ishing. I believe that the debt will be eventually cancelled; that, before this day closes, the sum specified as necessary to extinguish one half of it will be realized; and that we shall go down to the country with hearts rejoicing in hope, that the period is not very far distant, when the whole will be wiped away, and when we shall have it in our power to say we have complied with the divine command, "Owe no man anything, but to love one another." However, I confess, I am more solicitous at this moment as to the question of getting up the regular annual income of the Society to what I believe ought to be the annual expenditure of the Society for the time to come, than as to any other question. That is the point that presses on my mind, and which I wish to impress on the minds of my friends present, that they may go and recommend it to their friends in the country, because I see many friends from the country here to-day. This Missionary Society ought, at least, to have a regular annual income of some £10,000 or £12,000 above what it has even yet reached, in order to enable it efficiently to go on in that great work to which God in his providence has called it. Now, the inquiry has occurred to my mind, What should we do to effect this object? Three things have struck me. In the first place, as we all know that knowledge must go before practice, my conviction is, that the religious public, as regards some portion of that public, and that the people of this country in many parts of it, are not, to this hour, sufficiently informed on the Missionary subject. With all the stores of information they possess on other subjects, somehow or other, they have not informed themselves of the urgency of the claims of the Missionary cause as they ought to have informed themselves. Well, then, what shall we all do in reference to this? Why, make better use than we ever have done of all our Missionary Notices, of all our Missionary Papers, and of all our Missionary Reports. I would charge all those who get Missionary Reports not to keep them to themselves, but to lend them out, to circulate them in their vicinity, and to afford those an opportunity of reading them who are able to do something in support of this Society. I happen to know an instance myself, in which a gentleman of education, of influence, and of property, had a Report of this Society put into his hand by a friend. He read that Report with amazement. He had no conception, as he stated, that such a great work as this was in operation;

and, after reading it, he returned it with an expression of his high approbation, and accompanied that expression with a handsome donation to the Society. I am sure that this is not a solitary case, because I believe there are hundreds, and perhaps thousands, in our own country, who have little idea of the magnitude of the work in which we are engaged. It is to my mind refreshing, that the press is just now teeming with Missionary publications. I have already read several narratives of Missions, and there are others coming forth, by Missionaries themselves, and which I know to be replete with information; and I am sure you will not forget a work by one of your respected Secretaries, (Dr. Alder,) nor indeed another Report from another respected Secretary of your Society. Then I turn with pleasure to those Missionary Prize Essays which have just issued from the press: I think of the "Great Commission," and of four or five more admirable Essays written on the same occasion, and about the same date; and I could travel south and north, I could go beyond the Tweed, and find one which comes from Fife, which is far north, (Mr. Macfarlane's,) of very high excellence indeed. Why, those publications, independently of the mass of Missionary information they contain, independently of the spirit of piety and devotion which they breathe, and of their value as specimens of sanctified zeal, even on the ground of elegance of composition, deserve a place amongst our best English works; and I do hope they will be read by many who will feel it their duty to come forward, and be the liberal supporters of this cause. Then, I would humbly submit, that we should all make this great matter, more than we have ever done, the subject of prayer; that we should settle it with ourselves this day in the presence of the Heart-Searcher, and that we should bring this subject more frequently, and with greater earnestness and importunity, to the throne of the heavenly grace. We know that God hears prayer, and we should not only beseech his blessing upon the Missionaries, that he may preserve their persons and their health, and that he may give his blessing to their labours; but we should specially pray that He who can turn the rivers would open the hearts of men that can give, that they may be rendered willing to contribute in favour of this cause. It has been said, that he who has the ear of God has the arm of God; and as it is the privilege of every person within these walls (of every devout man) to have the ear of God, then

it is his privilege to have the arm of God; and if the Almighty Arm be stretched out in favour of our efforts, what power can stay our success? I take shame and confusion to myself this day, that I have not prayed a great deal more for this cause. I resolve in future to pray more for it; not merely in the sanctuary; (for we Ministers all do that ;) not merely when we unite in social prayer; not merely at the family altar; but I charge it upon myself, and would charge it upon all my friends, that we all become what I have heard designated as Closet-Missionaries; that we carry this case into our closets, and lay it before that God who hears and answers prayer. Then, in the next place, I know there is a very intimate connexion between praying and giving. When a man is interested by praying much and fervently for Missions, if he has the means in his pocket, they will soon be in his hand, and be freely distributed in support of that for which he prays. Now it is not the question with me, What does this man? nor, What does that man ?-What is his property? or, What is my property? The question with me is, What do I? What do I as an individual? Am I doing what I can? that is the question. I would not dictate to any man the way and manner in which he shall give. I know there are some that are accounting for the past; they are looking back to the period when they first became subscribers to this Society, or to some kindred Society, and are subscribing for every previous year during which they might have subscribed, and are thus making themselves, in a good sense, life-subscribers. There are others, and I know one gentleman in particular (and I was struck with his plan) who subscribes an additional guinea every year, because he knows that, at the end of every year, he has a year less to live; and, therefore, as the year passes away, so an additional guinea comes from him in aid of this Society. Now I say from my heart, Sir, (and you, Mr. Chairman, know the meaning of this phrase,) "Long life to that gentleman!" Ay, and long life to all who will be like-minded with him, and who will resolve, every year they live, to give an additional guinea to this cause, because they have a year less to live in the world. Now, I am happy to say, that although these are all our friends, yet they are not all the friends we have. I found a letter waiting for me on Saturday evening, when I came to town, which was not empty. It was from a friend, Francis Riggall, Esq., of Louth, who would have been present at this Meeting,

but circumstances occurred which ren dered it impossible that he should be here. In his letter he stated, that he felt deeply on the subject; and though he is a liberal annual subscriber, and gives freely, and very often occupies elsewhere the position which you, Mr. Chairman, occupy here this day, and in which it is refreshing for me to see an old friend, (if you will permit me, Sir, to say so,) who has been year after year with us. In his letter this gentleman says, that he regrets he cannot be here; he devoutly prays that our blessed Master may be with us, and that his presence may be realized. He refers to the debt of the Society, and wishes to contribute to the extinction of it; he refers to the wants of the Society, and to the sending out of more Missionaries; and he incloses to me £100, to be disposed of partly for the liquidation of the debt, and partly for the general objects of the Society. He does more; for, what gratifies me more than the donation of £100 is, that he tells me he is resolved to increase his annual subscription. states that he will increase his annual subscription to the amount of £30 per annum for himself, and £20 for his better self.

He

By the way, if he were here, I do not know but I should take a liberty. I might say, I do not know why a man's better self should not be in these efforts, as good as himself: however, that is a matter to be settled in the proper place; the grand thing for us is, that this gentleman, with his excellent wife, will be subscribers of £50 per annum to this Society. I happen to know a Wesleyan Minister, who has felt so intensely on this subject, that he has had night-thoughts many a time, and he has communicated his thoughts often to me. He has thought, Well, what can be done? and he has come to the conclusion, that his subscription to the Society must be augmented. Accordingly, that brother-Minister has resolved that he will double, that he will treble, that he will quadruple, that he will quintuple his subscription! That is to say, that he will make his one into five pounds; and he has resolved that he will do this by honest and honourable means. What do you suppose those means are? He has resolved that he will go without his dinner two or three days in the week, rather than he shall not be able to do this; for, he says, he feels that he can better do without that than the perishing Heathen can do without Christ. Now I hope we shall all go away from this Meeting also resolved to increase our regular and stated subscriptions; and I hope we shall find this resolution carried

out throughout the length and breadth of the land; for then we shall have a regular income, raised to such an amount, as that this Society will be enabled to answer the calls now so urgently made upon it; and that some of those young men upon our List, now ready and longing to go away, may be sent off to some place of usefulness. I shall never forget the expression of one of them, a short time ago, to me. He said, "Till this hour, I never felt tempted to murmur at my poverty: O that I were a rich man! If I were, my outfit and my passage should be paid by myself, and away I should go to some distant part of the world, there to proclaim the Gospel of Christ; but I have not the money to enable me to do 89, and I do not murmur at Providence; I do not murmur at my poverty; but I do murmur at the rich." May you all pray that the rich may be induced to give the money, so that we may be able to send such men out. If these three suggestions are worth anything, they are heartily tendered to you, and I hope they will tend to benefit the Society. I do delight in the harmonious and hallowed proceedings of this day, and I think we may all take courage, and say from our hearts, in the language of our venerable Founder, "The best of all is, God is with us.

The REV. ALFRED BARRETT, of Leeds, without any observations, seconded the Resolution. Upon the Rev. gentleman sitting down, a general call was made for him throughout the hall. After a short time, he rose and said, He felt extreme difficulty in attempting to address that large assembly, oppressed as he was with over-mastering emotions. At the best, he could render the cause but very little aid. It appeared to him, however, to be an encouraging circumstance, and a sign of advancement, to find that not only the great, the noble, and the highly-gifted assisted this cause, but likewise the obscure and the humble. On behalf of the church of Christ, he might, perhaps, be able to plead, that this cause had at least connected with it purity of motive, comprehensiveness of moral vision, and everything that bespoke attachment to Christ, and concern for a perishing world. There were · many claims upon the public attention at the present day, many causes calling for our assistance; and men were very angry if we did not pay regard to them and to the authority they claimed. He might, perhaps, be permitted to claim authority for this cause; and he claimed authority for it on the ground of the unearthly and gracious spirit which had possessed many of its adherents. Was

it ever known that an individual had crossed the Atlantic thirteen times, not to accumulate money, but to spend it, as did Dr. Coke? Did any one ever cast the light of a profound and hallowed genius upon the subject of the Negro slave and the savage, without employing it to dignify his own intellectual existence, as did Richard Watson? Did any one ever, for any other cause but this, descend into the caverns of Chillumbrum, amid the midnight orgies of Brahmins, and preach the everlasting Gospel, as did his friend, Thomas Cryer, and men of a like order in other Christian communities? Did any savage, through any other than the Missionary instrumentality, ever arise in the recovered image of his God, and then preach the same salvation to the tribes among whom he roamed, as did John Sunday? Was it ever known, that any individual save a Missionary pressed through crowds of suspicious Africans, up to the blood-stained fetish-stool of Kumasi, into the very presence-chamber of Ashánti, and there proclaimed that he came to declare another kingdom-a kingdom that should never end, as did Thomas Freeman ? On these and many other grounds, which he could mention, he claimed authority for this cause of God. He might claim to place it before the Meeting without arguing it, as did the Apostles, throwing it upon the authority of the Almighty God. Its authority was not like that of the wind in the fable, which roared around its object, and endeavoured to obtain, by fitful gusts, that which it could not obtain by mild perseverance; it was more like that of the sun, which permeated by its rays every conflicting element, till it had dissolved them all in its own radiancy. At present, the cause might seem to be noiseless, when compared with the hum and bustle of mankind; yet God was not the less with it on that account. God worked in omnipotence, though it might be in silence. This cause must prosper; it had been fore-written to prosper; it had already prospered. By and by, the scene would be changed, and the triumphs of the cause would be published by the seven last thunders and the trump of God.

The REV. THOMAS CRYER, Missionary from Madras, said,-That he had thought, while listening to the proceedings, that there must have been a desire excited, in a great number of breasts, to go out to preach the Gospel in distant lands. The Missionary cause was not one now that was doubtful. Every one felt it to be an honourable

cause, the cause of God, which had for its object the salvation of our fellowmen. He had felt the excitement very much indeed; but he did not owe his Missionary feeling to the excitement of this or any other Meeting. It was now a great many years since he had first drunk in the Missionary spirit. He might say, he had drunk it in with his mother's milk. It was his privilege to have been born in the town in which, as he understood, the third Wesleyan Missionary Meeting had been held, and ever since then he had felt the Missionary spirit burning in his bo som; indeed it had grown with his growth, and strengthened with his strength. Perhaps he had had sufficient, in some of his foreign trials, to have quenched the flame, if it could have been quenched. If ten years' labour under a tropical sun, if personal sickness, if personal trials, if family sickness, if family deaths, and a variety of hardships scarcely to be enumerated, could have reduced or destroyed that flame, it would long since have been extinguished; but he felt it to be as strong that day as ever; and he felt that his having been permitted to attend this Meeting had been a blessing to him, as he trusted it would be to many others. He had heard one of the respected Secretaries of the Society say, a short time ago, that he had never known a returned Missionary, who did not try to prove that his field of labour was the most important field. He thought this was as it ought to be, because whosoever returned from the field of zealous labour would have pressure from within and pressure from without, and would come with his heart full of the wants and the woes of the people he had left behind; and he could not fail to come and say, that his field of labour was the most important; he could not fail to feel it to be such to himself. He (Mr. Cryer) had been somewhat sorry, that other Missionaries had not preceded him at this Meeting, so as to have taken up other parts of the Missionary field. Had that been the case, he had no doubt they would have endeavoured to show, that theirs were the most important posts occupied by the Society. This was as it ought to be; because when all the various parts were thus successively brought forward, they, taken together, made the most important whole the world ever saw. The Society desired, not the conversion of the African only, not the conversion of the South-Sea islander only, but the conversion of the whole world. The

great object was, to bring the whole world under the influence of Christianity. For his own part, in proof that the field from which he had returned was one of the most important occupied by this Missionary Society, he would simply refer to one or two particulars. He looked upon India, with its one hundred and twenty millions of inhabitants, in a political point of view. Amongst them were nearly one hundred millions of our fellow-subjects, the mass of whom were admirers of English rule; and only let them have the privileges which they had a right to expect, and they would continue to be attached to us. But how were we to retain India? Senators might devise other means for that purpose than those which a man in his situation might be able to suggest; but he would say, let them have the Gospel; for he was persuaded, that that would best attach them to the British Crown. Upon his return home, he touched at the Cape, and there conversed with his brother Hodgson, who told him, that if the Society would only send out more Missionaries along the coast of Africa, they would do more towards putting down the slave-trade than all the slave-cruisers that could be sent from England. So, as to India, he would say, if this and other Societies could only send out a sufficient number of Missionaries to India, they would do more towards effectually retaining India as a British possession, than all the armies that could be sent there. Look at India as a commercial field. It was capable of producing all the silk, cotton, indigo, rice, tea, coffee, and many other things, which this country might require for centuries to come; and let it be recollected that that would be the produce of free labour, not of slaves, but of free labour by our fellow-subjects, who obey the British laws, and who would continue to assist in making this country happy. He would not enter upon the question of India's receiving our produce, though his own opinion was, that it might become one of the best markets for the reception of our manufactures. was, however, another point more particularly deserving notice. In a religious point of view, India was exceedingly important. It was not to be understood, that the hundred and twenty millions of whom he had spoken were all idolaters, though they were nearly all destitute of Christianity. There were amongst them a great mass of Mahommedans, and a great mass of what the Brahmins term infidels. The majority of them, how

There