will be found that the best way, and indeed the only way, is the propagation of the Gospel. I mean not merely the material, but the moral propagation of it. We know that philosophers have attempted to destroy these animosities by serious argumentation or ridicule; but the powerful Word of our Divine Redeemer will no doubt remove it entirely, because it preaches love and charity, and unites, in a bond of brotherhood, men of every colour and every clime. The infirm state of the health of Lord Teignmouth obliging him to retire, his Lordship requested Lord Gambier to take the Chair: upon which the latter addressed the meeting as follows: Gentlemen,-Sure I am that I speak the feelings of every individual in this numerous assembly, when I say we deeply lament, and greatly regret, the cause which obliges our noble and excellent President to retire from this seat: but no one in the assembly has so much cause for regret as the humble individual who now addresses you. My regret is caused by my total inability to fill that station which he has left, and to which I am called: but I cast myself on your indulgence. Truly, I may say, my heart is in this great Cause: it is my earnest desire and prayer, daily, that the sound of the Gospel may go forth into all lands. The Right Hon. Charles Grant. My Lord, Deeply as we must all sympathize with your Lordship in some of those sentiments you have just expressed, there are also some in which we do not so cordially agree. My Lord, we all most deeply lament the necessity under which our excellent and beloved President has left this Meeting; but we all rejoice, and I am sure I express but the feeling of this assembly, we all rejoice to see your Lordship placed in that chair. It is one of the peculiarities of these our assemblies, that they impress us with mixed and various feelings, a joy chastised always with solemn reflections, and grief cheered and enlightened by lofty and holy anticipations. Something of that mixed feeling we have just now experienced, in the absence of the noble President, and your occupation of the chair; and something of it have we experienced, in a still warmer and more elevated degree, by what passed but a very few minutes since, when we were called back to former times and periods of opposition and persecution. We cannot look to these periods without regret; but we have before us a living memorial, that those periods have passed by, and brighter days have succeeded. Happy should I be, if I could in any adequate manner convey to that noble,-I was going to say stranger, but I recall the word,-that noble friend, that uoble and Christian associate, who has come to this meeting, to unite his spirit with ours, and to proclaim himself, in the eyes of the British nation, our co-partner in the glorions "Coast frowns on coast, by adverse waves dis. Arms, gods opposed, but most the adverse mind." These lines shall now be banished from our recollection. We shall forget national eumity,-a thing hateful to humanity, and execrable in the ears of Christianity. We now deny that "coast frowns on coast, by adverse waves disjoined." We say, coast smiles on coast. We say, that they were opposed, but are so, thank God! no longer. There are no longer the adverse minds, but friendly and fraternal minds; and, above all, God is no longer opposed. We are rauged round the same memorial of our common salvation; we acknowledge one Redeemer; we bow to one God; and confess ourselves one flock under one Shepherd. And well has that illustrious person observed, that this eradication, as I hope it may be called, of national hostility, may be ascribed to a higher cause than mere human philosophy. Much may be done by philosophy: much may be done by learning and science: but let me say, and only repeat what he has so well said, that this science is not taught in the sunburnt arena of other science, but in that volume which we are met to circulate : taught in the recollection of those scenes, to which we look back with wonder and affectionate sympathy, the scenes of Gethsemane and Calvary; and taught, best of all, at the foot of that cross, which was elevated as the banner of all nations; and which at this moment, though we see it not, is as truly elevated as if we did see it with our eyes; and is collecting in its ample shade all the ransomed nations of the world, who will henceforth follow one leader, the Captain of their Salvation, made perfect, indeed, through suffering, but crowned at last with triumph and glory. My Lord, it is perhaps no inappropriate preface to the resolution I am about to move, to have been thus called to allude to those memorable events, which sa much cheer our minds. I say it is not Religious Intelligence. inappropriate, looking at the Resolution with political considerations; for if there be any class of persons in the nation to whom the formation and progress of this Institution is particularly important, it is to those who preside over the energies of this great nation, and wield the sword of administration. It was said in the Report, that this Institution derives importance, at the present period, from a reference to the great change in operatien throughout the whole of our people. There truly is a great revolution effecting: I mean particularly to allude to the efforts now made to promote education throughout the great mass of society. It is impossible that these efforts should be neutralized; they will circulate, and circulate more and more widely: but then it becomes those who are anxious for the interest of their country, to consider whether it does not call them to new duties for let us never forget, that though security may have been derived in former times to political institutions, from prejudice, from prescription, from habit, these are gradually dissolving under our feet: and if these are taken away, which have in a manner been the foundation of every ancient institution, it becomes us to be careful that we substitute in the room of such delusive securities others of a more sound and substantial nature, that shall not weaken, but strengthen the political fabric, and carry it to the greatest degree of strength. Amongst these securities, none can be like that supplied by the diffusion of religion, which teaches every one the necessity of gradation in the community, and the true secret of dignity in every rank of society. It is on these grounds that I consider it a peculiarly advantageons circumstance that the Institution has received the countenance of the Illustrious and Royal Persons to whom this Resolution alludes. The Lord Mayor.- My Lord and Gentlemen, it was my earnest wish that I might have been permitted to express my unalterable attachment to the Bible Society, at the Anniversary of which I have attended to-day, certainly with considerable inconvenience, but with much delight, without attempting to do that which I am sure is unnecessary, and which I am totally incapable of doing,to defend it by arguments on the one hand, or to support it by illustration on the other. The local importance attached to me as Chief Magistrate of the City is, 1 conceive, the reason why I have been called upon to take a part in the proceedings of the day; and I am not displeased at the opportunity of expressing my increasing conviction that it is my duty, as all who hear me will acknowledge it to be the duty of every Christian, to attempt by all means to diffuse the word of God throughout this country, and throughout the world. I am persuaded that the Cause of the Bible Society rests not less be 1 was exceedingly delighted with what fell from the French Nobleman: it is just what I should have expected; cause I know that wherever the principles of the Bible prevail there every thing favourable to peace and good order will prevail also; and wherever there prevails any thing under the name of religion which is at variance with the interests of mankind, you will always find it shrink from the light of the Bible. I have with pleasure retreated from the stormy scenes in which I am engaged in the city, where all is uncertainty-and, I will not say all, but much is distress-to this scene, where all is certainty, and all is peace; where, without a dissentient voice, or even a feeling, all agree that we should separate with an increased desire to do what we can to promote the knowledge of the word of God, both at home and abroad. Rev. J. W. Cunningham.-My Lord, If a noble friend who preceded me shrunk from the difficulties of his undertaking, partly from contemplating its magnitude, the vast arena to which he must descend, and the great number of particulars at which he must look, I may with much more justice shrink; because, I will own, I shall feel it my duty to turn my attention, certainly not to the most gratifying, but perhaps to the least satisfactory part of the statement made to us this day. I have the comfort, however, if I judge my countrymen aright, of knowing that there is nothing more congenial to the blood and feelings of Englishmen, than to look difficulty and danger in the face. The difficulty to which I advert, respects what was stated in a single word of your Report-the "diminution" of your funds; and though it is far more delightful to walk in the train of triumph, and hear the shouts of victory, yet I think I may appeal to you as plain honest men, and ask, Whether it be not our best plan to look into the cause of this diminution, and see whether there are not means by which our lost ground may be recovered, and by which, in another year, instead of meeting to mourn our defalcation, we may arrive at the increase of which a noble Lord has spoken to-day? If I were to compare the speeches of my friends to any thing, it would be to the sound of a trumpet: but in all the finer compositions there is a minor key; and I may touch that minor key without disturbing the general harmony, or destroying the beauty of the sounds. Of course, My Lord, in adverting to the causes of this defalcation, we ought to place at the head of them what the Lord Mayor has mentioned,-the commercial distress of the city and the country. It would be unjust if they were not to be adverted to: we know that they are the work of Providence; and if sent by Providence, is it not with a good design, to warn us to the discharge of duty? Surely they say, Cripple not your charities, but reduce your indulgences. Great is the danger when a man says, I will subscribe no longer to this or that Institution. I would rather say, I will deny myself in this, or in that: and I believe no man was ever the poorer by a single guinea he gave to such a Cause as this. But, My Lord, another of these causes, if I may be permitted to state it, is this, that there is undoubtedly a diminution of a certain class of contributors to this Society. The Society arose in the midst of controversy and disturbance; and one of the effects of controversy is, to elicit a number of bad passions: and it would be but fair to admit, that, even among your own friends and acquaintances, there were High Church feelings and LowChurch feelings; and others, which I must call bad-Church feelings. A certain part of the Contributors who have fallen from you were those who were allied to you by passions of this description. One of our Kings, who wished to get rid of a part of his bad troops, asserted that a few good ones were better than a great number of bad ones: so I am willing to bear all this defalcation, if the Society is purged of what is merely carthly, and gathers round herself those sublime energies which arise from love to God and to one another. But, My Lord, among other causes which have produced the defalcation, one has been suggested by the Noble Earl (Harrowby) who has just left us. His Lordship thought it ought not to be matter of surprise that this defalcation should take place: for, as he observed, you are yourselves in part the cause; you have opened, all over the country, so many streams, so many other charities, that men cannot give in every direction; and if you have a great increase on the whole, you must not wonder if, in some directions, there be a partial decrease. But besides having come to this general cause and having given our hearts and hands to it, there have arisen afterwards, in our different Religious Societies, particular objects which engage our attention, and we become more attracted by that which is our own than that which belongs to others; and so there has been a withdrawing of some from the great general object, because they have felt it their specific duty to attend to their own design as the work appointed them by Providence. This is a just feeling in some respects, 'but in others highly dangerous; because the tendency of our nature is to centre all in self: we like sailing in the narrow seas. But, Gentlemen, what I would say is this, -we should get out of these narrow seas; and instead of taking our stand on the little corner belonging to ourselves, we should remember there is the great field of existence, the great family of man, the great family of God, a magnificent standing-place on which we must plant our foot, and each one say, 'I am not the child of any particular community, but I am a citizen of the world, because I am a child of God Almighty. But, My Lord, there are one or two causes of a more affecting nature; and if I had the language as well as the discerning powers of Spurzheim, I should get a word to express what I mean; but you shall have the best I can give it,-there is a sort of pugnaciousness in human-nature, and we take a deeper interest in a cause for which we are obliged to contend; and while we were hit on the head with hard words and reasonings of another kind, there was that in us which opposed the blow; and we said, "If we are beaten, we will not submit.' But now we are at peace; and instead of having Octavos and Quartos published agaiust us, we are permitted to pursue the work of the Society at our pleasure; and we are disposed, for want of a sort of moral stimulus, to go to sleep; and our danger is ten thousand times greater from the indolence of human-nature, than from any enemy, or any weapon with which the enemy could oppose us. But I suppose, if the Meeting were inclined to entertain the subject, I should find it extremely easy to give you a catalogue of these internal causes, as long as the catalogue of the names of all the persons in this assembly. If, however, there be a point common in our nature, and as much to be deplored as hated, it is its narrowness. It is perfectly wonderful and incredible, except from experience,-for the prima facie observation of human nature would never have discovered it, that men who cordially cooperate with others on great points should differ ou minor points. What has been the history of Christianity? Persons who agree on the principal points have differed about some of a trivial nature, and these have proved the cause of war, the element of discord: and instead of erecting the one banner of which we have heard to-day, the great banner of Christianity, we have been hoisting our own little flags: instead of coming to the help of the Lord, we have been anxious to secure our own interest, at the expense of the ruin of the world. I speak to many with whom I have not the happiness to accord on some points of Church discipline. But what do I feel for them? I would say, Let them differ from me on all the points in which Dissenters ever differed from Churchmen; and if they will recount to me all the points on which we differ, I will give them five hundred times as many on which we agree. We agree in our wants; we agree in the pains and anguish of our hearts; we agree in those oppressive necessities and sorrows by which the heart is distressed and bowed down; we agree in having been wrecked by the same storm; and we also agree in this, that if ever we be rescued, it must be by the same Redeemer: and, not to say more, I will repeat the statement, that it would be no 'difficulty for any man to mention five hundred points of concord for the very few points of discord. Therefore we must remember the tendency of our nature to narrowness, we must remember the tendency of our nature to shrink from our brethren, and then, also, those points of concord in which we are agreed; and cultivate that oneness of heart, that great tenderness of feeling, which, as the golden chain, comes down from heaven, and first binds us to God, and then to each other. I will not touch upon any more of these causes. I cannot, however, but say, that if, by any thing that I have stated, I have conveyed to the mind of any individual in this assembly a couception that I think these causes of a formidable nature, that is not the impressiou I wish to produce. If I were to repair to the sea-shore to observe the water beating on the cliffs, I might, perhaps, at low tide, ask, "When will all these natural bulwarks of my country be erected again?" I know that the tide will return, the waters will flow up again. And so the tide may be low in this Society: but is it not known that there are ebbs and flows in public feeling, there are ebbs and flows in great Societies? while I see enough in this Meeting, and enough in the facts of the Report to-day, to assure my heart that, just in the proportion as it has ebbed, the tide of feeling will flow, and that we shall come together at some future day with the waters as deep and as high as ever they were. But we like a practical conclusion to all our remarks; and I confess I have a great design upon every man's bosom and powers and faculties in this assembly. For the danger is, lest, delighted with what you have heard, you should take up your strain of congratulation, or go away saying, it is all exceedingly true; and there the matter should end: whereas, I speak to my Clerical Brethren and other Ministers of Religion behind me, and to those before me; and the meaning of this plain honest English address is, that you should bend your powers, your faculties of body and mind, to the work; and it is from yourselves we expect the restitution of what we have lost. I look at many faces to-day; and I should say we have so many staunch friends, every man will be a hearty operator in this great work ;-but that is not the fact. I know that the very energy which we sometimes feel on occasions like the present, instead of exciting to action, becomes the apology for inaction; and we go home and do nothing. I am sure I may say," from experience;" for I have done it a hundred times myself. Look at those pictures;-and what can you wish for more? There you have a King whose memory is blessed. The present Monarch of the country, and may God of his infinite mercy bless him! We never can be thankful enough for the blessings of peace, and the favourable countenance he lends to religion and benevolence, and as the Right Hon. the Lord Mayor could have told you, I believe only yesterday the Monarch of your country contributed 20007. to mitigate the sufferings of the people; and I rejoice in it, because I want it to be felt, that while we labour for foreigners we are not forgetful of our brethren at home, and that the most extensive benevolence does not check a man's doing good in his own district. But to return to the pictures. We have there the Duke of Kent, whose star always shone over this Society; and the Duke of Sussex, in a garb which, when the cause is good, has never failed to carry success. There they are, smiling on your Society; but they are not the living men, but dead pictures: and so with regard to all this assembly, we want them to be, not dead pictures, but living men and we say, you might as well be posted up in a gift frame, you might as well be ghosts, or men representing the appearance of benevolence and piety to us, as be present here, and not go home and support the cause. I trust a Divine blessing will be so granted to every man, that all will take this resolution," I will not be the dead picture, but the living man; and this Society shall feel the benefit of my prayers and my labours. I will endeavour to turn one subscription into two, and to deepen the interest in all hearts in my parish; and, instead of suffering myself to be rocked to sleep in that cradle which not the friends but the enemies of the Society have provided, I will go forth to the battle of the Lord, and strive to live to His glory, in promoting the salvation of all mankind.' The Rev. Dr. Philip, Secretary to the South African Auxiliary Society. - My Lords and Gentlemen, No friend of Divine truth can be indifferent to the exertions and success of the British and Foreign Bible Society. Whether we consider that Society in the simplicity of its design, in the purity of its principles, in the grandeur of its object, in the frank character and talents of its agents, in the benevolence of its spirit, or in the extent of its exertions, it is certainly the most powerful, the most incorruptible instrument that has ever been employed, since the gift of tongues, for the diffu sion of divine knowledge and the benefit of man. In the humbleness of its begin ning, it reminds us of the lowly origin of that religion whence it sprung, and the triumphs of which it is destined to spread over the world. In the purity of its principles it has less worldly alloy in its constitution than the element of any other society. In its progress, it reminds us of the little leaven which speedily assimilates the whole lump, of the grain of mustard-seed, which, though the smallest of seeds, increases till it becomes an immense tree,-of the fire, which continues to burn till it has converted every thing into its own substance. In its objects, it is not limited to a tribe or a nation; and there is scarcely a spot on the globe where its agents are not at work, nor a people for whose present and everlasting felicity it is not employed. The labours of this Society are at this moment cheering the dreary abodes of the Polar regions; they are elevating the character of the inhabitants of the great Pacific Ocean; they are multiplying the means of salvation among the Colonial inhabitants of South Africa; and they are gladdening the hearts of the Hottentots; and making the wretched Bushmen, the inhabitants of the rock, to sing for joy, and to shout from the tops of the mountains. When an attempt was made to establish a Bible Society at the Cape of Good Hope, the proposition was met in a similar manner to that in which a proposal of the same kind, as has been stated, was received when the first effort was made to establish a Bible Society in Sweden. We were told," that no such Institution was needed." In the face of this assertion, confidently made, we formed a Society; and the event has been as we anticipated; we soon discovered that Bibles were required, and we have not yet been able to supply the deficiency. Among the colonists, I have met with no class of persons who have not thankfully received the Scriptures; and many instances of the beneficial effects resultiug from their distribution, which I cannot now state, have from time to time come under my own observation. Among those in South Africa who prize the Bible, I cannot omit mentioning the descendants of the French Protestants, who were driven from their country by the revocation of the Edict of Nantz. There is perhaps no part in Great Britain itself where the cause of the Bible Society is more warmly espoused than amidst the beautiful and picturesque valleys in which this interesting people reside. The first European inhabitants of these valleys preferred the wilds of Africa and a good conscience to the advantages of civilized life, when they could no longer worship God according to their appre hensions of the nature of the worship He requires and the God whom they served has blessed the descendants of those noble confessors, both with temporal and spiritual blessings, in a manner I never could contemplate but with the liveliest sensations of gratitude and delight. On a late journey into the interior of Africa, in which I travelled 2500 miles, I took with me as many Bibles and Testaments as I could accommodate in my waggon; and if I had had three times the number I could have disposed of them all. In many instances, when my stock was nearly exhausted, and after had no more left to give away, Bibles and Testaments were as earnestly pleaded for as the starving mendicant asks for an alms. Dr. Philip then furnished the Meeting with an account of a Hottentot Auxiliary Bible Society, recently formed at the Missionary Institution of Theopolis, at which a Caffre Prince presided. The following are some of the speeches made by the Aborigines : "The Chairman, Jan Tzatzoe, of the Royal Family of Hinza, opened the business of the day, by calling the attention of the Meeting to the former condition of the Hottentots and Caffres. He remarked, that they were without the Bible, without God, and without hope in the world. He then noticed, in a feeling manner, the kindness which strangers had manifested to them, in sending among them that book which is able to make them wise unto salvation. Others, he observed, are still destitute of the word of God; and he called upou the Meeting to assist in sending them the Bible. "William Platges:-The Bible, he remarked, had taught him that he was a sinner; that he was born blind; that he was within a hair's breadth of destruction; that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners; and that he was led to esteem the Bible as the greatest of blessings. He added,-We are poor; but out of our poverty let us endeavour to help others, by aiding the Bible Society in giving them the Scrip tures. "Piet Spandel :-He said, that he had thought the Bible was greatly needed in the colony; but, on a late journey into the interior, with the Rev. Dr. Philip, he had discovered others who needed it still more. First, he noticed the Bushmen, whom he described as being in the greatest consternation; always watching the movements of men, who shoot them like wild beasts. Those, he said, enjoy no consolation. From what he observed when he was among them, he thought that they were capable of being instructed in its (the Bible's) contents; for when he tried to convey to them an idea of its first principles, he saw tears running down their checks. He next ad |