history of this Fund, if I venture to detain them with a few observations, in the first place, as to the resolution adopted at last Assembly, and as to the steps that were taken in regard to it. I do not need to remind you or the House, Moderator, that so early as the year of the Disruption, it was announced that the minimum stipend to be provided out of the Central Fund for every Minister of the Free Church should be £150 a-year. Apart altogether from what was due to men who had sacrificed, for the principles of the Free Church, incomes, in the case of many of them, of more than twice that amount, it was felt and acknowledged on all hands, that less than the very moderate and limited provision now named, would not be found compatible with the efficiency, or even with the existence, on a national scale, of the Church itself. (Applause.) Universally and cordially as these views were assented to, a variety of causes had concurred to hinder them from being realised. The pressure of other claims upon the Church pushed those of the great Central Fund for the support of the Ministry to a considerable extent aside. The building of churches and schools, and more recently of manses, largely absorbed for some years both the resources and attention of our people. The very progress, too, and prosperity of the Free Church cause itself, leading as it did to a rapid multiplication of its Ministers, tended most effectually to keep down their incomes. The present revenue of the Central Fund divided among the 474 Ministers of the Disruption, would have given to each a stipend of about £187. (Hear.) No doubt the charges which have been sanctioned since 1843, and have obtained a settled ministry, have added considerably to the total amount of the Fund. But even though their entire contributions were deducted, the sum remaining would still be sufficient to yield to the 474 Disruption Ministers a stipend considerably upwards of £160. (Applause.) It will not be imagined that reference is made to this fact with any view to reflect on the arrangements out of which it has arisen. These arrangements were both just and necessary. The fact, however, it is important to notice here, serving, as it does, so unequivocally to prove, that to have gone on as we had been doing, extending the Church without increasing in anything like a corresponding degree the funds for supporting it, would have been to pursue a course essentially unjust in itself, and that must in the end have deteriorated and degraded our whole institution. Why, Moderator, under this process, not only had the incomes of our Ministers ceased for three years to advance,-they had begun to retrograde. In 1845, the stipend arising to Ministers from the Central Fund was £122. In 1846, with an addition that year of £5051:6: 4 to the total revenue, the stipend to individual Ministers, owing to their increased numbers, was still only £122. And, lastly, in 1847, with a revenue upwards of £400 still in advance of the year before, the income of each Minister had declined to £120. (Hear.) Such were the circumstances in which the General Assembly of last year had its attention specially called to this subject. The great church-building effort, speaking of it in general terms, was all but concluded. The School and Manse Building Schemes were far advanced, and the means for completing them had been placed on a footing of comparative security. The time had come, and more than come, when the Central Fund for the support of the ministry must be made to bulk more largely in the mind of the Church, and to receive that careful consideration and energetic support, which are due to the main prop and pillar of our whole institution. (Applause.) It was a very solemn and memorable event in the providence of God, that just then, when the Church was preparing to arouse itself to do tardy justice to this all-important Fund, he whose far-sighted wisdom planned it, and whose matchless eloquence had so often urged its paramount claims, was suddenly taken from us. But of him pre-eminently it might be said, that, "though dead he yet speaketh." (Applause.) And it well became the Assembly that had been summoned in the very midst of its sittings to follow his honoured remains to the tomb, to resolve, in the strength of God, to complete without further delay what lay so near that great and good man's heart, the securing of adequate means for maintaining, extending, and perpetuating the ministry and ordinances of the Free Church of Scotland. (Applause.) On that occasion, it will perhaps be borne in mind, that certain measures for increasing the Fund were, on the part of the Committee, submitted to the Assembly and obtained its approval. To realize for all the ministers of the Free Church a minimum stipend from the Central Fund of £150, and to enable the Fund at the same time to meet, in addition, the payments due to the Widows' and Orphans' Fund and to provide for the further extension of the Church, would require, in round numbers, an income of £110,000, that is about one-third more than the existing income. To add all at once one-third, or about £27,000 to the then existing income of the Church, was no doubt a somewhat formidable undertaking. At the same time, considering what the Free Church had already been enabled, by God's good hand upon her, to achieve, and considering further how loud and clear was the call of duty, neither the Assembly nor its Committee were disposed to shrink from the task. (Hear.) Both the Assembly and the Committee were thoroughly convinced that the success of such an enterprise, and indeed the prosperous and permanent ongoing of the Sustentation Fund generally, depended, under God, upon the intelligent co-operation of the office-bearers of the Church, ministers, elders, and deacons included. It was, accordingly, with the office-bearers of the Church the Committee resolved, agreeably to the plan recommended to the Assembly, chiefly to deal, taking care at the same time that, through the local courts, the appeal should be carried home to the whole body of our people. To the Committee this method appeared not only the regular and constitutional, but in truth also the only thoroughgoing way of carrying into effect the wishes of the Assembly upon the subject. In efforts of this kind we have no system of electric wires, to propagate from a single centre the influence that will reach in undiminished force the remotest extremities. A touch at Edinburgh, whether in the shape of a speech or a circular, tells very feebly by the time it reaches the Pentland or Solway Firth, and in truth is not felt at all in many places much nearer hand. (Hear, and a laugh.) And even though we may make our electric battery locomotive, and send it, or send even twenty such, flying with railroad speed all over the country, darting their magnetic message, their winged words, not only from our great city platforms, but from our remote country churches or village school-rooms, it is not by such fitful and fleeting appliances the work is to be done. If, indeed, we should be able to plant and maintain such an apparatus, not locomotive, but stationary, in every Synod, Presbytery, and Deacons Court, having each its internal supply of force, and its own limited local field, on which steadily and systematically to bring that force to bear, the Committee were of opinion that the ultimate success of our great enterprise would be no longer doubtful. (Applause.) Let Synods keep up, in reference to this cause, a general oversight of the Presbyteries within their bounds, applying honestly and faithfully their periodic stimulus whereever it might be needed. Let Presbyteries, in their turn, give the subject its fitting place at all their stated meetings, not only examining carefully the returns from the several congregations, but maintaining, through Committees of their number, assisted by intelligent office-bearers, or even private members of the Church, a frequent and kindly intercourse with the several Deacons' Courts and Congregations, so as to quicken the sluggish, to help those who might be struggling with difficulties, to give information and guidance to such as had wrong plans, or no plans, and to encourage and confirm those who were steadily and successfully doing their duty to the cause. (Applause.) And finally, let the office-bearers of each congregation, from the minister downwards, be led to make conscience of this work,-let the pulpit from time to time bring to bear upon it the authority of God and the motives of the gospel,-let the Deacons' Court look to it as the great business which the Lord himself has committed to their charge, and of which he will require a strict account at their hands; let them,-instead of slighting or slurring it over, as a small matter which needs little care, or as something secular, and distasteful and wearisome, that should be hurried over or huddled out of sight altogether, on the contrary, realize the solemn fact, that with this Fund the Free Church must stand or fall, and that the Deacons' Courts that neglect this Fund are thereby doing what in them lies to destroy the Free Church of Scotland. (Applause.) Let the different local courts of the Church be brought, as regards this great Fund, to maintain a spirit, and follow a course like this, and with the divine blessing all is secured. But, on the other hand, let these things not be done,-let Synods, Presbyteries, and Deacons' Courts undervalue and trifle with this fundamental interest, and there is no power or agency which the Committee can employ that will long avert the decline and fall of the Sustentation Fund, and with it of our national Free Church. (Applause.) These few sentences may perhaps suffice to explain the theory of that method of proceeding which, in accordance with the plan submitted to last Assembly, the Committee subsequently followed. Arrangements were made immediately after the Assembly rose for holding conferences with the several Presbyteries of the Church in regard to the interests of the Central Fund generally, and specially with a view to obtain the increase proposed by the Assembly. To these Presbyterial conferences it was farther resolved to invite at least two office-bearers from each congregation in addition to the Presbytery elder. These conferences were commenced towards the end of the month of June. They were conducted on the part of the Committee by the Convener, accompanied by Mr Handyside, Superintendent of Associations, and by one or more brethren from a distance. Thus attended and assisted, the Convener traversed the entire country, in its breadth from Coldstream to Stranraer, from St Andrew's to Oban,-and in its length from the Solway Firth to the Firth of Dornoch. Within these limits there are included sixty Presbyteries of the Church. It is gratifying to state, that in the complicated arrangements for the meeting of that large number of Presbyteries, not a single mistake was made as to the place, day, or hour. (Applause.) Athough the common rule was to get through five of these conferences every week, and the distance from one Presbytery seat to another involved a journey of twenty or thirty, and in some instances of nearly forty miles, there was not one instance of a disappointment on either side. A circumstance, by the bye, which may serve to illustrate the completeness of that machinery for conducting its affairs which the constitution of our Presbyterian Church supplies. (Applause.) At these important conferences, after a short exposition of the nature and claims of the Sustentation Fund, and especially of the reasons for increasing it as the Assembly proposed, the case of each congregation was taken up in its turn, the state and working of its Association in support of the Fund was examined, and information was sought from the office-bearers representing it in the conference, as to the sum in the way of increase at which it would be reasonable and becoming to aim. Having gone over each case in detail, the conference, upon a view of the whole evidence submitted, proceeded to set down over against the name of each congregation some specific amount as the contribution to the Fund which the congregation should be recommended and urged to raise. the exception of the two or three Presbyteries that were first visited, and at which there had not been time to put things in train for coming, at least in detail, to such exact and definite conclusions, it may be safely affirmed, that in all the others the sums agreed on in the manner now described, were confessedly within, and generally far within, the ability of the congregations concerned. And further, even in the case of the two or three exceptional instances alluded to, however some further adjustment might be necessary then, or may even be necessary still, as to the particular sums in the way of increase assigned to each congregation, the total amount set over against each of these Presbyteries collectively was quite within their It is now proper to state what was the entire increase which the sixty Presbyteries visited have proposed to realize. means. With The total amount contributed to the Fund by the sixty Presbyteries during the year 1846-7, was £74,546 0 0 To realize an average increase of one-third more, as the Assembly 24,848 0 0 25,000 0 0 It will be seen from this statement, that what was proposed for the Fund in last Assembly, has been thus pronounced by sixty Presbyteries of the Church, upon a full and deliberate consideration of the subject, to be quite within the means of the Church, and what ought therefore to be realized. (Hear, and applause). The Presbyterial conferences at which this important conclusion has been arrived at, were attended by certainly not fewer than from 2500 to 3000 of the office-bearers of the Church. In order, however, to bring out the full extent of the movement in behalf of the Fund of which these conferences formed a part, it will be necessary to add some further particulars. It was a regular and important part of the business of every conference to make arrangements for visiting without delay all the Deacons' Courts and Congregations within the bounds of the Presbytery, so that the information and the influence which the Committee's deputation might have communicated at the Presbytery seat might be transmitted through the entire district. In many of the Presbyteries the resolution was taken not to be contented with a single meeting at each of the churches, but in order to make more sure of reaching the bulk and body of the people, scattered often over a wide tract of country, to hold a succession of meetings for each congregation, selecting convenient central points at which to assemble the contiguous members, so as, if possible, to carry the voice of the Assem bly upon this great question to the remotest hamlet and homestead where the Free Church has adherents to her sacred and glorious cause. This, the Committee would take leave, in passing, to observe, is a department of labour which cannot be too thoroughly followed out, and which, if wisely and diligently prosecuted, cannot fail to produce the most important results. (Hear, and applause.) It may also be noticed, that in every instance, on the evening of the day on which the Presbyterial conference took place, a public meeting was held, at which pains were taken to present the whole subject under the aspect which it wears in the Word of God, -to let our people see that it is a Bible question this of the Sustentation Fund, and that, in being called on to support that Fund, it is not only a sacred Scriptural duty which they are asked to perform, but a high gospel privilege they are invited to enjoy. By subdividing itself, indeed, the deputation was often enabled to hold two such meetings on the same evening, and in this way to deepen and diffuse whatever impression their visit might be fitted to make upon the neighbourhood, and at the same time to multiply examples of the kind of meetings which they desired to bring about, through the agency of the Presbyteries all over the country. It is necessary, on this part of the subject, merely to add, that as neither the time nor strength of the deputation admitted of extending their visits beyond the sixty Presbyteries alluded to, a special communication was made by the Convener to each of the eleven Presbyteries that remained, in which the course that had been followed in the other Presbyteries was described, and similar steps recommended. It will of course be understood that the measures thus detailed were all of them additional to the ordinary and active official management and general superintendence of the Fund which all along has been steadily in operation, and by means of which the business-like accuracy and regularity which now distinguish the proceedings of the great mass of our associations has been mainly secured. (Applause.) And now, Moderator, with your leave I will endeavour, as briefly as possible, to exhibit the results of the movement above described, the peculiar difficulties with which that movement has had to contend, and will thereafter submit, in conclusion, a few remarks upon the prospects of the Fund, and on the means which appear to the Committee most likely to promote its prosperity. In one sense, the result of the movement has been already given. There has been an increase upon the income of the Fund, as compared with the year before, amounting to £5878: 12 : 7. That sum, though considerable in itself, does certainly come very far short both of the point contemplated by the General Assembly and of the expectations which the Presbyterial conferences were fitted to create. When all the circumstances of the case, however, are taken into account, it will perhaps be found that there is less occasion for either surprise or disappointment than may at first sight appear. (Hear.) In the first place, it will be borne in mind, that the measures which the Committee adopted could not, in the nature of things, be carried into effect all at once. To follow out the measures already narrated with the Presbyteries, and through them with the Deacons' Courts and Congregations of the Church, was necessarily a work of time. The month of October had arrived before the wide field of sixty Presbyteries could be gone over by the representatives of the Committee. The corresponding work of each Presbytery within its own bounds which followed, involved a proportional and equally unavoidable delay; and even after the springs of motion had been touched at these multiplying centres of impulse, there remained within each individual congregation consultations to be held, and often agencies to be provided, and plans to be organized, that still further deferred the point of time at which the measures of the Committee could begin practically to tell. It may indeed be alleged, that in accounting for these delays, we are condemning the mode of proceeding that rendered them inevitable. The Committee are satisfied with the course they followed, notwithstanding. It seemed to them of much greater moment, even at the expense of a little more time, to set in operation a uniform and well-digested system, than by having recourse to some speedier but more superficial contrivance, to run the risk of marring the whole movement, producing perhaps a greater temporary excitement, but leaving far less hope of permanent good to the cause. (Applause.) For the reasons now stated, it was near the end of autumn before the Fund could begin to reap almost any of the fruits-whatever they were,―of the Committee's plans. In point of fact, at the close of the fifth month of our financial year, the entire increase up till that date was only £1121: 2:31. Of the total increase, therefore, which has been realized upon the income of the year, the whole of the remainder, being £4650, 14s. 64d., has been the produce of the seven succeeding months. During these seven months there has been therefore an average increase per month of £676 : 9:94, which, if continued throughout the twelve months, would give, even as matters now stand, an addition to our annual revenue of £8117:11:3. This, however, is not the only statement on this point which ought to be made. The object and effect of the measures in question were to increase the produce of the Associations. Now, the actual increase from Associations during the year was £6847, 18s. Of this amount £5856 has been realized since October. The average increase, therefore, during the last seven months, upon the produce of Associations, has been £838, 11s., being equal to £10,062, 12s, per annum. (Applause.) It were most unreasonable and unjust, however, not merely as regards the Committee, but as regards the Presbyteries and Congregations of the Free Church, not to notice what has been unquestionably the main difficulty with which this movement has had to contend. That difficulty has been the extraordinary pressure of the times. The judgments of the Lord have been abroad in the earth, and by terrible things in righteousness He has been causing His forgotten voice to be heard. At the date of last Assembly, no man, not even the most clear-sighted and calculating, dreamt of such a crisis in the affairs, not of this country only, but of the whole world, as even then was already at hand. On the contrary, the prevailing impression was, that, instead of entering, we were emerging from the cloud. And it was undeniably in this belief that, with so much heart and hope, we addressed ourselves to the great enterprise which I am now attempting to describe. It was well for us that in this, as in other things, the future lay hidden from our view. A single glance into that dark period of overwhelming disaster that was about to overtake the whole commercial and manufacturing, the whole monetary and industrial, interests of the kingdom, would in all probability have sufficed to make us lay our whole intended effort aside. (Hear.) And what would now have been the inevitable consequence? Had the season of distress and difficulty come upon us at a time when the mind of the Church was to a large extent asleep as to the claims and exigencies of our Central Fund, it is not too much to say that, instead of being occupied in accounting for a limited increase, we should at this moment have been considering how we were to face a seriously diminished revenue. (Applause.) The Committee feel, and they doubt not the Assembly will sympathise in the feeling, that the guidance and goodness of God have been most abundantly manifest in those leadings of his providence under which the Assembly was led last year to adopt those measures which have served, by his blessing, to avert from us so great a calamity. To that circumstance it is mainly due that, in great trial of affliction, the abundance of our people's joy, and their deep poverty, have abounded to the riches of their liberality. For in the case of not a few the Committee can bear record, like the Apostles of old, that “to their power, yea, and beyond their power,” they have been willing of themselves, refusing to allow their temporary straits to stint their contributions and embarrass the Lord's cause. (Applause.) But I am bound to say-duty to the Assembly binds me to say-the great cause which this Assembly has committed to my hands binds me to say,—that the pressure of the times will not avail to justify all the shortcomings of the year. (Hear.) It is gratifying, indeed, to be able to state, that 534 ministerial charges and 94 stations have this year increased their contributions. But it is not gratifying to be obliged to add, that while so many have been going forward, no fewer than 163 ministerial charges and 73 stations have been moving the opposite way. (Hear, hear.) Had these 236 congregations done no more even than maintain their former ground, |