544 



METHODISTS. 



VII. Methodist Church of Canada, This Church 

 comprises a General Conference, which meets 

 every three years, and eleven annual confer- 

 ences. The statistics for 1887 gave it 1,558 

 traveling preachers, 1,162 local preachers, 

 194,761 members, and 16,847 probationers. 

 The statistics of 1888, not completed in time 

 for this publication, indicated, so far as they 

 had been made up, an increase of more than 

 15,000 members, and a total of 2,871 Sunday- 

 schools, with 27,209 officers and teachers, and 

 197,538 pupils. 



VIII. Weslcyan Connection, The summaries 

 published with the minutes of the Conference 

 for 1888 give the following totals of members 

 (including those on trial) and ministers (includ- 

 ing probationers and supernumeraries) in the 

 British and affiliated Conferences : 



The numbers of ministers and members in 

 the Australasian Wesleyan Methodist Church 

 and the Methodist Church of Canada are given 

 in the minutes of tlreir respective conferences. 

 The whole number of declared Wesleyans in 

 the regular army, militia, and Royal Navy, at 

 home and abroad, is given at 16,660. The 

 whole number of day scholars in 843 school 

 departments was 178,918, with an average at- 

 tendance of 138,813 ; total income of day 

 schools (from school-pence, Government grants, 

 subscriptions, etc.), 240,760; total expend- 

 iture, 246,377. There were also 223 stu- 

 dents in the two training colleges, the West- 

 minster for young men (114) and the Short- 

 lands for young women (109). The number 

 of Sunday-schools in Great Britain was 6,851, 

 with 128,752 officers and teachers and 908,719 

 pupils. The whole number of children re- 

 ceived at the Children's Home and Orphanage 

 up to the end of March, 1888 was 2,300, of 

 whom 1,472 had been provided for and 64 had 

 died. The Temperance Committee returned 

 3,344 Bands of Hope, with 339,065 enrolled 

 members, and 520 adult temperance societies, 

 with 32,389 members. 



A tendency was, however, noticed to ignore 

 the principle on which the Wesleyan Metho- 

 dist Temperance Society is founded the co- 

 operation of abstainers and non-abstainers. 



Missionary Society. The annual meeting 

 of the Wesleyan Missionary Society was held 

 in London, April 30. Mr. Isaac Hoyle, M. P., 

 presided. The total income of the society for 

 the year had been 131,867, and the total ex- 

 penditure, 137,957. The reports from the 

 mission fields showed that the increase in the 

 number of chapels had been 114; of mission- 

 aries, 9 ; of paid agents, 175 ; of unpaid agents, 



208; of full members, 1,037; of members on 

 trial, 577; and of pupils, 1,508. Favorable 

 accounts were given in the report of the Euro- 

 pean missions in France, Germany, Bavaria, 

 Bohemia, Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Malta. 

 A Moslem mission had been established in 

 Cairo, Egypt. Reviews of the missionary 

 work in Ceylon, India, China, the Transvaal, 

 the west coast of Africa, and the West Indies, 

 were also given in the report. 



The following general summary was given 

 of the missions under the immediate direction 

 of the Wesleyan Missionary Committee and 

 British Conference, in Europe, India, China, 

 West Africa, the Transvaal, British Honduras, 

 and the Bahamas : 



Central or principal stations, called circuits 836 



Chapels and other preaching-places 1,338 



Missionaries and assistant missionaries, including su- 

 pernumeraries 833 



Other paid agents (catechists, interpreters, day-school 



teachers, etc.) 2,000 



Unpaid agents (local preachers, Sunday-school teach- 

 ers, etc.) 8.859 



Full and accredited church-members 82.8-25 



On trial for church membership 4.674 



Pupils attending either the Sunday or day schools. . . 59,388 



Conference. The Wesleyan Conference met 

 in its one hundred and fifteenth session at 

 Camborne, July 24. The Rev. Joseph Bush 

 was chosen president. A committee to which 

 the subject had been referred by the previous 

 Conference made a report in which it recog- 

 nized that various causes, some of them per- 

 taining to social life, militated against enforcing 

 the rule making attendance upon class-meetings 

 a test of membership, and suggested certain 

 modifications in the system. A committee was 

 appointed to continue the inquiry during the 

 year. A proposition was discussed for changing 

 the order of the sessions of the Conference, so 

 that the ''representative session," in which lay 

 members participate, and which has charge of 

 the general business, shall precede the "pas- 

 toral session," which is composed wholly of 

 ministers, and conducts the ecclesiastical and 

 disciplinary proceedings. The subject was re- 

 ferred to a committee representing the two 

 orders, and to the district meetings of min- 

 isters and laymen. The reports from the dis- 

 trict meetings held in May showed that the 

 greater number of the thirty-five districts had 

 united in protest against the " compensation 

 clauses" of the local government bill. The 

 committee of the Conference had united with 

 the " Central Committee for the Prevention of 

 the Demoralization of the Native Races by the 

 Liquor Traffic " in inviting the attention of 

 Parliament to the " persistent efforts made by 

 civilized countries to introduce the sale of vile 

 and pernicious spirits and intoxicating liquors, 

 under Government sanction, into our colonies 

 and dependencies." The Conference referred 

 back to the Committee of Privileges the ques- 

 tion of the introduction into Parliament of a 

 hill to relieve non-conformists from the pres- 

 ence of the registrar at marriages celebrated in 

 their places, with instructions to consider the 



