one of worship. Secure God's honour, and He will secure man's welfare; trample down God's claim over the day, and the claim of the labourer, the claim of the poor, and the claim of the rich, will all go down together. I believe that in our families and in our churches very much of the blessing hitherto inherited has come to us because of our attachment to the day of God. Let us take care not to give it up; but as to the spirit in which it is observed, let us always remember that the law of worship is above the law of rest, and the law of mercy is above all law, and Christ Himself, the restgiver to the whole human race, taught the great lesson that "the Sabbath was made for man;" a device of heaven for the welfare of heaven's offspring down upon earth; a device of eternity for the keeping of the offspring of eternity who are yet entangled in the wheels of time. The Sabbath was made for man, and I trust that for man we may keep it.

REV. C. C. MCKECHNIE (Primitive Methodist): I only wish, sir, to remark that I think the Methodist people as much, perhaps, as any other Christian Church-I might almost venture to say more than any other Christian Church-have hitherto carried into practical effect our Lord's idea of the purpose and sacredness of the Sabbath-day. When He said the Sabbath was made for man, I understand Him to have meant, that it was made for the ministry of mercy to man. That seems to me to be His special instruction. Now, Mr. President, the Methodist people have hitherto devoted the Sabbath-day specially, pre-eminently, I might almost say exclusively, to the great work of the ministry of mercy; and in doing so they have realised in their blessed experience that labour is rest. They have found the highest kind of rest in labouring for the good of their fellow-men, and I do not think that there is any more effectual way of convincing ourselves, or convincing others, of the Divine authority of the Sabbath than by prosecuting more and more the ministry of mercy to our fellows.

REV. J. C. BARRATT (Wesleyan Mission, Germany) said: We have heard this morning something of the view taken by Dr. Martin Luther on the Sabbath question, and therefore it is not difficult to understand that in Germany this question is regarded, as I have been told there, again and again, from a different standpoint from that observed in England and America. Of course the responsibility for their interpretation of the Divine command must rest with the Lutheran Churches. We cannot but regret the difference that exists between their views and ours on this question. I wish to call the attention of this Conference to the fact that there is no essential difference as to the observance of the Lord's Day between the Lutheran Protestants in Germany and the Roman Catholics, but a difference only of degree. I come from what may be regarded as, perhaps, the most distinctly evangelical state in Germany-the kingdom of Wurttemberg. We have at the present time, in Stuttgart, an Exhibition of Arts and Manufactures which cannot but be regarded as a most successful Exhibition; but the fact remains that the great day of the week for the visiting of this successful Exhibition is the Lord's Day. The number of visitors to the Exhibition is twice or thrice as great on the Lord's Day as it is on any other day. This is the point on which I would wish to lay stress before this Conference, and I think I shall scarcely be out of order in doing so. I wish to give a word of gentle caution to Methodist parents who seek educational institutions for the training of their children on the continent of Europe. My own conviction is that the assaults that have been made upon the Lord's Day in Great Britain may be traced to the education received on the continent of Europe. The influences surrounding the Continental Sabbath are very subtle and very powerful, and even with the most carefully elaborated safeguards that can be designed, it is scarcely possible to protect young people from those very subtle and dangerous

influences. I regard it as a calamity when Methodist parents send their children to the Continent, even for the undoubted advantages that may be gained there, without having taken in advance all possible care in the selection of the educational institution; and I would strongly urge that no Methodist parent should seek these advantages in places where their own Church is not distinctly represented, and where their children may not be committed directly to the care of ministers of their own Church. I consider that we, as Methodists, have a vocation in Germany on this very question. May God help us to be faithful in our witness on this question of Sabbath observance !

DR. WILLIAM COOKE (Methodist New Connexion): Mr. President, I have listened with profound attention to the most admirable paper which has been read on this important subject, and subsequently to the admirable remarks which have been made by our brother Mr. Arthur; and I would say that my sentiments exactly accord with the sentiments which have been delivered by the two gentlemen referred to. The speaker who has just sat down referred to parental influence with regard to the Sabbathday, and the consequences arising from laxity on the part of Christian parents with regard to this great and important question. Sir, the Sabbath, when rightly observed, is the ally of virtue, of morality, and of religion; but lax notions with regard to the Sabbath may tend to generate immorality and vice in various ways. Let me suppose that we have a Christian mother, and in the presence of her children she utters some sentences which would indicate that she has some uncertainty in her own mind with regard to the obligation of a Christian Sabbath. The daughter, 'a'r and lovely, hears the remarks made by her mother which may have an innuence upon her, and the result is, she is led into dangerous society, and brought under evil influences; that fair daughter may become a harlot and lead an impure and vicious life, breaking the mother's heart, and finding an untimely and a degraded grave-and her eternity how dark and awful to contemplate! But suppose, on the other hand, that a Christian mother inculcates the duty of Sabbath observance according to God's holy law : that fair. daughter becomes an angel of light and of mercy. A pious mother, an example to her children, lives a useful life, dies a happy death, and goes into the brightness of the glory of the eternal world. Let mothers, then, take care in what manner they speak in the presence of their children with regard to the solemn duties of the Christian Sabbath. And so with regard to our sons. Let the Christian father speak in a way doubtfully with regard to the Sabbath, in the presence of his sons, and the effect is injurious. Those sons are led to neglect Divine ordinances; they are brought under dangerous influences; and the promising boy becomes a drunkard, a profligate, a felon; breaks the father's heart, and passes into an untimely grave. Oh, sir, there is an awful solemnity in connection with these important considerations. But let that son be brought up, not only in the fear of God generally, but with a regard of God's Sabbath, of God's ordinances, and other sacred duties devolving upon him, and the result is that that son becomes what may be a herald of mercy, a minister of grace, lives a happy and a holy life, and dies in the favour of Almighty God. Let parents be careful to inculcate a profound reverence for the Sabbathday.

REV. JAMES HOCART (French Methodist): I just want to express an opinion which seems to me of importance. If ever England were to give up her Sabbath it would be a great calamity for the European continent, and for France in particular. We have made several serious attempts to form in Paris, and in France, a Lord's Day Observance Society. Those attempts, I am sorry to say, have to a great extent failed up to the present time, but help and stimulus have come to us from Geneva; and I may

here mention an honoured name, the name of a man who has given his life to the promotion of Sabbath observance in Geneva, and throughout Switzerland and Europe-I mean Monsieur Alexandre Lombard. But we want help from you as well as from Switzerland in order to excite public attention to this great question, and therefore if your own views and practices were ever relaxed it would be the greatest damage to us. No one who has not laboured in the great towns of France for some time can possibly be aware what a hindrance to the spread of the Gospel and the conversion of sinners Sabbath profanation is. Your grand hour for action in England has been the Sabbath evening, while the Sabbath evening has been a nullity with us as to Christian exertions for the benefit of the masses. This arises from the fact of labour in the early part of the day, and also from the number of hours given to pleasure in the after part of the day. We cannot get the people together, and will not get them together, unless we obtain Sabbath observance. Let me just add one or two brief observations: what an evidence of the depravity of man we have in this matter! God's order is inverted in France; people will work, and masters will get their men to work on the day which should be a day of rest, and I have been told by workmen that a man is dealt more leniently with if he absents himself from the workshop on Monday than if he absents himself on the Sunday. Many work on the Sunday, and then take pleasure, and give way to vicious excess on the Monday, hence the name of Le bon Lundi. After they have worked on Sunday they abstain from work on Monday, and in some instances, at least, the master indirectly countenances the practice. In that way many working men are disabled by their excesses from regular and energetic labour even on the Tuesday. Therefore, if you regard your work of evangelisation in France, and on the Continent generally, I think you will feel that you are bound to retain the immense privilege and the powerful means of action on the people here which you possess through the observance of the Lord's Day.

REV. W. GRIFFITH (United Methodist Free Church): Mr. President, will you allow me to make one remark before I come to the point under discussion in this Conference, that is to say, what an unutterable pleasure and profit the assembly of this Ecumenical Conference has been to us? I desire to give the right hand of fellowship to every brother, ministerial or lay, in this assembly: though at the first sight I did not desire to be present, because I could not see any practical result that would issue from the Conference; now, realising what it has been to myself and to others, there is no consideration of any kind that would, could I have foreseen what this Conference has become, have kept me from it. I would have walked every step of the way to it if I could not have come otherwise. I believe we entirely go with the sentiments of the speakers on the subject of the Sabbath, and its obligations, and also as to the great advantages to accrue from the religious observance of the day, and the great neglect of the Sabbath-day. But there are two points on which I feel a difficulty: one is, how are we to secure the universal or general observance of the Sabbathday in this or in any other country? I hold its observance to be a truly religious act, that it is binding on those whose conscience tells them that God exists, that God established the Sabbath, and that the New Testament dispensation, so far from annulling the authority of the primitive inception, has really confirmed it by calling it the Lord's Day. But then if it be a matter of conscience, if it be a thing to be decided on religious grounds, what are you to do with the men who have no conscience? and how are you to act in reference to those gentlemen who do not observe it as a religious duty? I see only one way. Call in the aid of the State! I would as soon call in the aid of infidelity to support religion as call in the aid of the State. What right has the State to interfere between me and my conscience

in any matter? If it has a right to interfere between me and my conscience in one matter, has it not a right to interfere between me and my conscience in any matter that it chooses to make a question between me and itself? Now, if any of those present can point out in what way we can by reason, persuasion, argument, sound logic, appeal to the best feelings of human nature, and still more by such a diffused influence of the Holy Spirit as will turn the great majority into real instead of professing Christians, then, sir, every man will be a law unto himself, and that law will be to respect the Christian Sabbath.

BISHOP MATTHEW SIMPSON (Methodist Episcopal Church): I suppose, Mr. President, that there is no difference of opinion in this body in reference to the necessity and the duty of observing the Christian Sabbath. Expression of opinion here is, I think, without a single dissentient voice. I think the only means by which we shall promote it is by teaching clearly the doctrine of the New Testament on that subject, and bringing out in our pulpit ministrations the Divine authority on which the Sabbath rests. But I do not rise for that purpose; I rise to say that I think the friends of the observance of the Sabbath are liable to make some mistake in admitting that there has been a great decline in its observance. It is one of the means by which infidelity ever seeks to propagate itself, to assume that it is constantly gaining ground; and our young people are taught that the Sabbath is going out of use, and that progress and enlightenment will render it unnecessary. Now I want to say that, so far as I understand the matter, my own opinion is most clearly, that the Christian Sabbath was never so well observed by so many people, in so many lands, as it is at this day. It was better observed that is, more strictly observedby a few people in one or two countries. We complain in the United States, for instance, of a laxity of Sabbath observance, and we have it in certain cities; but, sir, it is simply the transfer of a European Sabbath by European emigration into our midst, and these very people observe the Sabbath better among us, with all their defects, than they did when at home in Europe. They have been improved a little. Now, when I look out at the mission field, and see how God is spreading missions by means of the English and the Americans, and that they are taking into China, and to Japan, and to the islands of the sea, the Christian Sabbath as they observe it, and are teaching their people to observe it, I see that the Sabbath is becoming, taking the whole world together, an institution of greater power than it ever was before. And I think, so far from admitting to infidelity and to error, that the Sabbath is passing out of use, an enlarged view would teach us that the Sabbath is gaining ground. While I lament that in our own country-I speak of the United States, not of England-we have in certain points the foreign element not observing the Sabbath so well, and affecting to some extent some of our people, and that there is greater laxity among some of our people on the subject, yet, on the other hand, there is a reaction. I have been in Europe several times; I do not know what the judgment of brethren who are better acquainted with it than I am is, but I was pleased to see on my present visit more signs of Sabbath observance, more quiet, less work, and less disorder in the great capitals of Europe, than I saw when I was over twenty-four years ago; and the impression was made in my mind that the Sabbath is really gaining ground. I was glad to see that the election platform laid down in France as one of the things demanded by the electors in many districts, was the observance of the Sabbath, not quite as we want it, but as a day of rest, a day of abstention from labour; and if that can be fully secured we can reach the minds of the people. When I look over the earth, I must repeat, that I believe we are gaining ground from year to year. We need to stand firmly in our positions, and maintain our doctrines; and teach our

young people that we are on the winning side, and that the Christian Sabbath will prevail.

BISHOP H. N. McTYEIRE (Methodist Episcopal Church, South): I think we are upon ground now, where, if it were possible, we would do well to dwell for some time. When we have brought up statistics and the results of our labours and our numbers, I have feared, and others have feared, that we might be tempted to indulge in something of the pride of life, and that the Lord might blow upon our assembly, instead of blessing it; but we are safe before Him, and certain of His approbation when He sees us joining hands to maintain the Christian Sabbath in the world. And if this Ecumenical Council, and all whom it represents, will take a firm position on this subject, we can maintain the Christian Sabbath in spite of Romanism, in spite of Continental university teaching, and in spite of infidelity. Some remark has been made about asking the State to interfere in the way of legislation. That principle of asking State legislation will come upon your programme in connection with temperance. We can certainly legislate for ourselves; we can begin at home, as Wesleyanism has always done in its reformations. Might I suggest that ministers of the Gospel, Methodists everywhere, should be very jealous over themselves as to the amount of Sunday travelling that they undertake. We are obliged to travel somewhat on Sunday; even under the old strict Jewish law there was a Sabbathday's journey allowed. But, sir, it knocks a good deal of good preaching on the head on the Sabbath-day when a minister of the Gospel, without any urgent necessity, is seen to take the railroad train on Sunday morning. We ought to be very jealous over our own practice on that point. I have been pleased to see how our great camp-meetings have adjusted themselves on this subject, and the good it has done. Once they were open to incursions of strangers on the Sunday, but now it is not uncommon for them to close their gates, and to enter into stipulations with railway companies that they shall bring no passengers on the Sabbath. That sort of legislation will do more than the State can, and there will be no question about the right of it. Again, not only ought we to be very jealous over ourselves, but we ought ourselves to be vigilant over those in high places. I saw this notice in the public prints in America, that a certain ex-President, the example of whose wife has been quoted here most properly and forcibly, when on a journey, stopped over the Saturday night, kept the Sabbath, went to church, and resumed the journey on the Monday morning. Sir, that was worth more than a thousand tracts circulated on the Sunday, and, per contra, sometimes an item gets into the papers that men, whom we honour and love and pray for, take Sunday trains for distant points, when there is no absolute necessity for it. I say that a just and respectful but earnest animadversion and protest becomes the Methodist press when these things occur.

A hymn was then sung.

REV. BISHOP D. A. PAYNE (African Methodist Episcopal Church) then read an eassy on The Relation of Methodism to the Temperance Movement.

It is said that "Methodism is Christianity in earnest." Let this definition be regarded as correct and accurate; then who can doubt its logical consequences? Who can question the character of its thinking, of its speaking, of its decisions and its actions, respecting anything evil in itself, or evil in its tendencies ?