News and Notes by Editor

International Tract and Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Oct 30, 1884

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 10, No. 41.

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News and Notes.

By Editor

RELIGIOUS.

—The pope is about to create eight new cardinals.

—Moody and Sankey have commenced a series of revival meetings in Boston.

—Since 1868, the Duke of Norfolk has given more than $2,500,000 to the Catholic Church.

—Some stir has been made in Germany because the pope has commissioned Lenbach, the painter, to produce a portrait of Bismarck.

—It is stated that British merchants send 10,000 barrels of rum to Madagascar every year, to neutralize the efforts of the missionaries there.

—Dr. Greene, a missionary in Constantinople, says: "The greatest peril of foreign missions is the want of vital piety in the churches at home."

—Miss Louisa S. Baker, who has been officiating for four years as pastor of the First Congregational Church, Nantucket, was recently ordained as the regular pastor of the church.

—There are 546 lady missionaries at work in the zenanas of India, where they are admitted for the express purpose and with the distinct understanding of reading and explaining the Bible.

—New York parties have purchased 26,000 acres of land near Las Vegas Springs, N. M., upon which they propose to establish an Episcopal colony with an educational institution.

—The electric light is being introduced into the churches in New York City. That is a good step, but, unfortunately, electricity does not furnish the kind of light of which they stand most in need.

—In his recent annual address before the Episcopal Convention, Assistant Bishop Potter expressed the hope that the day might not be far distant when a convention of all the ministers on Manhattan Island would be held.

—The Congregationalist says: "The Catholic Review is very zealous for 'freedom of worship' in New York. One of our exchanges asks it the pertinent question, whether it is equally zealous for such freedom in Spain."

—Dr. Dale, of England, in his "Manual of Congregational Principles," says that "the idea that infant baptism is a dedication of children to God is a pure invention, without the shadow of a foundation in Holy Scripture."

—Mr. C. W. DePauw, of New Albany, Ind., is the superintendent of a Sunday-school which, after sending out two branch schools, now numbers 1,053 pupils. The buildings, and the land on which they are placed, were the gift of Mr. DePauw.

—The superintendent of the Center Congregational Sunday-school of Meriden, Ct., has adopted the plan of asking each member of his school to bring on the Sunday following his or her birthday a "birthday offering" for the Lord's treasury. Envelopes are provided for this purpose, which will not be opened until the end of the year, when the entire sum collected in this way will be devoted to mission work.—S. S. World.

—At the meeting of the Pittsburg Presbyterian Alliance it was resolved that "this Conference do hereby recommend to the respective churches here represented that their representation and co-operation in the future meetings of the Alliance be conditioned upon the exclusive use of the divinely inspired and authorized hymnology contained in the book of Psalms." It is all right to sing psalms, but to disfellowship those who venture to sing anything else, savors more of bigotry than of Christianity.

—The Pacific Commercial Advertiser (Honolulu) charges that the Chinaman is the only one who suffers on account of the violation of the rigid Sunday law in the Hawaiian Islands. It says: "They know the difference between right and wrong as well as the Christians do. If they steal, cheat, lie, or commit murder, they do it willfully, knowing that they deserve, and are liable to punishment of some sort or other. But they have never learned, and cannot instinctively know that to carry their clothes home on a Sunday morning is a deadly sin. Nor have they any fair chance of learning that the law denounces both work and pleasure on the 'Sabbath' day from their observation of the conduct of those people to whom we owe the maintenance of our idolatrous Sunday law. From the highest to the lowest in the land, Hawaiians or foreigners, including even the teachers of religion themselves, all break it with impunity and apparently without compunction."