in the realms of spirit.

"The existence of a Divine order in spiritual growth and attainment is certain. The truth makes a man free from groundless fears, and in the spiritual life this is also true. Genuine spiritual knowledge will free the mind from doubt for man's progress in spiritual life. Men doubt the wisdom of God because they are suffering, and by reason of disorder. Men do not doubt about what they know, it is what they do not know or what is seen only in the twilight and flitting forms of appearances that they doubt. Genuine knowledge carries conviction with it. The main question in relation to a spiritual life is 'Whether it is.' All conceivable forms of existence are given to the Lord and spirits, but they are not regarded as beings, and consequently their relations to one another cannot be determined. Having the true nature and laws of the soul, we can cultivate and develop them.

"After a most thorough disquisition on the subject, the address was concluded as follows: 'Let us be faithful to our trust; let us counsel wisely and labour diligently to make known to men those spiritual and Divine truths in which the Lord is making His Second Coming to men, and by which He will subdue all things to Himself."

"The report of the Committee on the publication of Swedenborg's writings reviewed their work at great length, showing that during its existence many valuable additions have been made to the published lists of the works of the great founder of the Church, and several are now in preparation."

WEEK-EVENING HOME READING MEETINGS.

N Tuesday evening, May 21st, at Devonshire Street, Islington, at the Society's Annual General Meeting, the sub-committee of the London New Church Association attended by appointment to bring the subject of Home Reading Meetings under the notice of the Society. Mr. C. Tarelli, Secretary of the Committee, introduced the subject, and said: "Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, I appear before you as the Secretary of the Committee appointed by the New Church Association, and I beg on behalf of my colleagues

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