PRESBYTERIANS. 



PRISON REFORM. 



701 



The contributions from these schools for the 

 year amounted to 2,951. The total congrega- 

 tional income for the year was 159,550, or 

 2,721 more than in the previous year. The 

 commutation trustees returned a capital account 

 of 587,735, the same as in the previous year. 

 The income for Foreign Missions had been 

 12,728, showing an increase of 700. The 

 Aged and Infirm Ministers' fund secured a re- 

 tiring allowance of 100 to each minister. 



The General Assembly met in Belfast June 

 6. The Rev. Dr. Orr was chosen moderator. 

 The business transacted was chiefly of a rou- 

 tine character, without questions to excite act- 

 ive discussion. The " Revised Book of the 

 Constitution and Government of the Church 

 and Directory for the Administration of Ordi- 

 nances " was adopted. The subject of raffling 

 at bazaars, which was brought up in the report 

 on the State of Religion and Evangelization, 

 was referred to a committee for consideration. 

 The erection of a Victoria Jubilee Assembly 

 Hall was decided upon. Deputies were ap- 

 pointed to attend the Presbyterian Alliance 

 and the Centennial Celebration of Presby- 

 terianism in America. 



XIII. Welsh < ahinistif Methodists. Statistics of 

 this Church were presented to the General As- 

 sembly, of which the following is a summary : 

 Number of congregations, 1,224; of ministers, 

 619 ordained, and 370 not ordained ; of dea- 

 cons, 4,505 ; of communicants, 128,401 ; of ad- 

 herents, 278,039 ; of teachers in Sunday-schools, 

 23,898 ; of pupils in Sunday-schools, 186,740 ; 

 amount of contributions during the year, 172,- 

 012. The amount contributed for missions 

 was 6.080. Of 1,252 chapels belonging to the 

 connection, 652 were freehold and 600 lease- 

 hold. The General Assembly met in Liver- 

 pool in May. Rev. Owen Thomas, D. D., was 

 chosen moderator. Gains of 363 members and 

 827 adherents were reported in the English 

 churches. The subject of dealing with the 

 chapel debts, which had grown from 202,000 

 in 1871 to 325,000, was referred to the pro- 

 vincial synods. A proposition for the union of 

 the colleges at Balaand Treveccawas relegated 

 to the committee appointed to consider the 

 question of union between the two provinces 

 of Wales. The object of the Intermediate 

 Education Bill recently introduced into Parlia- 

 ment was commended, but the bill was declared 

 " both inadequate and unsuitable to the require- 

 ments of the principality." 



XIV. Original Secession "Chnreh of Scotland. At 

 the meeting of the Synod, a committee was 

 appointed to consider the condition of the 

 Church and report to the next meeting. The 

 mover of the motion for appointing the com- 

 mittee said that, if affairs continued to go on as 

 they had been going, there would be great 

 danger of the Church losing its identity. The 

 present number of members was shown by the 

 reports to be only 3,475. 



XV. Federal Assembly of Australia. The Pres- 

 byterian Federal Assembly of Australia is a 



body, the purpose of which is to promote the 

 organic unity of the Presbyterian Church 

 throughout the Australian colonies. At its 

 second meeting, held in 1887, steps were taken 

 to perfect the machinery for federal action. 

 A scheme was advanced for the common train- 

 ing and uniform examination of theological 

 candidates; and additional measures were in- 

 stituted for securing a uniform directory of 

 worship, with a view as was understood, not 

 of destroying individual liberty in the conduct 

 of public worship, but of protecting the order 

 of worship from undue caprice. 



PRISON REFORM. Prison reform during the 

 past quarter of a century has been almost en- 

 tirely experimental; and it is only within the 

 past decade that the science of penology has 

 shaped for itself a body of principles and pre- 

 cepts that are likely to be permanent. Prior 

 to the enunciation of the indeterminate-sen- 

 tence principle by the Hon. Frederick Hill and 

 its modified application in the prisons of Ire- 

 land under Sir Walter Crofton, with its more 

 complete realization in the New York State 

 Reformatory, the protection of society by 

 mere incarceration of law-breakers was the 

 dominant idea of most of the prison systems. 

 Prison discipline, from the earliest records to 

 the beginning of the present century, had in 

 it the following principles: 1. Retribution for 

 injury done to society. 2. Protection to so- 

 ciety by incarceration or banishment or death. 

 3. Protection to society by deterrent example 

 of punishments. The practical working of 

 these principles resulted in such a state of the 

 prisons as called forth the labors of John 

 Howard and Elizabeth Fry in England, and of 

 the Philadelphia Society for the Alleviation of 

 the Miseries of Public Prisons in America. 

 The malefactor was regarded as an enemy of 

 society, and an effort was made to mete out to 

 him a degree of retributive justice such as 

 should make him suffer for the injury he had 

 done, not with a view to the uplifting of the 

 culprit, but to inflict punishment for the sake 

 of the pain to get the criminal out of sight, 

 out of the temporary possibility of doing 

 harm ; to make the pain of his punishment a 

 popularly recognized sequence of his wrong- 

 doing. The practical result was, that men 

 were treated in prison as outcasts, were re- 

 turned to society with enmity in their hearts, 

 unfitted to cope with the forces of society, 

 branded as criminals, and at the same time the 

 principle of deterrence was found to be almost 

 wholly inoperative either upon the imprisoned 

 malefactor or the class from which he came. 

 It was not until the early part of the present 

 century that better statistics made the world 

 aware how little had been accomplished by the 

 prevailing prison systems. The great work 

 of Beccaria on "Crimes and Punishments" 

 (1764) laid down principles that at once ar- 

 rested the respectful attention of social scien- 

 tists. But there were at that time no gem-mi 

 statistics and no collated information. There 



