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These conflicting principles cannot safely be disregarded they must be reconciled. To this country belongs the honour of having succeeded in this mighty task, as far as the State is concerned, whilst other nations are still wrestling with it; and I feel persuaded that the same earnest zeal and practical wisdom which have made her political constitution an object of admiration to other nations will, under God's blessing, make her Church likewise a model to the world.

Let us look upon this assembly as a token of future hope, and may the harmony which reigns amongst us at this moment, and which we owe to having met in furtherance of a common holy object, be by the Almighty permanently bestowed upon the Church.

AGRICULTURAL STATISTICS.

We hope to lay before you,* as far as Great Britain is concerned, the Registrar-General's analysis of the causes of death, and the dangers that people encounter at each period of life; complete returns of the produce of our mines; the agricultural returns of Ireland, in which the Registrar-General of that country has given every year the breadth of land under every kind of crop, with an estimate of its produce, and has proved by his success in obtaining these facts. at a comparatively moderate expense, and by the voluntary assistance of the landowners and cultivators, as well as of the clergy of all denominations, that the apprehension was groundless, that it could not be done without cost, or without injuring individual interests. We must hope that, considering its importance with regard to all ques

* This and the next paragraphs are from the address delivered before the International Statistical Congress, July 16, 1860.

tions affecting the food of the people, this inquiry will not only be extended to England and Scotland, but also to the Continent generally, wherever it may not already have been instituted. Our trade returns will exhibit the great effects produced on our commerce by the changes in our commercial system; our colonial delegates will exhibit to you proofs of the wonderful progress of their countries, and proofs at the same time that elaborate statistics have rendered them con

scious of that progress. And I have no doubt that the foreign delegates will more than repay us by the information which they will give us in exchange.

OUR DEPENDENCE ON EACH OTHER.

THESE returns will, no doubt, prove to us afresh in figures what we know already from feeling and from experience, how dependent the different nations are upon each other for their progress, for their moral and material prosperity,

Our Dependence on each other.

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and that the essential condition of their mutual happiness is the maintenance of peace and goodwill among each other. Let them still be rivals in the noble race of social improvement, in which, although it may be the lot of one to arrive first at the goal, yet all will equally share the prize, all feeling their own powers and strength increase in the healthy competition.

IMPORTANCE OF UNIFORMITY.

I TRUST that it will not be thought presumptuous in me if I exhort you generally not to lose yourselves in points of minute detail, however tempting and attractive they may be from their intrinsic interest and importance; but to direct your undivided energies to the establishment of those broad principles upon which the common action of different nations can be based, which common action must be effected if we are to make real progress. I know that this Congress can only suggest and recommend, and

that it must ultimately rest with the different Governments to carry out those suggestions. Many previous recommendations, it is true, have been carried out, but many have been left unattended to, and I will not except our own country from blame in this respect.

A PRAYER FOR THE SPREAD OF TRUTH.

HAPPY and proud indeed should I feel if this noble gathering should be enabled to lay the solid foundation of an edifice, necessarily slow of construction, and requiring for generations to come laborious and persevering exertion, intended as it is for the promotion of human happiness by leading to the discovery of those eternal laws upon which that universal happiness is dependent. May He who has implanted in our hearts a craving after the discovery of truth, and given us our reasoning faculties to the end that we should use them for this discovery, sanctify our efforts and bless them in their results.

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