for which they are distinguished. Be men, and incur not the humiliatin imputation, that you despise the churc upon which you are dependent. We are not so well versed in morals as we ought to be. But if it were lawful to hold office in a religious community, whose institutions we failed to support or laboured to undermine, then it would be equally lawful to hold office in a mercantile establishment, and yet neglect or undermine its interests. We have yet to learn that ecclesiastical morality and honour are of less value than commercial. We shall be glad when the strength of the Presbyterian Church is increased, and when the development of College ideas which such increase necessarily involves, takes place. We shall be glad to find four or even six endowed

chairs. But, meantime, we shall not

permit that which we already possess to be spoken against. This we do, not only for the cause of the principles of equity and honour, not only for the prayers of the Christian people, and the support and success of the College itself, §: for the sake of that development which yet awaits both Church and College—that success which will and must come, provided we fully employ what is already within our reach. Let us do our work quietly but perseveringly. , Let our aim be to §. in souls to the fold of the Good

hepherd; and let us seek by prayer, that He would give us shepherds after His own heart, men who will feed the flocks and be the instruments of adding

multitudes to their number. Away with that contemning spirit, as you would the blast and the mildew of

heaven.

THE Synod met on Monday, April 20th, in John Knox Church, Newcastle-on-Tyne, and was constituted in the usual form. The Rev. George Lewis, of Dudley, the retiring Moderator, preached an appropriate sermon from 2nd Timothy, i. 13. The Rev. W. M. Thomson, of Woolwich, was elected Moderator for the ensuing year. On taking the chair, Mr. Thomson delivered a most appropriate and impressive address, which we are sure will be read with interest and profit:Fathers and Brethren, Allow me to return you my most grateful thanks for the honour you have conferred upon me in calling me to occupy this chair. I am deeply sensible of my own insufficiency rightly to discharge the duties which belong to it, But I venture to anticipate the exercise of your forbearance in the midst of all my shortcomings; and above all, I would remember the assurance which our blessed Lord and Master hath given us that His grace is sufficient for us, and that His strength is made perfect in weakness. Encouraged by a full confidence in these things, your kindness, and the all-sufficiency of Him who never calls his servants to any duty without furnishing the grace that is needful to enable them to discharge it, I would take my seat in this chair and enter upon the duties of the office which I have not sought, but to which you have of your kindness been pleased to call me, I do not wish to detain you from the important

business which is to come before the Synod,

and which must be transacted within the very brief period that is at our command, by any lengthened address of mine; and yet, perhaps, it may not be unsuitable, and is in accordance with the example of my predecessors in this chair, if I venture to say a few things in your hearing as expres: sive of my own mind in regard to the spirit which it becomes us to cherish in conducting the public business of a Church of Christ. Fathers and brethren, it is our happy privilege to be put in trust with the affairs of a branch of the Church of Christ, which I may venture to say, without vain boasting, is in its constitution thoroughly scriptural, and in its teaching flobly evangelical. We believe that our Presbyterian form of government is founded upon the word of God, and agreeable thereto; and that the teaching of our Church, as embodied in her subordinate standards, is in full nocordance with the inspired record. We hold fast by the great truth that all Seripture is given by inspiration of God—that the whole Bible is the word of God, and not merely, as some venture to say, that the word of God is to be found in the Bible. We believe that the province of reason is not to sit in judgment on the teachings which are found in that word, but simply to ascertain what is written there, that we may reverently receive and firmly hold fast the whole truth which the Lord hath been Fo to reveal; and in these days, in which in the midst of th large amount of living Christianity which

for which they are distinguished. Be men, and incur not the humiliatin imputation, that you despise he churc upon which you are dependent. We are not so well versed in morals as we ought to be. But if it were lawful to hold office in a religious community, whose institutions we failed to support or laboured to undermine, then it would be equally lawful to hold office in a mercantile establishment, and yet neglect or undermine its interests. We have yet to learn that ecclesiastical morality and honour are of less value than commercial. We shall be glad when the strength of the Presbyterian Church is increased, and when the development of College ideas which such increase necessarily involves, takes place. We shall be glad to find four or even six endowed

chairs. But, meantime, we shall not

permit that which we already possess

to be spoken against. This we do, not only for the cause of the principles of equity and honour, not only for the prayers of the Christian people, and the support and success of the College itself, but for the sake of that development which yet awaits both Church and College—that success which will and must come, provided we fully employ what is already within our reach. Let us do our work quietly but perseveringly. , Let our aim be to ather in souls to the fold of the Good š. and let us seek by prayer, that He would give us shepherds after His own heart, men who will feed the flocks and be the instruments of adding multitudes to their number. Away with that contemning spirit, as you would the blast and the mildew of heaven. A. B.

THE Synod met on Monday, April 20th, in John Knox Church, Newcastle-on-Tyne, and was constituted in the usual form. The Rev. George Lewis, of Dudley, the retiring Moderator, preached an appropriate sermon from 2nd Timothy, i. 13. The Rev. W. M. Thomson, of Woolwich, was elected Moderator for the ensuing year. On taking the chair, Mr. Thomson delivered a most appropriate and impressive address, which we are sure will be read with interest and profit:— Fathers and Brethren, Allow me to return you my most grateful thanks for the honour you have conferred upon me in calling me to occupy this chair. I am deeply sensible of my own insufficiency rightly to discharge the duties which belong to it, But I venture to anticipate the exercise of your forbearance in the midst of all my shortcomings; and above all, I would remember the assurance which our blessed Lord and Master hath given us that His grace is sufficient for us, and that His strength is made perfect in weakness. Encouraged by a full confidence in these things, your kindness, and the all-sufficieney of Him who never calls his servants to any duty without furnishing the grace that is needful to enable them to discharge it, I would take my seat in this chair and enter upon the duties of the office which I have not sought, but to which you have of your kindness been pleased to call me. I do not wish to detain you from the important

business which is to come before the Synod,

and which must be transacted within the very brief period that is at our command, by any lengthened address of mine; and yet, perhaps, it may not be unsuitable, and is in accordance with the example of my predecessors in this chair, if I venture to say a few things in your hearing as expressive of my own mind in regard to the spirit which it becomes us to cherish in conducting the public business of a Church of Christ. Fathers and brethren, it is our happy privilege to be put in trust with the affairs of a branch of the Church of Christ, which I may venture to say, without vain boasting, is in its constitution thoroughly scriptural, and in its teaching nobly evangelical. We believe that our Presbyterian form of government is founded upon the word of God, and agreeable thereto; and that the teaching of our Church, as embodied in her subordinate standards, is in full accordance with the inspired record. We hold fast by the great truth that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God—that the whole Bible is the word of God, and not merely, as some venture to say, that the word of God is to be found in the Bible. We believe that the province of reason is not to sit in judgment on the teachings which are found in that word, but simply to ascertain what is written there, that we may reverently receive and firmly hold fast the whole truth which the Lord hath been pleased to reveal; and in these days, in .. in the midst of th large amount of living Christianity which

143

is to be found in our land, there is so much of departure from the simplicity of Christ, in the direction, on the one hand, of adding to the word of God, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men; and on the other, of taking away from the very foundations on which the hope of a sinner can alone securely rest; we are called to bless God that the trumpet of our church gives no uncertain sound—that the grand doctrine of the sacrificial character of the death of Christ, his death not as a mere martyrdom, a testimony to the truth of

what he had taught, but as a propitiatory

sacrifice, an atonement for sin accomplishing the whole work of the Church's redemption, and standing forth in all its glorious completeness as the one only and all-sufficient foundation of the sinner's hope, —we have cause, I say, to bless God that this great and central truth of the gospel enters into the whole teaching of our Church, as it must ever enter into the whole experience of a spiritually taught man, of a converted, a living soul. Christ's work for us, dying for our sins, and ising again for our justification,-and the Spirit's work in us, applying Christ to the soul, in the sinner's conversion and sanctification,-these are the two t departments of Gospel truth, by which God is glorified, and the hope of His Church is secured; and of these the subordinate standards of our Church arefull, and these beit, through the grace of our only Lord and Saviour, the great end of our public ministrations to unfold and maintain as the all in all in our personal Christianity, and the sum and substance of God's message of mercy to sinful men. Let it be our care that that precious legacy of a full gospel, which, as a church, we have received from our fathers, be transmitted unimpaired to those who are to come after us, that this Presbyterian Church in England may fulfil her mission, and be a blessing in the midst of the land. Fathers and brethren, the Lord has given us a great work to do in this land, in which he has appointed us an habitation, and he hath given to us all that is needful to our success. ful accomplishment of that work. He hath

- F. to us a glorious Saviour to make

nown—His person, character, and work— having all to give and ever ready to give all that is needful for the full and o ing salvation of the very chief of sinners; and he has promised to us His Almighty Spirit to make this testimony of Jesus effectual to the pulling down of strongholds,

and the ingathering of the elect people of

God. And with that precious all-sufficient Saviour to preach, and that gracious Almighty Spirit to quicken by that preaching the dead souls of men, we need not fear to carry the Gospel wherever we can ; and

whether from our pulpits, or in the streets and lanes of our great cities, we testify for Christ, we need not tremble for the result of the proclamation of that faithful saying, so worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. We hail with thankfulness every agency that is at work for the good of the people of these lands, for the elevation of the masses of our great cities, for stemming and rolling back the tide of profligacy that flows through our land ; but the great agency that is all-sufficient for these ends, we believe to be the glorious Gospel of the grace of God, without which in their hearts the most elevated in station, and the most pure in morals of this world's children, are but children of wrath after all; and with which received into their hearts, the lowest and the most abandoned of our population can be elevated to the dignity of God's children, blessed themselves . made a blessing to all around. Be it our privilege, dear brethren, our unceasing work till we rest in our graves, to publish the glad tidings of our great salvation, so full and so free, to all who will hear. Be it our work to contribute our part to the great aggregate of Christian effort put forth by the different branches of the Evangelical Church of our land for the evangelization of our vast population. Oh let that

art be a large one! Let us grudge no la

our, and spare no self-demial, that we may sow the o of the kingdom broadcast over the land, and that ours may be a large reaping time of joy, a glorious harvest to the praise of the abounding grace of our blessed Lord, in the salvation of a great multitude of souls. Fathers and brethren, the Lord hath been pleased to put us in trust with a very precious mission to those who are sitting in darkness, and who are made to realise the truth of the affecting statement that the dark places of the earth are full of the habitations of cruelty. The great Head of His Church hath given to that Church His commission to go into all the world and preach repentance in His name, and the remission of sins, beginning at Jerusalem. That commission he has given grace to this Church in some measure to fulfil. That commission we have put into the hands of beloved brethren, who have gone forth from us in the Lord's name to the land of China, and who are labouring there in the midst of many perils, in proclaiming the glad tidings of salvation for the guiltiest, by faith in Him who died for our sins, and rose again for our justification. These labours he has been pleased graciously to own and bless, and native Christians not a few, the precious fruit of our mission in that land, are now engaged in spreading abroad the sweet savour of that

THE HYMN Book.

Dr. Weir brought up a report on Psalmody. The ...i been authorised to review the present selection, to reduce the number of paraphrases and hymns to a number not exceeding 150, and to issue them for the use of such congregations as may desire to make use of them. The committee had held eight protracted meetings, and, after careful consideration, they concluded their labours in February last, but had deferred the publication till it was laid before the Synod. On the principle of adaptation, and with an express regard to greater spiritual edification, the committee had ventured to make some few alterations, and now presented the book, which, besides hymns, contained Scriptural paraphrasesasa supplement to the Psalmody hitherto in use. A conversation followed, in which Mr. Murdoch, Mr. Inglis, Mr. Alexander, and the Clerk took part. It was agreed that the Synod receive and adopt the report, thanking the committee for their labours, and authorising the London members of the committee, after making such verbal amendments as may seem yet necessary, to issue the hymn-book for the use of those congregations whose ministers and elders may find it desirable to employ it, recommending that when the congregations employ any psalmody additional to the psalms and paraphrases now in use, this collection should be adopted.

REPORT ON SCHOOLS.

Professor Lorimer brought up the report on education. The committee began by recording several instances of encouragin success and progress in the educatio effort which had occurred during the past year. In Berwick the ground lost for a time had been regained by the energy of Mr. Murdoch and his people. Schools had been opened, and a Government certified teacher appointed. Crookham, Wooler, Warrenford, Morpeth, Wigan, Felton, Falstone, and Brampton, were also referred to, as indicating that the attention of ministers and people was now beginning to be thoroughly aroused, to the value of the assistance afforded by Government. The committee next referred to a success of a more splendid kind, and upon a scale which might well be termed magnificent, which had been achieved at Woolwich, where, by the indefatigable labours of their reverend Moderator, schools had been erected at the immense expense of £2,800, of which f1,400 had been raised by the Moderator and his friends, including a name familiarly known and deeply hononred, Colonel Anderson. The remaining £1,400 was contributed by the Committee of Council.

These schools would be of great value to the soldiers and sailors stationed at Woolwićh. The committee regretted that while the claims on the school fund continued as large as before, the fund itself was not so well sustained; and the committee had been compelled to make corresponding reductions in the grants, which reductions had been limited to two classes of schools, those which had come into the receipt of Government grants, and which might, therefore, be supposed to stand less in need of the aid of the committee; and those schools which, having been aided by the maximum grant, to one teacher, of £15, must now be prepared for reduction to £12 10s. The committee, in conclusion, felt it their duty to plead with the Church for greater liberality in support of this useful and indispensable fund.

§. the motion of Mr Fraser it was resolved:—“That the report be adopted, and the thanks of the Synod tendered to the convener and committee, and that they be re-appointed with the addition of the names of Mr Alexander Anderson, Mr George Grant, Mr William Ferguson, and Dr Thomas M'Crie, and that the Synod rejoices in what has been already done in this most important matter, and hopes that encouragement to further advancement will be given by increased contributions to meet the increasing demands.” He hoped the Presbyterian Church in England would be always distinguished for its desire to encourage education. It had ever been the first and distinguishing feature of the Presbyterian Church that the most ample provision possible was made for the support of the schools connected with every congregation, and he hoped that feature would continue.

open-air PREACHING.

A very interesting discussion took place on this subject, a few particulars of which we subjoin –

Mr Anderson, Morpeth, reported that the committee on bills thought that the evening of Thursday, during the time that the Court would be occupied in hearing the deputations from Scotland and probably Ireland, and when the House did not sit in a judicial capacity, leave might be given to such members as had gifts and inclination to use them in out-door preaching.

Mr Alexander suggested that the arrangements should be made by local parties, in order that they might act in concert, and that the names of the brethren willing to speak or give their countenance be given in to the Clerk. While he would gladly try to preach himself, he would be glad if some of his brethren would go with him. Let them hold up the standard of the Cross