76 



BAPTISTS. 



periodicals were published under the direction 

 of the society. A resolution was adopted by 

 the Conference to the effect that the Seventh- 

 Day Baptists, " believing in the principles of 

 humanity and of the Christian religion, and 

 being themselves engaged in efforts to establish 

 Christianity in China, desire to place on record 

 their earnest protest against the unchristian 

 policy of our Government with respect to the 

 immigration of the Chinese, and their abhor- 

 rence of the recent most unlawful and inhuman 

 killing of Chinese by miners in "Wyoming Ter- 

 ritory." Engrossed copies of this resolution 

 were ordered sent to the Chinese legation in 

 Washington, the Secretary of State of the Unit- 

 ed States, and the mission in China. Resolu- 

 tions were adopteda pproving the principle of 

 prohibition of the traffic in intoxicating liquors, 

 and declaring the license system, high or low, 

 as applied to that traffic, " wrong in principle, 

 and a crime against God and man." 



III. Frce-Will Baptist Church. The following 

 is a summary of the statistics of the Free-Will 

 Baptist churches, as they are given in the "Free- 

 Will Baptist Register for 1885 " : Number of 

 yearly meetings, 46; of quarterly meetings, 

 185 ; of churches, 1,496 ; of ordained preach- 

 ers, 1,286; of lincensed preachers, 159; of 

 members, 80,913. In addition to the churches 

 represented in these are many other small Free- 

 Will Baptist bodies in the Southern and West- 

 ern States, substantially agreeing in faith and 

 practice with this Church. The u Liberal Bap- 

 tist Year-Book," published in 1884, makes the 

 following estimates of the numbers of mem- 

 bers of such bodies : Various Free-Will Baptist 

 associations in the United States, 13,190 ; Gen- 

 eral Baptists, 13,225; Separate Baptists, 6,329; 

 United Baptists, 1,400; Church of God, 40,- 

 000 ; Free Christian Baptists of New Bruns- 

 wick, 10,777; Free Baptists of Nova Scotia, 

 3,415. These, added to the numbers recorded 

 above, would make 169,249 members of church 

 of similar faith with that of the Free-Will Bap- 

 tist Church. 



The latest reports of the Free-Will Baptist 

 benevolent societies at hand are those of 1884, 

 which were presented in October. The Edu- 

 cation Society returned for that year, its forty- 

 fifth, a total income of $8,531 ; while the amount 

 of expenditures was $2,227, and $6,225 had been 

 invested. The total amount of invested funds 

 was $10,616. The society had afforded aid to 

 twenty-one students in the Theological and 

 other schools of the Church, to the amount of 

 $1,119. The educational institutions include 

 HilMale College, Mich., which reported an 

 attendance of 867 students; Bates College, 

 Lewiston, Maine, with a theological school 

 attached; Storer College, Harper's Ferry, W. 

 Va., where special attention is given to the 

 instruction of freedmen ; Rio Grande College, 

 Gallia County, Ohio ; Ridgeville College, Ridge- 

 ville, Ind. ; and five seminaries and preparatory 

 schools. 



The Sunday-School Union made an imperfect 



report of 228 schools, with an aggregate mem- 

 bership of 25,915. 



The receipts of the Home Mission Society 

 (including $1,548 contributed through the 

 Woman's Mission Society) had been $12,955, 

 and the appropriations made by it had amount- 

 ed to $4,800. The sum of $2,034 had been 

 raised in the Church Extension department. 



The receipts of the Foreign Missionary So- 

 ciety had been $19,268, and its disbursements 

 $17,940. Its permanent fund was $8,700. The 

 mission is in India, and its returns are included 

 in the general denominational statistics under 

 the heading of the Orissa and Bengal Yearly 

 Meeting. It includes eight churches, with which 

 are connected a Bible-school, seven common 

 schools, and sixty- three jungle-schools and a 

 dispensary. The Woman's Missionary Society 

 returned $3,863 of receipts in addition to those 

 of the former society and co-operates with the 

 society in the support of schools for girls, Ze- 

 nana missions, and a Girls' Orphanage, in con- 

 nection with the Indian mission. The mission 

 returned in all 566 communicants with 40 ad- 

 ditions by baptism during the year, 3,135 Sun- 

 day-school scholars, and a native Christian com- 

 munity of 1,004 souls. The contributions by 

 native members amounted to 500 rupees. 



IV. Regular Baptists in Great Britain. The fol- 

 lowing is a summary of the statistics of the 

 regular Baptist churches in Great Britain as 

 they are given in the " Baptist Year-Book " : 



Number of churches, 1,961 ; of chapels, 

 2,894, having sitting accommodations for 882,- 

 503 persons ; of pastors, 1,434 ; of teachers in 

 Sunday-schools, 39,035; of Sunday-school 

 pupils, 384,013. 



The regular annual (spring) meetings of the 

 Baptist Union of England and Wales, and of 

 the societies affiliated with it, were held in 

 London in the last days of April. The report 

 of the Council of the Union showed that, on 

 the 31st of December, 1884, accommodation 

 existed in 3,900 chapels for 1,160,000 persons. 

 The reported membership in 2,699 churches 

 was 312,460, an increase of 7,600 from the 

 previous year. The sum of 71,000 had been 

 expended in new chapels for the provision of 

 about 18,600 sittings, and the sum of 85,000 

 had been paid toward the diminution of debt. 



The ninety-ninth annual meeting of the Bap- 

 tist Missionary Society was held April 30th. 

 Mr. Joseph Hoare presided. The receipts of 

 the society had been 67,828, and the expendi- 

 tures 67,353, the largest in one year during 

 the society's existence. The debt of the previ- 

 ous year had been removed, and the society 

 had a balance in its treasury for the first time 

 in thirteen years. Twenty-two missionaries 

 had been accepted by the committee. The 

 federated colonial churches of Australia con- 

 templated raising 2,000 a year for strength- 

 ening the mission in Eastern Bengal. 



The mission-fieldsin India, Ceylon, China, 

 Japan, Central Africa (the Congo), the west 

 coast of Africa (Cameroons and Victoria), the 



