who have presided at these Meetings: yet, I think we may be forgiven, if we are conscious of a peculiar sympathy towards one born and bred amongst usone of whom it may be said, as it was of one of the holiest men that ever lived, "He has walked before God's people even from his youth." Sir, my taste may not be a very cultivated or refined one; but I will venture to avow, that I love the flowers of native growth better than the more gay and showy exotics: and, Sir, long may it please God that you "flourish in the courts of the Lord." And permit me to offer the devout wish and prayer, that, as the noontide of life fades into the softer hues of evening, the light of a brighter world may gladden your path; that the yet richer hopes and consolations of the Gospel of our Saviour may strengthen and cheer you that blessed Gospel which it has been one of the great solicitudes of your life to extend to the ends of the earth. Now, Sir, I move "That the Report, an abridgment of which has now been read, be received and printed; and that this Meeting offers devout thanksgiving to God, the Giver of all good things,' for the manifest blessing vouchsafed to the evangelical efforts of this and all other Protestant Churches; and also for the Christian liberality which has been evinced by the supporters of this Society during the past year." No word from me, in the shape either of argument or persuasion, will be necessary to induce this great assembly to adopt this Resolution. The Report commends itself at once to the warmest approbation of all who justly estimate the great and blessed results which it has so ably described. Undoubtedly it is a remarkable document, remarkable for its condensation, for compressing into so small a compass so large an amount of information. Sir, whether we regard the vast sphere over which it has so rapidly conducted us, or the numerous and diversified agencies which in every page it has more or less described, or those very thrilling incidents, some of joy and some also of sorrow, which it has exhibited to our view; and especially if we regard the decisive and inestimable successes-successes so wide-spread in their extent as almost to be general in every portion of the Mission-field, I am sure we shall all feel impelled to indulge sentiments of gratitude to God and joy on behalf of our fellow-men. The Report brings us "good news," a very acceptable donation just now. We have had bad news enough 66 throughout the whole of last week. Here is "good news," good news, ay, from France; good news from the continent of Europe; good news from Africa, from India, from China, from Australia, from Fiji, from Canada, from Newfoundland, and from other portions of the Missionfield, from the north and from the south, from the east and from the west. Who, Sir, listening to these exhilarating facts, will not feel his heart rebound with gratitude to God, and exclaim, What hath God wrought?" Sir, these important facts prove to us, what I delight from time to time on such occasions as these to advert to,-that Methodism is, as through all the parts of its preceding history it has been, essentially a Missionary system. I hold that that element is essential to establish its claim to be recognised as a true branch of the Christian church. The Christian church at large, for what does it exist? Not for its own benefit alone, but for the welfare and the salvation of the world. It is the depository of the truth,-not to conceal it, not to withhold it from others, but to extend it to the ends of the earth. It is designated "the catholic church;" and why, Sir? Because it is designed by its great Head to be a universal blessing to mankind. And to us it must be a source of peculiar satisfaction, and a demand on our gratitude, that from the beginning those churches which have been collected by the blessing of God on the labours of Mr. Wesley, his coadjutors, and successors, have from the beginning borne this type, they have been Missionary churches. And no wonder! Our distinguished Founder himself was at the very outset of his career a Christian Missionary. He undertook the voyage to Georgia with the express, the primary view of converting the American Indians; and if we contemplate his wonderful history, his apostolic character, his expansive views, his diffusive charity, his untiring zeal, his extraordinary labours, his writings, his sermons, his very hymns, they all breathe a Missionary spirit, all bear a Missionary character. What was his vocation? "To call sinners to repentance "I quote his own words "in every part of God's dominions." What was the design for which he believed his people to be raised up? "To spread scriptural holiness through the whole earth." What was the sphere of his labours? "The world is my parish ;" and what were the maxims, the precepts, which he enforced on his Assistants, and which he has bequeathed to his followers? Some of them are these: "Go not to It those only who need you, but to those who need you most. Remember you have not to preach so many sermons, or to take care of this or of that Society; but to save, everywhere, as many souls as you can." And what, Sir, has been the result of the enforcement of these principles, and of that system of evangelical labour to which they have given birth? Blessed be God for what our eyes behold in this country,--a million and a half of people gathered into the fold of Methodism ! In the United States of America, five millions of people! In the various British colonies, Missionary churches planted; and over the vast and magnificent field of Missionary labours, let the Report tell what has been accomplished. Why, Sir, which of us in listening to these things will not acknowledge it, what Mr. Wesley rejoiced ever to call it," the work of God?" It is "of Heaven, and not of men." Let us not claim it as our own. Let us not appropriate any of the glory of it to ourselves. God is "a jealous God." Let us guard against the spirit of boasting and self-glorification. We shall be assuredly rebuked of Him, if we give place to so unhallowed a feeling. Them that walk in pride He is able to abase. "It is the Lord's doing," and not ours. were impiety to regard it as the creation of human policy, or of human wisdom. "The finger of God is here ;" and from the depths of our hearts let us say, "Not unto us, O God, not unto us, but unto Thy name be all the glory." Mr. Chairman, how shall we secure this "vantageground?" How shall we maintain the unabated attachment, the unswerving allegiance, the undiminished liberality, of our people to this great and best of causes ? The answer appears so plain and obvious, that I trust you will forgive me if I venture to enunciate it. great duty is to adhere to first principles; to stand in the "old ways;" to persevere in the employment of those means which God, from the beginning, has sanctioned with His blessing. This, then, is the unpretending theine on which I must engage your attention for two or three minutes. We are to stand by first principles. We are to maintain those feelings, which first, under God's blessing, generated an interest in our minds on this great question. One, undoubtedly, of the leading and of the most prominent of those sentiments must ever be compassion for the Heathen; tender, earnest, effective compassion on behalf of the Heathen world. We have grown painfully familiar with its sad condition. The tale of its Our idolatries, its cruelties, and crimes, year after year has been repeated to us, and that narrative in its essential features is as true as ever. It is still true, literally true, that millions upon millions of our fellow-creatures are without God, and without Christ, and without hope in the world. It is still true. We have heard it so often that, really, there may be some danger of our regarding it, if not as a tale of romance, yet as a fact of bygone history, something like an old almanack. It is not so; it is, literally, awfully, true, that the "dark places of the earth" are yet "full of the habitations of cruelty;" that men have "changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." It is still true that they worship devils, and not God. It is still true that the atrocities, the hideous crimes, the obscenities, with which the worship of those imaginary deities was associated at the commencement of our Missionary career, are yet perpetrated. The case of their moral danger is unrelieved. It is still true, as when we started on this great enterprise some forty or fifty years ago, we were reminded by the best and ablest amongst us, and reminded in a tone that spake of more than human authority,that they who "sin without law shall perish without law;" that idolaters cannot inherit the kingdom of God; that, violating" the law written in their hearts," "they are without excuse." Now, Mr. Chairman, these were the facts asserted, and these were the doctrines based upon them, some forty or fifty years ago, when we entered more largely into the prosecution of this enterprise than we had done before. How shall we contemplate them? With a colder emotion, with a blunted sympathy, with a feeling exhibiting the remotest approach to apathy and indifference? God forbid ! There must be something fundamentally and fatally wrong in the condition of my heart, if it can ever be brought to contemplate the condition of the Heathen world without the truest and the deepest compassion. There must be something wrong in those who profess to respect the authority and to imitate the example of our Saviour, if they can no more "weep," as He wept over the doom of impenitent Jerusalem; if they can no longer "sigh and cry for the abominations done in the earth;" if they can no more echo the lamentation of the Prophet over the desolations of his people," O that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears!" What deep, tender, true compassion, what heartfelt, overflowing, exhaustless compassion, ought we not to continue to pour over the crimes and miseries of a perishing world? These may not be very popular topics; but never let us descend from the sacred elevation of our theme; never derogate from its majesty; never impair its true and glorious sublimity. There is no need of it; for I honestly believe, that the more earnestly-ay, the more religiously-we conduct our advo cacy of this cause, the more deeply we shall move the feelings, the more forcibly we shall grapple with the conscience, and the more effectually we shall command the liberality and the support, of those whom we call forth "to the help of the Lord against the mighty."-There is another, Sir, of those first principles, which, in order to secure the maintenance and extension of the Missionary cause, it is important we keep alive, we preserve in vigorous action; that conviction of duty which first impelled us to undertake it. If we go back to the fathers and founders of this Society, you, Sir, will remember how impressively they appealed to our people through the length and breadth of the land on this important question; with what authority they told us that we were not at liberty to espouse or neglect it as we liked; that the fundamental principles of our religion summoned us to the work, and woe unto us if we neglected to obey the summons ! You have alluded to one, Sir, and the Report has paid an appropriate and well-merited tribute of love and of sorrow to his dear name. His voice, as you well know, pealed above the rest, when, from one end of the country to the other, he told our Societies that we were "debtors to the Greek and to the Barbarian, to the wise and to the unwise;" and that justice, humanity, religion, demanded the payment of that debt. I was a mere youth then, Sir; but I never can forget the impression which was made en my mind by the appeals-the solemn, weighty, and almost irresistible appeals of that revered and lamented man. Well, Sir, suffer me to ask, Are we now to soften the tone of exhortation, or to lower the standard of duty? Is the basis of Missionary labour changed? What is that basis? If I correctly understand it, it is the express and authoritative command of the Son of God, "to go into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature.' So long, therefore, it appears to me, as that final law of His remains unrepealed, it becomes incumbent upon us, in addressing our people, still to say, not as a matter of pleasure, or of amusement, but as a matter of plain, palpable, and indispensable duty, that they are required to obey that last command of the Son of God, either in person or by proxy; that if they have received the truth, their first duty is gratefully to accept it, their next to impart it to the world; that it devolves on every professing Christian first to seek his own salvation, and next, the salvation of the world. Now, Sir, there was another feeling which the early advocates of this Society most assiduously sought to maintain in the minds of those whose services they wished to enlist,—it was that of an enlightened, well-founded, confident hope of success. Despair paralyses exertion. In the vigorous and successful pursuit of any enterprise, the hope of success is essential. Convince a man only that he may not succeed, and, if he does not instantly abandon the project, his future efforts will be powerless and inefficient. Is it not necessary, then, that we preserve in our own minds, and endeavour to sustain in the minds of all we seek to call forth to the work and help of the Lord, an enlightened hope-more than hope, an assured and confident belief -of final success? that we prosecute our sacred toil with a vigorous, elastic, untiring energy, under the inspiration of the brightest hopes, and with the confidence, the unfaltering confidence, of success? I apprehend, that, in order to maintain that feeling, it is not necessary we conceal from ourselves, or from others, the existence of unquestionable difficulties, and the probable occurrence of disappointments and delays. We should rather, I take it, guard against the effect of surprise from scurces of that sort, and instead of closing our eyes on our difficultics, we should calmly, boldly, manfully look them in the face. should prompt us to deeds of heroism and chivalry, so that with a determined and unshrinking fortitude, and with God's help and blessing, we shall grapple with and overcome them. But let those difficulties be what they may,were they ten thousand times greater than they are,-still the succession of day to night is not more certain, the revolutions of the seasons, the beauty of the spring, the fertility of the summer, and the luxuriance of the autumn, after the dreariness and desolation of winter-are not surer than is the attainment of the great consummation to which we devote ourselves. I speak of confidence; I speak of the confidence of final success. Is it irrational? Is it enthusiastic? I speak of confidence, and with solemnity They I would say it is built on the rock of eternal truth; on the sure word of the living God. Heaven and earth shall pass away; but not one jot nor one tittle of that word shall pass away, which has said, "The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." That confidence rests on the extent of the Saviour's redemption. The world was made by Him and for Him. He has redeemed it, and He shall rule it; it is His purchase,-it shall be His possession. That fidence rests on the promised effusion of the Holy Spirit. Here is an agency literally omnipotent; an agency to which nothing is impossible. He can enlighten the darkest understanding; He can rend the hardest heart; He can rescue the spirit most deeply fallen, from the thraldom of Satan,— "He speaks, and, listening to His voice, con Now, Sir, I need not remind this large "Lo, the promise of a shower -And when this shower shall come down on every land, then shall we witness the fulfilment of the promise, "The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad; the desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose."-Permit me, as an aged Minister, to add, it was frequently pressed on our attention, in the earlier stages of this work, that we should prosecute our toil in a devotional spirit. Mr. James has recently said, we have an active church; we have a giving church; now let us have a praying church! The work is God's; though He is pleased to employ human agencies. It is originally, essentially, supremely His; and He will be recognised, He will be acknowledged and sought. To expect that the world will be converted by prayers without labours, would be fanatical; to expect it will be converted by labours without prayers, would be atheistical. How is the world to be converted? By the preaching of the Gospel, accompanied by the operations of Divine Providence and the effusion of the Holy Spirit. Let our labours be directed to the one, and our prayers addressed to the other; and "what God has joined together, let no man put asunder." "O," said a late Missionary, "what a spectacle would it be one of true moral grandeur, to see England, Ireland, and Scotland, on their knees, imploring of the Father of mercies the salvation of the world! And, Sir, when the "elect of God" shall "cry to Him-mark the expression-" cry to Him"-how importunate, how vehement it is!" cry day and night to Him"day and night, "Let Thy kingdom come; and let Thy will be done on earth, as it is done in heaven,"-how gloriously it will be accelerated! Had I time, I would refer to the incidents detailed in the admirable Report; but I simply conclude by proposing, "That the Report, an abridgment of which has been read, be adopted." The REV. DR. MILLER, Rector of St. Martin's, Birmingham, and Canon of Worcester, who was very cordially received, said, I rise, Mr. Chairman and Christian friends, to second the Resolution which has just been moved. The President of the Conference is followed by a Clergyman of the Church of England. I must leave the Secretaries and the Committee to explain to you this anomaly or irregularity, if anomaly or irregularity you deem it; and I certainly shall not detain this Meeting by offering any apology for the position which I occupy to-day. I conceive that when we meet upon the Bible Society's platform, and upon occasions like these, an elaborate apology for the position we occupy as Churchmen, as Wesleyans, or as Nonconformists, only betokens that there is a lurking uneasiness in our minds which we are somewhat anxious to get rid of. I confess there was a slight and passing anxiety-it was but a momentary one-when the President of the Conference laid such stress upon a man being of your own school; for I must plead guilty to not belonging to the family. I am not a plant of native growth; I am an exotic; and I am sorry to say I have not the advantage of being either a gay or a showy one. But I may venture to say this, that I belong to a Church which has taught me, in one of her most beautiful prayers,-a prayer which is more dear to me than most others in our Liturgy, because of the one sentiment to which I am referring, or that the church of Christ consists of the blessed company of all faithful people. And I conceive that if there be one occasion on which, more than another, it is profitable to ourselves, and desirable for the interests of our Master's cause, that we should manifest a catholic spirit, and that we should proceed a little beyond the boundaries of our own churches, it is in connexion with the great Missionary enterprise. I can nowhere find a more emphatic protest on the part of the great Head of the church against anything in the shape of narrow-mindedness sectarianism than in the dispensing of His various gifts, from the throne of His exaltation, upon those who are labouring in the Mission-field. If I saw that the great Head of the church had given that branch of His church to which, even here, I will say I have the honour and privilege to belong, the monopoly of Missionary labours, of Missionary gifts, Missionary openings, and Missionary successes, I should distrust my position upon this platform to-day. But when I look abroad upon the world, I find that, whether I regard the past history of the Missions of the church of Christ, or whether I look at what is going on in every corner of Heathendom, there are labourers of different sections of the Christian church. I find that, if God has greatly honoured the London Missionary Society in Tahiti, He has greatly honoured the Moravians in Labrador and in Greenland; I find that, if I turn to Sierra-Leone and New-Zealand, and am disposed to say, these are the brightest gems in the coronet of the Church Missionary Society, I must nevertheless remember, that on both these great fields of enterprise, not only other bodies of Christians, but especially the Missionaries of the Wesleyan Society, have, to a considerable extent, shared the toil of their Master's work. And if I look to India and China, I perceive at once that, upon these great fields of labour, God is graciously looking upon many not only from the Church of England, but from the Independents, the Baptists, the Wesleyans, the Presbyterians, and almost every other denomination; clearly showing me that there is to be no monopoly of this work in any branch of the Christian church. And so with regard to the honoured names of those who have preceded us in this work, and of those who are still labouring in the Missionary field if the Lutherans have their Schwartz, we have our Henry Martyn and our Henry Fox; the Baptists have their Carey; the London Missionary Society have men whose praise is in all the churches their Williams, and Moffat, and Livingstone; and you have had, in the work, men who are equal to any other that God has raised up. If I look to the Presbyterian Church, I find that great apostolic and noble-hearted man, Dr. Duff, one of the good gifts of the Head of the church to India in the present day. Again, if I look at the various translations of the Scriptures which are circulated among the Heathen, I find that if Martyn translated portions of them into one language, Carey and Marshman translated them into another; if Maunsell, in New-Zealand, has given the blessed word to the natives, your Missionaries are engaged in spreading it among the Kaffirs and the Fiji Islands. If I look to China, I find that the Bible cannot be revised, and questions of philology settled, without a Conference of the Missionaries of the different departments of the church; thus showing that God intends that there is to be no monopoly of the work. And if it is God's design that there shall be no monopoly of the work, it ought to be the church's determination that there shall be no narrowmindedness and no jealousy in carrying it on. Mr. Chairman, in anticipating this Meeting yesterday, and in my journey from Birmingham this morning, I could not help feeling that we were about to meet at a very awful-I use the word advisedly, and not rhetorically-at a very awful crisis in the history of the world. And if, as has been said with great truth, these May Meetings have assuredly improved in tone,-if there be less of levity, less of personal flattery and compliment, if there be more of deep, earnest feeling, more of solemn sense of the responsibility of the work to which we are putting our hands,-I trust that this may be the spirit in which all the |