house, carefully guarding against controversial ones, and selecting those best calculated to lead the ginner directly to the Saviour. I believe our spiritual power will be best promoted by abstaining from controversy, and enforcing earnestly and prayerfully the old, unfailing truths of "repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ."

I have generally given a week to each neighbourhood, holding meetings every night, and trying to secure as many services for young people as possible. This week I have held thirteen; and though the weather has been bitterly cold, and the snow almost constantly falling, the attendance and interest in every meeting have awakened gratitude to God. I believe in all cases there has been direct spiritual good.

In September I took a Sabbath in connection with the opening of the new chapel and Soldiers' Home in the North Camp. We also held an openair service, and gave an hour to visiting the houses and huts in the neighbourhood. The evening service was very blessed. Souls were seeking and finding the Saviour, and the good work has continued. About forty have since obtained mercy, and joined the Society; and the increasing attendance and interest have made the building already too small for the numbers seeking to attend. In an after visit to the South Camp, at the Monday night service, three soldiers were led to the happy realisation of God's pardoning love. During my stay in Yorktown we visited the huts of the Royal Engineers. We invited one whom we met in the streets to our service. There he was awakened to a sense of his guilt, and soon bore blessed witness to his acceptance with God.

To sum up the results from every place visited: I have the most cheering testimony to the good effected. Souls were saved, backsliders restored, sinners penitently seeking the Saviour,

small Societies quickened, and religious impressions made upon many neighbourhoods. I am fully persuaded that Surrey, Hampshire, and Sussex, in the most spiritually destitute districts, need only suitable agencies and patient, prayerful, and continually plodding work, to repay very blessedly any expenditure that may be bestowed upon them.

II. FROM HOME MISSIONARIES EMPLOYED IN CIRCUITS.

1. MIDDLESBOROUGH CIRCUIT.-From the Rev. Charles J. Back.-November 19th, 1875.-We have good cause to thank God and take courage from the measure of success with which we have been favoured. At the September Quarterly Meeting the superintendent reported the number of members in Society at the West End to be one hundred and forty-three, being an increase on the quarter of twenty-two; and these are chiefly new members. We have a flourishing Sunday-school, with an earnest band of teachers, and nearly two hundred children on the books in fact, the accommodation provided by our school-premises has become quite inadequate. At the request of the teachers I have just commenced a Bible-class, to meet on Monday evenings. We have good congregations, and they are steadily increasing.

September, I have made two hundred and sixty visits in this place; generally taking with me tracts, which also contain invitations to our services. Sometimes my only opportunity is to speak a word at the door; sometimes I am asked in, and generally treated with respect. Now and then I have found cases of affliction, which would otherwise have been unknown to me. Our own people are glad to have pastoral oversight, and others welcome me with pleasure to their houses. The result of these calls I leave with God, and I do not think they will be in vain.

We have held some successful cottage-services, conducted in an informal way. We have also had a fortnight of special services. The Lord was with us, and some of the meetings were very precious. The cause in this place, though low, is, I believe, hope

ful; and we trust soon to win many souls for Christ.

Milverton is a village of a thousand inhabitants, and is about three miles east of Wiveliscombe. Here I have made a hundred and ninety-one calls. One day I visited a poor woman who was very ill. She was seriously inclined, and the Lord not only enabled me to speak to her, but blessed my visit to her soul. She has since been restored to health, and commenced meeting in class.

Occasionally I preach at Taunton and Wellington. One evening I conducted a special service for the young at Taunton. There has been a very good work going on in the Sundayschool and that night teachers and scholars were speaking to penitents, some of whom found peace. Unto God be all the glory!

WEEK OF UNITED AND UNIVERSAL PRAYER, JANUARY 2-9, 1876.—In accordance with the circular invitation issued throughout the world, the usual meetings in London at the West-end, Willis's Rooms, King Street, St. James', and in the City, at the London Tavern, Bishopsgate Street, will be held daily during the week commencing Monday, January 3rd. The meetings at the West-end at eleven o'clock, and in the City at one o'clock, daily. Short addresses will be delivered at each meeting. Ministers of the Gospel and Christians generally are cordially invited to be present, and to make these meetings known to congregations and friends.

EVANGELICAL ALLIANCE CONFERENCE AT BELFAST.

[THE following extracts are taken from an extended and interesting ac

count of the proceedings of the above Conference which appears in last month's "Evangelical Christendom."]

OLD CATHOLIC CONFERENCE AT BONN ·

The Chairman (the Right Hon. William Brook) said, when their worthy Secretary called upon him to fill the place which he then occupied, he added an injunction that he (the Chairman) should say something to them of the Conference that lately took place at Bonn between the Old

Catholics and the members of other Churches.......In the month of August he went with his friend Lord Plunket to the Conference at Bonn. They went simply as visitors, and by no means to take any part in the proceedings. They considered the invitation given by Dr. Döllinger to all Europe included them, and so they went; and there he learned much which seemed to him of considerable importance, and which he would gladly communicate to them.....The interesting part was to see above one hundred members of various Churches which had been ranged in the most hostile attitude against each other for more than one thousand years-to see them on a friendly footing, was, indeed, interesting. When they looked back and considered the anathemas that had been hurled from one side to another, and compared it now with the acknowledged domination of Chris. tian love, he thought they might augur most happily for the future, more especially so when he told them that the action of the Old Catholics was a progressive one, and from which they might expect much.

He had often heard it said that Dr. Döllinger and his followers in no way differed from the Church of Rome, except on the question of infallibility. There could not be any greater mistake. He had in his hand two authorities for this statement: one was the report of the proceedings of the Conference at Bonn in the year 1874, translated from the German into English, and published this year, with a preface by Canon Liddon; the other was a report of the proceedings of this year, which appeared in the “Guardian” of the 25th of August. This report was furnished by a correspondent, a much-esteemed English clergyman, who supplied an accurate account of the proceedings. These were the authorities he now relied on, and let them see the solid gains which these interesting men have -obtained.

They knew that the Council of Trent had declared that the Apocrypha was an equal authority with the Holy Scriptures. The Old Catholics had given that up, and it had been declared that the Apocrypha was not of equal authority. Secondly, the Council of Trent had declared that the translation of St. Jerome or the Vulgate was the only true one. That had been ostensibly repudiated, and it had been declared that there could be no translation superior to the Hebrew. Thirdly, the Council of Trent forbade the reading of the Scriptures to the laity unless they had episcopal authority; but the Old Catholics considered that the reading of the Scriptures could not be denied to any human being. They had also decided that conducting the service in the tongue of the people was the proper manner to conduct public worship, and they were endeavouring to form a liturgy for that purpose.

Next, they dealt with the question of justification by faith. Many of them were aware-especially those who had studied the works of Bishop O'Brien-that the Roman Catholics consider faith to be a mere assent to historical facts; but the thesis of the Old Catholics puts it in this wayfaith working by love, and not faith without love. The Roman Catholic dogma would be, faith without love; but the expression used by the Old Catholics seemed to him to bring the word into the Protestant view of it, and that was surely progress. The Council of Trent had declared that there was a certain merit of condignity in unconverted men which entitled them to salvation. The Old Catholics had denied that a man could by any merit whatever be saved, but through Christ.

They repudiate in the severest manner indulgences. They hold that there were no indulgences except in Church censure; but, as to applying indulgences to those who had passed to the throne of God, they utterly

repudiate that. As to the giving of the cup to the laity, they admit that it is a better practice, and they were endeavouring to arrange matters so as to introduce it into their regular worship. The two sacraments which they (Protestants) called sacraments were recognised by them as primary. As regards the other five of the Church of Rome, they were secondary. They distinctly recognise the supremacy of the two sacraments.

From these things, he held they were in a better position now. In the year 1874, a thesis was introduced about purgatory, and it was determined to abandon it for one year, as they had not agreed to the manner of bringing it forward. They brought it forward this year. It was then admitted that the ancient Church knew nothing of purgatory, and that it was introduced first into the West in the reign of Gregory I., in the year C00. The doctrine of Papal indulgences grew and spread until this year 1875, when they had a grand jubilee of indulgences, in which the Pope might perhaps clear out purgatory. The Old Catholics declared that they repudiated the whole system of Papal indulgences, and they believed what the old Church taught about the middle state, but they did not attempt to define that state. He thought that these were circumstances of great progress.

Another very satisfactory thing, to his mind, was the expressions used by Dr. Döllinger in his speeches in 1874 and 1875. He refers to the cruelty, frauds, and forgeries by which the Church of Rome obtained its bad pre-eminence. The speaker then read extracts from the reported proceedings at the Conferences in 1874 and 1875, showing the light in which Dr. Döllinger held the Church of Rome. He thought that all this was a very hopeful state of mind in a man who once held a foremost place in the Church of Rome-a man whose books were taken as text-books-a man who was respected by the Roman Catholies

throughout the West; the fact of that man now speaking of the cruelties and forgeries of the Church of his youth, he thought, was a very hopeful sign. He could not but express his admira. tion that, through the grace of God, he had got so far. He commended him to their prayers, that he may go, leading many others with him, a good deal further still.....

RELIGIOUS REVIVALS.

THE Rev. Mr. Park said the com-mittee had requested him to say a word or two with regard to the gracious revival with which they had been visited in the north of Ireland. The first sign of it they had was the spirit of union and brotherly love amongst all denominations. There had been a great deal of this union in Belfast.... The second sign of the presence of the Lord in the midst of them was the universal desire to hear the Word of God. It was always a good sign when people gathered to listen to the truth. It would not surprise those acquainted with such movements as the present, to hear how, in Belfast last winter, at some of the boardingschools the young people asked permission to meet in one of the rooms and read God's Word and pray together; how in some of their foundries and ship-building yards the men took their dinner as rapidly as possible in order to devote a portion of the hour to the reading of God's Word and the singing of Gospel hymns. As he had been informed by one who was in a position to know, in many a working man's blue jacket the New Testament has won the place previously occupied by the pack of cards.

The meetings which had been held were crowded by men and women, many of whom were never in the habit of attending any place of worship. This same desire to hear the Gospel still continued, and wherever evangelistic services were announced throughout the town there were crowds to listen. By the agency of old men as well as young men there was scarcely

a lane or alley in the town in which a cottage-meeting was not held, so that the poor might have an opportunity of hearing the truth. The third sign of God's presence in their midst was the earnest inquiry after the way of salvation on the part of hundreds and thousands....... It was not for them yet to speak of the amount of fruit; time was the best proof of that. This revival movement had indeed given a new energy and power to the Church of Christ in this town.

SPAIN.

MR. J. C. Faithful (from Madrid) next spoke of the work of the Gospel going on in Spain, and said that country, notwithstanding its degradation-political, moral, and religious, was not the Spain of a few centuries past. In no year till this had their Christian prayer-meetings been so blessed, so numerous, and so marked with fervour and zeal. In Galicia, and Corunna, and Madrid, and the surrounding districts, the work of evangelisation was steadily going on. Above all works in Spain they needed medical missionary works. The great unity existing between the priest and the doctor had brought things to light that he could not tell them of. A Christian sister, a member of one of the Evangelical churches of Madrid, was forced to go to the general hospital, or, as it was there called, the general dead-house. There he visited her for several weeks, during a prolonged illness; but at the last moment of her life she was compelled to receive the wafer, in order that she might be registered in the hospital books as having died a Romanist, so that the Protestant Church could not claim her body. It would be thrown into the dead hole, except they paid a small sum for responses to be uttered by the priests for her soul. He entreated Christians in England to lay this matter to heart, and if there were any medical men present he would beseech them to ask God, "Wouldst

Thou have me to go to Spain?" There were now many openings for such men in Spain. He had had the sympathy of Christian people in every place he had visited, by prayer and kindly feeling practically expressed, in the proposed work of commencing not only a medical mission, but an hospital in Madrid, and he confidently looked to God to supply every need to that work.

CHRISTIAN UNION.

THE Rev. R. D. Wilson (London) felt he would be unfaithful to his own convictions if he went away without uttering what had arisen in his own mind since he came to Belfast. Since they commenced on Tuesday night, they had wonderfully warmed to their work, and their deepest convictions had found larger articulation as they had proceeded. He had been thinking, as he listened to the speeches that had been delivered, that if there had been no such society as the Evangelical Alliance at the present moment, it would somehow have been called into existence to meet a very urgent want amongst the Evangelical Churches all over Europe. Was it not apparent to them that what they should now do was to close their ranks and present an unbroken front to all that menaces the weal of the Redeemer in all lands? Lately they had amongst them in Belfast a meeting of a very different character, at which they had the utterances of what might be called unscientific science. However, they might all rest satisfied that if ever the necessity arose, the story of the old covenant and the sturdy heroism of the Puritan fathers would be repeated over again. But it was better to be drawn together by the sweet constraint of a common Christian love than compelled to unity by the pressure of a strong necessity. If it was the offspring of Christian love, it would endure; but if it was simply brought about by the pressure of a great external necessity, as soon as that necessity was