awakened by the Parliament. It has already led to the founding of two lectureships on Christianity and the other faiths, one in Chicago and the other in Calcutta. I have shown that the Congress of Religions is promoting a new and humaner interest in foreign missions; that it has brought about a better understanding among enlightened minds between Catholics and Protestants in America; that it brought together the first modern Parliament of Christendom, and revealed the harmony of the great churches on the chief questions of doctrine and duty; that it brought the problem of church unity once more into the foreground, and that it has been blessed in promoting the spirit of a universal human brotherhood. Many missionaries and others are convinced that the Parliament will be of the greatest benefit to those who have gone as teachers to non-Christian lands, and particularly to intending missionaries. The Parliament did a remarkable service in helping to remove some false impressions, both of heathenism and of Christianity. As Dr. George W. Knox, recently of Tokio, has written, "We judge the ethnic faiths harshly and unjustly, by an over-insistence on their darker aspects, instead of comparing their best with our best." The Parliament gave an amazingly full and adequate representation of Christianity, as readers of its proceedings well know. The Rev. Dr. Burrell, of New York, calls the official history of the Parliament "the most valuable of recent contributions to Christian literature." The Parliament established a precedent of courtesy, fraternity and tolerance, which has met the approval of enlightened minds throughout the world. It was founded upon sincerity, the free and honest declaration of individual opinion, and it had no respect for the substitution of laxity for liberality. Christendom in the Parliament held up Christ as the only Saviour of the world, and Rev. Dr. Noble said, "Never did Christ seem so large and precious to me, never did Christian faith seem so necessary to humanity and so sure to prevail, as when the Parliament of Religions closed." I cherish the faith expressed by the venerated Dr. Schaff: "The idea of this Parliament will survive all criticism. The critics will die, but the cause will remain." JOHN HENRY BARROWS. PRACTICABLE SABBATH REFORM. The current movement for national Sabbath reform which celebrated the close of its first decade by the World's Fair Sabbath-closing victory, began in 1882-83, in the vigorous attack of the International Sabbath Association, Rev. Yates Hickey, secretary, upon Sunday mails, Sunday trains, Sunday papers and other new forms of Sabbath-breaking. Its Pittsburg convention of May, 1882, has not been equaled by any other Sab bath convention in the ability of its papers on these subjects. Wisely published in full in The Sabbath Association Reporter, at a nominal price (three cents each), they were swiftly and widely circulated, and challenged the attention of Christian leaders in all parts of the country. Petitions to national authorities and to other bodies to abate the evils named were also circulated. They helped the agitation, though few signatures were then obtained. The Railway Age, in 1883 ably seconded the impeachment of Sunday trains by a prolonged symposium of railroad managers, many of whom confessed that Sunday trains wronged both God and man. Half a score of authors, of nearly as many denominations, in nearly as many states, east, west and south, were prompted by these discussions, largely, to prepare elaborate treatises in defense of the Christian Sabbath, in whose behalf, in the score of years since the publication of Gilfillan's book of that title, no treatise on the same side had been published. The same agitation no doubt led to the establishment, in 1884, of the very efficient Sabbath Observance Department of the N. W. C. T. U., Mrs. J. C. Bateham, superintendent, which soon became the chief agency in the movement for national Sabbath reform. The movement, whose genesis we have now fully given, was aided by the Morton prizes in Great Britain, and by the Green and Fletcher prizes in the United States, all offered for best essays in defense of the universal and perpetual obliga tion of the Fourth Commandment, which Dr. Hesse had denied in his volume entitled "Sunday," and Professor Egbert C. Smythe in his contribution to "Sabbath Essays." come of the controversy is that American Protestants are today practically a unit in holding to the continuity of the Sabbath from Eden to Eternity. The influences I have named prepared the way in five years for the American Sabbath Union, which entered upon its work in 1889. Its petitions, and those of its co-worker, the W. C. T. U., in behalf of a national law against Sunday mails, interstate Sunday trains, and whatever other Sunday work was under the jurisdiction of Congress, received the endorsement of the whole American Protestant church, substantially, and of distinguished Roman Catholic leaders, and of the chief labor organizations. The more emergent question of the Sabbath at the World's Fair turned these petitions aside-nay, carried them forward to a kindred result. The overwhelming majorities for Sabbath-closing in Congress, in the Commission, in the Directory, and, most of all, the signal failure of Sunday opening through the covering of the exhibits, by the rich, the Sabbath non-attendance of the poor, and the week-day nonattendance of Christians, constitutes a victory on which the Stein-Goggin-Fuller injunction farce is only a fly-speck. The atmosphere of hope and courage created by this victory affords unparalleled opportunities for both national and local Sabbath reform. But, alas, when at our best in opportunity we are at our worst in organization for national and state work. The American Sabbath Union, which in 1890 had three general secretaries, and four district secretaries, all paid to give their whole time to Sabbath reform, has now only one of these on duty, namely, Rev. J. H. Knowles, D. D., the office secretary in New York. The society has been almost fatally crippled by the sudden death of its generous president, Col. Elliot F. Shepard, on whom it had depended almost entirely for support. Those who have undertaken work as field secretaries of its state auxiliaries have many of them given up work for lack of support, and many of the state and local societies have died for lack of supervision. I know of but two state secretaries devoted wholly to this reform who are being paid even the scanty salary allotted for such work, and of but two secretaries of city Sabbath associations who are paid, and so enabled to give their time to the work. The leader of the World's Fair Sabbath-closing campaign, selected by representatives of the American Sabbath Union, and seven of its auxiliaries, and of other kindred societies, for that position, did all the lobbying and letter-writing (everything except lecturing) in that interest con amore, the funds available being only sufficient to pay expenses for printing, telegraphing, etc. What should be done? It is to be hoped that some way may soon be devised to supply the American Sabbath Union with the financial sinews of war. It is possible that some day rich men in their living and dying gifts, and churches in their regular offerings, will recognize the claims of the imperiiled Sabbath. Of what use are our gifts to church erection and ministerial education if we do not preserve a day of freedom for worship and from work when the community can enter the churches we are building and hear the preachers we are educating? Is it not as important to prevent the heathenizing of a Christian land. as to Christianize a heathen land? There are home missionary churches in which, because there is no united Sabbath reform movement in the State or locality the only man who attends the church is the preacher, and in others the Lord's Supper has to be postponed on Sabbath morning to the evening "because the deacons are all down in the mines. We believe churches and individual Christians are not more bound to give regularly to public charities than to the preventive work of Christian reforms for which there should be a column in all denominational year books. Rich men give in ruts. Their bequests are largely for charity and very little for the reforms that would make the charities mostly unnecessary. How it would reduce the work of hospitals, refuges, asylums, charities, if intemperance, gambling, impurity and Sabbath-breaking were mostly suppressed! The National Bureau of Reforms, projected by the writer to promote Sabbath reform with other reforms, was delayed in its organization from January to September, 1894, by the financial stringency, and was inaugurated at the latter date with only anticipated support financially, but with the endorsement and approval of the following distinguished leaders of Christian reforms who have consented to co-operate with the writer as superintendent, as an Advisory Board and Honorary Committee: Herrick Johnson, D. D., Joseph Cook, LL. D., Mrs. Isabella Charles Davis, (The list will be extended.) D. J. Burrell, D. D., The Massachusetts Sunday Protective League, by unanimous vote of its Executive Committee, has approved the Bureau. The object of the Bureau is to promote such moral reforms as the Christian churches generally approve by securing the enactment and enforcement of good laws and the defeat of bad ones in regard to Sabbath reform, gambling, purity, temperance, public schools, immigration, civil service reform, ballot reform, voluntary industrial arbitration, etc., through petitions, letters and personal appeals to legislators, and the use of lectures, literature and friendly conferences on labor and other problems among the people.* *Twelve dollars ($1.00 per month or 25 cents per week) constitutes one a sustaining member of the Bureau and entitles him in rebate to all literature published by the Bureau, with discounts, etc., as below. One hundred dollars constitutes the giver or one designated by him a Life Member, with all privileges. Pastors of churches who agree to allow the Superintendent an opportunity annually to present Sabbath reform or other reforms to their congregations on the Sabbath, or at prayer meeting or otherwise, will be enrolled as Patrons with all privileges. Two dollars and sixty cents (5 cents per week), constitutes one an Annual Member of the Bureau and entitles him to literature in rebate, including bulletins and documents published by the Bureau giving reform news and arguments, and 20 per cent discount, besides postage, on reform books, periodicals and other reform literature, sold but not published by the Bureau, with helps by correspondence. All members and "Patrons" will be entitled to a free copy of Princeton Lectures on Christian Sociology when published. Funds will be used under direction of three auditors from Advisory Board to promote Christian reforms by lectures, literature, Christian lobbying, correspondence and confer ences. The Bureau is related to the National Christian reform |