PSALM VIII.: 4-5.

4 What is man that Thou art mindful of him? and the son of man that Thou visitest him?

5 For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and hast crowned him with glory and honor.

And a son of man that Thou heedest him!

Thou hast made him in rank little less than divine, Thou hast crowned him with glory and honor!

A very valuable feature of this version is supplied by the notes. In these the scholarship of translators and editors appears to unquestionable advantage. In the volume containing Isaiah nearly ninety pages of notes are given, and in Psalms about seventy-five. These are freely illustrated.

As to the general propriety of endeavoring to make an accurate and faithful translation of the Scriptures in language comprehensible to readers of our own time, there can hardly be room for reasonable argument. To prefer a translation badly made can be no evidence of pious superiority. In every translation honestly and intelligently performed something is gained for a proper understanding of what the Hebrew books stand for, and what relation they bear to the Christian dispensation and those who live under it.

The substance of the truth does not suffer if in the variation of the verbal rendering there is a nearer approach to the original text; on the contrary it gains. Nor is the message of the Scriptures to us impaired. The testimony they bear to man's upward struggle, to the growth of the religious sentiment, to the aspiration of the human soul toward the Great Over-Soul, or the better apprehension by man of his relation and duty toward God, this testimony is not only not diminished, but it is more clearly and forcibly presented.

HISTORICAL.

-I. Peter 3: IO, II. Scripture reading: I. Peter 3: 8-22.

Into a world of war came the Man of Peace; into a world of hate came the Man of Love. When Jesus of Nazareth proclaimed his new gospel and gave his new commandment the world was not actually at war; but the apparent peace was only a time of exhaustion and surrender. The power of the Roman empire was too great to be longer resisted. But at the same time its government was based on force, and at the first signs of weakness war broke out afresh. From the death of Jesus even down to the destruction of Jerusalem the relations of Jews and Romans were bitter in the extreme. Hatred of Rome and Romans was almost a part of the religion of patriotic Jews. Nowhere in the philosophies which, among the cultured classes, had replaced the decayed religions of the Roman world, do we find the deep note of truth

courage, but not one demanded blessing for railing and earnest pursuit after peace. Passive endurance was the supreme height of philosophy. To love our enemies we must be possessed of the spirit of God. TEACHING.

This time is particularly appropriate for a lesson on peace. There are countries to-day where an insult or an injury to an individual can only be washed out in the blood of the offending party. National honor may be made clean in the same way.. A few years ago the Italian army in Abyssinia retreated under conditions which cast some doubt on the courage of officers and soldiers. This doubt was expressed by a representative of the old French nobility and a duel was the consequence. If the Frenchman was most hurt we may assume that the Italian army is brave; if the Italian, that it is cowardly. We have still in our own country even, those who desire in every possible case of insult to our nation that the question shall be settled by war. Among cultured people a man who will get into a brawl with another under any circumstances, stamps himself at once with an ineffaceable mark of vulgarity. One who bears himself as a gentleman can never be under the necessity of fighting.

In international matters war is no more a necessity than is duelling among individuals. Many, it is true, consider it not only unavoidable but desirable, as teaching patriotism and other lessons; but then the time was with us, and the time is in Germany and France, when the same was believed of personal encounters. But, it may be said, suppose we are attacked? This question, as in the case of the individual, is largely a theoretical one. A man who will not act as a brute will very seldom be treated as a brute. Our fellowmen are very likely to reflect our own attitude of mind. But nevertheless let us meet the question; suppose we are attacked; suppose injury is done to us. Is it to be supposed that Jesus, when he told us to "do good to those that despitefully use us," meant it only in cases where no one despitefully uses us? Is a testimony in favor of love only applicable when no one hates us? Is a testimony in favor of peace only to be applied when there is no occasion for war? "If ye suffer for righteousness' sake, happy are ye." "It is better, if the will of God be so, Our Society has had a record of faithfulness in its testhat ye suffer for well-doing, than for evil-doing." timony for peace. And to this end let us personally re-examine and understand this testimony and not be moved by the specious arguments of those who would force our nation into war. War is murder, and those who consent to war consent to murder.

SCRIPTURE STUDY AT RACE STREET. Conference Class of Race Street First-day School, Philadelphia. Syllabus for Fourth month 31st. Presented by Garrett W. Thompson. Subject for consideration: The Mission of the Jews.

Syllabus:

A. Brief historical sketch of the Jews.

B. Secular and religious characteristics of the Jews.

THE POSITIVE CHRISTIAN.

CHRIST did not come to cramp any one's manhood; he came to broaden it. He did not come to destroy our manhood; he came to fulfill it. A thoroughgoing Christian is a man with a stronger reason, kinder heart, firmer will, and richer imagination than his fellows-one who has attained to his height in Christ. A bigot or a prig or a weakling is a halfdeveloped Christian, one not yet arrived at full age.

What ought a Christian to read? Every book which feeds the intellect. Where ought he to go? Where ought he to go? Every place where the moral atmosphere is pure and bracing. What ought he to do? Everything that will make character. Religion is not negative, a giving up this or that, but positive, a getting and a possessing. If a man will be content with nothing but the best thought, best work, best friends, best environment, he need not trouble about avoiding the worst. The good drives out the bad. There are two ways of lighting a dark room: one is to attack the darkness with candles; the other is to open the shutters and let in the light. When light comes, darkness goes. There are two ways of forming character: one is to conquer our sins, the other is to cultivate the opposite virtues. The latter plan is best because it is surest the virtue replaces the sin.

Christianity is not a drill; it is life, full, free, radiant, and rejoicing. What a young man should do is not to vex himself about his imperfections, but to fix his mind on the bright image of Perfection; not to weary his soul with rules, but to live with Christ as one liveth with a friend. There is one way to complete manhood, and that is fellowship with Jesus

Christ.-Ian Maclaren.

NEWS OF FRIENDS.

Ar the Monthly Meeting of Friends of Philadelphia, (Race street), held Fourth month 20, the following minute, which originated in woman's meeting, was united with and directed to be signed by the clerks, Sarah J. Ash and Alfred Moore, and forwarded to the President, at Washington:

"The members of the Monthly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, of Philadelphia, held at Fifteenth and Race streets, in the city of Philadelphia, hereby express their deep sympathy with William McKinley, the honored President of the United States, in his steadfast and earnest efforts for the maintenance of peace. They deplore the immanence of war, and crave that if any possibility for the averting of its horrors shall yet appear, it may be prayerfully heeded and magnified for peace."

The following response was received by mail on the 26th, addressed (to the Clerk of Woman's Meeting), Sarah J. Ash:

Your note of recent date, enclosing copy of the minutes of a recent meeting of your Society, has been received and its

The third meeting of the series held in Haverford meeting-house (Meeting-house lane, leading from Lancaster Pike, Wynnewood), will occur on First-day, Fifth month I, at 3 o'clock. There is a change in the program as previously announced, and Elizabeth Powell Bond will read a paper entitled "The Thought of the Heart." Friends will kindly spread the word, as far as possible, and invite the attendance of all interested whether members or not. The gathering upon the last occasion was the largest which has met in that house for years, and there is genuine and large interest manifested in the movement.

MARIE ROSE.

*

THE author of "The Dungeons of Old Paris" gives a touching picture of what womanly sympathy can accomplish, even among fallen and criminal women:

There was a strangely sympathetic side to this saddest of the prisons of Paris (St. Lazare for women). The sick and worn-out were always tenderly regarded by their fellow-prisoners, and if a woman died in the prison it was not unusual for the rest to club together to provide a costly funeral.

In the early years of the Restoration, a pretty peasant girl named Marie was sent to St. Lazare for stealing roses. She had a passion for the flower, and a thousand mystical notions had woven themselves about it in her mind. She said that rosetrees would detach themselves from ther roots, and glide after her wherever she went, to tempt her to pluck the blossoms. One in a garden, taller than the rest, had compelled her to climb the wall and gather as many roses as she could, and there the gendarmes found her.

This poor girl excited the most vivid interest in that sordid place. The prisoners plotted to restore her to reason, christened her Rose, which delighted her, and set themselves to make artificial roses for

her of silk and paper. Those fingers, so rebellious at allotted tasks, created roses without number, till Maria's cell was transformed into a bower.

An interested director of prison labor seconded these efforts, and opened in St. Lazare a workroom for the manufacture of artificial flowers, to which Maria was introduced as an apprentice.

Here she made roses from morning till night, and her dread of the future being dispelled, the malady of her mind reached its term with the end of her sentence, and she left the prison cured and happy. She became one of the most successful florists in Paris.

Friends' Intelligencer and Journal.

EDITORS: HOWARD M. JENKINS. LYDIA H. HALL. RACHel W. Hillborn.

PHILADELPHIA, FOURTH MONTH 30, 1898.

LONDON Y. M. CORRESPONDENCE. THE question whether English Friends should recognize by correspondence any other bodies of Friends. in this country than those called "Orthodox," and should further confine this recognition to those bodies formerly called " Gurneyite," has been agitating London Yearly Meeting more or less during the past decade. Recently the subject has been freshly freshly brought up in a rather unexpected manner by Samuel Henry Adams, a Friend residing at Harrogate, (England), who last year spent some time in this country. The preparative meeting, Harrogate, of which he is a member, has sent out circular letters inviting the attention of English Friends to the subject, and proposing that London Yearly Meeting extend its correspondence to "all who bear the name of Friends" in this country. His own theological. attitude appears to be somewhat "orthodox," but he holds that divergencies of doctrinal opinion among Friends are not properly a bar to epistolary intercourse. The substance of his proposal is contained in the following passages:

When in America last year I could not but feel that our action with regard to Friends there is open to question. It seems illogical and unchristian to sympathize only with the body we call orthodox, and to neglect those, who, if unorthodox, require our help the more. If certain members of the so-called Hicksite body are to us unorthodox in their views, are not also others amongst the so-called orthodox in the methods of their religious services? Yet all are seekers after light, and most are in absolute accord with us on fundamental truths, and each body is equally entitled to our sympathy and regard. Are we not now rather endorsing the intolerance of the past and fostering a division which it may be our privilege to heal? It is hoped that a joint Epistle from the Yearly Meeting may be sent to all Friends in the United States, and that a closer union between American and English Friends may arise in a union which may be full of possibilities for good."

The subject will come up, no doubt, in London Yearly Meeting, this year, and it seems quite certain that it will be considered with a larger measure of sympathy for the proposal than has yet been the case. There has been, in England, within a few years, a broadening and widening of spirit, which has been observable in many important instances, and while we are by no means sure that definite action will be taken, this year, to extend the correspondence to all Friends in this country, there is little doubt that this will be done ultimately.

One observation we may add here, which we think all will agree to that the influence upon the world's affairs exerted by Friends, upon the foundation laid by George Fox, ought to be conserved and increased by every profitable means of increased cooperation and sympathy among the different bodies. Our forces are too small to be both minutely divided and uncordially separated.

BIRTHS.

BROWN.—Jn Washington City, Fourth month 19, 1898, to Thomas Janney and Elsie Palmer Brown, a son, who is named Boyd Janney.

CAMM.-At Newtown, Bucks county, Pa., Third month 4, 1898, to Joseph C. and Mary C. Camm, a daughter, who is named Dorothy Elizabeth.

DAVIS.-Fourth month 2, 1898, to Ellwood and Elizabeth Davis, near Woodstown, N. J., a son, who is named Frank.

PALMER.—At 630 E. 16th street, Chester, Pa., on Firstday, Fourth month 10, 1898, to Charles and Arletta C. Palmer, a son, who is named Edgar Z.

MARRIAGES.

PENNOCK-SMITH.-In Boston, Mass., Fourth month 19, 1898, by Friends' ceremony, Edward A. Pennock, formerly of Chatham, Chester county, Pa., and Sarah A. Smith, of Boston.

TURNER-GASKILL.-At the residence of the bride's parents, Fourth month 6, 1898, under the care of Abington Monthly Meeting of Friends, James R. Turner, of Jenkintown, son of Richard T. and Martha E. Turner, of Betterton, Kent county, Md., and Clara H., daughter of Nathan B. and Emma W. Gaskill, of Jenkintown.

DEATHS.

LINVILL.—At Gap, Pennsylvania, Twelfth month 21, 1897, John Comly Linvill, aged 63 years. Interred at Old Sadsbury.

REEVES.—In Philadelphia, Second-day, Fourth month 18, 1898, Mary Ann, wife of Stacy Reeves, and daughter of the late William and Ann Satterthwait, in her 69th year.

ROBERTS.—Suddenly, at Seattle, Wash., Fourth month 10, 1898, Thomas L., son of Albert C. and the late Elizabeth H. Roberts, and grandson of the late Charles and Rachel S. Evans, of Philadelphia.

SMITH. In London, England, Fourth month 17, 1898, Robert Pearsall. Smith, formerly of Philadelphia, aged 71 years, son-in-law of the late John M. Whitall, of Philadelphia. [His wife, Hannah Whitall Smith, is a well-known 'evangelist," and writer. For a number of years they have made their home in England.]

TALCOTT.-At Bloomfield, Ontario, Fourth month 20,

1898, of pneumonia, Elisha W. Talcott, aged 76 years.

He was a life-long and consistent member with Friends, who will be much missed in the meeting, as also by many in the business relations, where by his honesty and uprightness he had won a large and favorable acquaintance, but most of all in the family relation. He leaves a wife in feeble health, who with her friends had scarcely thought she would outlive the husband that was seldom ailing, but with only a few days of severe illness, that was borne with much patience, the unexpected bereavement came, and a family of seven children, all of whom have reached maturity, but still looked forward to the father for counsel, are left to mourn their great loss. Although dead, yet his example and influence speaketh. W.

ARCH ST. FRIENDS' YEARLY MEETING.

THE Yearly Meeting of Friends of Fourth and Arch streets, (Philad'a), was held last week, beginning on Second-day, and adjourning on Sixth-day. A report in a daily paper stated of the opening day that about. 900 persons were present, 400 men and 500 women.

Among the items of business of general interest was a proposal sent from Concord Quarterly Meeting to so amend the Discipline as to make possible the consolidation of preparative meetings of ministers and elders, where great reductions in numbers may have taken place. The matter was referred to a committee, which reported favorably to the change, and it was approved. Of the discussion of this subject on Second-day, when it was presented, the Friend says: "A remark that this indicated provision for a declining state' was followed by a lively exercise in which several participated, upholding the one remedy for decline, Christ, the Provision of Zion, with absolute surrender to his will in all things. . . . A provision for greater outwardness, worldliness, numbers at the expense of principles, would indeed be a provision for a declining state. . A hopeful view seemed to prevail that the cause of Truth would not decline. The growing openness to our principles in regard to war might be a token that our other principles will in their turn largely take hold of men.

The committee appointed last year to assist the Friends of Bucks Quarterly Meeting in their reduced condition, made a report in writing recommending that the quarterly meeting be laid down and the members thereof joined to Burlington Quarterly Meeting, from which Bucks was separated in the early days of the Society in America. The meeting united with the report and decided that hereafter Burlington Quarterly Meeting shall be known as Burlington and Bucks Quarterly Meeting. With the laying down of Buckingham Monthly Meeting some months ago, Bucks Quarterly Meeting was reduced to but one monthly meeting, that at Falls.

The queries and answers were considered on Third- and Fourth-days. The trustees of the Charleston Fund (money realized from the sale of the Friends' property in Charleston, S. C.), reported that since their last report, some eight years ago, they had expended $5,410 in building or repairing Friends' meeting-houses in North Carolina, Ohio, Iowa, Indiana, Kansas, and Baltimore yearly meetings.

The Meeting for Sufferings (Representative Committee) reported their action in preparing a memorial in favor of Peace, and their presentation of it to the President (as mentioned in a recent number of the INOf the TELLIGENCER). Epistle" issued by the Yearly Meeting last year, the Committee reported. that it had been sent to twenty-seven yearly meetings, and with but little exception had been well received. "Of the 40,000 copies which were printed, 32,000 copies have been distributed among meetings and their members in both hemispheres, leaving 8,000 to be circulated in Ireland and elsewhere, when the Epistle shall have been read in Dublin Yearly Meeting. Several very appreciative and encouraging extracts from letters sent by recipients of the Epistle were read." The Book Committee reported 1,181 books and 761 pamphlets as sold, and 1,256 volumes, and 1,469 pamphlets given away, those gratuitously distributed costing $522. Opportunities had been embraced of sending some books to Mexico, Central America, and South America. The whole printing, binding, and distributing for the year had cost $1,883.57.

As to intoxicants, the report stated that the members of ten monthly meetings are clear of using them, and the general condition as compared with last year is not much changed.

The educational answer and reports stated that there are in the yearly meeting 737 children between 5 and 20 years old, and 143 of these are not in attendance at Friends' schools. The Committee on Education had assisted or supported eighteen schools with 290 pupils. The Superintendent, Anna Walton, had visited these during the year and had held monthly meetings with the teachers. A spirit of coöperation and progress was noted, and the general work of elementary instruction has been advanced. The meeting appropriated $2,000 to the use of this committee.

The report of Westtown Boarding School showed the average attendance for the year had been 165. The total expenditures were $44,0co, being $3,000 in excess of receipts for the year. This deficit is made up from the funds of the school.

ATTITUDE OF ENGLISH FRIENDS. British Friend, Fourth Month. THE important subject of the correspondence between London Yearly Meeting and Friends in America is again moving the minds of Friends in different parts of the country, with a view to some readjustment of our position that shall be more in harmony with Christian brotherhood, and with the spirit of catholicity, so strongly emphasized by George Fox when he counselled Friends to cherish "a universal spirit." The following letters will assist our readers to understand the position many Friends desire our Yearly Meeting to adopt.

The matter was discussed at York Monthly Meeting on the 9th ult., on the introduction of S. H. Adams. The spirit of the proposal was cordially accepted by the meeting, and S. H. Adams was encouraged to carry it forward to London personally, but the meeting concluded to take no official action, on account of the danger of compromising our position with the so-called orthodox bodies, and on the ground that a year or two later might be a more favorable time for an alteration of some kind in the present position, which was admittedly unsatisfactory. Among

the points brought out in the discussion were the large share which mere personal feeling, ignorance, and intolerance had in bringing about the separation, though the trouble originally arose some years before 1827, on a doctrinal point. That so far as our correspondence carried endorsement, we were endorsing the practices of the "Friends' Church," which were wholly unlike what we knew as Quakerism, whilst refusing fellowship to those who were really akin to us.

S. H. Adams said that, speaking to an orthodox Friend [in the United States, we presume.-EDS. INTELLIGENCER.] on the sadness of the separation, and the possibilities of unity, he was told that they were drifting nearer, but "it rests with you English Friends who can bring this about." Was not this a serious responsibility for us, if we did not hold out a hand to help? to help those who are Friends in heart and by loving inheritance from the days of William Penn. He doubted whether a message of love and peace was inexpedient in any year, and that this should be treated as a matter of principle rather than expediency.

The subject was also taken up in Hardshaw East Monthly Meeting, which appointed a special adjourned sitting to be held at Manchester, and to be devoted to the subject, and a Committee was appointed to bring information or proposals to that meeting. The Monthly Meeting adopted the following minute after a long and interesting discussion:

This Meeting suggests to our next Quarterly Meeting the propriety of addressing the Yearly Meeting with the object of bringing about an equality of treatment, in the matter of correspondence, of all the various sections of Friends in America; thereby necessarily avoiding the formal endorse

ment of the views of any, while yet linking ourselves in Christian love with all.

For this end we propose that an Epistle "to all who bear the name of Friends in America' be sent year by year, and replies received from all who are willing to send them.

[The following paragraph from The Friend, London, Fourth month 15, may be added to the matter given above.]

AT Hardshaw West Monthly Meeting, held at Liverpool on the 30th ult., an interesting discussion arose on a minute sent up from Southport Preparative Meeting. This minute approves of the minute sent by Harrogate Preparative meeting to all preparative meetings, and it urged that the monthly meeting should send forward to the quarterly meeting a

minute condemning the present method of correspondence between our some of those on the American Continent, and own yearly meeting and pleaded that one General Epistle should be sent to all those bearing our name in America. The Monthly Meeting was adjourned to the 4th instant, in order that the matter might be fully gone into. At this adjourned meeting Friends had the advantage of hearing the views of Professor and Elizabeth Emmott, long resident in Baltimore. These Friends were not in favor of opening a correspondence with the "Hicksite" meetings, although they spoke of this body with much respect and sympathy. Their opinion had evidently great weight with the meeting. Strong arguments were used on the other side, in favor of the Southport minute, and showing how unsatisfactory was the present mode of procedure. One proposal was that all correspondence should be dropped for the present, and that letters should only be addressed to our sister yearly meetings when a living concern arose to do so, full liberty being felt in our yearly meeting to address any or all of those who bear our name. The conclusion of the meeting was, however, that the matter should not go forward to the quarterly meeting, and that Friends did not feel that the time had come for extending our correspondence to the "Hicksite" Yearly Meetings.

SEIZURE OF MERCHANT SHIPS.

[The following communication was sent by the writer to some of the daily and other newspapers, on the day of its date.] ASIDE from any other question concerning the war with Spain, there will be, one would hope, a substantial unanimity among American people regretting and disavowing the sudden capture, without previous warning, of Spanish merchant vessels on or near our coasts. The taking of the first steamer, the Buena Ventura, just issued from one of our own ports, and engaged in peaceful commerce, was, it would appear to the ordinary mind of justly-disposed persons, a flagrant breach of right, if not of law, while the capture of the others, since then, the Pedro, the Catalina, etc., is scarcely less, if at all, a harsh and even cruel proceeding.

It was long ago proposed,—by Dr. Franklin, among others,—that war should not be made on merchant vessels, and if we cannot yet reach that point of civilization, it is to be hoped the state of the law applicable to "prizes," recognized by the Courts of the United States, forbids the capture of such vessels, under such circumstances as those which have existed up to this time (the 25th). No declaration of war had been made when the Buena Ventura was taken, and her captain had a right to expect that he would be allowed to leave our coast in safety. No notice whatever was given that the war-ships at Key West would make him their prey. The unfortunate Pedro, equally in ignorance, and proceeding hopefully on its voyage, presents equally pathetic features, and the eagerness and haste of its capture,-even by the great "flagship" itself,-adds an unpleasing feature to the case.

I venture to make these suggestions: