Heligious Intelligence.

FOURTEENTH ANNIVERSARY

Of the British and Foreign Bible Society.

ON Wednesday, the 6th of May, 1818, was held, at Free Masons' Hall, London, the Fourteenth Anniversary of the British and Foreign Bible Society.

That the issue of Bibles and Testaments, within the year, have been 89,795 Bibles, 104,306 Testaments; making the total issued by the British and Foreign Bible Society, in somewhat less than thirteen years, more than TWO MILLIONS of Bibles

and Testaments.

The Right Hon. N. Vansittart, (Chancelof the Exchequer.)

"My Lord,

Among the numerous and respectable assemblage, upon this interesting occasion, lor were the Bishops of Norwich, Gloucester, Cloyne, and Derry; their Excellencies the "I take the liberty of rising, to move that Ambassadors from the United States of the Report of the Committee be received America, and from his Serene Highness and adopted. And if that were the sole the Prince of Hesse Homburg; the Earl object of my addressing you, it would be Harrowby, Lord Gambier, the Right Hon. unnecessary for me to add any thing to the Nicholas Vansittart, M. P. Sir Thomas impression which the Report itself must Dyke Ackland, Bart. M. P. Thomas Babing- have made. I might leave its contents to ton, Esq. M. P. Joseph Butterworth, Esq. make their own impressions on your minds. M. P. Charles Grant, Esq. M. P. Charles For I can appeal to all who have heard it, Grant, jun. Esq. M. P. W. T. Money, Esq. whether a Report replete with more imM. P. William Wilberforce, Esq. M. P. portant facts, and leading to more animaAdmiral Sir James Saumarez, Bart. K. G. ting conclusions, was ever delivered to this, or any other Society. I must be permitted, Lord Teignmouth, in opening the busimy Lord, to take this opportunity of exness of the day, read a note from the Bishop pressing the gratification with which I am of Salisbury, at his lordship's particular again enabled to partake of this great feast request, stating, that he was much mortified of Christian benevolence. I must be perat being prevented, by illness, from attend-mitted to state the admiration and gratitude ing the meeting.

C. B. &c.

An abstract of the Report was read by the Rev. W. Dealtry, from which it ap peared that the cash account stood as follows:

Total net receipts, exclu- L. s. d. sive of sales 68,359 10 9

Of which sum 55,8571, 7s. 5d. was contributed by Auxiliary Societies.

Received by sales, the major part of which was for Bibles and Testaments purchased by Bible Associa tions

Total net payments

with which, in common with those around me, I see the great plans of Providence developing themselves, and its mysterious purposes apparently about to be effected— and in particular, that we are allowed, and enabled, in however humble a degree, to co-operate in so great a work. We find, that, while the zeal, the liberality, and energy of this Society have, in no respect diminished, within the British dominions, its operations have been widely extending, and receiving the most energetic aid, among foreign nations. I particularly allude to what we have heard respecting the Empire of Russia, and the States of Ame86,979 10 11 rica. Can we be too grateful to that Pro71,099 1 7 vidence which has touched the hearts of

18,620 0 2

kings and of statesmen, which has raised the great apostolic commission, “Go, and up a zealous protector and propagator of baptize all nations." For how could they the Gospel, in the great Sovereign of the be baptized in the name of Jesus, without North? Can we be too grateful that those extensive dominions, stretching in a solid mass throughout the longitude of one half of the circumference of the globe, are about, in the numberless languages spoken in that vast empire, to receive the blessings of Christianity?

first becoming acquainted with the fact which the Bible reveals-that the blessed Jesus is their Saviour? That there should be persons in this country, who view our proceedings with suspicion, is to me matter of surprise and concern; especially as I see, among the ranks of those who are enemies "In the other hemisphere, the prospect to our Society, the names of scholars whom is equally cheering and delightful. Happy, I admire, and of friends whom I love. Yet, indeed, is the time when the two greatest conscious how very differently the same maritime nations upon earth are seen object strikes all of us, as it appears in uniting their numberless fleets, to circulate, different lights, I do not condemn their universally, the glad tidings of the Gospel. judgment-while I claim the great right of If we may suppose, my Lord, that the a Protestant Minister to consult my own. spirits of the just, delivered from the burden "I have, however, my Lord, still more to of the flesh, are allowed, on any occasion. lament, that there seems, of late, an increasto take a part in human affairs, with what ing spirit of hostility against those of us who delight must they co-operate in a work like are Members of the Establishment. At this; when, after the lapse of so many ages, first, our opponents disputed with us; they in which the cause of truth appears rather, then pitied us; and now they censure us. perhaps, to have receded than advanced, One gentleman has ventured to assert, that we find the ice beginning to be melted by the whole of our exertions may be resolved the beams of the Sun of Righteousness; into a fondness for popularity, and indifferwhen we see idolatry and superstition, ence to the established Church. A little heathenism and ignorance, every where while after, another person went much yielding to the simple, the inoffensive, the further! for he declares us to be an Antibenevolent exertions of the Christian Mis-Christian Association, formed for Antisionary. This spectacle must be viewed Christian purposes. Now it appears to me with delight, by those who have gone before us, and who, many of them, sacrificed their lives, and all offered their prayers, for such a consummation as we witness. Truly we may say, in the language of Scripture, that 'many prophets and kings have desired to see the things that we sce, but have not seen them, and to hear the things which we hear, but have not heard them."

The Bishop of Cloyne.

"I rise to second the motion of the Right Honourable Gentleman who preceded me but perhaps it may be expected that I should say a few words upon the business which calls us together. I congratulate you upon the progress of your exertions to spread the name of Christ over the world, to carry into execution, as far as you can,

extraordinary, not to say absurd, that persons, sending the Bible to different countries, and disseminating it among the poor at home, should be accused of not believing in the Bible. I confess that I am shocked at a charge of such a nature, brought against so many respectable persons. Gentlemen, I am a member of the United Church of England and Ireland. I believe its doctrines, from the bottom of my heart, and I perform its functions; but I detest the intolerance which, on account of a shade of difference in doctrine or discipline, would consign any one to the uncovenanted mercies of God. What, gentlemen, because Luther differed from our Church in some respects, was he therefore no Christian? The man that first seized the torch which

illumined all the west of Europe, and taught | reading and dissemination of the Bible. So, us to read and understand the Gospel, was then, to propagate that Book on which he no Christian himself? What shall we Christianity is founded, is to propagate say of the different Reformed Churches in heresy. The misfortune of this Bull cerGermany? What of the Church of Scot-tainly is, that it comes into the world a land-of the Presbytery of Glasgow, which thousand years too late. It might have forms so respectable a part of it, and which done some harm in the ninth century, but has certainly been deeply imbued in the will have very little effect in the nineteenth; guilt that attaches to our efforts? For, no and I am glad to know that we have still persons have assisted us more with their the countenance of many respectable men purses and with their prayers. And, to of that communion. This is not a time or come nearer home, gentlemen, ought such place to say more, and I shall leave the charges to be hastily thrown out against the subject, with one quotation from St. Paul: Prelates of the Established Church? I say I thank my God, that after the way which nothing as to those who are present; they they call heresy, so worship I the God of want no defender; but I may be allowed my fathers.' Proceed in your exertions, to repel the attack with indignation, as far gentlemen, God will prosper them; and as it applies to some who are absent, and to neither our enemies at home, with all their one who is no more; men who have de pamphlets, nor the Pope himself, with all fended the Christian doctrines by their his Bulls; nor the great enemy of mankind, writings, and adorned it by their lives; to with all his arts, will be able to prevail the venerable names of Porteus, and against us." Burges, and Barrington. Are such ment not to be Christians?—I fancy the respectable audience I address, the noblemen and gentlemen on the platform, the merchants of the city, the ministers of state, who have come forward, much to their credit, on more than one occasion, to declare their concurrence in our principles, will be rather startled at hearing, that they are none of them Christians? Half Europe will be astonished at the discovery, that Mr. Wilberforce is not a Christian. Gentlemen, such charges, against such men, can only be dismissed from our minds with utter Anniversary commemoration. Happily, contempt, conscious as we are of the truth of the common maxim, that no disputant has recourse to hard names, until he finds himself deficient in good reasons.

"I must say a few words about another adversary of ours, and I will say them as mildly as I can; I mean one that appeared some months ago, His Holiness the Pope. This respectable personage, and respectable he is in many particulars, has condescended to publish a Bull against us. He says, that many heresies will appear, but that the most baneful of all heresies is, the

His Excellency Mr. Rush, Envoy Extraordinary, and Minister Plenipotentiary, from the United States of America.

"I have been requested, since I came here this morning, by one of the officers of this Institution, to move that the thanks of this Meeting be given to the Right Honourable Lord Teignmouth, President of this Society. Although sensible of my incompetency to this task, I feel, at the same time, that I cannot decline it. Nor can I help expressing the great and solid satisfaction which every bosom must feel at this

there is a common ground upon which all the nations of the world, who make up the family of Christendom, can associate together; and it is a still happier and more consoling reflection, that it is a ground upon which they can always meet, and ought always to meet, as friends and as brothers. Kings, Emperors, Republics, whatever the grandeur or the means of their human sway, all look up to the same power, are all protected by the same almighty hand; the precepts and the truths contained in the Sacred Volume, which it is

true sense of the word, all men shall be one fold, under one Shepherd.

the great and the useful purpose of this In- | cite, and to spread, than that it should fall stitution to disseminate, are such as com- to my lot, in this metropolis, to have the mand the consentaneous reverence of all pleasure of seconding a motion made by nations; and why? Those precepts and the Minister of a foreign state. In truth, those truths teach the maxims of charity and my Lord, it is a strong proof, that in this love, not merely between man and man, cause there is nothing foreign; but from but taking a far more extensive range, they the progress of this Society, and of societies inculcate peace and good will between like this, we may be sanguine enough to nation and nation. And hence, the repre- hope that the period may be approaching, sentative of another nation, through a kind- (whether with steps more slow, or more ness so often extended to foreign ministers rapid, can be known only to that Providence in this metropolis, is permitted to be pre-which guides every step of it,) when, in the sent at such a celebration as this. I was a listener to the eloquent reflections with which the Report concluded.-They are, they must be, true. The poets and orators of Britain may select, if they will, other topics of renown, but in the sober records of the moralist and the historian, in the eyes of other nations, in the eyes of the great family of mankind, the establishment of the British and Foreign Bible Society will ever put forth the purest, the most incontestable titles to the first praise. I felt the force of those kind sentiments, in relation to the kindred Institution of the country to which I belong, to which the Report also has allusion: I felt grateful at the kind manner in which these sentiments were received. I am sure I shall but anticipate the wishes of the Bible Society of the United States, if I return their most grateful thanks. I felt with equal force and gratification, the sentiments uttered by the Right Honourable and distinguished Gentleman who first spoke. May the canvass of the two countries spread more extensively over the world the riches of Christian benevolence than it does the riches of commerce; and hence-vate judgment, should hold forth such disforth, may that be their only strife."

"My Lord, I had another reason for wishing to take an early opportunity of addressing myself to your Lordship, a reason which perhaps reflects some degree of shame upon myself; and it is this, that I have not the happiness of being one of those who were early engaged in the ranks of this Society: whether, because I was distracted by many other subjects, or whatever was the cause, such was the fact; and what was it that first directed my attention to this subject? It was the sounding of the trumpet of alarm. Though I had not sufficiently attended to the progress of the Society, to be myself a competent judge of its proceedings, yet it did strike me, as a most singular circumstance, that it should be a subject of alarm to that Church which I had always conceived to glory, that its foundation was the Bible, and its object to spread that Sacred Book more extensively; that that which was a Protestant Church, which rested its own defence of separation from the Church of Rome, upon the right of pri

trust, should hold so much at a distance

The Earl of Harrowby, (President of the from itself all those who (whether right or Council.)

"It is with peculiar pleasure that I seize this moment of offering myself to your notice, immediately after the speech we have heard from the representative of the United States of America, because I do not know a more striking proof of that feeling which a society like this is calculated to ex

wrong) had presumed for themselves to exercise the same right which the Church of England had exercised for itself; that it should be deemed, if not a stain, yet a detraction from the advantage and benefit of a good work, to partake with them in the pursuit of it? But, if there was nothing in argument, was there any thing to be found

in the conduct of this immense Society, | only, their own peculiar predilections, unwhich could justify that alarm by fact? less we set them that example ourselves?

"To return to the motion which I have the honour of seconding. To many of us, whose minds have not been so well disciplined as your Lordship's, your situation on this day might be a subject of pride and exultation; to you, I am persuaded, it is a subject of humble gratitude to that Provi

To argument upon the subject, I paid every possible attention: to pretend to say that I, or any man, could have read, with deep attention, every publication that has appeared upon the subject, would be absurd; but this I can truly say, that I have read, with the best attention in my power, every publication that has materially attracted dence which has permitted you to be the the notice of the public. I have read every instrument of such extensive, such everstatement of facts on both sides of the ques-during benefit. Others may fully partake tion, which were represented to me as of the pleasure arising from the general worth reading; and the deliberate result of success of this Society, but there is one that investigation, has been a confirmation quarter of the globe to which your Lordship of the opinion which first struck me, that, must look with peculiar interest: it must be so far from any danger existing to the an object of gratification to your mind, to establishment of which I am a member, the reflect upon the anxiety with which, during union of that Church with this Society only your presence in India, you endeavoured to adds to its credit, its dignity, and its useful-provide for the temporal welfare of millions; ness, and therefore cannot but add to its but with feelings of a higher order must you strength.

now recollect, that, since your absence, your influence in this Society has contributed to diffuse among them blessings of a far higher description. That the prospect which is opened before us, may be abundantly more extended, must be the object of our wishes, and our prayers, and ought also to be that of our exertions."

Lord Teignmouth.

"My Lord, I have been unfortunately prevented from arriving here early enough to have more than a cursory view of the Report which has been read to you, and this Assembly. I can only speak of the general impression it has given me; and that impression is gratifying in the highest degree; it proves that, during a period of more than ordinary pressure, whatever retrenchments have been made, persons have not applied their economy to the Bible Society, and that it has been assisted in every part of the world, by exertions nearly corresponding; that its influence has spread to an extent, and its great name has arisen in a manner, in which no other Society, however respectably constituted, or well conducted, could have done: no insulated Society, in this country, belonging to one peculiar class, be that class what it may, could excite, in all nations, and in all countries, and among all sects, the same degree of enthusiastic adherence which has risen from the very nature of the Society before us. How could we successfully call upon them to lay aside any of their prejudices; "But, while we contemplate the auspi to forget for a moment, and for a moment cious results of our Institution with the

"Gentlemen-I cannot sufficiently express the happiness which I feel, and my gratitude to the Author of it, in being permitted once more to attend the Anniversary of our Institution, and to rejoice with the Members of it on its past success and encouraging prospects. The experience of fourteen years has realized the hopes with which the Society, in humble dependence upon the Divine favour, began its career; and we are now, more than ever, authorized to indulge the confidence, that the liberality which has accelerated the exertions, and enlarged the operations of the Society, will never relax, while the inhabitants of any portion of the earth implore or require its assistance.