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A MISSIONARY SPEECH.

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from this address as published in the Annual Report of the Missionary Society.

After introducing himself in his hard-pressed position as a gleaner, he said :

"And now, sir, looking round upon the field, I do not seem to see a standing stalk of truth. These brethren, with their bright blades or their keen sickles, have been gathering the harvest-they have even carried it to the mill. They have ground it out in their close, clear, vigorous thinking; they have manufactured it into nourishing and delightful food, and it has been dealt out among the people; you have been enjoying it in the morning and in the evening, and are now entirely satisfied. It seems to me that it only remains to return thanks and go home. Or, sir, if I may change the figure, I have thought during the evening, while occupying my seat, that we have been engaged during the day in the inspection of our great missionary ship, its keel, its timbers, its planking, its deck, its machinery—a most magnificent piece of machinery - its pilotage, and its larder. Our flags are flying, our officers are in their places, and all that we are needing, as it would seem, is the missionary spirit, which might be entitled the motive power."

After showing that liberal contributions of money might be made in the absence of the real power necessary to success, he continued:

"What is the missionary spirit? Is it an ordinary interest in, or a kind of general concern for, the heathen abroad and the heathen at home?-a cold and calculating love for those millions that have so long, too long, lingered in the shadow of sin and of death? Nay, sir, such a spirit as that would never convert the world-has never illustrated itself as the secret spring or motive power of self-sacrificing and successful endeavor in this world. There must be love, it is true, but then let us remember it must be love on fire; it must be love in a paroxysm; it must be love intensified, absorbing, all-controlling. Observe, if you please, the missionary quitting his home, kindred, native land, and accustomed comforts. He is willing to abide in the ends of the earth, encompassed by heart-sickening idolatrous superstition and crime. Wherefore? Is it because of a simple concern respecting the temporal, or even spiritual, welfare of those by whom he may be encompassed? Nay, I insist it is rather because of the Christ-given and Christ-like love that burns in his heart and literally consumes his life. Oh, sir! it is the missionary spirit that crosses broad seas, that clambers cloud

crowned mountains, that traverses far-distant regions, that sails around the world if it may save but a single soul.. It is the missionary spirit that breathes miasmas, that bears heavy burdens, that challenges adversaries, that imperils precious life, that laughs at impossibilities, and cries, ‘This must, and this shall be done.' It is the missionary spirit that gives and bears sacrifices, and dies, if it were necessary, and if it were possible, a hundred thousand deaths, if, like its divine Exemplar, it might be going about doing good. Now, as I have said, there may be liberality, but there can not be the missionary spirit where there is not a conscientious, Christ-like liberality.”

Inquiring, then, how this missionary spirit shall be excited and maintained, he replied-" First, by the careful contemplation of the spiritual necessities of the unregenerate around us." With a few brief touches he illustrated the power of the eye to report to and sensibly affect the heart, and proceeded further to discuss a more vital condition :

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Again, it might be asked, 'Are there not many of our own community who are familiar with temporal and spiritual wretchedness, who are acquainted with the necessities of the heathen world, who hear of this subject not only from year to year, but more frequently, and yet they have none of those exercises or experiences of missionary zeal?' That is true—that is undeniable; and so we are constrained to the conclusion that something more is indispensable than this simple consideration. What is that something? I answer that it is a union and a living sympathy with the blessed Lord Jesus Christ. And now, sir, at the close of these anniversary exercises, this thought brings me where I joy to come, and where I would like to lead this little company, that is, to Calvary. I throw the arms of my affection around the consecrated cross of Jesus; I drink in, in constantly increasing measure, his tender, sympathizing, self-sacrificing spirit. Now from this stand-point of the cross-from the measure of that feeling which influences the heart and life of the divine Redeemer-I look out again upon the world; but now with what different feelings! Now I hear with Christ's ears, I feel with Christ's heart, I see with His eyes; now I am ready to labor with Christ's energies; now I am disposed to give or go, or do or dare, or sacrifice or die—any thing and every thing—if I may but help in lifting our sin-cursed world up to God. This experience of which I am speaking is a vitalizing principle; it is a divine force. It is Jesus reigning, not (as my brother would say) simply in the skies; there is something better than that. We can have heaven on the way to heaven. It is Jesus reigning in per

THE MISSIONARY SPIRIT.

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sonal consciousness in the individual heart; it is Christ living, breathing, dwelling, and triumphing in personal life. Philosophy is contemplative and studious, fond and full of plans and of theories; infidelity, as we all know, is given to boasting and to detraction; both of them laying special stress upon the human rather than upon the divine.

"But, Mr. President and Christian friends, after all their proud vaunting, pray tell me what heathen shores have they ever visited for purposes of mercy? What funeral pyre have they ever extinguished? What dumb idol have they ever cast down from its pedestal? What nation have they ever lifted up from its barbarism and degradation? What profligate have they ever reclaimed? What sorrowful heart have they ever cheered? Where to-night are their earnest, self-sacrificing missionaries? Where are their organizations for the amelioration of human suffering and the extension of wholesome and blessed truth in the world? Where are their Pauls, their Barnabases, their Wesleys, Wilberforces, Thomas Cokes, Asburys, Howards, Phebes, Dorcases, Nightingales, and Elizabeth Frys? I ask it with confidence and with Christian exultation. In vain I wait for an answerthere cometh none. Sir, we must come to Christ; we must drink in His Spirit; for it is there, and there only, we will find the source and the fountain of this missionary spirit, which is so needful and so indispensable. The theory and practice of missions, as I take it, can be expressed almost in a single sentence. It is love to the blessed Lord Jesus Christ, who has bought us with his blood, drawing forth the stream of human sympathy, human affection, and human endeavor—a stream which, by an invariable law of nature and of God, seeks the lowest place-for, let me say to you, that Christian compassion, like Christ's compassion, always flows downward, and fixes upon those who need it the most. Was it not so with Paul? The love of Christ constrained him, and he counted not his life dear unto him so that he might but glorify his Saviour, propagate His Gospel, save immortal souls, and finish his course with joy.

"Mr. President, that great man had been to Calvary. *** As we heard remarked this morning, with him it was a master passion in death. I lingered in the dungeon, I looked over the shoulder of that great servant of Jesus Christ as he wrote his last epistle that he indicted to a faithful apostle, and I read with the speaker of this morning these words: 'I am ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day.' Here my brother stopped; but I read on a little farther, 'And not for me only.' There came out his mis

sionary spirit. That would have been too narrow, circumscribed, and selfish for that great heart. 'Not for me only.' Oh! Paul at that hour took in the hundreds of millions of the world's population-'Not for me only, but for all those that love His appearing.' ***

"Mr. President, I am not by any means despondent or discouraged; but, on the contrary, I am full of cheerful hope and of Christian confidence. I believe the clouds above will vanish. I believe the right is about to conquer. "Clear the way!

A brazen wrong is crumbling into clay.
With that right

Shall many more enter, smiling, at the door.
With that wrong

Shall follow many others, great and small,

That for ages long have held us as their prey.
Men of thought and men of action
Clear the way.'

I believe in the future. *** I believe in the government of the future, and in the Church of the future. I think there is a day not very far distant when from the watch-towers of Asia, once the land of lords many, there shall roll out the exultant chorus, 'One Lord!' when from the watch-towers of Europe, distracted by divisions in the faith, there shall roll up the grateful chorus, 'One faith!' when from the watch-towers of our own America, torn by controversies respecting the initiatory rite into the visible Church of our Lord Jesus, there shall roll forth the inspiring chorus, ‘One baptism!' when from the watch-towers of Africa, as though the God of all the race were not her God—as if the Father of the entire human family were not her Father-when from the watch-towers of neglected and despised Africa there shall roll forth the chorus, 'One God and Father of all!' when the sacramental host, scattered all over the face of this lower creation, shall spring upon their feet, and, seizing the harp of thanksgiving, they shall join in the chorus that shall be responded to by the angels, 'One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all ;' 'to whom be glory, dominion, and majesty and blessing forever!'

"Mr. President, these eyes of mine may not see that day of rapture; but if not, then I expect with the great cloud of witnesses to stand yonder upon the glory-illumined battlements of immortality, and looking down, I will surely enjoy the feast of vision. I may not be associated with those who shall send up from the earth the shout that 'Jesus reigns;' if not, it seems

NATIONAL CAMP-MEETING AT ROUND LAKE.

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to me I will crowd a little closer to the throne with all the glorified company, and I will join with them in singing that the kingdoms of yonder world have become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ. Oh, sir! at the close of this anniversary day, as the result of what I have seen and heard and enjoyed, I resolve to be a better man, and to be a more devoted friend to the missionary cause."

Ah! how little it was thought as the noble, healthful-looking orator took his seat amid shouts and tears, that these concluding references to himself were so painfully prophetic! Three brief years—and yonder he is on the battlements, crying to Christ's hosts still in the conflict, "Forward! and I will be looking down upon you."

By an act of the General Conference of 1868 the Philadelphia Conference had been divided. All that portion of its territory in Delaware, Maryland, and Virginia lying between the Delaware and Chesapeake bays, and known as the Peninsula, had been set off to itself, and denominated the Wilmington Conference. The new Conference held its first session in Wilmington. Mr. Cookman remained in the Conference, and was re-appointed to Grace Church for the second year. He thus found himself a leading member in a leading charge of a forming Conference, and, with a loyalty to Methodism exceeded by none, he addressed himself vigorously to the development and conservation of the elements of progress within its bounds.

The National Committee had appointed their annual campmeeting for July 6th, at Round Lake, near Saratoga, New York. The success of the two previous meetings at Vineland and Manheim, the eligibleness of the location at Round Lake, the increasing attention awakened in the subject of Christian holiness, drew together a vast concourse of people. Representatives were there from well-nigh all the states, the Canadas, and even from England.

"The cosmopolitan character of the meeting is a very marked feature of the occasion, and while the word 'National' is sometimes criticised as meaning too much, yet, in the sense that it is national, it does not express

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