PRESBYTERIANS. 



PROUDHON, PIERRE J. 



707 



as to " the course to be pursued toward the 

 colored people within our hounds," the pream- 

 ble sets forth that "the colored people never 

 stood in any other relation to the Church than 

 that of human beings lost with us in the fall of 

 Adam, and redeemed with us by the infinitely 

 meritorious death and sacrifice of. Christ, and 

 participants with us in all the benefits and 

 blessings of the Gospel ; and that our Churches, 

 pastors, and people have always recognized this 

 claim to Christian equality and brotherhood, 

 and have rejoiced to have them associated in 

 Christian union and communion in the public 

 services and precious sacraments of the sanc- 

 tuary." And the final resolution speaks of the 

 advantages of the " colored people and the 

 white being united together in the worship of 

 God," though deferring to the wishes of the 

 former as to whether this shall be continued. 

 A " Pastoral Letter" to the Southern Churches 

 sets forth at greater length the viewsof the As- 

 sembly concerning the relation of the Southern 

 Churches to the civil Government, to the war, 

 the negro race, and slavery. 



The statistics of this denomination were, in 

 1865, as follows: Synods, 10; presbyteries, 46; 

 churches, 1,277 ; ministers, 811 ; licentiates, 91 ; 

 candidates, 65; communicants, 83,821. Of 

 these, 12,473 are colored people. 



In South America, the (Old School) Presby- 

 terian Church of the United States supports 

 missionaries in the United States of Colombia 

 (at Bogota) and in Brazil. In the latter country, 

 the missionaries, on December 16th, organized 

 themselves into the " Presbytery of Rio de Ja- 

 neiro." They publish a semi-monthly religious 

 newspaper, called Imprensa Evangelica (Evan- 

 gelical Press). 



' In Scotland, the Synods of the three great 

 divisions of Presbyterians (Church of Scotland, 

 Free Church of Scotland, and United Presbyte- 

 rians) met, by an unusual coincidence, at the 

 same time in Edinburgh. The proposed union 

 between the Free Church and the United Pres- 

 byterians was again advocated by the great 

 majority of both Assemblies, and the joint 

 committee reported that the Reformed Pres- 

 byterian Church and the English Presbyterian 

 Churches had joined in the Conferences, and 

 that so far as the negotiations had gone, they 

 found a general agreement jn principle. On 

 one day, the two Assemblies held a joint meet- 

 ing, presided over by the two moderators alter- 

 nately. Both Assemblies resolved to reappoint 

 the Union Committee. At the close of the 

 year, Dr. Cairns, one of the leading members of 

 the committee, publicly stated that the final 

 report of the committee on the proposed union 

 of the Free, United Presbyterian, Reform- 

 ed Presbyterian, and English Presbyterian 

 Churches, would be made, before the meeting 

 of the Church Courts in May, 1866. 



The statistics of the United Presbyterian 

 Synod, in 1865, were as follows : Ministers, 

 580; elders, 4,308; preachers, 102; students 

 of divinity, 133 ; members, 170,590 ; average 



Sunday attendance, 199,101; congregational in- 

 come, 178,858 ; income for missions and be- 

 nevolence, 50,696 ; total income, including 

 miscellaneous revenues, 232,316; average con- 

 tributions of members, 1 6s. lid. The Finance 

 Committee of the Free Church Assembly re- 

 ported that the amount contributed during the 

 past year to the public funds of the Church was 

 358,198 13s. 10d. being larger than that of 

 the previous year by 15,064 5s. and the 

 largest sum raised in any year since the year of 

 the disruption. 



A Presbyterian bi-monthly paper was, in 

 1865, established in Bangkok, the capital of the 

 kingdom of Siam, in Farther India. It is 

 printed partly in English and partly in Siamese. 

 The editor is Rev. N. A. Macdonald, a mission- 

 ary of the American Presbyterian (Old School) 

 Board. 



In New South "Wales, the union between the 

 Synods of the established Church of Scotland, 

 the Free Church, and the United Presbyterian 

 Church was consummated in November. The 

 different Synods were declared dissolved, and 

 all their members will henceforth be united in 

 the new " Presbyterian Church of New South 

 Wales." 



PROUDHON, PIEEEE JOSEPH, a French so- 

 cialist and political writer, born in Besancon, 

 July 15, 1809; died in Paris, January 19, 1865. 

 He was the son of a cooper, and after studying 

 for some time, through the assistance of some 

 benevolent persons, at the college of his native 

 town, he became apprenticed to a printer, and 

 in 1837 was taken into partnership by a print- 

 ing firm at Besancon. Having devoted much 

 of his leisure to study, and particularly to phi- 

 lology, he published the same year an edition 

 of the Bible, with annotations upon the princi- 

 ples of the Hebrew language, and an essay de 

 grammaire generate, receiving for the latter a 

 prize from the French Academy, consisting of 

 one thousand five hundred francs, which en- 

 abled him to visit Paris, where he spent three 

 years of scientific study. Here he became a 

 contributor to the Encyclopedia Oath-clique, 

 and among other writings published a pam- 

 phlet entitled Ou 1 est-ce que la Propriety which 

 opened with the celebrated doctrine " Property 

 is Theft" and for which he was censured by 

 the Academy, and deprived of his allowance. 

 In 1841 he issued another pamphlet upon the 

 same subject, and again in 1842, for which he 

 was arraigned before a jury at Besancon, but 

 acquitted. His principal work is entitled Si/s- 

 teme des Contradictions Economiqucs, on Phi- 

 losopliie de la Miscre (1846, 2 vols.). On the 

 breaking out of the revolution of 1848 he w:is 

 engaged in the publication of his Solution du 

 Probleme Social, a plan of social reform by 

 means of a new organization of credit and 

 monetary circulation. About this time he 

 started a new paper, Le Peuple, which made 

 a great sensation at the time, and subsequently 

 several other short-lived journals of like char- 

 acter, which for their rash and violent tone 



