645th ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING. 



Held in Committee Room B, 



THE CENTRAL HALL, WESTMINSTER, on Monday, 

 June 12th, 1922, at 4.30 p.m. 



Lieut. -Colonel G. Mackinlay in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the previous meeting were read, confirmed and signed, 

 and the Hon. Secretary announced the election of Mr. John C. Procter 

 as an Associate. 



Lieut. -Colonel Mackinlay, as Chairman, said : Miss Hodgkin has 

 been an Associate of the Victoria Institute for several years, and she 

 is a constant attendant at the reading of the papers, but this is the 

 first time she has read a paper here herself. She is not, however, 

 unversed in literary matters, as she has written an excellent book, 

 " Christ in all the Scriptures," which not only has a wide circulation in 

 English, but has also been translated into Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, 

 French and German : she is also co-Editor of the " Friends' Witness," 

 which is valued by Bible students, containing many articles which 

 combat the false teachings of Modernism : this periodical frequently 

 quotes the papers of our Institute, and Miss Hodgkin has written a 

 good article in the last issue, which draws very favourable attention to 

 our " Tracts for New Times," a service which only an Editor is able 

 to render. We thank her warmly for this help. I will now ask Miss 

 Hodgkin to read her paper. 



THE WITNESS OF ARCHAEOLOGY TO THE BIBLE. 

 By Miss A. M. Hodgkin. 



The little land of Palestine has for centuries been an isolated 

 country. Now a network of railways is fast linking it up with 

 East and West, and it is once more becoming the centre of the 

 world. Before long it will be easier for all mankind to visit 

 Jerusalem than any other place on this earth. Its importance 

 from a military and from a commercial point of view is realised 

 by politicians, but the Bible student sees in all this a fulfilment 

 of prophecy. A great future awaits this land. 



In ancient times Palestine was likewise the centre of the 

 world. Dr. Masterman writes: — " It was in no out-of-the-way 

 c(jrner of the earth that the race, through whom revelation came, 

 was located by the Divine purpose, but in the very turmoil of 

 the strife of nations, buffeted between the smaller nations in the 

 immediate neighbourhood — the Philistines, the Ammonites, the 

 Moabites, the Edomites, the Syrians, and the restless children 

 of the Desert, and ground betwixt the interchange of blow upon 

 blow between Assyria and Babylonia, or the Grseco-Syrian Em- 

 pire of the Seleucidse and Egypt. How small and how weak a 

 race they were in almost all their history we realise as they 

 appear as two small states, among many others, in the monu- 

 ments. And yet God prepared this race, as He moulds the 

 choicest individual characters of His saints — in the furnace of 



