To the Yearly Meeting now sitting :—

The Committee having in charge the Fair Hill Boarding School Property, have again a favorable report to make of the present condition of the Property and School.

The average number of pupils has been about fifty, with an increased number of Friends' children at the present, when compared with the preceding term.

Since our last report the School Room has been enlarged, and bath rooms added at the expense of the occupants, thereby promoting the comfort and health of the inmates.

CHARITY.

rank in Scripture. They are introduced as inAll virtues have their approximate place and dividually beautiful, and as reciprocally connectthe hand of a more consummate master than ed. But perhaps no Christian grace ever sat to charity. Her incomparable painter, St. Paul, has drawn her at full length in all her fair prolineament of beauty. The whole delineation portions. Every attitude is full of grace, every perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

Who can look at this finished piece without The Committee appointed at a former sitting Yet if this conscious dissimilitude indnce a corblushing at his own want of likeness to it?to consider the subject brought up from Not-dial desire of resemblance, -the humiliation will tingham Quarterly Meeting, produced the follow- be salutary. Perhaps a more frequent conteming report, which was approved by the Meeting, plation of this exquisite figure, accompanied and the Clerk was directed to furnish that Quar- with earnest endeavors for a growing resemterly Meeting with the judgment of this Meet-blance, would gradually lead us not barely to ing upon the subject. admire the portrait, but would at length assimilate us to the divine original.

To the Yearly Meeting now sitting :—

The Committee appointed to consider and report their judgment upon the subject brought up from Nottingham Quarterly Meeting in relation to the words "improper Monuments," as used in our Discipline in regard to placing grave stones in our burying grounds, report, That we agree in the judgment, that they are intended to, and properly apply to such only as are of a character involving our testimony for the maintenance of simplicity and plainness; and that those that are of such dimensions as only to admit of placing thereon the name and date of the birth and death of the deceased, may in future be admitted in our burying grounds. Baltimore 10th month 27th, 1857.

The Committe appointed at a former sitting to prepare Essays of Epistles, as way may open, to the several Yearly Meetings with which we correspond, now produced one, embodying the Minute on the Exercises of this Meeting, which was approved, and the Clerks were directed to transcribe it, sign it on behalf of the Meeting, and forward it to the Yearly Meetings of New York, Philadelphia, Gennessee, Ohio and Indiana respectively.

Having been favored throughout the several sittings of the Yearly Meeting with the comforting evidence of the presence of the great Head of the Church, under whose cementing and solemnizing influence we have been enabled to transact the various concerns of Society in a spirit of much brotherly love and condescension, adjourned, to meet at the usual time next year, if so permitted.

BENJAMIN HALLOWELL, Clerk.

What a world of gossip would be prevented, if it was only remembered that a person who tells you of the faults of others, intends to tell others of your faults.

and of angels, and have not charity, I am be"Though I speak with the tongues of men come as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.

envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself; is not Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but lieveth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all rejoiceth in the truth; beareth all things, bethings.

prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be Charity never faileth; but whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.

derstood as a child, I thought as a child; but When I was a child I spake as a child, I unwhen I became a man I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face; now I know in part, but then shall I know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.'

LIFE'S TROUBLES.

We may compare the troubles which we have bundle of faggots, far too large for us to lift. to undergo in the course of this life to a great But God does not require us to carry the whole at once; he mercifully unties the bundle, and gives us first one stick, which we are to carry to

THINK YE 'TWAS MEANT THAT
SHOULD FIND NO SPELL.

MAN

Think ye 'twas meant that man should find no spell.
Of joy and beauty in the song-birds lay?
Oh, were the bright flowers only meant to tell
A warning tale of bloom that must decay?
Were it not worse than vain to close our eyes,
Unto the azure sky and golden light,
Because the tempest-cloud doth sometimes rise,
And glorious day must darken into night?
Wiser and better with a thankful mind,

day, and then another which we are to carry to- | ing up of the pine in the worn out fields of the morrow, and so on. This we might easily man- southern States, and this has been considered as age, if we would only take the burden appointed proof of the proposition; when the fact is, that for us each day; but we choose to increase our the mere cutting off the forest does not produce troubles by carrying yesterday's stick over again this effect. This only takes place when the roots to-day, and adding to-morrow's burdens to our and seeds of the first forest are all destroyed, and load before we are required to bear it. the soil re-reduced, and deprived of its potash, that oaks cannot grow in it. The sceds of the pine having been carried on to it by the wind and other causes, and finding a congenial soil and one adapted to their growth, they occupy and flourish in it. In the sandy pine lands of New Jersey, the oak cannot succeed under any circumstances, for only the dwarf oak can grow there. On the shores of the Chesapeake Bay, where more loam is found in the soil, a mixture of oak and pine is often met with. Here on cutting off all the timber and leaving it so, the oak I will prevail over the pine, because the former sprouts from the stump, while the latter does not, but must be renewed from seed. If, after taking off the wood, the ground is cleared and cultivated in corn a year or two, and then left, the seeds it succeeds, while the oak is destroyed by cultiof the pine being placed in a condition to grow, vation. Some of the land just alluded to, has been cut over several times, and by following the above method, pine is kept there; being considered more valuable. There are many places where oak timber has been several times cut off, as fuel for furnaces, where oak is always renewed. Where the soil is strong enough for oak to grow freely, oak generally succeeds, even where pine is in the vicinity to furnish seed, because oak will sprout from the stumps of former trees, and overshadow the young pine, which is Where laud is cultionly produced from seed.

To bless our God for every glory given,
And with a gentle heart to seek and find,
In things on earth, a type of things in heaven

CHARITY.

"Give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would bor

row of thee turn not thou away."-MATT. 5: 4.

O stay not thy hand when the winter winds rude,
Blow cold through the dwelling of want and despair,
To ask if misfortune has come to the good,
Or if folly has wrought out the wreck that is there.
When the heart-stricken wanderer asks thee for bread,
In suffering he bows to necessity's laws;
When the wife moans in sadness, the children unfed,
The cup must be bitter-oh ask not the cause!
When the Saviour of men raised his finger to heal,
Did he ask if the sufferer was Gentile or Jew?
When the thousand were fed by the bountiful meal,
Did He give it alone to the faithful and few?
Oh scan not too closely the frailties of those
Whose bosoms may bleed on a cold winter's day;
But give to the friendless who tells thee his woes,
And from him that would borrow, oh turn not
away!"

For Friends' Intelligencer. "ARE OAKS PRODUCED WITHOUT ACORNS?"

vated so as to reduce its fertility, and destroy the roots and seeds of the oak, then by throwing it out of cultivation the pine may succeed, because its leaves are never eaten by cattle, and it will grow where scarcely any thing else will.

The latter part of the proposition is equally at variance with every theory of vegetable growth, Mankind find it much easier to take principles now acknowledged by scientific men. Where upon hearsay, and build theories upon them, than the leaves of the forest and all refuse materials to investigate the truth of these principles for of growth are left to decay on the soil, the exist themselves. Thus false premises are often ence of the forest cannot exhaust the soil of started with, and as a consequence the proposi-"the materials for growth," for they are not cartion being unsound, the fabric erected thereon will not stand the test of examination. In Friends' Intelligencer of 10th mo. 10th, page 476, is an article over the signature of S. L. E. E., taken from the New York Tribune, and headed by the editor, Are oaks produced without acorns?' The first proposition of the writer, that it is a well known fact, that the removal of one species of forest is followed by a growth The second proposition is no doubt true, "that of one entirely different,' is not correct in the seeds buried in the ground below a certain depth, sense designed by the writer. It is only true retain their vitality for years, and when under under certain circumstances and not as a general favorable circumstances, germinate as surely as law. Superficial observers have seen the spring-the seed of the past year.” Many kinds of seeds

ried away, but left in a condition to improve rather than exhaust it. Orchards of fruit trees, where the fruit and leaves are taken away, do exhaust the soil as well as our usual crops of grain, but the surplus growth of the forest or the prairie is still added to the soil, and we have no reason to suppose that it becomes unfitted for any kind of growth.

think?'

retain their vitality a long time without being | visible, disrobed of material substance, yet reburied. It is said that the seed of the stone taining its power to draw from its surroundings a pine has been kept forty years, and then grew body; and may not this account for the fact that readily, and we have no reason to suppose that such germs are destitute of the leaves which init would not have retained its vitality a longer variably attend the newly planted acorn?" If time. the life-principle' is disrobed of material subThe writer then advances a new theory by stance,' what are its surroundings,' and how way of query, a theory, it would seem, based more can it retain power to form a body,' and where on fancy than fact. He asks," May not the re- is the fact that such germs are destitute of moval of the dense foliage admit the warmth of leaves? Until such facts are produced and well the sun, and thereby wake from their long sleep attested, it is certainly unsafe and highly imthe germs from the forests of past centuries, sup- proper to form theories upon conjecture. The plied with more perfected materials for a more intelligence of the age forbids it, the deductions perfect growth than their progenitors, they to of science do not support it, and is it not a mark run their course and give place to a yet more ad- of skepticism to deny the deductions of science, vanced species, in accordance with the great law and when pressed by its advocates to say, 'perof improvement?" This theory appears to be sub-haps so; we don't deny it, we only ask men to stantially the same as that that supposes man to be only an improved monkey, and the monkey himself to be derived from some still lower order of creation. As if the Creator could not or did not make man at once a perfect being, as we are told in Moses' account of the creation. This account represents the Creator as having made every plant and every herb of the field whose seed was in itself, and our experience testifies that every plant and every herb still brings forth and continues itself by seed. Shall we, with this evidence before us, suggest new theories, and set aside this testimony before we have reason to doubt its correctness? We may say, "How or when the first oak was made we know not," but have we not faith to believe that God created not only the oak, but every thing we see on this earth, and that they are continued by laws then given, and to which they are still subject? We may imagine that "the great law of improvement," as we suppose, warrants the suggestion that "this long sleep may have imparted to the buried germ a strength and vigor to be obtained only in this way, thereby producing a tree quite unlike its successor," but where is the evidence? A more rational method would be to produce facts that could be substantiated, upon which to found a new theory, before setting aside an old one. Many persons have supposed they have struck upon an idea, calculated to achieve some great improvement in mechanics or science, and have spent years of thought upon it, when if they had first made themselves acquainted with what others have done in the same direction, they would at once have seen the folly of continuing the investigation. The idea of a perpetual motion has been entertained by many, and much time spent upon it, when the exercise of a little good common sense applied to the universal law in mechanics, of gravitation and friction, would shew them that no power could be produced which could of itself overcome them.

But there is still another suggestion advanced, one at least new to me, it is this: "May not the spirit or life-principle remain intactible and in

But there is still another view of the matter, in which the writer has shown a want of consistency. He supposes that 'the germs from the forests of past centuries' are thereby supplied with more perfect materials' after their long sleep,' and then seems to think that it may yet prove a valuable auxiliary to a more rapid improvement in the productions of the earth.' How a rapid improvement' can be had, when it requires the long sleep' of centuries' for the germ to be 'supplied' with 'materials for a more perfect growth,' is not easy to conceive. Did the peach pits,' 'buried for at least 30 years,' produce fruit more perfect than their progenitors,' or did the wheat said to have been found in the hand of an Egyptian mummy, and supposed to have been buried for 3000 years, produce more perfect grain than then grew in Egypt or than now grows here? I think not. It is certainly wrong in principle, and unjust in practice, to set aside long established theories and generally received opinions, until such are proved to be erroneous, not by mere conjecture, but positive facts well sustained. Y. T.

Waterford, Virginia, 10th mo., 1857.

ARKANSAS.

Philadelphia, Saturday, May 7th, 1836. In the proceedings of the United States Senate on the 25th, we notice the following:

Mr. Buchanan said he rose to present the memorial of the Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends, which had been recently held in the city of Philadelphia, remonstrating against the admission of Arkansas into the Union, whilst a provision remained in her Constitution which admits of and may perpetuate slavery. This Yearly Meeting embraced within its jurisdiction the greater part of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, the whole of the State of Delaware, and the Eastern Shore of Maryland. The language of this memorial was perfectly respectful. Indeed. it could not be otherwise, considering the source