No. 7. :APRIL,1906. Vol. XI.

SOUTH PLACE MAGAZINE

Contents PAOE'.

ON THE EVE OF SEVENTY.FOUR .................... 97 MONCURE D. CONWAV.

GLEANINGS FROM THE CORRESPONDENCE OF F. W. NEWMAN ......... , ...... , . .. .. , . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 98

R. BRAITlIWAITE.

ART AT 8.30 ......................................... 102 A. HUGII FIST/EH.

DRAMATIC PERFORMANCE AT SOUTH PLACE ...... 105

THE DEDICATION OF CONW A Y HALL 105

NOTES AND COMMENTS ............................. 109

CORRESPONDENCE ........................ , ...... , . . .. 111

NOTICES .............................................. 111

Monthly, 2d., OK 2". (id. I'FR ANNUM, pn'iT FRF'r. .

$on~on : SOUTH PLACE ETHICAL SOCIETY, FINSBURY, E.C. A. & H. B. BaNNER, I & 2 TOOK'S COURT, FURNIVAL STREET, E .C.

~ll11tq Ilact ®tqicaI ~llcittu, ------------- ............... .

South Place Chapel & Institute, Finsbury, E.G. Object of the Society.

"The object of the Society is the cultivation of a rational religious sentiment, the study of ethical principles, and the promotion of human welfare, in harmony with advancing knowledge. "

APRIL, ],906.

The followil,g DISCOURSES It'ill be dcliv(lcd Olt SlfIlIl/lY 1II00nincs, SttVICl

belfi1l1rillrt at 11.15. April Ist.-HERBERT BURROWS.-A Simple Life.

Antbems 11 • My heart Is weary, waiting for the May". 2. Inflammalus et accenSU5 '0' ,0, ... ' 0' .0.

H mns I No. 26. One by ODe tbe .ands are flowing ('520.B.) y No. 52. Ope, ope, my soul (2670.B.)

April 8tb.-JOHN A. HOBSON, M.A.-A Society of Nati~ns. Anthems I t. If I stooP. into a dark, tremendous sea (No.2t2) ".

2. 0 salntalls bostla 00' 00. ... ... ... , ••

Hymns I No. So. Hark I through the waking earth (3870.B.) No. too. Who is thy neighbour 1 (5440.B.)

April 15th .-JOHN M . ROBERTSON, M.P.-Theism and Poetry. A thems It. From tbe blgh heaven ". ." ". ". ". " .

n 2. Quis est homo (Stabat Mater) ". H ns I No. 24· lews were wrought to cruel madness ' ('I37 O'-B.)

ym No.8 .. Why thus longing 1 (3950.B.)

H,tts. Dvo,ak.

De Lauy. Hi1lJmtl

Mo.a-t. Rossir".

April 22nd.-JOSEPH McCABE.-The Novel with a Purpose. Anthems It. SpriD~'s message Gadt

12. Qui s degno ". ". ". ' " ". ". ". ." "Mo.".t. H mns I No. tOt. 0 how much more doth b.auty beauteous .eem <537 0 .B.)

y No. 39. 0 brother man fold to thy hfart thy brother (,840.B.) April2gth.-AYLMER MAUDE.-Tbe Crisis in Russia.

Anthems It. A~nus dei ." ." ." ". ". ". 2. 0 hall of song (Tannbauser) ". ." ."

Hymns I No. 70. Morning breaketh on the (3560.B.) No. P4. All common tblngs-each day's events

SUNDAY SCHOOL.

... Go""od.

... lVagnt~.

Tbe Children mfet at Arm6eld's Holel ol'poslte the CHAPEL every Sunday morning, at Il.t5, and their lesson Is given during the d,scourse. Members and friends wishing tbelr children to attend the school are requested to communicate wltb the Secretaries.

April t. MR. C. NAISH. " 8. MISS F . A. LAW. " t5. (No Meeetinl(.) " 2'Z. MR. A. W. WALLlS. " 29. M. W . VARIAN."Flrst Aid. (4).

Visitors bringIng children to tbe Sunday Morning services are cordially invited to allow them to attend the Children'S lesson. _______ __

Visitors may take allY Seals vacallt ajter the first Allthem, alld they ale illlJllrd to obla;1I illjol1ltatioll f'egal'dillg Ihe Sotiety ill the Library 011 SUllday 1II0rnilrgs.

A Collectioll is ,"ade at lite close of eaclt Service 10 mable Visitors to COl/tribute 10 the expeuses of Ihe Society.

Tbe Chapel Is licensed for Marriages. Cyclists desil'illg 10 a/lmd lire Services aI'e ill/olmed that Ihe Committee !ralJe

",ade anal/gm/tills for hOIlSill/( IIltir lIIac/lI1/es ill tire baselllml. Arrangements can be made for the conduct of Puneral Services on appllca.

tlon to the Secretary. MEMBERSHIP.

"Persons paying for slttlngs In the Society's place of Meeting for the time being are therehy constituted members of the Society. Members who are twenty·one years of age alld upwards, wbose names have been twelve months UpOII the register, and whose SUbscriptions for the previous quarter bave been paid, shall be qualified to vote and to hold oflicp.."-Ex/rrltl frorn lIr. RI/les.

SllIings may be obtained upon application in the Library, or to Mrs. HAROLD SEYLER, .on Featherstone Buildings, Holborn, W.C., Hon. Registrar of Members and Associates, prices varying from 18 . to IOS . per quarter. Persons under 21 are cbaflred half tbe usual rates.

ASSOCIATES. Persons re~iding at a di_tance, and who are linable to attend the services regularly, IlIay

become A •• oclate. of tbe Society upon payment ot an annual Subscription of 5s. with the prlvlle~e 01 receiving all the current publications of the Society. Subscriptions may b. paid In the Library or to the Hon. Registrar of Members and Associates at above address.

SOUTH PLACE M,AGAZINE . No. 7. Vol. XI. . APRIL, 1906. • d. Monthly.

~. Gd per annum, post fr ('c.

(Tlte writers of A rtides appearing in tlti~ Magazl1Ie are alone respollsible tor the Opilliolls tlterem expressed.)

ON THE EVE OF SEVENTY-FOUR .

. AMONG my accumulation of old papers there is one on 'c Old -Age." It was my graduating oration, written fifty-seyen years -4g0 , when I was seventeen years, three months, and some days old. Being the youngest of graduates, my theme excited some

,amusement, but my youthful aim was to go forth as a sower, and J was held by a vision of the far off harvest and the gather­.jng of sheaves. In my dream old age was a time when the outer world faded before a brightening inner world-Cc when -turn we from the wolfld without to seek the world within "­and this would make old age happier than youth.

Well, the time has come when I can compare-and con­trast-the dream of even teen with the re.aIity of seventy-four. I did not in my youthful vision consider anything other than years as leading into the Cc subjective world "-as I termed it -and that it is a time when old friends fall like 2..Utumn leaves. 'This inner chamber is furnished by our life-history, and its walls are hung by Memory with faces of those we can meet no more an the outer world. At seventy-four one's heart i not so grey .as his head; he can feel the loss of old friends, but not readily make new ones. It is not mere separation that makes one sad; so long as I know that an old friend is happy he stiH brightens my inner chamber. And Memory is gracious enough ,not to depict the ravages of time in the intervening years since Our old friend was met; we still th.i1'\k of his or her cheery face .and wit. All the more darkly-draped is the inner Hall when we lea,rn that they are d ad, and the.ir families plunged in mourn­ing. There was always the feeling- that my dear friend

'CIarence Seyler, recovered from illness, was still occupied with his' philosophic studies, and that I should again sit with him and his dear wife and converse on tho,se high themes we had -So often traversed together. And Dr. Gwyther, whose heart was as fine as his brain (which is saying much), who, with 'medical aid as well as sympathy, came to us in our terrible ;trouble-it appears so incredible that he and his JoyeJy wife should be parted, and that his u eful life houJd end.

Well, perhaps thi apartment of mine, near to my affectio­mate children and grandchildren, though far away from South

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Place, where so much of my heart remains, is as near as I shalf get to a fulfilment of my seventeen-year vision of the happiness; of Old Age. The time has come for some taste of Lethe. vVhat could I do amid the sorrows of those who have been nearer than most of my blood-kindred-such, indeed, is Mrs. Cockburn, as was the mother shc mourn -but weep the burnino­tears of helplessness? The home of the Crow:.lers was as my own. The time has come to try and forget \fe's losses, and to make my little irvana out of the old smiles that have beamed on me, and the faces not yet wet with tears, so that the flowers of memory may overlay all the thorns in my path to Kensico Cemetery, where the urns o[ wife and son await me.

Yet steadily I watch for the Magazine that flits in like a carrier dove, bringing tokens and tidings of the living thought and work at outh l'lace, and lately a card as gladdening as any I have received these many years inviting me to a soiree on February 21st. The next day was Washington's birthday, but I totally forgot the holiday: what is Washington compared to the fact that our admirable Robertson-the ablest living Free­thinker-has been carried to Par li ament by the pure force of hi justice and intellect? The triumph spans like a rainbow the cloud that for me has long overhung my beloved England. or course, one Robertson may not make ~ ummer, except in his own home and his own chapel; we must wait to see how far the new House is able to appreciate a man trained for them by the Freethought a~d Humanity of th nation.

My friends will,. I know, forgive the egotism of this little note; if they detect ome senility in it they will not fail to · feel that to the la t our old Society wilt be in the depth of my heart. MONcuRE D. CONWAY.

GLEANINGS FROM THE CORRESPOl DENCE. OF F. W. NEWMAN.

By R. BRAITRWAITE.

IV (cOl/eluded flom page 23).-Cardillal New1IIan's Career; The: , Problem of the Jesus of the" Gospels."

November 5, 1880 .. That ignorant and uneducated people adhere to a traditional"

creed, however absurd and monstrous, is a sad but undeniable . world-wide fact; therefore does not surprise me. But that one like you and my Cardinal brother should breah away from the creed of his chi ldhood, thus u ing hi Private Judgment in the most cardinal matter, and then go deeper and deeper into what is to me per.nicious, and therefore detestable, foIly, is a pheno-· m en on with which I find it hard to argue.

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I am quite unwilling to say a word disparaging to my brother except on matters notorious to .the public. But he has republished lately two hymns written by him in 1832, which, as Soon as I saw (in 1833), I pronounced to be essential 1 opery ; a Popery which did not indeed .point. to a Pope in Rome in particular, but to a Pope somewhere in England-it might be in Canterbury, or it might be in an Oxford priest; but it [one of the hymns] severely rebuked Private Judgment as wilfulness, and described Protestants as " All wandering and all wrong" (except the writer?), and pointed to THE PRIEST as one who received mandates from heaven to which the laity ought to sub­mit, up to the point of" evering vow" and rigid rule. From 1833 to J843 (about) he preached that his was the only doctrine which could save Protestants from becoming Catholics, and treated with contempt the imputation that his school was only a nursery for Catholicism.

At la t, the glaring fact of his most intimate pupils becom­ing Catholics stopped his mouth, and he wisely gave up preach­ing in public for two years, and found it undeniable that such was the tendency of his doctrine. For years before this­from 1825 onward I had abundant personal opportunity for see~ ing his weakness in judging of men's tendencies, and his total neglect of examining first principles. He coolly assumed the correctness of Anglican doctrine barely because it 71!aS estab­lished; and scarcely had he joined the Church of Rome before he wrote a novel called" Lo s and Gain," which his late friends in Oxford characterised to me in words which I would not repeat, if I could with accuracy. For these reasons I regard everything that he writes in defence of the Church in which he finds himself (Anglican or Roman) as the work of an advocate, (Haw 8w.qmAo.TTwv, not of a philosopher seeking for truth. He has never sent me one of his writings; not a scrap, nor has addressed me at all 0!1 religion-since 1826, I think: and this, not from any want of kindness, but because (from 1825, per­haps) he has always found that he cannot get from me any acknowledgment of his first principles.-p am forgetting. About J848 he wrote, proposing to me to follow out, for argu­ment's sake, his Postulate that "the Pope is the infallible instructor in Divine truth" : but I replied, that I thought it as thoroughly waste time, as to assume the same concerning the Grand Llama of Thibet : and as to his excuse, that no First Principle can be proved, I replied that this was no reason for· assuming as a First Principle that which had no probability Or plausibility. ]

Now, as to your avowal that" if Christ be a mere man, his sinlessness is a gratuitous assumption and his conduct IS open to criticism "-by which you assail the Uni­tarians, I beg to remark that under (Jvery possible-

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hypothesis, his conduct must be open to criticism (!f we llavc any account of it at all) and his sinlessness IS

.an absurd a sumption when the facts alleged show him to be flO better than many an ordinary mortal, and much worse than plenty of us. The idea of his being God Incarnate will only be accepted without proof (as many a Hindoo observes) by one who has drunk it in with the motller's milk. Everyone else must or ought to ask, What is the proof of it? To allege his miracles of heahng is to me absurd; for neither then nor now are mankind competent to decide what cures are miraculous. 'The Gospels represent him as double-tongued; ready to accept .credit for miracles when addressed by the credulous, haughty and repellent when asked for evidence by cautious inquirers. 'The Jews of that day were eager for miraculous proof, and if it had been strong enough would manifestly have rejoiced to :accept it. Naturally, when they found that he claimed to teach with authority, they asked for some (miraculous) sign from heaven: but he sternly rebukes them for it, calling them an adulterous and perverse generation at one time (or twice in Matthew), at another refusing any reply concerning his authority, unless they tell him what authority had John the Baptist. Hereby he places himself on the same footing as prophets who do not pretend to miracle; who therefore can only be judged by moral criticism, It is clear in the Gospels that if he really was a Divine Being, or physically anything but man, he was in disguise . It was then immoral in him to expe.ct deference and claim that common men should see through his odi guise. A divine messenger, if he chose to assume a mask, could not act the part of a devil, by conduct which in a mere man would necessal-ily be judged outrageous. This is what the Jesus of the Gospels does. He does not try to commend .himself to men's consciences. The words attributed to him constantly repel . If you can only defend them by alleging that he had insight into men's hearts (which hi opponents .could not know) this is to me a virtual admission that his con­duct was such as wa alike impo sible to a Di~line Messenger and to an unfanatical man.-To represent a Divine Messenger as cunningly implicating Pontius Pi late in murder, by an enig­matical avowal of kingship, a:nd an obstinate refusal to explain that the kino-ship had nothing to do with armed insurrection, 'is to represent God as in complicity with murder.

All that you say about a Divine Mysterious Society is to me (forgive the strong phrase) gratuitous folly. There is no definition in the New Te tament, or any document called Authoritative, of such Society; and traditionally, the Greek Church never acknowledged Rome as its Head. Before Pope Hildebrand, the monstrous u urpations of the Bishop of Rome -Were unheard of. Only the blank ignorance of the eleventh

IOI

century, and the arms of usurping Normans riveted this mons­trosity round the neck of Christendom_

Yours truly, F. W. N.

V.-On the Duty of Free Enquiry; Olt First Principles; etc.

January 25th, I88r. I

Dear Sir,-Either you are (in some way) as you yourself express, "under a spell," (which I tentatively interpret to mean, you are deficient in mental courage)-or you hold funda­mental doctrines concerning Evidence (commonly called Logic, or it may be, Metaphysics) quite different from mine.

From the age of I I, when I began to be seriously religious, up to the age of perhaps 29, I was in this sense "under a spell," that I did not dare to use my own common sense against the doctrines which I had imbibed without proof. Any approach to un belief I regarded as sin, and when consistency with myself made me aware of foolishness, I thought I did but fulfil the duty of becoming a fool for Christ. No arguments could avail me, until I learned that it was my duty (to God and man) to follow rational conviction to whatever it led me.­Whether you have attained that point, you may yourself know.

But as to the second matter, the Groundwork of Convic-­tion, few of us can lay down what are our First Principles .

When urged by a Romanist, many year ago, to tell what was my first principle, I replied, I am much surer of Negative than of Positive truths . Thus, I am more sure that the Religion of the Ili:ld is not true, than that there is one­Supreme God. And I am more sure that the pretensions of the Roman Pope are false, than that there is any Good and Wise God such as Christians can receive.

The pretensions of Popery (to me) confute themselves. This last nonsense about the Pope's Infallibility breaks down with me respect for the intellect of any man who accepts it. But the whole monstrous history of the Popedom before Hildebrand and thenceforward makes it to me an outrage on morality and humanity, as weB as common sense, to imagine that that infamous, wicked, and fraudulent system has any Divine sanction . Every attempt to support it by such arguments as you indicate, of "consistency," "harmony," etc_, appears tq me a wealmess of understanding. I cannot resp et it enougl} to deal with it in any way that could bring satisfaction to you.­Just put it to your elf: If a person believing- in the Pantheon and stories of the Iliad, or of the Hindoo Religion were to beg you to listen patiently to his arguments in favour of it, and to recount to you his reverence for their great Saints and Prophets, and the beautiful morality of the Shasters, etc. -would you be Willing to waste your time about it? I think you would say:

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•• I can give nothing that will be to him confutation, if he does not see that the whole . thing is baseless and monstrous. To enter inlo his cobwebs can only make me forget my own good sense. " I have asserted, and assert, that Popery is baseless. It" rests itself on certain texts of the Gospels (Peter and the Keys, etc.), and rests the authority of those Gospels on its own pretended authority.

Its practices, its claims, and its doctrines, are all monstrous. -Its Hell-its Creeds- its claims for a clergy often profligate, ·etc.

H you see no weight in these refutations, what farther can I plead? I further assert to Protestants that the picture drawn for Jesus of Nazareth in the Four Go pels is that of a man in many re pects a very reprehensible fanatic.

The whole pretensions of Divine anction are rotten. on all :sides. Yours truly,

F. W. N.

ART AT 8.30.

(A Paper rtad at South Place, February sth, 1906.)

1 HAVE been asked to-night to speak to you about Art, and the two :sides from which the subject may be approached are on the one hand to attempt to gauge its value in the general scheme of life and its relation to other activities or professions, and on the other to try to show rather what Art itself is and wherein lies its excellences.

I am not a philosopher nor a preacher of ethical principles, but an artist-and having read little, and knowing little of the systems of thinkers or theologians, the utmost I can do is to say a few words about Art itself, leaving to others the puzzle of trying to range its importance, speculate on its history, gauge its influence, or judge in any comparative sense of its value. I do not say that the attitude of mind of artist and philosopher are incompatible, but I do say that if hi enthusiasm for his own work or profession be worth anything at all no man is able to gauge and assess justly the value of it in the general scheme. For him its very excellence in his own choice of it-the degree to which his enthusiasm enhances and makes fervid his ability-his skill-must render t.im unable to compare and weigh justly in the balance this which is especially his own. He must either vaunt it to an undue importance, or, fearful of his own con­scious bias, be disposed, like Plato, who suffered in this from his own artistic nature, to turn it alJtogether from the gates of his republic.

Here upon the platfc:.rm of your Ethical Society I feel rather like one summoned to expound th.e merits of an alien thing before those whose special recreation is t11e assessing of values of conduct, and the speculating upon life in general.

It has been done before. It has been done better-far better than I can do it; it has been done by the great masters .

.• Art," said "Vhi tier, ·' .that has of late become, as far as much

I ......

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.discussion and wntmg can make it, a sort of common topic for the tea-table-Art is upon the town! If fa mlhar.ty can breed contempt,

· certainly Art-or what is currently taken for it-has been brought to the lowest stage of intimacy," and again in his egoism, " Set -.apart by the Gods to complete their work, the artist produces that wondrous thing called the masterpiece, which surpa ses in perfection all that they have contrived in what is called Nature; and the ' Gods stand by and marvel , and perceive how far away more beautiful is the Venus of Melos than was their own Eve."

For my part I prefer Eve. Watts, with the humility of genius, prefaced the catalogue of an

· exhibition of his works with an apology. Some of the pictures were incomplete, and he urged as part excuse for their inclusion "The hope of profiting by public criticism ." In the same prefatory note

. Watts said that his object in work had been to suggest in the language of Art, "Modern thought in things ethical and spiritual." This, surely, is to your taste, oh, ethical societies! "In many cases," said Watts, " the intention was frankly didactic, excuse for this, generally regarded as exasperating, being that it has been found, not seldom, that the attempts to reflect the thoughts of the most elevated minds of all ages, even in an unused and halting language, have not been without interest at least if without profit," and he tells us that a cer­tain figure is intended to represent" conscience "-it is a figure with most strange inhuman eyes, but without label or explanation would never suggest anything of the kind to the beholder, but remain, so far as allegoric meaning were concerned a riddle and an enigma.

With a great sense of plastic beauty, Watts has, in his allegorical pictures, attempted to suggest modern thought in things ethical and

· spiritual, calling Art hi~ language to be used as " a means of expres­sion." But the great qualities of his work are such as are independent of and outside any moral or ethical consideratiqn whatever. A mar­vellous perception of plasti c beauty-an appreciation of the nude, such as no other English artist has ever shown, and a greater ski11 in painting it- -a power of seizing '.he essential character in portraiture, and a splendid feeling for colour and design-these are the excel­lences of Mr. Watts's work, and when standing before anyone of his canvases , I think of his didactic purpose, I murmur:

"Great painter-the Art in your pictures is independent of any · didactic purpose-if that amused you well and good-and just be­cause it happens that you were a great artist, and knew the beautiful in form and colour, your lessons and moralities may pass-they mat­ter nothing to the lover of Art, and I wild grant that through your adoption of such motives as subject matter, tbough they do not happen to occur in your greatest works, it is possible you may win to a love of the real beauties of Art some who would otherwise have remained blind without the tag of platitude or the label of virtue. Woe to them, bowever, so far as their ideas of Art are concerned if they think merely that your sym boIled virtues are the excellence rather than the forms you meant to embody them. Woe to him who knows not which is the banner and which is the man-who holds the mask more important than the voice tha.t cometh from its mouth, and when there are two voices, both crying out together even if they be in uni son, as in such a work as C Time, Dea.th, and Judgment ,_ woe so far as any understanding of Art is concerned ,to that m:l.n who confuses the two because they chime. The Art is not greater

104 because of the moral purpose of the Artist or the motto fastened' upon the frame. The one meaning of all true Art is beauty, and.. beauty is so far above any of the temporary expediency of our ~oralities that in whatever degree beauty is shown in a work of Art it heightens and ennobles even the most common subject matter and ~ives to the few who understand a message of exalting nature, a thnll of pleasure, a peace of contemplation, a sense of joy in life' altogether away from and apart from the whole realm of ethics."

The photographer is never by virtue of his photography an artist -the artist cannot draw or paint or carve ever any exact reproduction of Kature. He perforce must, however unconsciously, select and choose in every touch and every line; and just exactly in proportion to his gift-his sense of beauty-will the selection and the choice be ju t and good. But the choice and the selcction will never be justi­fied because of any moral attribute or ethical consideration. It is the false notions concerning this matter that hinder people from learning to know Art. And what makes it a little less simple than I have so far suggested is that there is a realm of instincts as well as a realm of ideas, and that in the subject matter of Art all natural instincts are especially appealing.

I have never heard anyone try to make this distinction, but to me it is a conviction that when any natural instinct is used as subject matter there may be a marriage between Art and sentiment such as never held and I believe never will hold, between Art and what is called Morals. I think this is a very important point, and worthy of consideration. It is that sentiment (not sentimentality) tbat senti­ment of primal actions and primal instincts may be so wedded in a very great master to appreciations of form and mass, to plastic beauty-to the loveliness of action and a discernment of its most dis­tinctive moment, that tbe scntiment becomes an essential part of his . particular works of art: as in "Le Baiser" of Rodin, or "Les Glan­eu es" of Millet. Grief, motherhood, toil, gladnes -these are things primal and instinctive, and independent of all systems of morals, and although we may have great loveliness in Art from natural beauties quite apart from human incident or human embodiment, where the feeling for these things is inextricably blended with the feeling for beauty itself-there is an enhancement of the power of both the sentiment and of the plastic beauty one upon tbe other.

But it is only rarely that such a marriage occurs, a_nd it is only rarely that when it does it is understood. ot one in ten thousand of the people who admire Millet's" Angelus" or Millet's" Gleaners" but would set upon equal level with them. the artistically worthless " Doctor" of Luke Fildes, and vastly more, of course, would prefer the latter whether they say so or not. And because in the case of Millet's work it happens that Art embodies something not essential to itself in such a way as to make it appeal to all men they are dis­posed in their ignorance to deem that human sentiment higher even III Art than loveliness of form and colour and design.

How often upon Sunday mornings have lecturers upon this plat­form used motto and illustration from pictures in such a way as to lessen in their hearers any chance of appreciating- the true beauty

'of Art, through confounding it with ideas! Seeking to enslave beauty for their own literary ends-to point copy-book maxims of courage and conduct entirely oblivious of her having notbing to do ­with such matters.

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And what does it matter if they do? Art is not virtu!; as Whistler truly said, nor is Virtue Art, and a people may be prosperous, stuffed iull of virtues to their chins, and even a little gay-sometimes-with­out any Art to speak about. And the artist may learn from them though they learn not from him. Did not Moliere read his come. dies to his housekeeper? and Alb!"echt Durer wrote:-

" Let none be ashamed to learn, for a good work requireth good counsel. Nevertheless, whosoever tak<!th counsel in the arts, let him take it from one thoroughly versed in those matters, who can prove what he saith with his hand. Howbeit, anyone may give thee coun. sel; and when thou hast done a work pleasing to thyself, it is good for thee to show it to dull men of little judgment that they may give their opinion of it. As a rule they pick out the most faulty points, whilst they entirely pass over the good. If thou findest something they say true thou mayst thus better thy work."

A. HUGH FISHER.

DRAMATIC PERFORMANCE AT SOUTH PLACE.

A Dramatic Performance in aid of the Lending Library was given 011 15th March, when there were performed" A Phenomenon in a Smock Frock," by William Brough (produced by Miss Murray); "The Man in the Street," by Louis N. Parker (produced by Mr. Robb Lawson); and "That Brute Simmons," by Arthur Morrison (produced by Mr. Arthur Broughton). The various characters were admirably sustained by the Misses Margot and Sheila Murray, Miss. L. F. Usherwood, Mrs. S. G. Fenton, Mr. Lionel Cornish, Mr. Edwin Feis, Mr. Edwin Dallow, Mr. Oswald Moser, Mr. WiJ1iam Peck, 1\1r. Robb Lawson Mr. Arthur Broughton, and Mr. A. E. Fenton. The acting was decidedly above the average merit of simi. lar performances, and a mo t enjoyable evening was spent by those present. We trust that the funds of the Lending Library have sub. stantially benefited by the efforts of those who took part in the enter. tainment.

THE DEDICATION OF CONvVAY HALL.

CONWAY HALL has been built as the home of the Collegiate Preparatory Sc_hool attached to Dickinson College, Philadelphia. The cost of the structure was over £12,000, and was defrayed by l\lr. Andrew Carnegie, by whose wi h the building has been named Conway Hall in honour of Dr. Man cure D. Conway. who was a student of the College. We feel sure our readers will be interested in the following extracts from Dr. Conway's Address at the Dedication on the 6th June last :_

Twenty·one years ago the College combined mJturity and youth in opening its doors to women. That was under President McCauley. When McCauley graduated in his twenty·fifth year, we all thought that shy gentleman with spectacles the mature conservative, and when he became President at fifty, probably few anticipated any innovation.

Io6

But meanwhile McCauley had presided over a female academy in Virginia, where the teaching was DO doubt reciprocal. He had learned that in culture there is neither male nor female. But there was no surprise about it. The Dickinsonian Adam was not asleep when this woman was taken from his side to be set really at his side, as an equal in intellectual rights. On the contrary, the old College was particularly wide awake, and had been brought by its hundred years of experience to give effect to the views of its chief founder.

Dr. Crooks said in his oration: ,. To Dr. Rush, of all the founders, belongs the honoured name of Father of Dickinson College." Now, among the collected essays of Dr. Benjamin Rush, the most remark­able, I think, is one on the education of Amelican women. It was written during the infancy of our College but is striking enough to be reprinted. He pointed out that the ide"s and methods of female education in England were inadequate to American conditions. Rush graduated at Edinburgh, and knew England well. He says the American woman must share in many studies that in England are limited to men, because she must here be the teacher of children, must often be the steward of estates; and he goes on mentioning

-competencies for which his countrywomen must be educated-com­petencies equally masculine and feminine. Dr. Rush could not, of COllrse, propose co-education to colleges with imported presidents and professors, but the evolutiun of those principles was inevitable, and on them is founded Denny Hall-trebly memorial of the honoured sisters who bequeathed it, of the advance of the College to its old Father's idea of female education, and to the enterprise of the presi­dent who in one year, has rai ed it from its ashes.

Our College arose as a product and ensign of peace and goodwill to man. A hundred and forty years ago Carlisle was mainly a fortress against the aborigines, whose descendants have long found welcome and culture on the very site then set apart for the soldiers. The Pontiac War and the Revolution having passed away, the fortress made way for the College. The first president was housed in the "barracks .... .

The dove of peace seems to have hovered over the College. In 1794, \Vashington, starting out to suppress the insurrection at Pitts­burg, quartered some soldier~ in the small buildin~ then used for teaching; but the President's visit proved an excursIOn-whether or not becau5e the rioters heard the soldiers were in our College- they at once became peaceful. In 1863 the Confederate Army held Car­lisle some days, but the College buildings and grounds were not harmed. The College was built on lands once belonging to V,Tilliam Penn; it bore the name of a grand old Quaker, John Dickinson; and we shall dedicate a hall given by the man who is also building a palace of Peace at the Hague. . . . .

I have long observed both in England and America, that where great public teachers and preachers have gone silent the as emblies that had surrounded them rarely seek new prophets, but tend to group themselves in various organisations for practical ends. I suppose they feel that they have been long enough pumped into like buckets·-brimming, running over-and need to absorb the stream like trees, and grow and bear their fruit. But poisons grow as well as good fruits, and the unscientific may fancy them good fruit. The Crusaders and the Inquisitors were conscientious men, and thought they were saving mankind from eternal torments. "We launched

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. on them," said one old Crusader-cc we launched on the Moslems the curse of sweet Jesus," and his church is now trying to wash out the stains of that blood. And how many stains are the foremost nations still bequeathing to posterity by the wrongs to which the ignorant rage of a few has carried them by unreasoning and precipitate action.

Sidney Smith said: cc In a country surrounded by dykes, a rat may :flood a province." Some small, base lust of power, or trade, or greed, to which the whole world seems a big cheese for its ratlike instinct, may deluge a nation with blood; it has only to disguise itself in a flag and mark itself with the cross, to identify its vermin purpose with the national honour, and with the c, gospel," should the victim resist. All the justice and conscience and brains of the country may ;see and detest the manceuvre till then, but let one drop of bloud be :shed, and a nation of peacemakers becomes a nation of man-slayers. In the history of the world it has been repeatedly shown that one :small brainless action may ouhveigh all the wisdom and justice of a -country, and bring on evils that never end.

Hence that dread doubleness of .nations-each sending out sweet waters and bitter. Thirty-five years ago my duties as a journalist carried me to battlefields of France, where men were mowed down like grass, and villages burned and desolated. Some time after, like duties carried me to the town of Es en, in Germany, seat of the Krupp Works, the largest forge of arms in the world. There I saw two kinds of perfection. One was the town of the Krupp work­-people. Socialistic reformers-Babeuf, Fourier, St. Simon, Robert Owen-have for more than a century been trying in vain to build ideal communities, and such have been successfully built only in romances. But where Social enthusiasts have failed, the Krupp Gun Works have succeeded. Exploring these beautiful habitations with happy wives and childlen, the library, reading-room, school, baths, church. gymnasium, playground , hospital, theatre, I walked through

.a veritable Utopia-all the visionary romances become real. Then I saw the other perfection: the exquisite evolution by which tht> iron ore passed from furnace to furnace, forge to forge-announcing to the scientific refiner by tints of flame, red, yellow, blue, when it was ready to advance another stage towards that purity of heart when it becomes Bessemer steel, and then attain total sanctification as a Il'un able to carry a shell for miles. They entrusted me to a scien-

'tlfic manager who knew English, and revealed certain things I was not to print-secrets of St:l.te. He showed me a transcendent gun­a beauty. This dainty creature was surrounded by artistic shells,

,as Venus might be by Cupids, each shell with a face or dial, on which .a band is turned to a figure. The shell :flies, and at the exact second pointed to by the dial hand infallibly explodes. When I saw the array of these perfect guns, with their families of shells ne tling around them, and the workmen's pretty and well-dressed children playing around, the touching scene recalled the early western epitaph .of "Jeamcs Hambrick who was shot with a revolver, one of the old­"fashlOn kind, brass-mounted, and of such is the kingdom of Heaven."

From a world in which humanity and inhumanity thus grow by reciprocity, and men gather grapes from grape-shot, happy homes from home-destroying guns, each individual derives a two-fold nature -in one seated reason and conscience, in the other communal }oyalty. The word "loyalty" is a corruption of "legality." Its :supreme virtue, called" patriotism," often disguises a real faithle_s-

I

108

ness to one's country, as when the legality of slave-hunting demandeci of our loyalty, our patriotism, that we should assist bloodhounds, pursuing men and women seeking liberty. And we Southerners­were here denouncing as unpatriotic the greatest man we had ever seen, John McClintock, for asking justice for negroes I Reall patriotism is an extension of family feeling; when a man loves his family so much as to rob other families for his own wife and childreu, or when he :eeks his country's welfare by wronging other countries, it is the human becoming brutal, tooth becoming hng, ..•

There is no glory in strewing the earth with dead bodies, said the­ancient Chinese sage, and victors in war should mourn as at a funeral. A main argument against enfranchising women is that they are not experts in the arts of destruction. Let them cherish that dis­tinction-Daughters of Disfranchi sed Peace, Gentlewomen of the ' Evolution, whose leaven, however hid in the coarse masculine lump, can lift it out of the vulgar notion that honour may depend on skill in butchery.

Ah, that is the' parable of all beautiful victories-victories in which none are defeated, all triumphant. Milton warned us that all that is done by violence is but half-done. Our time is full of confirmations. When I think over the evolutionary movement for removing the burdens of woman, begun in my youth, and see the legal burdens piled away as relics of barbarism- and see that e\'ery contemporary achievement of violence has left some evil sequel- methiuks I hear again that voice saying: "Ah, yes! it was a woman-unarmed, without bullet or ballot-content with a hidden infiuence, no pomp or glory, who has wruught this one only stainless triumph of your time. This is the victory of the love that is lowly, seeking not its own. Blessed are the lowly, for they shall inherit the earth."

Sublime paradox, which young ambition may despise, but grey experience knows true. The conquerors of the ea rth do not really possess the earth; it possesses them. Gibbon smiles at Livy, who, he · says, tried to persuade us that Rome conquered the world in self­defence. But such are the conditions. Whenever a nation makes a conquest, it must live up to it, or down tu it; must surround every subjugated country with a Monroe doctrine, ever expanding till it involves hostility to the whole world and loss of all that free-will, which alone can really inherit the earth, and enjoy it. Daniel Webster's rhetoric was splendid when in the Senate he spoke of Great Britain as "that Power whose morning drum-beat, travelling with the sun and keeping time with the stars, encircles the earth with one continuous strain of the martial airs of England." But what ha. it profited England to encircle the whole world and lose its real soul, its free-wilL, so that it has had to fight nearly every race-Hindu, . Russian, American, French Chinese, Spanish, Egyptian, Kaffir, Boer, Thibetan-in self-defence; every war being one for which England now hangs its head for shame.

And the United States, now" defending itself" on the other side of the planet, are we going on the same career-to gain the world at the cost of every principle that made the soul of our country, only to · find that we have not got the world at all, but it has got us? ....

If in the human world the deserts shall blossom like the rose, it will be when men and women have learned the art of making their hearts thornless. There is a flower of the mind whose fragrance is: a spirit that shall render that man utterly unable to hate or to wound.

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and of a force whose simpleness shall seem heroic, though he be really "pe normal man. Lycurgus was attacked by a brutal fellow, who .knocked out one of his eyes. The peopJ'e seized the assailant, and dragged him before ' Lycurgus, and said: "He is yours, by law and ..equity, to slay." The law-giver took his assailant to his house, and baving attended to his own wound set himself to heal the grievous condition, mental and moral, of the man who had assailed him without cause. At the end of a year or more, Lycurgus entered the

-assembly with a man at his side, and said: "People, you gave me a savage; I return to you a citizen." Heroic? Nay, normal. Try all your logic, your common sense, on it j you will find no other kind of

. .action that would not have car'ried' Lycurgus below his assailant ..... There is no situation that does not admit of doing one's best. I

~uppose that if there was one person in Jerusalem who might have despaired of doing any service to Jesus in his hour of pain and peril it was that poor woman, sometimes confused with Mary Magdalene, whose heart led her to his feet. She had a flask of spikenard to break, and she had a broken heart. She gave what she had. "She l)ath done what she could ," he said. "The house was filled with the

. .odour of the ointment," and every house in all time is filled with it. Because the fragrance W:lS her great love. Had there been no

. spikenard, but a cup of water, a tear of sympathy, only a loving look to sustain the suffering heart, the perfume would all have been there, as it this day fills the lowliest abode where affection and sweet­ness are poured out, and amid the sorrows of life hearts are loving much and doing all they can to diffuse around them happiness and

-peace.

NOTES AND COMMENTS.

Among the many glowing tributes to the memory of George Jacob Holyoake appearing in the public Press, none is more

loquent than Mr. Eden Phillpotts' sonnet, "Holyoake," in the Tribune. We quote the octave and concluding lines of this poem:-

"Thou glorious Titan, art thou gone at last? Shall the embattled peal thy name no more? Must the majestic spirit that of yore

Made thy young heart a home be now outcast? Ah never! with thy passing hath not passed

The Truth eternal that thou suffer'dst for. Never again shall clang the iron door

Thy bleeding hands thrust open and held fast. And o'er the upward pathway thou hast worn Thy steadfast name shaIJ blaze, a star of might."

In the life-work which has evoked such universal appreciation . as his country has just displayed, the valiant old Reformer has bequeathed to us a 117onU117entum aere perc1inius, and, dying, might have echoed the confident cry of the Roman poet: Non omnis moriar.

IIO

Matthew Arnold's "God and the Bible" will be the next . member to appear in the R. P.A. sixpenny series. The Asso-­ciation is a lso publi hing at the same price, through Messrs. Watts, "The Origin of Life," Mr. Joseph McCabe's reply to Sir Oliver Lodge's" Matter and Life." Among recent issues-­of thi firm we note with particular pleasure two twopenny pamphlets of outstanding merit. The first is Mr. J. M. Robert. son's" What to Read," a model of clarity, compression, and. shrewd wisdom, originally issued as a supplement to the Literary Guide. The other, Mr. H. S. Salt's article on " The Faith of Richard J efferies," is reprinted from the Tiff estminster R eview, and refutes with the simple logic of facts the assump­tion, for which the late Sir Walter Besant so unaccountably made himself responsible, that Jefferies underwent a species of ' Il death-bed conversion" to orthodox Christianity.

Mr. F. J. Gould's new book, "The Children's Plutarch," wiII be eagerly awaited by Rationalist parents, who have dis- · covered in his series of " Moral Lessons" a valuable instrument in the education of children. The work announced will be illustrated by Mr. WaJter CI'ane.

The death is reported from Florence of Signora Jessie White Mario. Her romantic career as organiser of the ambulances. of Garibaldi's forces during the campaigns that freed Italy from foreign domination, is e pecially intere ting t~ those con­nected with South Place, from the fact that her brother was a member of the Society for a quarter of a century (1870-1895). His death is recorded at page 70 of the first volume of this . Magazine.

CORRESPONDENCE.

CHESTERTON GIRLS' CLUB. 10 THE EDITOR.

Sir,-Many members will recollect the starting of the Chesterton Girls' Club by Miss Edith M. Johnson and a little group of South Place friends more than thirteen years ago, and not a few have fol­lowed its useful work in Homerton with interest and appreciation, besides givin'g it all the help in their power. But there may be · others who are unaware of its present difficulties, and who would be able and willing to aid in removing them. Mainly owing to necessalY structural repairs, and to the loss of such generous friends. and subscribers as the late Mr. and Mrs. Crowder, Mr. H. G. Morris, Miss E. Bristed, Mr. Seyler, and others, debts have accumulated to . the amount of £145, and in the hope of clearing off at least a portion of that sum a bazaar has been arranged to be held at the Club, TOO High Street, Homerton, N.E., on May 25th and 26th. Working>

III parties are now being held on alternate Wednesdays, April 11th and 25th , by 1iss E. M. Johnson, 162 Amhurst Road, Hackney, N.E. , and on alternate Thursdays, April 5th and 19th, by Mrs. Corby, 18-1- Evering Road, N.E., where any friends willing to help will receive a warm welcome.

Friends who live at a distance and are unable to attend these meetings would do great service either by starting working, parties in their own neighbourhoods, by sending ready made articles for sale at the bazaar, or financial assistance towards the extinction of the deficit. A MEMBER OF SOUTH PLACE.

NOTICES.

Members of the South Place Ethical Society who may wish to help in any part of its work, are cordially invited to place themselves in communication with the Secretaries of the sub-committees having charge of the activities in which they are interested.

Advertisements in the Ma.gazine. -It having been suggested that South Place members who have apartments to let might find it con­venient to advertise them in the Magazine, the Magazine Committee are willing to accept such advertisements at a charge of 2S. for the first 2-1- words, and Id. per word after.

Lending Library.-The Librarians have pleasure in acknowledg­ing the following gifts from Miss Gertrude Toynbee:-

C Essays and Lays of Ancient Rome," by Lord Macaulay (D 5) j

cc Letter, Conversations, and Recollections of Samuel Taylor Coleridge" (D 3), Ed. Thomas AUsop; cc Life and Letters of James Hinton" (E 3); cc Life of Benvenuto CeIlini" (Tr. T. Nugent), (H 7) j cc La Vita Nuova," by Dante (C 2) j cc Criticisms on Art," by WiIliam Hazlitt (H 3); cc Letters from India and the Crimea," by John Ashton Bostock (H 3); cc From Log-Cabin to White House," by W. M. Thayer (J 3); cc Early and MiscelJaneous Letters of Goethe" (C 7) ;

cc Gustave FIaubert," by J. c. Tarver (D 6) j cc Poems and Letters of Charles and Mary Lamb" (CoIl. W. C. Hazlitt) (E 5) j cc Hora! Subseciv<c," by Dr. John Brown (E 4); cc Tour­gueneif and his French Circle" (D 4) ; cc Tintoretto," by W. R. OsIer (H 3); cc Raphael," by N. D'Anvers (H 3); cc Mantegna and Francia " (H 3) , by Julia Cartwright; cc Giotto ," by Harry Quilter (H 3); cc Titian," by R. F. Heath (H 3); cc Letters, Conversations, and Re­collections of S. T. Coleridge," 2 vols. (D 3) j cc Essays of Elia and Eliana," by Charles Lamb (K 2); cc Saracinesca," by F. Marion Crawford , 3 vols. (K 3); cc An American Politician," by F. Marion Crawford (K 8); cc The Bostonian ," by Henry James, 3 vols. (K ,) ; cc The Warden," by Antllony Trollope (K 9); cc Love of Sisters," by Katherine Tynan (K 9); cC Sir Percival," by J. H. Shorthouse (K 8) ; and cc Wee WilIie Winkie and Other Stories," by Rudyard Kipling (L 6).

The following books have been added to the Lending Library:­cc Life of Voltaire," by S. G. Tallentyre (H 3); cc Veranilda," by George Gissing (K 11); cc Iconoclasts," by J. Huneker (07); cc A Book for a Rainy Day," by John Thomas Smith (N 8); cc Science and

JI2

Health," by M. B. G. Eddy (E 2) ; "The South Place Magazine and Report," VoL X (R 7).

Tuesday Evening Lectures.- Under the joint auspices of the Rationalist Press Association and South Place Ethical Society a course of five lectures by Mr. Dennis Hird, M.A., was commenced at outh Place on 20th March, and will continue weekly till 17th April. The lectures are <levoted to showing the support given by a tronomy and geology to the doctrine of Evolution. The charges for admission are IS., 6d., and 3d., or by course ticket, 4S. and 25.

Sunday Shakspere Society.-This Society will hold jts next meeting on the 15th April at the Passmore Edwards Settlement, Tavistock Place, W.C., at 6.30 p.11l. .Miss Backwell will read a paper upon" Romeo and Juliet," the moving story of the true love that did not run smooth. The Italian fire and passion of this trage:iy have never been equalled, even in its own sunny south; and although. age and toil have somewhat blunted the editorial feelings, yet we must confess that the reading or witnessing of this Shaksperean drama gives a tllIilling interest that is wanting in more moderri productions of the stage.

Soiree. -The last Monthly Soiree of the season will take place on April 2nd. Mr. S. G. Fenton will read a short paper en­titled" The Oldest Known Works of Man," which wi1L be illustrated by a varied and fairly comprehensive colIection of prehistoric im·· plements. Vocal music by Mrs. Heyl; recitations by Miss Rice. Tea and coffee, 7-10.30.

Sunday Evening Lectures. -A series of Sunday Evening Lec· ture will be delivered as follows: April 1st, "The Education Muddlf' and How to Mend it," Joseph McCabe; April 8th , "The Ethics of the Fiscal Question," John M. Robert on, M.P.; April 22nd, "The People's Economic Charter," John A. Hob on, M.A.; April 2Qtl}, "The Land for the People," Joseph Fels; Mav 20th, "Old Age Pen­sions," George N. Barnes, M. P. ; May 27th, "The Political Organisa­tion of the Empire." H. Crossfield. Chair taken at 7 prompt. Dis­

'cussion after each Lecture. Admission Free. No Collection. New Members. - Miss M. E. Penrose, 6 Alexandra Gardens,

Muswell Hill, N. Miss E. H. Stirling, 9 Raleigh Gardens, Brjxton HilI, S.W. Mr. H. Showell, 140 Kyverdale Road, Stamford Hill, N. New Associa.te -~Irs. S. A. Rei 5, 2-t8A High Street, Sutton,

Surrey. Removals·-Mrs. H. Ashley Cooper to 69 C1a.pton Common,

N.E. . Mr. H. P. Dommen, to 158 Great Dover Street) S.E. Mr. Donald J. O\'ery, to 4 \Vhitburn Road, Lewi ham, S.E. Miss Reid, to 5 Lessness Park, Belvedere (after March 30th). Mrs. Clarence H. Seyler, to 116 Valley Road, Streatham, S.W. Mr. A. Sumner, to Lyndhurst, 17 Park View Road, Church End,

:J:in ch1ey. Marriage -On Feb. 17th, Tela A. Young to H. Ashley Cooper.

Printed b? AS BaNNER, t & 2 Took's Court, Fllrnival Street. London, E.e.

LENDING LIBRARY. Tile Lending Llbral y is open free tb Members of the Socioty and Season Ticket Holders

on Sunday mornings before and after lhe Services. Associates and Non·Melllbers of the Society may under certain conditions be granted the use of the Library upon payment of a subsctiptlon of 2S. 6d . per annum. The new Catalogue including a supplement for 1904, is now on sale, price 6d., interleaved copies gd. Subscriptions towards tbe purchase q,nd repair of booits are invited .

H H L 'b,n 'n I Miss MAny RAWLINGS. 406 M'are Stl'eet, Hackney, N.E. o. I 11 liS WAI.LIS MANSFORn, Cherry Tree COUlt, 53 Aldersgate Street. E .C.

SOIREE. Tbe last monthly Soir~e of tbe Season will take place on April 2nd. Ig,·6, when Mr. S. G. Fenlon will read a short paper entitlelt: The Oldest Known Work$ of Man,

wbicb will be illustrated by a varied and falfly comprehensive collection of prehistoric imple­ments.

Vocal music by Miss Ruby Hey!. Recitations hy Miss Rice. Tea ond colTee. 7 to ra.30.

Hall. Sec. Soir~c Co",,,,itttc, Mrs. C. V. DRYSDALE, Betsom's Hill Farm, Westubam.

RAMBLES. April 7tb. No Ramble. (RamhIHs' Dance at Armfield's HoteL) Aprll.,st. British Museum Lihrary. Conducted by Mr. G. K. Forteseue. Meet at entrance

to Museum, 3 o·clock. April .Btb. Kew Gardens. Conducted by Wm. Varlan. Meet at !{ew Green Gate, 3.30. Tickets for tbe course 2S. 6d. (or bv Season Tickel) to be obtained In the Library, or from

tbe HO".TI·eas. E. F. ERRINGTON, 22 GasrOyDe Road, N.E ., er frolU tbe H S ! Mrs. E. BLACKBVRN, 22 GaEcoyne Road, N E.

0... ecs. MiEs L. F. USHERWOOD, 57 New Fillebrook Road, Leytonstone.

EASTER CO-OPERATIVE HOLIDAY IN THE ISLE OF WIGHT. Thursday, April 12, to Tuesday, Aplil 17. All RamblelS aDd friends desiring to join

this holiday sbould send In their nam,s at once to ~lr. and Mrs. A. J. Clements, '5 Camden Road. N.W. Names will not be received after Sunday, April 8, when a meeting ;Includlng tea) will be beld at Soutb Place Institute at 5 p.m., at wb icb arrangements will be made and depo,lts of 26s. received. Tbis sum is estimated to cover the expenses of the bollday on the Island. Non-Rail' biers will be char~ed the ./6 for course licket. which should also b~ ;>ald in advance. Mr. G . Kuttner, 5 Marquess Road , Canonbury. N., will be Treasurtr. Members of tbe party sbould take week-eDd ticket Its. to R}de Esplan.de (available Tbursday to Tuesday). Tbe train In wbich accommodation wlll be reserved leaves London Bridge (L. B. and S. C. Railway) at 4.45 p.m. on Tbursday. April 12. Members are ad­vised (0 arrive at tbe station by 4.30 P m. Heturn boals from Ryde Pier Head on Tuesday, AprtJ 17, at 8 a m. and 4 p.m. Headquarters, c/o Mrs. Baker, 1 Marine Terrace, Castle Street, Ryde, Isle of Wlgb!.

SUNDAY EVENING LECTURES. A Series of six Sunday EVEning Lectores dealing .. Ith social and political questions

will be delivered during April and May. The following arrangeu:ents bave heen made:­April I. Tbe Education Muddle and How to Mend It. JOSEPH McCABE.

" B. Tbe Ethics of tI e Fiscal Question. JOHH M. ROBERTSON, M.P. 11 22. The People's Economic Charter. JOHN A. HOBSON, M.A .

• g. The Land for tbe People. lOSEPII FELS. Cbairman: Professor EARL BARNES.

May 20. Old Age Pensions. GBO. N. BARNEs, M.P. " 27· The Political Organisation of the Empire. H. CROSSFIELD.

Eacb lecture will commence at 7 p.ol. and will be followed by discussion. Admission' free. No collection.

TUESDAY EVENING LECTURES. Five Lantern Leclures are being given by Dennis Hird, l'>!.A., on Tuesday evellings,

March 27th and April 3rd, Iotb, and 17th. Toe 6rst was gheD on March ,olh. Tbe 6rst tbree Lectures areon Astronomy, the las( tWOOD Geology, sbowing tbe snpport these Sciences lend to tbe doctrine of Evolution.

Lecture I1., March 27tb.-The Solar System, Its relation to tbe Universe, disfances, motions, origin, size. The Origin of tbe Moon, elc.

Lecture Ill., April 3rd.-Meteors, Comets, the Stellar Universe, Star Clusters, Nebuloo, tbe Origin and Growtb of Stars, as discovered bv Telescope and Spectroscope.

Lecture IV., April Ioth.-A glance at tbe history of Geology, with views of the Eartb's Crust, of Rock Layers, and toe Earliest Forms of Fossils.

Lecture V., April17Ih.-A series of ex_mples of Fossils from all the Rock-beds, including the earliest Fossils of Man, and tracing his evolution.

The Chair will be taken at eigbl o'c1ork each evening. Prices of adJlission-ls., 6d ., and 3d. Course tickets-Reserved seats, 4s.; Unreser'ed 2S. (No seals will be numbered .) Tickets may be procured at tbe Hall and of tbe R.P.A., Ltd., sand 6 JohDson's Court, Pleet Street, E.C.

READING CLASS. Mr. Herbert Burrows's Reading Class is held at Soutb PlacA on the first Tuesday and tbe

succeeding Mondays In the month, at 7 30 p.m . Text book: Mr. J. A. Hobson's Tbe Social Problem.

SUNDAY POPULAR CONCERTS. Tbe TWENTY-FIRST SEASON will hegln on Sunday evening, October 7tb, when the

FOUR HUNDRED AND SEVENTY-THIRD Concert will be given . Further particulars in September, with the Heport of tbe Twentletb Seasou.

Committee Meeting on May 6, at 6 p.Ul. puuctually. (for Report). Ho ... Treas., FRANK A. HAWKINS, 13 Thurlow Park Rd., West Norwood, S.E. HUll. Sec., ALFREU J. CLEMENTS, 25 Camden Roael, N.\V.

ORCHESTRA. Hall. Conductor: T. EUSTACF. BARRALKT.l

The TENTH SEASON will begin in tbe Autumn. Tbe exact date wm be announced In due course.

Ladles or genliemen wishing to join tbe orchestra are reques ted to send their names to the Hon. S"., A. 1. CLKME~TS, 25 Cawden Hoad, N .W.

RAMBLERS' DANCES. A Farcy Dress Dance wlB be beld at Itrmfield's Hotel on AprU 7th, 1906. Admission

25.6d. Dancing 7 to 11.30. FanC'y, evening or morning drecs. Hon. Sec., Miss H. M. FAIRHALL, 8, Scarborough Road, Stroud Green , N .

PUBLICATIONS. The followl1Ig amollgst other p"bliClltiolls tire 011 Stile in the Lib"""y:

Dr. Conway's Autobiography, Memories, and Experiences. 2 Vols. 305. Farewell Discourses, by Dr. CON WAY ; IS. Centenary History of South Place, by Dr. CONWAY; IS . 6d. (redJced price). Workers on their Industries; IS. lId . ReligIOUS Systems of the World; 4S. National Life and Thought; 2s.6d. British Empire (Sunday Afternoon Free Leclures). 5 vols. Crown 8vo, with Maps,

Charls, etc. 4s . 6d each volume. The Religion of Woman: An Historical Study, by JOSEPH MCCABE,2S. The Reprinls, etc., of the Ralionalist Press Association are also OD sale, price 4~d.

The GENEI<AL Com"TT>:E will meet on Wednesday, April 41b. Correspondence dealing With l1lallers for consideration should be forwarded la the Secretary at the earliest possible moment. All matters relating to finance should be addressed lo the Treasurer.

NOMINATIONS for Members of General Committee sbould be seDt 10 lbe Secretary Dot later Ihan April 29. Tbose members of Committee whose names are marked thus e in the IIS1 below, relire Ihis year by rotalloD, and are DOl eligible for re·dect!?n.

HONORARY OFFICERS . rr(!aSI"el : W. RAWLtNGS, 406 Mare Street, Hackney, N.E. Secftta,),: Mrs. C. FLKTC IIER S"ITII, loa Fealber"toIle Buildings, HolbOlD, W .C.

Rigi,/wr oJ MeI/,bers allll Associntes: Mrs . HAROLD SEYLER, loa Featherslone Buildings, Holborn, W.C.

Eelitor DJ Magn.i".: F. W. READ, 65 Harley Road, Harlesden, N.W. Lib,minlls J MIss MARv HAWLTNGS, 406 Mare Slreet, Hacleney, N.E.

jWAI.LIS MANSFORO, Cherry Tree Court, 53 Aldersgate Slreet, E.C. Re.b"ilelill w Flllld 7'", t" \ \V. HAWI.INGS, 406 Mare Slreet, Haclmey. N.R. " ,r 11. R. CARTER, Courlfie1d, Ross Road, Wa1lingtoIT, Surrey.

JOHN ALOREU. J. R. CARTER. E. CUNNINC;IIA\!. Dr. A. Du.vF-.

Dr. C. V. DltYSllAr.F.. C. E. 'FAtRIIAI.T .. W. HAt .. J.lIlA\'.

!:Iulldlng Concert ... Decoration .. Discussion ... Finnncf; Ho use institute

Publications Magazine Music

Rambl.s Season Ticket Soiree Sunday School

Sunday Services

GENERAL C.OMMITTEE. eL. C HARRISDN. F. W . REA\). G. KUTTNER. JULIAN RONEY.

T. Rooo LAWSON. Mrs. IT. SEYI.P.R. Mrs. LIDSTONE. -B. SVMONS. F . M. OVERV. W. C . WADE. Miss RAWLINGS. E. \VILLIAMS. ' W. RAWLINGS. TIIEO. R. WRIG HT.

Secretllnes of Sub-Committees. C . R. BRACE. 26 BelhuDe Road. S lamtord Hill, N. ALl-'RE D I. CLlu,n;NTS , 25 Camden Road, N.W. Miss E. HARRINGTON. 22 Gascoyne Rd., S. Hackney, N.E . W . C. WADE, 107 Englefield Road, Canonbury. N. C. E. FAIRIIALL, 18 Firs Maosions, Muswell H111, N. Mrs. LIDSTONE, 96 Elacl(slock Road, Finsbury Park, N.

I W. SHEOWRING, 42 Osbaldeston Road, Sloke Newlngton, N. 1. HALLAM, 18 SI. Mark's Crescent, Regent's Park. N.W. E. WU.LIAMS, 12 Meynell Crescenl, S . Hackney. N.E. MISS K. J ARRETT. 18 Meynell Crescent, Soulb Hackney, N.E. ADOLF REI ss, 15 Wiltsbire Road, Brilton, S.W.

1 Mrs. BLAC"BURN, 22 Gascoyne Rd., S. JIacl<ney, N.E. MIss USHERWOOO, 57 New FilIebrook Rd., Leylonslone .

WA1.I.IS MANSFORO, Cherry TrecCourl, 53Aldersgale Slreet, E.C. Mrs. C. V. DItYSDALE. Belso ms Hill Farm, Weslerham.

1 MISS F. A. LAW, 59 Monlpelier Rd ., Peckham, S .E. A. W. WALLIS, 21, Llnzee Road, Hornsey, N. W. RAWLINGS, 406 Mare Street, Hackney, N.E .

Organist H . SMITH W>:BSTER, 69 Brecknock Road, N. The Building is to be let for Meetings, etc. Forms of application may be had

of the Caretaker, tI S outh Place, E.C.; and when tilled up should be sent to Mr. N . Lid,tone, 96 Blackstock Road, Finsbury Park, N .