Committee said, "Now don't waste our time in asking such foolish questions."

23. Murdoch, who was persecuted for introducing gas. His enemies declared that gas was dirty, had an ill smell, produced headaches, and spoiled both pictures and furniture. "Sir Humphrey Davy, the greatest chemist of his age, denied the possibility of lighting the streets of London safely with coal gas. And in this opinion he was joined by such eminent men as Wollaston, Watt, and Lord Brougham."

Now these twenty-three cases are only a few of well-known historical cases, and for every one recorded in history there are at least a hundred unrecorded. What, then, ought to be done by Englishmen in view of all this injustice to inventors? The first thing is for the English nation to repent of its cruelty, as the Ninevites did in ancient times at the preaching of Jonah. The next thing is for the English nation to acquire habits of justice and generosity to the poor in general and to inventors in particular. The English nation must learn to give. It knows at present to talk about giving, but it knows how actually to give to the poor only imperfectly. This may be considered an interested assertion on my part. But better authorities say so more emphatically than I do. Let me quote one. The Nonconformist and Independent is the organ of the Nonconformists of England-that body to which Hume and Macaulay assign the sole honour of having preserved the liberties of England during the last three centuries. In the issue of the Nonconformist and Independent for May 16th, 1884, will be found an account of the annual meeting of the Congregational Church Aid and Home Missionary Society. At that meeting the Rev. W. E. Hurndall (Bow) said that the fact was growing upon him from day to day that what was really wanted in these urgent times was larger giving. Religious effort (and it is a religious duty to be just to inventors, let alone being generous to them) in this country was not receiving a fair share of the money which was spent by professedly Christian people. The income of this society was only as much as one London omnibus company received in penny and in twopenny fares in the course of three weeks. Turn for a moment from this society to a larger one-the great London Missionary Society. That received as much as the one omnibus company received in ten weeks; or as much as is spent in three days in the United Kingdom in the consumption of

that excellent product of nature, improved upon by mannamely, tobacco; or, still further, as much as had been drunk away in intoxicants during the duration of this meeting. Some time ago there was published a chart of what was spent in a year in the United Kingdom on intoxicating drinks and the amount spent on Christian missions. The one was one hundred and thirty-six millions of pounds sterling (£136,000,000), the other one million and fifty thousand pounds (£1,050,000). If this society had £100,000 a year, surely it would not be a penny too much. He did not think that their section of the Christian community would have done its part until the income of the London Missionary Society reached £100,000. The report referred to work amongst that section of the population which was somewhat injuriously called outcasts. A great deal was being heard (though not a bit too much) about the "Bitter Cry of Outcast London." He would, in passing, call attention to the bitter response to that cry. The financial issue of that otherwise marvellously successful appeal amounted to little more than a bitter sarcasm. They heard the other day that through the issue of this pamphlet the London City Mission had received £10,000. While he was sitting, lamenting over the smallness of the amount, he came across a letter from one of the secretaries in the Nonconformist and Independent, in which it was stated that the real sum received through this channel was not ten thousand pounds, but only one hundred pounds, and that although this excellent institution (upon which the London Congregational Union had playfully stolen something of a march) proceeded to issue other bitter cries, the result only amounted to some five hundred pounds. The London Congregational Union, until it published its accounts, was somewhat secret, and not very easy of approach, but it announced that it had received already the munificent sum of £1,600. The real condition of Christian work in our cities was, he did not hesitate to say, one of starvation. Many of the people in the poorer districts were starving, and it seemed fitting that the religious agencies brought to bear upon them should be starving also. While thankful for. the little that had been done, they cried most eagerly and earnestly for a great deal more to be done in their cities and in their villages. He had heard of a gentleman who dined at a continental hotel, and called a waiter to him, and said, "Waiter, I very much approve of the samples you have brought to

me; please let me see the bulk." (Laughter.) They approved very much of the samples they had seen, but they also could not do without the bulk. In their aggressive work they were most frequently obliged to adopt an economy which was perfectly suicidal. The buildings which they had to use were for the most part grim and ugly, often bare walls. The furniture was frequently the poorest of the poor, and eminently suggestive of the Union. The lights were turned down economically, so that the gas bill at the end of the quarter should not be excessive. Books were handed round to those who were induced to come within the magic circle of the mission-books whose gaping backs uttered most bitter cries for the bookbinder (which, like some other bitter cries, were largely unheeded). In order to introduce an element of cheerfulness into the gathering, there was a performance upon a wheezy harmonium, rather less musical, and a good deal more out of tune, than the average barrel-organ. For the purpose of refreshing the inner man, there was served a decoction of tea and other leaves, which, unfortunately, had already paid one visit to the pot, and were scarcely improved by their second pilgrimage. (Laughter.) Tracts were sent from house to house clad in covers which seemed purposely designed to reduce the recipients to the very depths of despair. The whole thing was mean, poor, and shabby. The music-hall, the concert-room, and the theatre were not after this order, and he, for one, did not wonder that the poorer classes could be induced, only with the greatest difficulty, and in very small numbers indeed, to come within the sound of the voices of the ministry, and within reach of their work and their mission efforts. (Applause.) Aggressive work was to a large extent being played with rather than being done. Those engaged in the work appeared to be afraid lest they should be financially ruined by the process; they cut down here, and they cut down there, until at last the thing was cut down and perished. The Salvation Army had been able to go ahead with large strides, because it had been financially favoured. (Hear, hear.) It was very seldom he hurled any hard words at that movement. He thought it wiser and better to reserve the hard words for Congregationalists, and Baptists, and Wesleyans, and members of the Church of England, who, by failing to support more decent and proper movements, had placed a decided premium on religious eccentricity. To-day a man was tempted to play the fool in order that he might

secure the help which was refused to others. (Applause.) It would have been impossible for the Salvation Army to do what it had done if it had not adopted eccentric means of arresting public_attention. Had it been more sober, more refined, more Scriptural, it would have been allowed to die a natural death. They were told that what the churches wanted was the outpouring of the Divine Spirit. That he believed most thoroughly, but it had many a day been on his mind that while they were praying and longing for a Divine Spirit they were hindering the work of that Divine Spirit. The first thing to be done was to loosen the purse-strings of a Christian community. When the Divine Spirit fell of old upon the people they gave-not one-tenth of their income-many of them gave all that they possessed in order that the world might be converted. To-day there might be found men who, if, like Barnabas, they possessed land, would readily sell it (for land to-day was not a good investment in the country, and, if Mr. George had his way, it would not be a very good one in the towns). If a new Acts of the Apostles were written, it would be said of these men that they, having lands, sold them, and, after having selected out a few threepenny-pieces for collections and other benevolent objects, brought the price of the thing which was sold, and laid it out in some promising investment likely to pay from 10 per cent. to 15 per cent. He was willing to acknowledge that there were noble individual exceptions, and noble church exceptions; but in the matter of giving to the Church of Christ, the church was only in its infancy. They talked very much of their church and of their giving, but when it came to the real matter of what they were doing they fell grievously short. Men did not want more money in their pockets, but more grace in their hearts. There were two occasions upon which a man's income tended to fall very low indeed. One was when he was making up his income-tax return, and the other when he was asked for a subscription. (Laughter.) Those who did not keep a strict record of what they gave, firmly and conscientiously believed that they gave three times as much as they did. A man took his wife and family to the seaside, and thought not so much of the expense of doing that as of the hundred half-crowns which he dropped into the collection plate. Voluntary offerings were very often anything but voluntary, and there were places where it was necessary to have the collection in the middle of the service in order to avoid a stampede

at the close. (Laughter.) The world was within their reach if only they had the means to do the work. If they had the means, the Gospel might be efficiently carried to the five millions of London within twelve months. The whole world might be reached in ten years, if only the funds were forthcoming. They had the men; they had the women; they had the message; they had the Saviour; they had the Divine Spirit and the great God. What was needed was the means. This was a matter which should be urged upon the churches everywhere. People were being taught of all things to get; they must be taught also to give. Everybody was trying to be a little higher in the social scale. Would to God that there might be inaugurated a great giving crusade-a crusade so much nobler than the crusade of ancient times." (Applause.)

The same paper says that forty-one families of every hundred families in Glasgow live in a single room.

In the same paper there is a very fine passage in the speech of the Rev. G. S. Reaney, which is as follows:"When I know of those who are working for a penny an hour, who are making a shirt for three farthings, and when I know that there are huge fortunes made in this way, when I see the luxury of this modern Rome, I am not out of my place when I say to you, 'Think about it, pray about it;' and it may be there will come a statesman amongst our free churches in England who shall be able first to suggest the solution of this problem (as the solution of the question of free trade was suggested chiefly amongst the free churches in England). There will come a time of afterthought and of prayer, when it shall be impossible that there shall be amongst the people this unpaid toil, and this unearned increment of the capitalist. I hope, Dr. Parker, that you will rewrite that sentence of yours, and utter a curse not only upon the publican, but upon the man who robs the poor and grows rottenly rich." (Loud applause.)

What all philanthropists ought now to do is this: they ought to stir up all classes to give to those who are poorer than themselves. And they ought with still greater energy to teach that poverty is the punishment inflicted by the Omnipotent himself on those who do not give to the poor, while abundance is the reward bestowed on those who do give to the poor. "There is that scattereth and yet increaseth; there is that withholdeth more than is meet, but it tendeth to poverty." "Honour the Lord with thy substance, and with the firstfruits of all thine increase, so shall thy barns be filled with