The total amount for these thirty-five years is a sum of Twelve million nine hundred and twenty-two thousand pounds, four shillings and threepence.

The annual average over the whole is £369,200.

And this all proceeds from the free-will offerings of the people. The sanguine estimate of Dr. Chalmers has been actually exceeded on the whole average of these years by nearly £70,000 of annual income.

It is still more striking to observe that for the last seven years (1874-80), instead of the estimated £300,000, the revenue has largely exceeded £500,000-half-a-million sterling.

Such results sufficiently show the strength of principle and depth of religious feeling which were enlisted in the cause. The Free Church appealed to the love and loyalty which men bore to Christ, and it was this which set open the fountain of Christian liberality, and ever since has kept the stream not only flowing but deepening.

Not since Apostolic times, said Dr. R. Buchanan (1867), has there ever been a more noble "outburst of joyful, self-denying, large-hearted, loving liberality to God's cause than was exhibited by this Church of ours in the ever-memorable 1843. It was a blessed time of refreshing from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power. Who that had any part in that time can look back on it without feeling as if no other words could adequately describe it but those of the 68th Psalm: "O God, when Thou wentest forth before Thy people, when Thou didst march through the wilderness; the earth shook, the heavens also dropped at the presence of God: even Sinai itself was moved at the presence of God, the God of Israel. Thou, O God, didst send a plentiful rain, whereby Thou didst confirm Thine inheritance, when it was weary. Thy congregation hath dwelt therein : Thou, O God, hast prepared of Thy goodness for the poor. The Lord gave the Word; great was the company of those that published it."

XLVI. DANGERS IN 1843.

In the foilowing sections our object will be to give some account of the work done by the Free Church in advancing the cause of true religion in the land. Already in these Annals we have seen the conflict through which she passed when the battle of spiritual freedom was fought and won. We have traced her after history, amidst those sacrifices and trials which followed the Disruption. And now we come to the more peaceful and less exciting scenes in which she was seeking to carry out the great work for which the Christian Church exists on earth-the upholding of the cause of Christ, and spreading among the people the blessings of salvation.

There were, it must be admitted, very serious difficulties in her way at the outset. For many months the anxiety and toil of the conflict had been excessive. Working at high pressure, with every power of body and of mind stretched to the uttermost, it was obvious that men could not long endure the strain-a time of reaction might be expected to set in, when those who had borne the burden and heat of the day might sink into lassitude and depression. If this fear had been realised, the warmth of spiritual earnestness which had carried them through the struggle would soon have grown cold-the tide of religious zeal which had been running at high flood would have been followed by the inevitable ebb, and the bright promise of spiritual blessing would have passed away.

The fickleness and instability of the human mind, might well have given rise to such misgivings, but there was still greater cause for anxiety, on looking to certain ominous warnings in the past history of the Church. Times of remarkable spiritual life and activity have not unfrequently been followed by

times of degeneracy and decay. Among the Protestant Churches of the Continent there was, at the Reformation, a great outburst of religious earnestness; but, one by one, they lost their first love, and fell into coldness and deadness. In our own country, the marvellous awakening of the Second Reformation soon had its bright promise overcast; and, after the Revolution, our Church, which had stood the fierce fires of the long persecution, no sooner came forth from the furnace than signs of unfaithfulness appeared, and went on increasing till she sank into the depths of Moderatism. Thus it was that past experience might well suggest anxious misgivings for the future, lest what had happened before should happen again.

There was some reason to fear, also, that the spirit of controversy in the Free Church might prove hostile to her spiritual life. For ten years, controversy of a very serious kind had been unavoidable, and men had become inured to it. But the training which makes a good soldier is not that which makes a good agriculturist, and practised skill in the conflicts of religious debate might seem to be but an indifferent preparation for the work of ministering to the wants of human souls, and spreading among the people the blessings of the Gospel of peace. Apart, indeed, from the question of personal fitness, it might well have been doubted how far God's blessing could be expected on her efforts. In Bible history, King David was not allowed to build the Temple, because he had been a man of

The battles he fought were the battles of the Lord; but the mere fact that he had been a warrior was enough to set him aside, and no stone of the sacred building could be laid by his hand. And so, when it came to the great work of spreading spiritual religion among the people, might not the Free Church have been passed over? It had been a good fight for great Scriptural principles which she had fought, but the very consciousness of this had given a certain sternness to the conflict; and might not a Church which had been thrown into such an attitude have been made to stand aside, and leave to other hands the great practical work of spreading the blessings of salvation among the people?

But the greatest risk of all was the danger of a boastful

spirit showing itself in the Free Church. The way in which she had risen from the ruins of the Disruption had filled both friends and foes with wonder. The deed of self-sacrifice at the outset, the energy of her subsequent proceedings, and the unheard-of liberality of her contributions, were everywhere spoken of. Congratulations came pouring in from so many of the Churches of Britain, America, and the Continent, that she found herself the observed of all observers. Most perilous of all, her ministers and members were looked up to as conspicuous examples of All this high-toned spirituality and religious earnestness.

might have proved a fatal snare if the Free Church had given way to the spirit of boastfulness and pride, tarnishing the lustre of the sacrifice she had made, and bringing a fatal blight over all her prospects of spiritual usefulness.

It is interesting to observe how the men who were prominent in Disruption times were alive to the dangers of the position. "It seems to have fallen in the providence of God to the Free Church," said Dr. Candlish, "to attract on various accounts the attention of other bodies, and we cannot but feel that this, among other circumstances, puts this Church in a situation of peculiar responsibility. If we are as a city set on an hill, and if we have been so moved and directed in the adoption of our measures as to call forth the regards and attract the sympathies of other bodies of evangelical Christians,-and, above all, if we have any reason to believe, as others are ready to believe, and some of us are constrained to feel that, as a Church, we have, in some measure, experienced the presence and power of the Spirit of God, I say, all these considerations are fitted, not to fill us with exalted feelings of complacency, but rather to make us sensible of our deep unworthiness and heavy responsibility."

Dr. Henry Grey, Moderator of the Assembly of 1844, brought the whole subject before the Presbytery of Edinburgh in an elaborate papert; and Mr. Andrew Gray, of Perth, in a still more powerful address, gave an emphatic warning in the Assembly of 1848: while incidental statements in the same * Commission of General Assembly, August, 1844-Witness newspaper. + Free Church Magazine, v. 65.

strain will be found scattered, from time to time, through the speeches of the more prominent leaders of the Church.

That the Free Church was able, in all respects, to keep clear of these dangers no one will allege. It was inevitable that among so many ministers and members exposed to the temptations incident to their new position, there would be errors in judgment, and shortcomings and failures in duty. And yet, amidst all such results of human imperfection, the Free Church was enabled steadfastly to hold on her course and do much earnest work for the cause of Christ. It may safely be left for future years to determine how far the Disruption of 1843 is destined to form a marking epoch in the religious history of Scotland. In the meantime, it will be our object in the following pages to show in what spirit the Free Church addressed herself to the work which God had given her to do, and what efforts she was prepared to make in carrying it forward.