BOSTON MONDAY LECTURES. 



BY JOSEPH COOK. 



HISTORY OF THE LECTURES. 



The Eibliotheca Sacra, January, 1878. 



MB. JOSEPH COOK was invited, early in September, 1875, by tbo 

 Young Men's Christian Association of Boston, to lead the noon 

 prayer-meeting in the Meionaon daily for a week, and to make on 

 each jccasion an address of half an hour in length. After four of 

 these services, it was found that the audience had quadrupled in size. 

 Mr. Cook was requested to continue his addresses daily through 

 another week. On Monday noon, Sept. 23, the subject was " Final 

 Permanence of Moral Character; or, The Doctrine of Future Pun- 

 ishment," and it was noticed that a hundred ministers were in the 

 audience. Mr. Cook was then requested to speak on the Atonement, 

 on a Sabbath evening, in Park-street Church. He complied with 

 this request, and spoke to an audience filling the house to its utmost 

 capacity. He was then invited by the Young Men's Christian Asso- 

 ciation to speak every Monday noon, in the Meionaon, for twelve 

 weeks. Oct. 25 his subject was " Boston Sceptical Cliques." " The 

 Daily Advertiser" had a reporter present, who reproduced a part of 

 the address. " The Springfield Republican " began to call attention 

 to the large number of ministers and scholars who were present at 

 the Monday Lectures. It was suggested, in many quarters, that 

 these lectures should be continued regularly through the winter. 

 Meantime, Mr. Cook was delivering one course of lectures at Am- 

 herst College, and another at Mount Holyoke Seminary, largely on 

 Materialism, Evolution, and various biological topics. The Meio- 

 naon Hall seats about eight hundred persons, and in January, 1876, 

 was completely filled by Mr. Cook's hearers. After four months 

 had passed, the assemblies were occasionally gathered in Bromfield- 

 street Church. The lectures continued to be under the auspices of 

 the Young Men's Christian Association, until May, 1876, when, at a 

 meeting in Bromfield-street Church, resolutions were passed found- 

 ing the Boston Monday Lectureship, and placing it, for the next 

 season, under the care of a committee, consisting of Prof. E. P. 

 Gould of the Newton Theological Institute, the Rev. Dr. E. B. 

 Webb of Boston, the Rev. Dr. McKeown, the Rev. Samuel Cutler, 

 the Rev. Mr. Deming, the Rev. Edward Edmunds, and the Rev. 

 "VV. M. Baker, men of different evangelical denominations. The 

 lectures for 1875-76 continued eight months, and closed, with the 

 forty-fifth of the course, on the last Monday in May, in Bromfield- 

 street Church. 



In October, 1876, the lectures were resumed in the Meionaon; 

 but the hall was found to be too small for the audience. It was, 



