ANNUAL ADDKESS. 



■2) 



lewer gods, and in tlie end to monotheism. The spiritual 

 powers resident in all natural objects converge into the one 

 great spiritual power who is called God. And the gradual 

 ennoblement of religion lies in the purging away of all the 

 material imaginations which have gathered around the pure 

 spirituality of God Himself. For when once the existence 

 of spiritual beings, many or few, was apprehended, the belief 

 in the one Supreme spiritual Being was a sure result of time 

 and thought. 



In this paper I have treated the origin of religion from the 

 human side alone. I have inquired how man, being such as he is 

 and living in such a world as he inhabits, developed his religious 

 instincts and capacities. But there is a divine side as well to 

 religion. For man is religious, because God has created in 

 him a natural aptitude for religion. He owes his religious 

 interpretation of the natural world to the constitution of his 

 own nature. Also, however much he may reflect upon external 

 nature, however eagerly he may seek to discover in it the 

 counterpart of his own natural character, yet the sublime 

 truths of the Christian religion are such as he cannot learn for 

 himself, but must get to know^, if at all, by direct spontaneous 

 revelation of God. For revelation is in fact nothing else than 

 the divine communication of vastly important spiritual truths 

 which man is, and must ever be, impotent to discover apart 

 from the inspiration of God. 



Resolutiox. 



Moved by Professor J. W. Spencer, D.Sc, and seconded by 

 Colonel T. H. Hendley, CLE., and carried, " That the thanks of 

 the Meeting are hereby accorded to the Right Rev. Bishop "Welldon, 

 D.D., for his able and interesting address." 



The following Resolutions were also put to the Meeting by the 

 President and carried : — 



