apostolic fires on the smouldering altars of Christian homes enough to build a fleet of the Church! We have scarcely made a 50,000 vessels, ballast them with Bibles and beginning, and we talk as though the work crowd them with missionaries, build a church were almost done. Ten millions of dollars is in every destitute hamlet, and supply every all the entire Church of God can raise to pro- living soul with the Gospel within a score of secute the missions of the world; while one years! Only let God's fire come down and city spends far more than that on a city hall, take possession of our hearts and tongues, and and two others on a suspension bridge; and the Gospel would wing its way like the beams there is buried in jewellery, gold and silver of the morning, and illumine the world's plate, and useless ornamentation within darkness.-Missionary Herald. THE LATE BISHOP HARRIS ON NATIONAL PERILS. must take the place of division, and co- But the movement which has brought us For it is well seen that the peculiar civilisation which we are concerned to defend and preserve is gravely threatened. There are vast and hostile forces of evil that are being marshaled and organised against it. While those whose feelings and convictions we share are divided, scattered, and dispersed, there are magnificent combinations and organisations of those who contend against and oppose what we hold dear, and there are strongholds of vantage that are being garrisoned and manned in our very midst. It is felt, therefore, that the need of this hour is co-operation among all true lovers of our country and of its civilisation as we understand it; that it would be madness for those whom we represent to remain divided in this hour of danger. In other words, it is felt that if our civilisation is much longer to endure as we prize it. Then combination though large, has nevertheless a definite Along with these characteristics there have which up to this time, thank God, our people | peculiar outcome of our evangelical civilisahave defended an open Bible, the Christian tion, which is far more essential to good Sabbath, liberty of conscience, and the citizenship than is ordinarily supposed, and dignity of a sober, decent, and reasonable that is imperiled this day-far more gravely worship. imperiled than you and I, perhaps, have hitherto thought. I mean the free common schools of our country. I live in a State where that system is elaborated, manned, and equipped, and where it is contending daily and hourly, and hand to hand with the most tremendous problems of foreign immigration. As I go about, I see the work that it is doing. I see that it emancipates the children of aliens, and not only fits them for freedom, but it is making them free. I see the shackles of error and superstition fall from their minds. It is the greatest work that is being done for good in this land, my brethren, against ultramontanism to-day. Nevertheless, we Protestants, by our divisions, have almost betrayed it. By our divisions we have almost surrendered, as we have already discredited this precious power. With wily cunning, ultramontanism has taken advantage of the divisions of Protestantism in order to banish the Bible from our public schools. And now with savage inconsistency it redoubles its attack upon them because they are godless. The answer is, "No, no ; not godless yet, though you have attempted to make them so; not godless yet, so long as godly men and women are the teachers; not godless yet, so long as our children shall issue from Christian homes in the morning and return to Christian homes at night." But we Protestants by our divisions have left our common schools almost defenceless while ultramontanism is making organised assaults upon them. To our shame be it said that we have neglected, practically disowned, the offspring of our own civilisation, handing it over to the tender mercies of select men or supervisers, who are often but the tools or the dupes of ultramontanism or infidelity. But divine Providence does not guarantee the faithfulness nor ensure the safety of any other nation, no matter how honoured and favoured. Though this civilisation be of God, yet it must be kept and defended by man. The path of human history is strewn with the monuments of national dereliction and consequent decay. We have but to remember desolate Jerusalem, and ruined Antioch, and wasted Ephesus, and grassgrown Thyatira, to know that golden opportunities and royal privileges may be forfeited by whole peoples as well as by individual men, and that when the faithless nation is derelict, then its type begins to be depraved, its civilisation begins to decay, and the light sweeps back upon the sun-dial that marks its progress. It has been so in other ages and beneath other skies, and it will be so even here, unless we front and resist the dangers that threaten us. What, then, is the duty of this hour but co-operation? There is need for all Protestant lovers of their country to co-operate in Christian work. The words of the theme of this hour are none too strong. There is a necessity of co-operation. But it is necessary to bear in mind, and constantly to affirm, that the kind of co-operation which we are concerned to promote is not political. It should constantly be borne in mind that it will not do, Christian brethren, for us to be suspected of being here to serve or to contest any party claims or any party ends. The spheres of State and Church are distinct. Jesus long ago decreed it when he said: "My kingdom is not of this world." We all have our own serious and earnest political convictions, and each one of us is convinced, I trust, that his convictions are right. But, my brethren, we are here to consider something far more profound than any political issues, to consider how public opinion may be regenerated, how the public conscience may be requickened, how the national instinct may be revived, and how that ultimate power may be best invoked which shall save the precious liberties of body, mind, and soul for us and for our children. If I dared to content myself with taking merely a superficial view of this question, I might well pause here, to emphasise the necessity of co-operation in order to preserve those institutions which are at once the outcome of evangelical civilisation and its best defence. Pardon me if I do pause for a moment in order to mention a single one of these institutions which will best illustrate the force of my argument. It has passed into a proverb that the safety and perpetuity of republican institutions depend upon the virtue and intelligence of the people. Now, sir, there is one American institution, the Ah! Christian friends, unless we are blind and mad, this must not continue to be so; but the great Protestant Communions must co-operate to defend and preserve our common schools, well knowing that in spite of all our neglect, it is there, that ultramontanism is being confronted and withstood to-day. What we need, my Christian brethren, let us not conceal it or gloss it over, what this hour is calling for, as with the peal of a trumpet is religion co-operation; that kind of co-operation which shall best set forward the interests of evangelical Christianity in our land. When, fourteen years ago, the great Evangelical Alliance met in the city of New York, the divisions of Protestantism were apologised for and defended. It is true, that even then some brave words were uttered, pointing out the essential and ineradicable evils of such division; as when the brave and good Professor Taylor Lewis said: "Division is never to be treated as a good per se." I can never go with those who regard denominational | do not, therefore, seem to justify the reproach distinctions as things totally innocent, or that after all it is not for truth, but for mere indifferent, much less desirable. Let union opinion or taste, that we are contending with -ecclesiastical union-take place without one another? The only remedy for this is delay, between those bodies that are divided for us to co-operate in the defence of the by the least interval. Let the last parting eternal truth. That is the only answer and be the first to come together. Let it be the only remedy. Co-operation is necessary deeply impressed on every mind that the in order to fulfil the mind of Christ and to greatness of the sin of schism is in the convert the world. The honour of Jesus and inverse ratio of the smallness of the dividing the world's conversion are bound up in the interval. But, my brethren, the weight theme of this hour. He whose we are, and of the thinking and of the utterance at that whom we serve, has solemnly declared it to time were on the other side. The divisions be so. He has declared that the conversion of Protestant Christendom were not regarded of the world and His own honour depend as evil. Now, however, a new spirit is upon the oneness of those who believe abroad, and is growing in strength, thank Him. God! I have not time to discuss the causes of the change though those causes are most interesting and important. Suffice it to say, that a great awakening is taking place, I believe, in this land of ours. Everywhere is being felt with more and more distinctness, that division is at once the opprobrium and the weakness of Protestant Christianity. Ah! my heart was stirred; I felt that a new era had begun to dawn, that the old night of brotherly strife was almost past when my dear friend, the Secretary of this Alliance, sent me the invitation to come and speak here on this topic, and when he said, "the new work of the Evangelical Alliance is inspired by the conviction that the time has fully come when co-operation among denominations and local churches must take the place of competition." Yes, friends, the time has fully come when, if this American civilisation of ours, which we are set to defend and preserve, is much longer to endure, there must be co-opera tion. Co-operation is necessary in order to preserve the integrity of faith and perpetuate its power. The power of true Christianity depends largely on the maintenance of the proportion of faith on the assignment of its regal truths to the sovereign positions which they are entitled to occupy, and in the keeping of all secondary truths and mere opinions in strict subordination. But, Christian brethren, it is the tendency of division to break up that classification, to degrade those regal truths by lifting secondary truths and mere opinions to an equality with them, nay, to lift up those things above those regal truths, because you and I know that it is regarding secondary truths and mere matters of opinion that we Protestants have divided. Ah! we In the upper chamber at old Jerusalem, on the night of His Passion, and after His great Supper, He prayed in the midst of His disciples His memorable intercessory prayer. He said, "I pray for them. Sanctify them through thy Truth. Thy Word is truth. Neither pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe on me through their word, that they all may be one as Thou, Father, art in me and I in Thee, that they also may be one in us.' My Christian brethren, we dare not claim for ourselves, or for our constituencies, that we have hitherto been one in the meaning and the spirit of that prayer. We know that we have been miserably and selfishly divided, and therefore the work of evangelical Christianity languishes; the liberty of mind and soul and spirit, which Jesus gave to our fathers for our inheritance, is endangered. The poor are wandering about our land as disinherited; indeed, unblessed, uncared for, and unfed. The cry of desolate cities is going up to God. The Church, oh! she mourns for these her wandering children; for even the disinherited are yet children of our common Father. And so the light of our evangelical Christianity and civilisation is beginning to grow dim. The remedy is simple. I do not say it is easy, or easily applied, but I do say that there can be no manner of doubt as to what that remedy is. Brethren, it is cooperation, unity-such unity as shall abolish our divisions and extirpate our competitions, and settle our jealousies and strifes. It is for nothing less than for such co-operation that I have dared to plead this day in the presence of my Master, and before you, my brethren, as I have stood here to speak of the necessity of co-operation. OBITUARY. THE DOWAGER LADY KINNAIRD. THE call home to her eternal rest of the widow of the tenth Baron Arthur Fitzgerald Lord Kinnaird marks in the field of Christian activity an event very different in its significance from the removal of an ordinary benevolent and pious lady of rank. Gifted with qualities, some of which taken singly are rare, and all of which found in combination are very rare, her aggregate of character, of work, and of influence was notable. A Noel on her mother's side, neice to the late Earl of Gainsborough and to the Hon. and Rev. Baptist W. Noel, she always seemed to have much of the intellectual character of the latter eminent Christian labourer. In the Hon. Arthur Kinnaird, Providence gave to her a consort fully disposed to co-operate in the works to which her energy was unweariedly addressed. Hence her home became not only the focus of her own activity and that of her daughters, but also a centre for the counsels of many others, and a place of refreshment for their working strength. The intimate friendship of Mr. Kinnaird with Lord Shaftesbury closely linked them both in with the undertakings of that ever-memorable toiler in the blessed business of doing good. Also Mr. Kinnaird's close and practical connexion with the Foreign Aid Society, made them familiar with the leading men engaged in the evangelistic labours of the continent, and for many of these their drawing-room and its meetings formed one of the pleasant places of help and encouragement. Again, his early connexion with the diplomatic service gave to them a keen interest in questions of international moment; and his intimacy with Lord Palmerston gave special facilities for noting the turns of internal policy, as they bore upon questions of deeper than party concern. Thus anything threatening to the interests of religion or morality, or anything likely to be of real advantage to them was early noted, and action in opposition or in support, as the case might require, was promptly organised. As an instance of the manner in which their house, with the personal services of its Lord and Lady and the auxiliary force of the entire family staff, were turned to account for one and another branch of Christian activity, it may be mentioned that there regularly met the few friends whom Mrs. Ranyard called her council, and who entered as far as others could do, into her plans, cares, and blessed successes. There would Lord Shaftesbury give as close attention to the works and wants of the bible-women, as in one or other House of Parliament he would give to some historical Bill. There, in addition to Lady Kinnaird, attended by her hometrained group of gentle aides-de-camp, would the Countess of Gainsborough, her lovely kinswoman, the Hon. Miss Canning, and others, join with a few gentlemen in helping to bear Mrs. Ranyard's burdens-rare burdens of precious seed corn. In these groups not the least interesting figure was that of Mrs. Ranyard's father, Mr. J. Bazeley White. As an example of the way in which drawing-room of Lord and Lady Kinnaird was put to service in matters of international interest, may be mentioned the epoch of the American Civil War. Early after its outbreak, when public opinion was running high in favour of the Anti-Union party, a large meeting of influential men had opportunities of hearing both Americans and others explain points then little understood. At that meeting the chair was taken by the ninth Lord Kinnaird, whom afterwards his brother succeeded. Later, when the terrible crisis of the Trent affair brought it home to us that war in our neighbour's borders might easily turn into war in our own, a special meeting was given to receive Mr. Thurlow Weed and Bishop McIlwaine, who were at the moment here as a kind of informal envoys from Mr. Lincoln; a meeting eminently calculated to promote the sacred ends of peace and goodwill. In affairs more closely our own, when the Indian mutiny raged, the same well-known salon gave repeated opportunity of forming opinion and ventilating proposals for usefulness. If my memory does not fail me, the Indian Vernacular Education Society had there one of its earliest introductions to the public. Afterwards one of the familiar appearances there was the bronze figure of John Lawrence, whose first call on reaching London after the mutiny, if I do not err, was to that house; as one of his first Sundays in England was spent at East Farm, on the edge of Trent Park, near Barnet, where Mr. Kinnaird then had a lodge near by his friend Mr. R. C. L. Bevan. Among other notable Indian figures, who, in that drawing-room gave forth light and Christian influence, Herbert Edwardes and Dr. Duff may be specially mentioned. There one day you might meet, on a mission for the Evangelical Alliance, M. Necker, of Geneva, kinsman of Madame de Stael; and another day, an unknown youth from the same city, bearing the well-known name of Naville, which youth is now himself the celebrated explorer, among the ashes of buried ages in Egypt. The mention of Geneva and the Evangelical Alliance recalls Lady Kinnaird as particularly active at the great meeting there in 1861, especially in direct evangelistic movements. In her drawing-room, also, was held a noble meeting to aid in the erection of the Calvin Memorial Hall, the proposal to rear which sprang out of the International Conference of the Evangelical Alliance in 1861 already alluded to. Of the funds for that building no small portion was raised either in the salon or drawing-room had already done much to call under the auspices of Lady Kinnaird. attention to the matter, by a meeting at which the plans of Sir Arthur Cotton were explained by several competent speakers. those efforts Mr. Kinnaird took an active practical part both in and out of Parliament. To aid Christian efforts in Africa, to combat there the spread of intemperance, and to usefully assist in finding means of emigration were among some of the later public objects to which Lady Kinnaird's fruitful toil was directed. In public movements affecting the interests of the Kingdom of Christ, the personal influence of Lady Kinnaird was altogether exceptional. With rapid feminine intention she penetrated to the inner side of (any emergent question. Then, with masculine judgment she saw what was well to be done, and with solid strength of will impelled her measures forward. But not less remarkable were her executive skill in planning means, and her executive aptitude in carrying into Born on the soil of Surrey, she now lies execution the things planned, combined with in that of Perthshire. If we are not mistact in using others. She well knew who taken her earliest home was Broomgrove were they whose hands were of value, and (later called Broomwood), the house of which they whose thoughts were the best contribu- Wilberforce had been the previous occupant. tion they could bring. Among the number- Her long home is in the ancestral resting less Christian works which she promoted were place of the Kinnairds at Rossie Priory. It some which owed to herself their origin and is there that the frame which worked for so principal support. She was the founder of many and worked so much, lies at rest with the London Young Women's Christian Asso-him who was taken home before her. That ciation; also of the St. Johns Training interment has carried northward the heart of School in Westbourne Park, for girls intended for domestics-a school of which a ful and attached fellow-worker in the cause many a poor beneficiary, and of many a gratethousand girls have had the advantage. of Him who came to seek and to save that The name St. John's is a memorial of her which was lost. To those will be joined beloved and honoured uncle already named, many beyond our own seas, who had seen the Hon. and Rev. Baptist W. Noel, long and felt her influence. They will pray that the minister of St. John's Chapel. His they who "at home" are left to weep name is one among those of its founders receive comfort from the God of all which the Alliance will ever thankfully recall. Among her manifold exertions for the benefit of India, one was the large part taken by her in forming, supporting, and managing the Zenana Bible and Medical Mission. Among Lord Shaftesbury's collected speeches perhaps none is nobler or more statesmanlike than the one made in the Lords on irrigation works as an urgent need in India. The BOOKS From the RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY. The Threefold Course (Companions for a Beds. Scripture Natural History.-The Animals From Messrs HODDER & STOUGHTON. Heroes of the Mission Field. By the Right Christ and His People. By the Bishop of may consolation, and that the line of Kinniard may yet, by the grace of God, see even rarer examples, and bequeath even more fruitful memories of Christian character and Christian labour than has now been seen, and is now bequeathed to her children and her children's children by Mary Jane, Consort of the tenth Baron. RECEIVED. W. A. Turning Points and their Results in the Lives From Messrs JAMES NISBET & Co. Report of the Missionary Conference, London, 1888 (2 volumes). From Messrs CASSELL & Co. The True Glory of Woman. By the Rev. W. From Messrs HAMILTON ADAMS & Co. The Papacy (Evangelical Alliance first prize essay on Popery). By the Rev. J. A. WYLIE, LL.D. Special Edition 1888. From Messrs MORGAN & SCOTT. The Present Tenses of the Blessed Life. By the Rev. F. B. MEYER, M.A. |