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and other persons, there had been delivered under the immediate sanction of the committee about 500 lectures during the past year, to about 110,000 persons. Half a million of tracts have been distributed. The periodical press has been employed both in England and Wales. The sale of the "Herald of Peace" is increasing. Fairs and markets have been visited. Sumner's Oration and Bowring's Lecture on the commercial importance of peace have been circulated. Petitions for a legalized system of arbitration have been extensively adopted. And on the continent of Europe twenty lectures have been delivered, some of them to as many as 1500 persons; and many thousands of tracts distributed. The report referred also to the dockyards, and the approaching general election; as also to the decease of J. J. Gurney, Esq., T. Clarkson, Esq., and others. Including a balance of £556 at the commencement of the year, the income of the society has been £2,147 19s. 10d. There is a balance of somewhat more than £100 on hand,

RAGGED SCHOOL SOCIETY.

The annual meeting of this institution was held in Hanover Square Rooms on the 18th of May, Lord Ashley in the chair.

The Committee say in their report that "they have great reason for thankfulness in regard to the present year. Not only has the number of schools increased, and also the funds of the Union, but a growing interest has been going on in the public mind in regard to the Society, which bids fair to place it, ere long, in circumstances of far greater prosperity and usefulness. At present there are forty-four schools in all, with an average attendance of 4,776 children, and 450 teachers. Sixteen are open daily, morning and afternoon, and have a paid teacher to conduct them; thirty-one are open three to five evenings a-week, to give some instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic, with a paid teacher to superintend, and occasionally voluntary teachers to assist, while about thirty-three are open only on Sabbath, under voluntary teachers. This, it will be observed, makes in all eighty schools; but as they are conducted in only forty-four buildings, the Committee have considered them as forty-four schools.

"From this list it will appear, that, although much good is doubtless being done at a very small cost, yet, if all these schools could be kept open every day, or at least every evening, for two or three hours, a far greater amount of good would be effected, and many a poor child saved from ruin; the evil influences to which the children are daily subject being, in many cases, enough to destroy all the good they derive from so short an attend

ance at school. The Committee are very anxious to have all the schools open every evening, and would soon effect this object if the public would do their part, in supplying the necessary funds.

"The amount received for the general purposes of the Society is this year increased to £637 0s. 5d. This has enabled the Committe to assist twenty-two different schools, with grants toward rent of schoolrooms, a paid teacher, books, &c.; while the total expense of conducting the Society is still under £105.

"A new feature has been introduced into the Society since the last report, viz., the establishment of the Juvenile Refuge and School of Industry,' in Old Pie Street, Westminster. This has now been in operation for four months, and the result is very gratifying to your Committee. Fifty boys, of the very lowest and most degraded class, are there taught and fed every day-not only taught to read and write, but taught the rudiments of a trade, that may be useful to them all their after life, and perhaps lay the seeds of honest, self-supporting industry.

"The Committee having made a special appeal to the public on behalf of this school, are happy to observe, that they have received funds to keep it going for one year, after which, they trust the blessings attendant upon this interesting effort will be sufficiently apparent to enlist the sympathies and ensure the support of many more friends. Any one who witnessed the condition and conduct of the boys in that school, on their first being admitted, and observes their beha viour and appearance now-any one who reflects on those poor outcasts, day by day receiving moral and religious instruction, useful recreation, and wholesome food, who, but for this effort, would have been begging or thieving in the streets-must feel the heart warm and the eye glisten at such blessed results from Ragged Schools. And your committee are amply repaid for all their efforts, by observing the good thus accomplished, even in this one department of labour."

The committee conclude their report, by expressing "an earnest hope and prayer, that more hearty and zealous efforts will yet be made by all sects and all parties, to bless and cheer suffering humanity of every grade, however debased, vicious, and revolting the class may be."

The cash account was then read, from which it appeared that the receipts amounted to £824 68. 10d., and the expenses to £625 7s. 11d., leaving a balance of £172 188. 11d. The receipts for the special fund for the Westminster School of Refuge amounted to £857 38., of which £300 have been deposited for future contingencies. The balance in hand amounts to £201 13s. 7d.

TRIENNIAL CONFERENCE.

BRITISH ANTI-STATE CHURCH ASSOCIATION.

The time having arrived for the first Triennial Meeting required by the constitution of this Society, between five and six hundred delegates assembled in Crosby Hall, on Tuesday morning, May 4th. Dr. Thomas Price was appointed chairman for the first day, James Watts, Esq., of Manchester, for the second, and the Rev. J. H. Hinton, M.A., for the third.

An admirable report was presented from the executive committee, the following extracts from which will amply repay the perusal both of those among our readers who do and those who do not belong to the Association :

"Gentlemen, the British Anti-state-church Association has outlived the perils which surrounded it at its birth. It has put to silence detraction. It has greatly increased the num ber of its friends. To the hopes of its earliest supporters, upon which erewhile it rested for continued existence, there is now to be added its own character. Such as it is, it is no longer misunderstood. It has compelled respect, even where it has failed to secure attachment. Strong, considered in relation to the stupendous undertaking it seeks to accomplish, it is not-for it is yet in its childhood-but of that constitutional strength which develops itself in steady growth, it has its full share. It is now passing its first climacteric. Its future vigour, its power for usefulness, its moral influence, will be greatly affected by your deliberations. This conference will be the commencement of a new chapter in its history-will communicate to it, doubtless, a fresh impulse-will open up to it a wider career of exertion and of triumph.

"The course taken by the executive committee during the three years they have held office, has been further regulated, to no small extent, by their firm belief that the move ment over which they were called to preside should have for its main-spring a deep reli- "And surely, confidently as in days gone gious conviction. They are well aware that by dissenters may have entertained the belief the question of church establishments has an that in quiet was their strength, and cogent aspect of great political interest and import-as may have been the reasons by which they ance. They know that, ultimately, that justified their inaction, there can remain but question must be settled by political agency. few who, attentive to what is past and passing, They have never thought it inconsistent with still main the policy and duty of witnessing Christian profession, or unworthy of the object unheeded the rapid expansion of state-church they are labouring to advance, to employ all principles. It is coming to be felt that, i constitutional and legitimate political means. this as in other things, not to advance is to It was not, therefore, as a religious controversy retreat, not to labour is to lose. We cannot, that they were anxious to determine the if we would, remain in statû quo. Whilst we character of their proceedings. They deemed sleep, the enemy sows tares. Taking advan themselves justified in receiving honest sup- tage of our indifference, the state-church is port, from whatever quarter it might come. lengthening its cords, and strengthening its They never gave countenance to the idea that stakes. Active error can only be met and they would restrict themselves to purely reli- overcome by active truth. God gives no gious instrumentality. But they judged it to victory to the indolent, on which side soever be both becoming and wise, to see to it that they may range themselves. He is carrying the life-blood of their organization should be on his own cause by human instrumentalityconcern for the purity and triumph of divine nor have we any warrant of His for the truth-and whilst exercising a vigilant care, expectation that in this particular matter, the in conformity with the constitution of the zeal, the courage, the self-denial, the energy, association, to preserve their efforts free from the perseverance, and the prayer, requisite in all questions of controverted theology, they all other great moral enterprizes, may be have systematically striven to enlist in this safely and appropriately dispensed with. cause the voice of conscience, the strength of "Gentlemen, the executive committee inspiritual affections, and that all-daring, all-vite your solemn consideration_to_the_fact enduring principle of action—a single concern to be approved of God. They apprehended that the coming contest is one through which voluntaryism can be carried with safety only by the religious spirit. To it, consequently, their appeals have been prominently addressed. They have studiously sought to stimulate it. Their publications have been, for the most part, such as were adapted to win it over to this service. And they are thoroughly persuaded, that valuable as may be the help of mere politicians, whether in parliament or out of it, the great work before us must be achieved principally by men who are moved thereto by the fear of God."

that church pretensions are becoming every day more preposterous, church power every day more formidable, in the empire. Cabinetministers, senators, and even judges, designedly, or from the unconscious bias of prejudice, are giving a practical, institutional, and legal interpretation to the demands of state-ecclesiasticism. There would seem to be a determination amongst the ruling classes, to link all our secular interests, if so it may be, with clerical ascendency. The spirit of the establishment is gradually permeating and assimilating all the means of intercourse and impression between mind and mind. It is stealthily creeping into our private seminaries. It is

obtaining sway in our schools for the labouring poor. It claims legal exemption from the comments of a free press. It gives its tone to much of our literature. It exercises a powerful influence over our organs of political opinion. There is nothing too high for it, nothing too low. It overlooks the throne itself, and it stands a sentinel of exclusion at the door of our workhouses. It has not only revived assumptions which, a century back, were thought to be exploded, but it has resuscitated many of those terms of contempt which it was wont, in the days of Laud, to heap upon nonconformity. This intense activity, this universal presence, this untiring, unremitting persistency, worthy of a nobler cause, met by no correspondent effort on the part of dissenters, are strangely telling upon the public mind. It is vain to conceal from ourselves what the smallest observation will suffice to make evident, that, in England, the influence of the state-church has increased, is increasing, and must,' if we would save the civil and religious freedom of our country, 'be diminished.'

"But, gentlemen, this is not, by any means, the worst feature of the case. Could we but have had representatives from all the colonial possessions of Great Britain, we should have learnt that, actively as the system of establishments is being extended at home, it is pushed on with more oppressive vigour abroad. The multiplication of colonial bishops, sent out to their newly created sees at the public expense, and, in some instances supported, in part, from the consolidated fund, evinces the purpose of government to sow the seeds of that system in every spot of God's earth subject to British control. Scarcely a newspaper reaches us from any one of these distant possessions, these cradles of new-born empires, which does not present illustrations of the grasping and domineering character of the church of England as by law established. In one, it is fearfully augmenting burdens long complained of as too heavy. In another, in defiance of previous stipulation, it is obtruding upon reluctant settlers the support of every form of religious teaching. The evil which centuries back entwined itself with our civil institutions, and which the lapse of time has made it difficult to separate from them, is thus deliberately, and in our presence, transplanted to other climes, to develop itself in huge forms and to obstruct vital Christianity in every part of the globe.

"To these grave, and, in some aspects, melancholy facts, the executive committee have thought it fitting to point your notice, with a view of deepening your sense of obligation to bestir yourselves for the emancipation of divine truth, and promptly, heartily, unanimously, to throw your energies into an association, which aims by moral agency to counteract and finally abolish a system bearing so abundantly its noxious fruits. The

contest which has been begun cannot, must not, be given over. The vows to which we are pledged must, at all hazards, be redeemed. We have put our hand to the plough, and, for us, there must be no looking back. The enterprize before us, gentlemen, is unquestionably an arduous one, but the encourage. ments which cheer us on the prosecution of it are neither few nor small.

"There are indications of no common significance, which give high probability to the prevailing opinion, that it is the manifest design of Providence, in this our own age, to bring the question of state-establishments of religion to an ultimate issue. The very fact that such an opinion should have so widely obtained is ominous. The coming event casts its shadow before.' It would seem as if, to every eye, the vague and undefined outline of this great change loomed through the haze. It is assuming the character of a national presentiment. It is as though society had been visited by the spirit of prophecy, and compelled to take up its parable against state-churchism in all its forms. But this is not all. Public attention was never so completely disengaged from other matters of immediate and distracting interest. The mountains are all levelled, the valleys all filled up, to prepare a highway for the onward march of this question. No coyness, no unfaithfulness of ours, no mutual understandings, no party compromises, can retard the discussion of it. It comes up in forms never yet dreamt of. We are driven across it by the most unsuspected causes, and at the most unexpected moments. Statesmen, the more eagerly they fly from it, the more certain they appear to be of meeting it. By the force of some law, potential as the law of gravitation, it is uppermost in the affairs of the three kingdoms, England, Scotland, and Ireland.

"Nor should it be lost sight of that the principle of civil establishments of religion is just now in process of transition from a higher to a lower basis. Political exigencies have constrained the powers that be' to resign, in profession, if not in act, the guard. ianship of divine truth considered as such. They are no longer, in their own view, God's magistrates enforcing outward respect to God's revealed will. Their authority is not now from heaven, neither is it exercised with an avowed reference to heaven. The connexion between church and state is in the present day maintained by all political parties, merely as a device for preserving public order. The religious sentiment, quite irrespectively of the doctrinal truth to which it may attach itself, is deemed to be the best and surest instrument by which to hold permanent sway over an intelligent people. To get the mastery of this, by subsidizing religious teachers, no matter of what sect, is the obvious drift of modern statesmanship. And this shifting of

the foundation upon which the establishment | system has heretofore been made to rest, is immensely in our favour. It tears away the principle from all the nobler and more spiritual associations which give it an interest in the affections of devout but mistaken men. It unsettles, on one side at least, the corner stone of faith. It takes the whole controversy out of the realms of conscience. It degrades into a mere political expedient, what myriads have done homage to as a divine law. It renders all the old arguments, and all the more sacred ones, inapplicable-blights the tenderest sympathies which the subject had attracted—and leaves conscientious adherents in a maze of astonishment paralyzing to their best energies. This, then, is our opportunity. The voice of Providence incites us to seize it. It is like the wavering of a host-it invites a prompt and courageous charge. The field is our own if we be true to our own advantages. The controversy is in that shape, that earnest truth may surely and soon decide it.

"The executive committee refer you not merely to the obvious tendencies of the times, but to accomplished facts, and to the state of feeling which those facts are exciting. The act for permanently endowing Maynooth college, the first serious legislative attempt to reconcile the establishment principle with the claims of justice, demonstrated how impossible it is for the state to be impartial in providing religious instruction for the people, without exalting antagonist ecclesiastical systems to the same position of respect, and breaking down, so far as its proceedings are concerned, all distinction between them. Within the boundaries of the established church, that act, carried in spite of earnest and very general opposition, first awakened the suspicion that the object of statesmen in giving public support to religious teaching is essentially a political one, and that they are more anxious to convert Christianity into an instrument of civil government than to in crease its efficiency as a purifying and regenerating moral power. It placed the advocates of state endowments of religion in a most perplexing dilemma. They were compelled either to protest against extending to others the favours which they claimed for themselves, thus laying themselves bare to the charge of unfairness, or to sanction, expressly or tacitly, the national maintenance of what they deemed erroneous. It was not to be anticipated that they would see, at a glance, wherein lay the real weakness of their position. But it cannot be doubted that vast numbers of them were troubled with unpleasant misgivings, and, in their sincere anxiety to save the country from what they held to be a sin and a curse, that they sometimes turned their eyes to an alternative which, practically, would have brought them alongside of the British Anti-state-church Association.

"The uneasiness thus awakened in the

minds of the extensive class of persons just alluded to, both in the church and out of it, might have been lulled by the lapse of time, but for the appearance of the Minutes of the Committee of Council on Education. Stateendowments for the teaching of all creeds, however, entered so largely into the principle of that measure, that it could hardly fail to indicate, even to such as might court deception, the ultimate point to which legislation is drifting. Temporary inducements may have availed to secure a resolute closing of their eyes to danger; but the inducements having been withdrawn, the danger will not have passed away. Men who have assented to a principle, with this or that reservation only, will discover, when the reservations come to be dealt with singly and apart, that their moral influence is gone. That which they have let in simply because something else was kept out, leaves open the door for the very thing they dread. Within a few months hence, the religious education of British youth will be aided by the state, without reference to the doctrines taught. A juvenile establishment, comprehending all sects, will embody the very form of the statechurch principle which, as a floating notion, has long attracted the attention and elicited the good wishes of every political party. It would be unreasonable, perhaps uncharitable, to believe that, when this feature of the government scheme stands forth in its full practical development, that it will increase the leanings of religious sentiment to a statealliance with Christianity. What next?' will be the inquiry circulating from mouth to mouth, when once the dreams of theory, or the calculations of worldly wisdom, have been disposed of by unmistakeable realities; and to this question of alarm, born out of due time,' an answer far from soothing will, in all likelihood, be early furnished.

"For, gentlemen, the next form in which the state-church principle will come before the country for discussion, and that, probably, at no long interval after the assembling of a new parliament, will be a proposition to connect together by pecuniary tie, the British government and the Roman catholic clergy of Ireland. All leading statesmen have de clared themselves in favour of this policy, and wait but the fitting opportunity to carry it into effect. They profess to be anxiously watching the ripening of public opinion-and of that public opinion they will take the legislature itself to be the surest exponent. Backed by a majority of the House of Commons, and encouraged by the distance intervening between themselves and the day of their account, they will do as they have done before, treat popular opposition as a transient clamour, and resolutely refuse to be parties to a religious dispute. It matters comparatively little whether they succeed or fail. The mooting of the question will subject

the principle of church establishments to the | it, is that which it is most desirable should be severest test, and will put a pressure and a known universally :-Resolved, strain upon the sympathies of myriads who have embraced it, which they will not be strong enough to bear. Amid that violent conflict of opinions which the introduction of this question will inevitably excite, the principle of the British Anti-state-church Association will commend itself to multitudes who now reject it. The seeds of truth which we are scattering will quicken and germinate. Then, it may be anticipated, all our labours will tell. The witness we bear will be clear, consistent, emphatic-not open to the charge of partiality-not exposed to be taunted with selfishness. Common sense and Christian feeling will be alike competent to understand and appreciate our argument. The issue, who can venture to predict? Or who can foretell how soon the union of church and state, upheld no longer by deep-rooted religious conviction, shall be reft asunder?

"It is quite possible, gentlemen, that the state of things to which we are looking forward, and the ferment and heat of public controversy, may disclose tendencies now latent in the English establishment, and bring out sympathies, which will convert some of its stoutest advocates into suppliants for its abolition. Be this as it may, it is certain that the voluntary principle will be viewed as a far less perilous alternative than the indiscriminate support of all religious creeds. Happily, as a practical thing, it has lost many of its terrors. The rapid growth, the wonderful energy, and the unexampled success of the Free Church of Scotland, prove how confidingly earnest religion may commit itself to the affection and resources of its own friends. That church has borne a silent but noble testimony to the native power of God's truth to maintain and extend itself. And although the leaders of that great ecclesiastical movement should persist to the end in casting contempt upon the source of its strength, and with parricidal unthankfulness should curse the principle whence it draws its vitality, the deeds of the Free Church will be more potent to convince, than the words of its spokesmen will be to prevent conviction. The youth now rising to manhood, tempted by no previous utterances on the other side of the question, and needing not to keep up a semblance of consistency, will not consent to disavow what a stern necessity first made them familiar with. Sooner or later they will be found in our ranks, calling upon the civil magistrate to cease his meddling and corrupting intervention in the affairs of religion."

The treasurer's report showed that the receipts had been £1,429 78.; the expenditure £1,368 6s. 8d.; and that there was a balance in hand of £61 0s. 4d.

Among many resolutions passed, the following, which was agreed to after much discussion, one hand only being held up against

"That this Conference, discerning no such difference of principles or practice between the leading political parties of the House of Commons, as to render the support of either of them important to of them, during the present Parliament, a readiness the welfare of the nation-having observed in both to combine their efforts with a view to subsidize the teachers of religion, and thereby bring them under direct government control-believing that they ento which they adopt it, the highest temporal and danger by such policy, in proportion to the extent spiritual interests of the people-and assured, by long experience, that they attach little importance not followed up by correspondent firmness at the to any opposition to their avowed designs which is poll-booth; solemnly commend to Dissenting electors throughout the three kingdoms the duty of employing the franchise entrusted to them by Divine Providence, in vindication of those ecclesiastical principles which constitute the sole basis of religious freedom and equality, and of resolutely general election, in which an opportunity is not standing aloof from all contests at the approaching afforded them to record their testimony, by vote,

against any form of alliance between the Church and the State."

NEW CHAPEL.

STUDLEY, WARWICKSHIRE.

On May 12th, a neat commodious baptist chapel was opened in this village. Sermons were preached in the morning and evening by J. Mortlock Daniell of Birmingham, in the afternoon by A. G. O'Neill of Birmingham. Messrs. Morgan of Birmingham, Davis of Bromsgrove, Crumpton of Atchlench, Philpin, of Alcester, Bottomly, of Henly-inarden, and Francis of Westmancote, took part in the services.

The land on which the chapel stands was given by Thomas Boulton, Esq., a gentleman residing in the village, a member of the established church. It has been erected at a cost of about £370, about £125 has been collected, leaving a debt of about £245, which will press heavily on the interest, especially as a great portion of the amount must be paid immediately. It is hoped therefore, that the friends of truth will bear this case in mind among others that share their liberality.

Studley is a populous village, a principal seat of the needle manufactory. The church is united with Cookhill, a village about five miles from Studley; it is an infant cause, the church having been formed so lately as 1841, and is still dependent on the Worcestershire Auxiliary Home Missionary Society.

ORDINATIONS.

DERBY.

Mr. Thomas Pulsford, who for some years past has been labouring as an evangelist under the auspices of the Baptist Home Missionary Society, has accepted the cordial invitation of the church meeting at Duffield

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