and surrounded by the children and children's children of his old disciples, who had long since passed away. Overwhelming evidence exists to show what preachwas before and in his day; overwhelming evidence exists to show what the Church and people of England were before and in his dayhow dull, how vapid, how soulless, how Christless was the preaching; how torpid, how Laodicean was the Church, how godless, how steeped in immorality was the land. Wesley was mainly granted the task, for which he was set apart by the hands of invisible consecration, the task which even an archangel might have envied him, of awakening a a mighty revival of the religious life in those dead pulpits, in that slumbering Church, in that corrupt society.

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His was the religious sincerity which not only founded the Wesleyan community, but, working through the heart of the very Church which had despised him, flashed fire into her whitening embers. Changing its outward forms, the work of John Wesley caused first the Evangelical movement, then the High Church movement; and, in its enthusiasm of humanity, has even reappeared in all that is best in the humble Salvationists, who learned from the example of Wesley what Bishop Lightfoot called "that lost secret of Christianity, the compulsion of human souls." Recognizing no utterance of authority as equally supreme with that which came to him from the Sinai of conscience; Wesley did the thing and scorned the consequence. was the voice which offered hope to the despairing and welcome to the outcast. His was the voice which, sounding forth over the Valley of Dry Bones, cried, " Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain that they may live." The poet says:

His

Of those three hundred grant but three To make a new Thermopyla.

And when I think of John Wesley, the organizer, of Charles Wesley, the poet, of George Whitefield, the orator of this mighty movement, I feel inclined to say of those three self-sacrificing and holy men, grant but even one to help in the mighty work which yet remains to be accomplished. Had we but three such now,

Hoary-headed Selfishness would feel His death-blow, and would totter to his grave;

A brighter light attend the human day, When every transfer of earth's natural gift Should be a commerce of good words and works.

We have, it is true, hundreds of faithful workers in the Church of England and in other religious communities. But for the slaying of dragons, the rekindlement of irresistible enthusiasm, the redress of intolerable wrongs, a Church needs many Pentecosts and many Resurrections. And these, in the providence of God, are brought about, not by committees and conferences and common workers, but by men who escape the average; by men who come forth from the multitude; by men who, not content to trudge on in the beaten paths of commonplace and the cart-ruts of routine, go forth, according to their Lord's command, into the highways and hedges; by men in whom the love of God burns like a consuming flame upon the altar of the heart; by men who have become electric to make myriads of other souls thrill with their own holy zeal. Such men are necessarily rare, but God's richest boon to any nation, to any society, to any church, is the presence and work of such a manand such a man was John Wesley.

The memorial placed in Westminster Abbey to the memory of John Wesley, more than twenty years ago, was a very tardy recog

energy, "I look on all the world as my parish;" another, so full of bright and holy confidence, "God buries his workmen, but continues his work; "the third, when, on his death-bed, uplifting victoriously his feeble and emaciated arm, he said: The best of all is, God is with us." ." "Yes!" he exclaimed again, in a tone of victorious rapture, "the best of all is, God is with us."

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influence.

Like early Christianity itself, it took hold of the lowest sill of society, and thus raised to a higher level the whole superstructure. It inaugurated a new age of preaching power. As one has said, "it startled a drowsy, dissipated clergy, awoke a slumbering Church, and saved a halfdamned nation." The new preachers moved around like lighted torches, and kindled the very refuse of society into sympathy with the new moral enthusiasm. Methodism is much greater than itself-greater, I mean, than the Church which bears its name. It has kindled with its enthusiasm Churches that despised its methods and spurned the name.

Some one has well said, that while only one Church bears Wesley's name, all the Churches that are alive have caught his spirit.

Wesley did more than any other man to save England from the throes of a revolution, not to say a reign of terror, similar to that which convulsed old France. Such was the discontent of the masses in Wesley's day, that if the social and political trend of the times had not been changed, sooner or later a crisis must have been reached that might have shaken the very throne, and undermined the institutions of the country. While Wellington checked the revolutionary tendencies of France with his big guns and brave battalions on the field of Waterloo, Wesley, more than any other man, checked the revolutionary tendencies of the British population themselves with a preached Gospel on the moors and heaths of his native land. was Methodism that quenched the smoking embers of popular discontent, which later on might have burst forth in a conflagration. Green, the historian, says that "Methodism gave rise to a new

It

moral enthusiasm, which was seen in the disappearance of the vices which had disgraced the upper classes, and the foulness which stained the common literature ever since the Restoration.

But the noblest result of that revival was seen afterwards in the attempt which all England made to remedy the physical distress and social degradation of the oppressed and the poor. It was seen in the newborn sympathy of society towards women who had been brutalized, children who had been cruelly entreated, and labourers who had been hopelessly enslaved. It was seen in the humanitarian sentiment which like a tropical wave swept over England and America, which raised hospitals, endowed charities, built churches, wept over the erring, sheltered the outcast, sent missions to the heathen, applauded Burke and Sheridan in their plea for the oppressed Hindu, inspired Clarkson and Wilberforce in that historic crusade against "the sum of all villainies," which eventuated in the emancipation of every British slave. It was this that fired the soul of John Howard with a lofty enthusiasm for the lowest dregs of humanity, and which led him to spend and

sacrifice himself in seeking the mitigation of those horrors which made every common gaol an indescribable hell.

In fact, there is scarcely a reform or philanthropy of modern times which is not traceable to that new sentiment which Owes its being largely to the greatest revival of modern times. We rejoice in the triumphs of the Tract Society, but Wesley wrote and distributed tracts half a century before the society was born." The ragged-schools, which have been compared to life-boats picking up the many little waifs which a cruel fate had flung like so much driftwood upon the social sea, had their inception in Wesley's orphan-houses. Our loan libraries and dispensaries for the poor had their origin in his prolific brain. Wesley was a temperance reformer long before a son of temperance wore a badge, or a temperance society unfurled a banner. "He was

an abolitionist when Whitefield and Lady Huntingdon trafficked in slaves." So is it true, that Methodism, more than any other moral agency, created these modern conditions out of which modern England itself has come.

-Charlotte Brewster Jordan.

ITH a country of continental proportions,

the question of cheap and ready transportation is ever one of primary importance. Where water systems with navigable rivers intersect the country, its development is greatly facilitated, and the question of economic transportation is largely solved. The presence of large navigable rivers in the United States has certainly contributed very much to the rapid development of that country. In the far west, by this means, the heart of the continent could be readily reached, and cheap transportation afforded its products both before and since the development of modern railways.

The absence of any great river system in the continent of Australia has certainly been a great detriment to the development of the interior of that great country. Since this question is of so great importance, it is worth while for us to have our thoughts turned in the direction of our own country, with a view to learning what nature has done for us in this direction.

Great and advantageous as are the water systems of the United States, it may be said with all modesty, that those of the Dominion are far more extensive and more farreaching; perhaps no country in all the world has been so amply provided with facilities for inland navigation as has Canada. The small

*From a forthcoming volume, which deals exhaustively with this subject.

ness of the population in the past, and the undeveloped character of the Great North-West, has not made it necessary to use, or possible to appreciate, these vast lakes and rivers to the extent that their possibilities imply. With the development of the country there will be a growing demand for cheap transportation, for the ever-increasing harvests and rapidly-multiplying millions, therefore, a new importance must attach to these natural highways of

commerce.

It must not be inferred, however, that these inland waterways have not already contributed very much to our present development and prosperity. Indeed, the country could not be what it is to-day if these facilities had not been at hand; they have been essential to the prosecution of the lumbering industry, the fur trade, and the opening up of the West. Had it not been for access to the far West afforded by this means, it is doubtful if it could have been held as a part of the Canadian Dominion. Up to the present time, we say, we owe almost everything to our marvellous system of the natural waterways; but they are destined to be of much more importance in the future.

It will be noted that the great natural water system of the Dominion may be grouped in five divisions, namely: The Pacific, Yukon, Mackenzie, Hudson's Bay, and the St. Lawrence. The presence of the Rocky Mountains entirely separates the Pacific and Yukon systems from the rest of Canada, and perhaps their importance may never greater than it is at the present

be

time. They have, however, contributed very much to the opening up of the countries through which they pass, and, in their navigable portions, will become more and more made use of as population and general commerce increases. The water systems east of the Rocky Mountains hold a different relation to each other, and to the future development of the country. It will be noticed as a peculiarity to the three great systems east of the Rockies that they overlap and interlace each other, and that the distances separating them are comparatively small.

Before contemplating the possibility of uniting these systems we may look at them separately and note their importance independent of each other. The St. Lawrence system is, of course, the best known and the most fully developed, as well as the most important as a highway of commerce. Perhaps, viewed from every standpoint, there is no river system in the world the equal of the St. Lawrence.

First, we have a magnificent river, with its broad mouth lying open to the commerce of Europe, at the shortest ocean distance, and extending eight hundred miles into the interior. Then, losing its identity in a wonderful chain of fresh water seas such as are found in no other part of the world, it extends one thousand miles farther to the westward into the very heart of the continent. The commerce that moves upon this great system of lakes and rivers is already stupendous, yet it is only in its infancy. More vessel tonnage passes through the Soo canals in the seven months of their operation than makes use of the Suez Canal in a whole year.

Of course, this great system has not reached its present state of usefulness without the expenditure of vast sums of money by way of improvement. The Canadian Govern

ment alone has spent well-nigh one hundred million dollars in perfecting the system, but the money has been well spent, and the value of this great waterway is simply incalculable to the country. It is now possible to load a ship with grain at Fort William, Duluth, or Chicago, at the head of Lakes Superior and Michigan, and never break cargo until she reaches Liverpool.

Turning now to the Hudson's Bay system, we find it even more extensive, though presenting, perhaps, more barriers to continuous navigation, and demanding lighter draught vessels. Lying in the centre of the continent is the great Lake Winnipeg, some three hundred miles long. Into the north-west angle of this lake flows the mighty Saskatchewan River, navigable in its northern branch for suitable craft to Edmonton, one thousand miles to the west, and on its southern branch to Medicine Hat, one thousand miles to the south-west. The Grand Rapids at the mouth of this river is the only break in the navigation, and these present no serious barrier.

Flowing into the south end of this great lake is the Red River of the north, with its several large tributaries, representing navigable water of not less than one thousand miles in extent. It is true, at the present time, that the St. Andrew's Rapids, near its mouth, prevent navigation between the lake and the river, but they present no engineering difficulties; and it is said for a moderate cost this obstruction could be entirely removed. Doubtless it will receive the attention of the Government in the near future. There is also the English River, which receives the waters of Lake Sud and Rainy Lake flowing into Lake Winnipeg.

The great Nelson River of the north unites all the waters of this system, carrying them to the sea from the north end of Lake Winni