218 



ORDIN"ARY GENERAL MEETIXG* 

 Theophilus G. Pinches, Esq., LL.D., in the Chair, 



The Minutes of the previous Meeting were read and confirmed. 



The following elections were announced : 

 Associate. — Mrs. Charles C'hevenix Trench. 



Missionary Associatfs. — Miss. L. G. Robinson ; Eev. W. S. Moule 

 Edward C. Woodley, Esq., Principal of Lond. Miss. College^ 

 Calcutta. 



The following paper was then read by the Secretary in the absence of 

 the author : 



BEGENT DISCOVERIES IN PALESTINE IN RE- 

 LATION TO THE BIBLE. By Dr. E. W. G. Masterman. 



DISCOVERIES in Oriental lands are now accumulating so 

 fast, and excavations are being conducted by so many 

 societies and nationalities, that to keep pace with them requires 

 vigilant and unremitting study, and to report them all would 

 require volumes. There are few discoveries in ancient " Bible 

 lands" which have not some bearing on the Holy Scriptures- 

 especially in as far as the Bible claims to be a true history of 

 the progressive revelation of the one and only God. The bearing 

 of all such discoveries may be looked upon as threefold, to- 

 confirm, to illustrate, and to interpret the language of the 

 Bible. At one time the first was looked upon as the one thing 

 of consequence, but to-day, to a large extent, the illustration of 

 the Scriptures and its interpretation is generally recognised as 

 at least as important. The kind of man " who will believe- 

 any thing that is oiot in the Bible " is disappearing, and it is- 

 generally recognised that the Old Testament, as a collection of 

 historical documents, has the highest claims to consideration by 

 secular historians, while, on the other hand, we know that records 

 in clay and stone are by no means free from mistakes and even 

 wilful misstatements. 



The position of Palestine with regard to all such investigation.s- 

 must ever be unique. In the first place all light thrown on 



* Monday, May 13tli, 1907 



