CONGREGATIONALISTS. 



207 



Christ are in danger of perishing forever and must 

 perish forever unless saved in this life. 

 | 14. That a system of physical and metaphysical 

 is true which, by fair inference, neutral- 



izes the Christian doctrine as taught in the creed ot 

 the seminary. 



15. That there is a " new theology better than the 

 old," which we apprehend is not in harmony with the 

 creed, but fatally opposed to the same. 



16. That the said professors hold many things which 

 can not be reconciled with that orthodox and con- 

 sistent Calvinism which the statutes require of them, 

 and to which they stand publicly committed, and that in 

 repeated instances these professors have broken solemn 

 promises made when they subscribed to the creed. 



The counsel for the accused pleaded in an- 

 swer to the charges, denying the jurisdiction 

 of the Board of Visitors, which they held was 

 not an original court, but had only appellate 

 power; affirming that proceedings had been 

 begun before the Board of Trustees of the 

 Seminary, and were still pending; contending 

 that the defendants, if tried, must be tried 

 singly, and not in a body, and insisting that the 

 charges were too indefinite. The Visitors de- 

 cided, after hearing the arguments of counsel, 

 that they had original jurisdiction in the prem- 

 ises ; that no proceedings were pending in the 

 Board of Trustees for the same alleged offense ; 

 and that the complainants were rightly before 

 the board. But they directed that the charges 

 should be amended so as to proceed against the 

 respondents individually and separately ; and 

 that such charges as were indefinite should be 

 made plain. A set of complaints, amended so 

 as to present the charges in a more specific 

 form, and with the support of citations from 

 written or spoken expressions of the several 

 defendants and applying separately to each of 

 the five professors, was sent in to the Board of 

 Visitors, according to its order, on the 8th of 

 November. A motion to dismiss the cases was 

 filed on the 27th of November, and denied by 

 the board ; and, after this, the formal answers 

 of the defendants were filed. They compre- 

 hended denial of the charges as a whole, and 

 pleas to the definiteness, relevancy, or suffi- 

 ciency of the same severally. 



The hearing in the cases was begun at Bos- 

 ton, Dec. 28, when the case of Prof. Smyth 

 was taken up first, and the opening arguments 

 were made. The hearing was concluded dur- 

 ing the week, but the decision of the court had 

 not yet been declared at the end of the year. 



Congregational Statistics of England and Wales. 

 The numerical returns of the Congregational 

 churches of England and Wales, as given in 

 the "Congregational Year-Book" for 1886, 

 showed that there were 4,384 churches, branch 

 churches, and missionary stations, providing 

 sitting accommodations for 1,582,400 aduits. 

 Twenty-four new churches had been formed 

 during the year. The number of students un- 

 der ministerial training in the institutions of 

 the denomination (not including 300 native 

 students in the ten institutions of the London 

 Missionary Society) was 450. The London 

 Missionary Society returned 162 English mis- 



sionaries, 1,082 native ordained missionaries 

 and pastors, 5,054 native preachers, 91,407 

 church-members, and 325,171 native adherents. 



Congregational Union of England and Wales 

 The fifty- fourth annual meeting of the Congre- 

 gational Union of England and Wales was held 

 in London, beginning May 10. The Rev. Ed- 

 ward White presided and delivered the opening 

 address. The committee, in its annual report, 

 remarked that, while political issues of first- 

 rate importance had been before the nation, 

 they having no direct bearing on the interests 

 which the Union was set to protect, it had 

 placed nothing on record with respect to them, 

 except an expression of opinion that Sir R. 

 Webster's bill did not deal satisfactorily with 

 the question of nonconformist marriages. In 

 regard to a contemplated joint meeting of the 

 Baptist and Congregational Unions, the expla- 

 nation was made that they ought not to be 

 understood to be meetings in which one body 

 receives the other as its guest, but as " strictly 

 joint or mass meetings of the two bodies; that 

 the occasion is not one for dealing with mat- 

 ters of faith and practice in which the two 

 bodies differ ; and that there is not behind the 

 meeting any unrevealed scheme for the re- 

 moval of denominational landmarks." The 

 number of persons who had offered themselves 

 for the examinations in religious knowledge, 

 instituted by the Union, had diminished ; and, 

 in view of the comparative failure which ap- 

 peared to have so far attended the efforts, it 

 seemed desirable to consider whether some 

 method might not be devised to make these 

 examinations more attractive and useful. The 

 financial statement showed balances in favor 

 of the Union amounting to 9,334. The As- 

 sembly declared, by resolution, that, regarding 

 the appointment of a royal commission on na- 

 tional education, as raising anew the question 

 of the basis on which a national system of edu- 

 cation should be placed, it renewed its protest 

 " against the violation of the principle of re- 

 ligious equality involved in the present sys- 

 tem," and affirmed that no system would be 

 satisfactory under which national funds were 

 appropriated to schools or training colleges 

 " which, being of a sectarian character, are un- 

 der the sole control of denominational mana- 

 gers." A special committee was appointed to 

 consider the subject of social parity. 



Church Aid Society. The Congregational 

 Church Aid Society reported that during the 

 year it had assisted 697 churches and branch 

 churches, and 334 evangelistic or mission sta- 

 tions, in all 1,031 congregations, having an at- 

 tendance of 108,342 persons, of whom 37,270 

 were church-members. The grants amounted 

 to 22,887, and the churches had raised from 

 their own resources 33,722. 



London Missionary Society. The annual meet- 

 ing of the London Missionary Society was held 

 May 13. Mr. Edward Crossley, M. P., presided. 

 The income of the society for the year had 

 been 124,078. A debt of 11,400, with which 



