of England in India has, of late years, become "High-Church" in its tendencies to an alarming degree. The various dissenting bodies of Europe do not seem just now ready to organize, and conduct a general and strong counteracting movement in India. Hence the sympathy which our mission commands among these persons in India, and the attraction it presents to those within the English Church who appreciate spirituality as opposed to formalism and ritualism.

We cannot fail to recognize the relation of all that is done in India to the work of evangelization of Asia. "India redeemed, Asia is the Lord's," was the sentiment and belief of Bishop Thomson, with which we heartily sympathize, and which lack of space alone prevents our attempting to explain, illustrate, and demonstrate. God bless William Taylor and the Methodist Episcopal Missions of all India! God bless all the missions of all the Churches in all places!

ART. IV.-ENGLISH AND AMERICAN METHODISM CONTRASTED.

As an exposition of Christian doctrine, the Methodism of Great Britain and the United States of America exactly coincides. Though separated, as we sometimes find them, by oceans, mountains, rivers, lakes, and prairies, the pulpits of the two great Anglo-Saxon families of Methodism invariably ring the same note. In each country the same triune God is adored, the same terrible apostasy is lamented, and the same glorious provision of divine mercy is offered for acceptance. In each country the distressed penitent is taught to look for relief, not to any meritorious works that he can perform or to any imaginary treasury of merit that fellow-mortals have accumulated for him, not to any sacerdotal efficacy lodged in certain officers of the Church, nor to any supposed virtue in the penances or sacraments which the Church may have enjoined, but to the "Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world," and to him alone. In each country the believer is encouraged to expect the witness of the Spirit to his adoption,

and to strive for a state of grace in which his character and experience will be mature and complete. In each country he is comforted with the prospect of a future resurrection, and of a gracious recognition and approval at the bar of infinite justice; and in each country he is taught to anticipate, if faithful unto death, the eternal felicities of a world of unmingled purity, happiness, and glory.

But while these cardinal doctrines form the base of the theological structure of Methodism on both sides of the Atlantic, and are guarded with equal jealousy by each, there seems to have been, at least in former years, a lack of flexibility on the part of the Wesleyan Church in dealing with other views, some of which are not only outside of the denominational standards, but which are regarded by other evangelical Churches as matters which are open to further inquiry. Thus not many years have passed since a Wesleyan minister was expelled from the ministry for preaching what are understood as millenarian tenets. Within a still briefer period another shared the same fate for expressing in public the opinion that the offspring of sanctified parents partake of their moral purity; and only two or three years ago another was dealt with in a similar way, because he repudiated the class-meeting as a scriptural test of Church membership.

In each of these instances the accused parties displayed some pertinacity in the defense of their opinions, which, whether it arose from the strength of their convictions, or from carelessness as to their fate, certainly tended to accelerate their doom. A more liberal spirit, however, is now rapidly gaining ground in the British Conference, and in a few years these and similar acts of severity will be remembered with as little complacency as Calvin must have reflected on the burning of Servetus.

Regarding Methodism as an ecclesiastical organization, the points of diversity between the two branches are more nu

merous.

In the machinery of Wesleyan Methodism the class-meeting occupies a very eminent place. It is the primary cell from which the society, the circuit, the district, and the conference are evolved; it is the unit on which the whole fiscal economy rests; and, as has been intimated, it is the sine qua non of membership itself.

FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XXIX.-18

The importance attached to class-meetings by Wesleyan Methodists may be accounted for on historical grounds. Methodism was originally a society in the Church of England. It consisted of members of that establishment who failed to find in its formal services, and in the dry morality taught in its pulpits, that spiritual aliment which they required, and hence, while retaining their connection with it, availed themselves of the evangelical theology and devotional appliances provided by the Wesleys. By meeting in class such persons not only participated in that communion of saints which Scripture enjoins as the privilege and duty of believers, but afforded a sign that they concurred in the movement which the two brothers originated. Hence the class-meeting eventually became the test of membership-not in the Church, for many persons who disapproved of Methodism remained members of the Church of England but the test of membership in the Wesleyan society; and though since then the relation which Methodism sustains to the Church of England has undergone a great change, especially since the "High Church" principles began to prevail in the latter, until Methodism shall openly renounce its association with it, and take its legitimate position as a distinct Church, the original test will probably retain its original significance.

American Methodism, on the other hand, commenced its astonishing career unfettered by tradition and unburdened by precedent. It adopted the class-meeting as a valuable means of grace, but regarded attendance on other means of grace, such as the ministry of the word and the sacrament, as of equal obligation.

In the ministry of Wesleyan Methodism, for reasons which will be afterward explained, the pastoral feature is to a great extent lacking. In order to supply this deficiency as far as possible, the preacher is expected to visit each class during the quarter, and after having heard the religious experience of those who are present, to give to each a ticket on which a passage of Scripture is printed, and on which the minister has written his own name and that of the member to whom it is handed. These tickets are the Church credentials of the holder. They secure admission to love-feasts, and similar social meetings; and as a new ticket is issued every three months, the possession of the one for the current quarter is a

sufficient guarantee that the holder of it is a recognized member of the body, in whatever part of the country he may happen to be. Though the distribution of these tickets involves a good deal of extra labor on the part of the preacher, the plan works well; and while objections have been raised against every other peculiar feature in the economy of Methodism, no one has ever assailed the ticket system. It possesses at least this advantage over the American method, that it requires every one who wishes to be considered as a member to come in contact periodically with the minister and Church members of the place where he then resides; and thus that anomalous state of things is rendered impossible in which a person may absent himself from the means of grace, withhold contributions for the support of the Gospel, and even live in a backsliding state, and yet claim membership with the Church on the ground that he has somewhere in his keeping a worn-out letter of dismissal, written months, or even years previously by some preacher of a distant conference in a remote region in the United States.

The duties of the leaders' meeting of the Wesleyan Methodist Society so closely resembles those which are discharged by the court of the same name in American Methodism, as to require no further notice.

The quarterly meeting, or, as it would be called in this country, the Quarterly Conference, is composed of the traveling preachers; the local preachers of three years' standing; the circuit, society, chapel, and poor stewards; the trustees and class-leaders; the superintendent preacher (or preacher in charge) taking the chair. At this meeting a circuit steward is annually elected, whose duty it is to keep the circuit accounts, to provide a comfortable and well-furnished house for the minister, and to welcome him on his arrival. He receives the moneys raised in the various societies, and pays the preacher the stipend which the circuit has fixed upon at previous meetings as its allowance. In some instances the receipts, when all accounted for, do not realize the sum agreed upon; but in such cases the circuit steward usually advances the deficiency from his own private resources, and such deficiency is regarded as a circuit debt. Gentlemen are usually elected to the office of circuit steward whose circumstances enable them to make such

advances without inconvenience; but should such circuit debt, after being carried to the following quarter, remain unliquidated, it is usual to assess the various societies in proportion to the average amount they pay in; and should this also fail, recourse is had to public collections, tea-meetings, lectures, bazaars, or some other method of raising money.

Such an officer as a circuit steward is not only considered honorable by the incumbents, inasmuch as it is a manifestation of the respect and confidence of the circuit, but is considered by the English preachers as exceedingly useful to themselves. In him, that authority which in America is divided among the whole board of stewards is centralized. Hence, the preacher on an English circuit is never exposed to the mortification, after "calling a meeting of officials," of finding himself the only one present. The circuit steward having authority during the interval between the preceding and following quarterly meeting to meet all legitimate claims which may be made upon the circuit, on arriving at a new field of labor he not only finds the lists of names, residences of members, and times and places of preaching, which his predecessor has left, but a "living epistle" in the person of the circuit steward, whose explanations elucidate all circuit matters far more effectually than writing can do, and whose hearty shake of the hand often helps to reconcile him to a field of labor which would be equivalent to what in the West would be considered as a "grasshopper district.”

The division of circuits; the desirability of an additional preacher; the erection and enlargement of new places of worship; the examination and approval of local preachers; the examination of candidates for the ministry, and their recommendation to the district meeting, (as it is there called,) are all duties of the quarterly meeting; and although beyond its province, and severely censured by the stationing committee, many quarterly meetings of late have been in the habit of selecting and inviting preachers for the following year. This practice, which is becoming exceedingly prevalent, unless checked by wise legislation is likely at no distant date to be the source of trouble and perplexity, inasmuch as it is an assumption on the part of the laity of that liberty of choice which both they and the ministers voluntarily surrender when they give the