MODERATOR'S CLOSING ADDRESS.

The MODERATOR then delivered his closing address as follows:Fathers and Brethren,-By the good hand of God upon us, the business of this Assembly has been brought to a conclusion. We have surely cause to be thankful for the measure of harmony which has characterised our deliberations and discussions ;—that even where there has been difference of opinion there has been no angry strife, nothing fitted to produce distrust or alienation, nothing to mar the free intercourse of brotherly affection when we are again dispersed over the land and engaged in our wonted spheres of labour. (Applause.) On the contrary, may we not hope that there has been not a little both in the nature of that business which we have been called upon to transact, and in the tone and spirit in which it has been transacted, fitted to strengthen the bonds of brotherly love, and to quicken us to fresh energy in the cause of Him in whose name we have been assembled here, and whose ministers we are. (Applause.) If there are reasons for humiliation on account of past shortcomings, and doubtless there have been many, when we consider the work which God has been calling us to do, and the opportunities He has been affording us for doing it, we have very abundant reason also to thank God and to take courage, when we remember all the way by which He has led us, and the goodness and mercy He has been making to pass before us. Our course as a Church has been progressive, and there is no reason for abatement of hope in the contemplation of the future. The Lord has set us in a large place. He has been preparing room before the vine which He brought out of Egypt, and has caused it to take deep root and to fill the land. He has not broken down its hedges, nor suffered the wild beast of the field to devour it. It becomes us to praise God for His long-suffering and forbearance, to hearken more diligently to His voice, and henceforth to walk more steadfastly in His ways. It is thus that the haters of the Lord will be made to submit themselves unto Him, and it is thus also that we shall be fed with the finest of the wheat. (Applause.)

It is not my purpose, in these few closing words, to review the proceedings of the Assembly, or even to recapitulate the manifold transactions in which you have been engaged. To rehearse what you have been doing is superfluous, to pronounce judgment on what you have determined would be justly regarded as presumptuous.

There are several things, however, which are fitted to make this Assembly a memorable one, as I cannot doubt it has been a pleasant and profitable one to most of its members. One of these is the presence in the midst of us of so many of our brethren from the great Western continent, and the words which they have spoken to us. None who heard him can ever forget what Mr Stewart has told us of the actings of that Christian Commission of which he was the honoured president, and the labours of which are fitted to stir up, as with a trumpet, the energies of all the Churches in the world. (Applause.) There is nothing like them in the annals of history-carried on upon a scale which was so gigantic and characterised by a beneficence which was so God-like. (Renewed applause.) On this side the Atlantic our minds were perhaps too exclusively directed to the horrors of the fratricidal strife in which so much blood and treasure were sacrificed, and it cannot but be

profitable to us to have had our attention arrested on that angel of mercy which all the while hovered over the battle-field. (Applause.) It is with a humbling sense of our own littleness that I contemplate the gigantic moral and spiritual power which resides within the Northern States of the Union, and which could summon into action as in a moment 4000 agents, and send them forth to minister to friend and foe alike, to soul and body alike—to undertake and carry through tasks the most revolting,-to enter into all the self-denying breadth of that beneficence which filled the heart and distinguished the life of Jesus on earth. The soul catches fire at such a spectacle the old grudges and suspicions are melted down-across the Atlantic, in the presence of horrid war, the spirit of Christ has triumphed; and now the disbanded soldiers, scattered over all the land, are diffusing the savour of Christ and have become the instruments of a wondrous revival; and here, in Britain, our wonder grows into brotherly love, and finds expression for itself in praise to the God of all grace, and in thanks to our brethren who have set us an example so noble and so worthy of imitation. (Much applause.)

Let us be very thankful, too, that God has put an end to the slavery which was estranging us from the American Churches. My heart turns with very peculiar affection to the Old School Presbyterians, who have this year sent a deputation to our Assembly. I rejoice in the presence among us of Mr Lea and Mr Cameron. I cannot doubt that an intercourse has been renewed between us and them which the progress of time will render only more close and endearing. They have had, and still have, not a few men who are beloved among us for their works' sakethe Alexanders, father and sons, who have lately passed away, and Hodge, who yet lives, with unequalled clearness and precision, to unfold the truths of the gospel. Nor do our hearts go forth to that great body alone. Our sympathies embrace all the Presbyterian family, which, yonder as well as here, has been sadly divided, but which healthier influences are once more drawing together, creating and sustaining the hope that we and they may rejoice in a happy re-union, and become, under God, a mightier power than we have ever been for the evangelising of the world. (Applause.)

The visit of Dr Patton and Mr Sella Martin, on behalf of the freedmen of America, will not soon be forgotten by any of us. Who can despair of the elevation of the down-trodden African race, when they have among them men of such singular energy and eloquence as Mr Martin? (Applause.) His pleading on behalf of the freedmen is a thing that will live in our memory, and, what is of more consequence, will, I trust, be instrumental in stirring us up to render effective help to those who have often helped us in our necessities, and who have now a very great and urgently necessitous work to do among the recently-emancipated slaves -a work the magnitude of which will task the energies of Christendom, and which demands our hearty co-operation. (Applause.)

Is it not also a memorable event of this Assembly that we have heard in the midst of us the voice of the most eloquent and most effective of all modern preachers, whose winged words, fragrant with the unction of the Holy One, are penetrating into all countries, and awakening an echo in so many hearts? I am thankful for Mr Spurgeon's visit to us, and cannot permit myself to doubt that it will be profitable, as it has been

refreshing, to our souls, as I know it has been to his. (Applause.) I will not pause to speak of other incidents, though there are many that invite attention. It has seemed to me, indeed, as if, on and after the first Friday of our Session, we had been obtaining a fresh baptism of fire-as if not a few of the members of this Assembly had received power to speak to us with unwonted warmth and eloquence-as if the spirit of the Disruption times had come back upon us again, with some of the fervour of its brotherly love and the energy of its action. (Cheers.) There is, however, one feature in the proceedings of this Assembly to which I may be permitted to advert more at length. I allude to the proposal which has been laid before you to institute a professorship of Evangelistic Theology in connexion with our Theological Halls. (Applause.) This, I believe, will make the present Assembly a memorable one in the annals of the Church. It does not belong to us to anticipate what the effect of such an institution may be on the ministry and the members of the Church, to estimate the extent to which it may more thoroughly mould the mind and heart of the Church into a great missionary organisation. The proposal itself, we cannot doubt, is the fruit of a revived and increasing evangelistic spirit, and we cannot but hope and pray that the carrying it into effect will yet more intensify and enlarge that spirit, till it grows into the fulness of one of the Saviour's latest words on earth-"Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature." (Applause.)

There is no word which expresses so perfectly as this does the grand work which the Church has to do in the world, and which it must do if it is to prosper and be in health. It is a word which covers the whole field of missions at home and abroad, to Jew and Gentile. It expresses the business to which the energies of the Church must be directed, the grand design of her organisation, the purpose for which she is preserved in the world. When the risen Saviour breathed on His disciples and said, "Receive ye the Holy Ghost," He said also, "As the Father sent me even so send I you." He was sent to seek and to save the lost, and this also is our mission, as His servants and instruments. If we are partakers of His spirit, if that breath which He exhaled on the first disciples has been breathed upon our souls, we have obtained this promise of the Father as a consecration for this sacred work.

Is it not a work which lies peculiarly to our hands, a work which is the best and most adequate expression of our distinctive principles as a Church? For our doctrine regarding the spirituality of the Church, its distinct and independent government, rests chiefly on this word of the Lord, "My kingdom is not of this world." This is the definition of the Lord's kingdom as described negatively. But He gives also in immediate connexion with this a definition of what it is positively. He says, "To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice." It is in this witnessing unto the truth, then, that the kingdom of Christ consists-this is its distinctive and peculiar function, and in this resides its power. Just in as far as the Church is so witnessing is she a kingdom not of this world, spiritual, free, depending on the Lord only, and the minister of His holy will. (Applause.) It almost inevitably happens, therefore, that when she abandons this her peculiar function she is enslaved, and becomes part of the kingdoms of

this world. A Free Church, therefore, if she is to vindicate her principles, must be peculiarly and essentially an Evangelistic Church, a Church bearing witness unto the truth, to all the ends of the earth. The doing of this is, in the deepest sense, an assertion of her freedom, of her spirituality, of her title to claim the privileges which belong to the kingdom which is not of this world. Nor is it without significance that our Lord, in immediate connexion with the great Commission to the Church, asserts His supremacy, His possession of all power in heaven and on earth. He asserts it not merely as an encouragement to the disciples to undertake the work which He has assigned them, but that they might understand how free they were to prosecute it. They might enter into all kingdoms, as witnesses unto the truth, to establish in them all that kingdom which is not of this world, without being liable to the charge of invasion or rebellion, because He is the King of kings, and because His kingdom is spiritual—a kingdom of righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. Therefore are they warranted to penetrate into all lands, and to take possession of them in the name of Him who is destined to wear the crown of all the world, to have the heathen for his inheritance, and the uttermost ends of the earth for his possession.

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When I speak of the Church as evangelistic, I make no distinction between Home and Foreign Missions, Christ's witnesses are sent to testify to all men. 'Every creature" does not mean only those who are remote from our shores; the phrase includes also my brethren and sisters according to the flesh, my companions, my fellow-countrymen. The Church which is evangelistic does not neglect the heathen at home any more than the heathen of other lands. Our Home and Foreign Missions, in fact, are different parts of one great work; there is no antagonism between them, no conflicting interest in the maintenance of them. On the contrary, the one sustains the other. The spirit which interests the Church in the idolaters of India, interests her also in those who are living without God within her own borders. I have little hope, indeed, of the Church extending or even long sustaining her evangelistic enterprises either at home or abroad, unless she enters into the full breadth of the Saviour's commission. If I suffer to perish those who are beside me, who are ignorant and out of the way, I shall soon lose all interest in those who are wandering in darkness in other lands. In such a case, my interest in these poor idolaters would be manifestly the fruit of romance rather than of Christian compassion, and the glow of romance perishes as the flower of the grass. It has been alleged, indeed, that Home Missions are the fruit of Foreign Missions-that it is in prosecuting the latter that the Church becomes alive to the former. It is not of much importance that we should try to settle this question of priority or of generation. Of this there can be no doubt that they act and react healthfully upon each other, and that because the prosecution of both brings us nearer to the mind of Christ. A vigorous Home Mission goes far to sustain an equally vigorous Foreign Mission; and, just in the measure in which a living Christ-like interest in Foreign Missions is awakened in the Church, do I feel confident that our Home Mission will be prosecuted with an ever-increasing zeal. The soul that longs and works for the salvation of the whole world cannot be indifferent to that little portion of it which has the special claim upon us of near neighbourhood and Christian patriotism. (Applause.)

Fathers and Brethren, I trust that our meetings here will have the effect of awakening us to fresh zeal in a work so beneficent and so much in harmony with the mind of Him who taught us to pray "Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." Our General Assembly, by its compact organisation, is well fitted to suggest to us what an admirable mechanism our Presbyterian Church furnishes for carrying out every evangelistic enterprise. If it be true that the peculiar function of a Church is to be evangelistic, to be a witness for Christ to every creature, there is no system of Church government so well fitted as ours for fulfilling this end of our vocation. And this fact has always appeared to me to furnish a strong presumptive proof of the Scriptural character of Presbyterianism. Other churches that are evangelistic in their spirit are necessitated to carry out their missionary enterprises by an instrumentality as it were outside of the organisation of the Church -by means of missionary societies which form no part of that organisation. But when the spirit of life and love from on high is breathed upon a Presbyterian Church, it becomes itself one great missionary society. (Applause.) For carrying out any evangelistic enterprise we need no new organisation, we have in our very constitution all the requisite agency. Far be it from me to depreciate the zeal and manifold labours in the missionary cause of churches which are not Presbyterian. The London Missionary Society and others of a similar character deserve the love and grateful esteem of all the churches of Christ. But surely it is no trifling benefit that we, as Presbyterians, can gird ourselves for this great enterprise in our entireness as a Church, that, by reason of the unity and compactness of our Presbyterianism, we already possess all the instrumentality needed for this chief business of the Church, and if it be so, are we not therefore laid under all the deeper obligation to use that instrumentality for the end for which God has given it to us, to be what God has so joined us together in one to become,—an evangelistic institute, witnessing to every creature, of that grace and truth which have come by Jesus Christ. (Applause.)

But if the Church is to become, or continue to be, such an institute, it must be by the spirit of life being diffused through all its members. Its organisation is not self-acting, however admirably fitted for the functions it was designed to discharge. It is like the body whose various members are so fitly framed and joined together, but are all motionless when the life-blood ceases to circulate in the veins. The compactness and symmetry of our Church, and the relation in which its various congregations and members stand to one another, are merely organisms for the action of the promised Spirit, whose creature and instrument the Church is. It becomes us, therefore, to be of one accord and of one mind in waiting with expectation for a more copious effusion of that Spirit by whose resistless power we know that sooner or later the knowledge of the glory of the Lord shall cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. But if the Church is to be the instrument of the Holy Spirit in effecting this most wonderful and beneficent revolution, she will become such, by the grace infused into each of her members. The Church grows from within. "The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all seeds; but when it is grown it is the greatest among herbs." The grace which is imparted to our soul is not only diffusive within that