EPHESIANS, i. 10.

That in the dispensation of the fulness of times, he might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth.

I AM called upon to address you this day on a remarkable occasion. It is one of those epochs which make glad the Church of Christ, and which old believers may rejoice to have lived to see.

In order to estimate rightly the progress of any thing in this world, it is necessary to survey it during some considerable intervals of time. For instance if at this season we look forth upon the trees, what do we see? Nothing but marks of death, ruin, and decay; every where we see the yellow leaf fluttering helplessly on the bough, or carried downwards on the breeze to mingle with its mother earth. If we look again in a short time, not even this will meet our eyes, there will be nothing but bare stems, and branches dark, as it were with mourning for the summer that is gone--but there will be no sign of life, far less of growth, visible. If then we were to form our opinion of the state of vegetation from so scanty a survey as this, we should pronounce that its period of growth was gone; but if we were to extend the time of our observation, we should find the apparently dead branches, quickened by the reviving Spring, sending forth their shoots nearer and nearer to the sky, and growing in strength and beauty. Thus too it is needful to judge of the growth of the Christian Church; it has had its periods of growth and of decay; it has had its summer and its winter; and alas! its winters have been long and dreary! And at times generation after generation seemed to be passing by without any mark of growth, so that the lookers on have exclaimed that its vitality was gone; and the Infidel, or the self-complacent Sceptic with much. inward gratulation at his own wisdom, has asserted that

Christianity was rapidly becoming numbered with the creeds now only visible in the crumbling ruins of the temples which their votaries frequented, for that growth had stopped and decay was coming on. At such seasons in the history of the Church there needs much of the enlarged sight of faith to support the few who are found faithful, there needs then a close application of the promises of God to His Church in order to believe that the blossoming time shall yet come. And doubtless then to the observant spiritual eye there may be visible what may hereafter shoot forth with vigourous growth, and spread the shade and protection of the Church far over the realms of Satan; just as close inspection in the depth of winter discovers the buds which the summer's sun will foster, and the genial rains will nourish, until they offer an inviting shelter. The difficulty then in such seasons of decay in the Church's growth, arises from our short span of life, and our limited reach of vision. To the Almighty, who sees all His plan from the Creation to the consummation of the world spread before Him with equal distinctness, these intervals of growth and decay all appear in the order in which He has appointed them, and all conduce to the completion of His design. To us only can there be an apparent difficulty, and to that difficulty there is no solution but Faith.

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Such however is not the present time; we are met, not to mourn over decay, but to rejoice at growth; not to lament losses, but to celebrate triumphs. We are met, not in the Winter of the Church, but in (as we trust) a reviving Spring, when growth has already begun, and there is large promise of abundant increase. But if we carry back our thoughts fifty years, we shall find ourselves in a very different atmosphere, we shall find ourselves in one of those periods of stagnation and stoppage of increase of which I have spoken How it had come to pass, does not fall within the province of this discourse to consider, though I may passingly notice it in some degree--but so it was that deadness and formality had crept over Christians every where to an alarming extent. Doubtless it was that the Church had not looked sufficiently for the guidance of the blessed Spirit of promise, and there

fore failed to feel his life-giving influence: but among secondary causes we may remark that during the last century it had to combat a spirit of infidelity which was alarmingly prevalent, and especially so among persons of the higher ranks of life. Now you will observe that the weapons needful for combating this spirit of infidelity are not in any great degree spiritual weapons, nor requiring a deep piety to use them. To the spiritual mind indeed, no proof is so strong as that drawn from its own experience of the vital truth of the doctrines professed, according to that saying of our Lord, "If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine, whether it be of God." But from its very nature, this proof drawn from experience is not applicable against the infidel, who must be answered by calm and deep reasoning, and arguments drawn from all the sources which philosophy and history can supply. And ably did our fathers in the church of the last century fulfil this duty; strong, clear, and convincing were their proofs of the divine foundations of our holy faith; but nevertheless this duty perhaps tended to withdraw their attention from the more spiritual parts of religion, and may have fostered a feeling of satisfaction at holding their ground, without an effort to make fresh conquests.

But whatever we may think of these or other reasons which may be assigned on surveying past history, it is clear that fifty years ago, a period to which our attention is drawn this day, there was a great spirit of slumber upon the church, and but little growth visible. We must not however so magnify this society, as to lead any one here present to suppose that the church had done nothing for the spread of the Gospel before its institution, on the contrary it had already possessed for a century those two noble and useful societies the Christian Knowledge and the Gospel Propagation Societies, and these two had done work which has in our own days shown much good fruit both in America and the East Indies. And some, especially of the Archbishops and Bishops of our church, had from time to time manifested their sense of the great duty which lay upon them in this respect; but the people and the great body of the clergy were utterly regardless and ignorant of it. To shew this clearly, mark well the sums

which were contributed to those Societies in the year 1799, when the Church Missionary Society was founded. They are these; the contributions to the Christian Knowledge Society amounted to little more than £2280, and to the Propagation Society to about £706, which together gives less than £3000 per annum from all our Church for Missionary purposes.

This will describe what was the state of the church when the founders of this Society stepped in. And the beginning which they made was in like manner feeble, but they were men of energy, men of faith, and men of prayer, who knew God's promises, and could appeal to them and stay their souls upon them. It is recorded that the first meeting to found the Society (not a public one) consisted of twenty-five persons, none of them men of high station or worldly influence; and that even at the end of the first ten years of its existence its income was scarcely more than £2000, whilst five years elapsed before it could send out any missionaries at all. How is the scene changed now! Its income is more than £100,000. It supports a band of one hundred and thirty-nine Clergymen, besides a numerous body of native teachers; it possesses more than six hundred Schools containing more than thirty thousand Scholars. The communicants gathered from the heathen are more than thirteen thousand; and if so, how many must the hearers be! When its operations were first begun, they could meet with no men who were both fit and willing to go out as missionaries, and after five years waiting they found two, and those two were foreigners. Now it has a College of its own for the express education of missionary Clergymen. This then is the change within fifty years; this the growth and increase of this Society.-The good seed planted has born fruit a hundred-fold. The mustard seed, which was committed to the earth as one of the smallest of grains, has sent upward its branches. Many nations are beginning to take shelter under the spiritual care afforded by this Society. What shall we then say ? "Let no man despise the day of small things." "What hath God wrought!"

Thus then have I said sufficient to justify me in speaking as I have done of this as a period of growth in the Church. But I should not have set before you an adequate representa

tion of the whole, if I did not notice one or two other encouraging facts. I mentioned just now the income of the two old Societies fifty years ago not reaching £3000 a year. Now has this newer Society pushed them out of the field? Has it opposed them, thwarted them, interfered with them in any way? Far from it; they have grown, and spread their branches wider and wider also, in a way they little dreamed of fifty years ago; the Christian Knowledge Society now expends annually about £94,000, and the Propagation Society about £68,000-Each occupies its own field of labour, and if ever there are little rivalries at home, they work together abroad in peace and unity. But I have not done It is well, we may say, but are there healthier symptoms at home? It is well to care for heathen, but have we bestowed a thought on our people at home? Surely, brethren, we have here something to tell. All know what a great number of addi

tional Churches have been built for the service of God within these fifty years. Schools have arisen every where. Bibles been sent forth by millions. There is increased activity wherever we turn our eyes. But this is not the purport of my present discourse to detail-I have only to hint at it; I have only to keep before your attention the fact of the great growth and increase of our Church within these fifty years. And I the more wish to keep the subject in this enlarged point of view, because it more clearly presents to us the great point at which all such statements as I have been making ought to aim; namely, that if this be so, then God has been powerfully acting upon the Church by His Holy Spirit, and according to the prayer of the prophet has "revived his work in the midst of the years." Therefore did I first notice the wonderful blessing which God has vouchsafed to this Society, and which we are now met to celebrate, and then showed you that this is only part of the blessing, that it does not stand alone-but that He has been sending from heaven rich dews upon His inheritance, and refreshing it when it was weary ; and therefore it begins to be as the Prophet said, "The desert shall rejoice and blossom as the rose"; and therefore we look for the fulfilment of that other word of the Prophet, "For as the earth bringeth forth her bud, and as the garden causeth the