in the spirit of that Sonship, if it did not draw out our hearts in cordial goodwill toward all mankind, of every name and of no name. We neither ask nor desire any part or lot in creation as fovorites of the Creator; rather do we humbly seek to enter into sympathy with the impartial and Eternal Goodness, which causes the sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.

We cannot therefore be deeply disturbed at the variety of names and forms which religion has assumed in different lands and times: rather we rejoice in the exhaustless fullness of that Fountain from which all these historic streams of religion have flowed. All the streams are limited; all are defiled by human impurities; only the primal Fountain is wholly and forever pure. From that Fountain, whosoever will may draw and drink.

As all the historic forms of religion have been subject to perversion, none of us can plead exemption from the perverting influences; and we would humbly confess our own liability, as individuals, to error and evil. But we look for deliverance, safety and soundness, not in turning our hearts inside out and morbidly contemplating our feelings and failings;-nor in the hope that false entries may be made in God's account-book, whereby the merits of another may be set to our credit, but in leaving the things that are behind and obeying the high calling to press forward to something better; in patiently pursuing the path of duty as it is made manifest by such light as we individually receive; in faithfully applying principle to practice; in works of righteousness and good-will; in overcoming evil with good, both in our relations with others and in our own lives; in making good uses of our bodies and souls, and our opportunities; in learning and following the laws which are divinely written in the constitution of man,-laws which are revealed in reason, illustrated by all growing knowledge and experience, and forced with winning power on our hearts by the precept and example of the wise and good men and women of all ages.

We accept entirely the word of Jesus which says, "If thou wilt enter into life, Keep the commandments;" and we would honor as commandments of God, all our perceptions of duty and fitness, whether derived indirectly, as from the Bible, or directly from the light that lighteth every man, or collected from the facts of science and experience.

"The fear of God" is not the phrase by which we would describe the highest and purest religious feeling: for if in many cases it is "the beginning of wisdom," mature excellence is only found in that "perfect love which casts out fear." And since "perfect love" must include perfect trust, we would be content to leave our destiny, in that great hereafter for which we hope, in the hands of the same mysterious wisdom which placed us here,-assured that while the Divine Parent lives, we shall live also.

II. TREATMENT OF HIRED MEN AND WOMEN.

THE evil spirit of caste, which has produced and nourished all the slaveries and tyrannies of the world, still re-appears in the treatment of labor by capital; and too often embitters and poisons the relations between the farmer, the shop-keeper, or other small operator, and his hired help; as well as the relations between the woman of the house and those who are called her domestics. We must learn to apply to all such cases the large statement of the political economist: "The one who has labor to sell has just as many rights as the one who wants to buy it."

There is need of more consideration, more respect. We do not plead for tenderness, but for justice. All our high talk of freedom, fraternity and good will goes for nothing, and our religion itself is a worthless sham, unless we can apply our best principles to common affairs, and especially to our treatment of those with whom we are in daily contact and who are the inmates of our own homes.

The question of intimacy between those who possess some degree of mental and social culture and those who are coarse and ignorant must indeed be a matter of some delicacy and difficulty, calling for personal tact and discretion; but no man or woman can be innocent and noble who subjects another man or woman to indignity and contempt, or who willingly produces or confirms in any human being the feeling of personal degradation and inferiority.

There is complaint that the quality of hired help constantly grows poorer; that there is constant falling off in skill and in faithfulness. May not one cause of this vexatious state of things be looked for in the fact that employers have not done their duty to the employed; that "going out to service" has become unendurable to most men and women, except those of a low degree of character and ability. To be put off with mean fare and comfortless quarters; to be counted outside of all household enjoyments; to be on short rations of sympathy and courtesy; to be very freely blamed, and not very freely praised; to be made to feel that the employer only cares to get most work for least pay; to be looked on and treated, chiefly as a creature of muscle, and not also as a being of intelligence, affection, and aspiration, so that even kind employers are kind in the same way as to horses and dogs; surely such a sphere of life is not likely to attract a very high order of mind, nor to produce a very satisfactory service.

And how un-American and un-Christian is the influence to which our children are exposed, when they see, every day and from their tenderest years, men and women about them whom they learn to regard as inferior beings-intermediate somewhere between themselves and the domestic animals!

We must learn to "honor all men." Not that we are called to overlook real differences of character and ability, or grades of

service; but we are called on to apply the golden rule to our fellowbeings in all conditions, cherishing toward them the feelings and showing to them the consideration which in like case we might reasonably ask for ourselves, and which we all received from One who is "no respecter of persons."

III.-POLITICAL EQUALITY OF WOMEN.

FROM its first organization, this body has not ceased to proclaim its faith in Equality of natural rights, regardless of race, color or sex, and to protest against the brand of inferiority which the present political order fixes upon one half of the population, by compelling woman to live under a system of laws in the formation of which they are too little considered, and never consulted. In ages of darkness and brute violence, there might be excuse; but the darkness is past, and the true light of liberty and righteousness shines all abroad. Woman's equality of nature, needs and rights is so generally conceded in theory that to deny and withhold that equality in practice is no longer a thoughtless inconsistency, but has become an outrage and a burning shame.

The agitation of the question for a term of years has wrought such wholesome changes in public sentiment, and has opened up so many wide avenues for woman's better education and freer employment, that we feel encouraged and constrained to persist in the demand for her entire enfranchisement. There can never again be peace in this land so long as "all men are rulers and all women are subjects;" so long as "the most ignorant and degraded man has a voice in making the laws which the wisest and best woman must obey."

Every legal disability, and every abatement of the natural and reasonable liberty of woman, places all the faculties and forces of her nature at a hurtful disadvantage, prevents the development of her self-respect and measurably subjects her to the disrespect of man. Completeness of womanhood requires the same unquestioned and unembarrassed liberty of growth and action as completeness of manhood. All interests of society, of the family, of the rising generation and of the human race, share with herself the damage of the prevailing injustice; and all these interests, as we earnestly believe, will receive immense relief and re-inforcement from her admission to a rational equality of privileges and responsibilities.

Already, it has been said, "the mere talk of suffrage for women has changed the face of the world for every growing girl." Let all young women considerately prepare for accepting the high trust which awaits them in the near future.

IV.-CAPITAL AND LABOR.

SINCE society is one body, and "all the members, being many, are one body," the true prosperity of society is found in the welfare of every part; and in a rightly ordered state there can be no real hostility of interests, but all must rejoice or suffer together.

We deprecate and view with alarm every form and expression of caste or class-interest that devolops antagonism and jealous rivalry, striving for advantage by trampling others' rights.

We deem the interests of capital and labor, when justly related, as nowise antagonistic but harmonious, and we believe that neither can long prosper by the sacrifice of the other.

We believe that the tendency to centralization and monoply of power, making the rich richer and the poor poorer, is dangerous to the best interests of the State:-that the accumulation of exorbitant wealth in the hands of a few gives dangerous power to those who hold it, deprives the large majority of the people of their rightful share in that prosperity which is granted by our Heavenly Father to the whole human family, and tends to increase pauperism with its attendant ignorance, misery and crime.

We also deem the effort to control labor by arbitrary authority, and by tyrannical combinations, that result in strikes or strife and antagonism, as fatal to true brotherhood, to the general prosperity, and to the best interests of all.

We would accept and approach with manly spirit the difficult problem given us to solve. We would seek its solution by diffusion of general intelligence, by special study of the laws of social and political economy, and by bringing intelligent representatives of all interests into friendly consultation and conference. We would solve it by a more practical co-operation, that shall ensure just wages to labor and security to capital, and render employers and employee more equal partners of the common prosperity. Its permanent solution must come through recognition of the supremacy of spiritual interests and of the sovereignty of God's law, making us build all prosperity on the sure foundation of righteousness.

V.-LEGAL HOLIDAYS.

OUR governments, State and National, have been careful to give no preference to any religious establishment or mode of worship. Our legal holidays should therefore be strictly limited to the commemoration of State or National events. Hence it is not without regret and serious forebodings that we see the introduction and observance of "Good Friday," "Thanksgiving," or any other day, chosen by sectional or sectarian preference, sanctioned by legislative action and tacitly accepted by the people. It cannot be otherwise

than offensive and burdensome to those who are not consulted, or interested in the establishment of such days.

Government should afford equal protection to law-abiding men of all religions and of no religion; but it should not be used by any as an instrument for enforcing upon others their own opinions or observances.

VI.-REFORM IN WOMAN'S DRESS.

EVERY branch of reform, which agitates the thought of the present, asks for the permanent co-operation and highest influence of woman, as a condition necessary to its completion and use. Under the absorbing and enfeebling control of existing fashions of dress, it is not possible for her to give that co-operation or exert that influence. Hence it is incumbent on every woman, who would aspire to the true and high, to withdraw both her allegiance to and her approval of injurious styles and corrupting costumes. And it is equally the duty of all men, who aim at improvement, and who perceive the degrading effects of bondage to cumbrous and consuming burdens on the human body to encourage and sustain woman in such change of costume as may be necessary to secure to them the physical freedom and health which are conditions of that mental and spiritual strength which is requisite for acting well their part in the great concerns of life.

VII.-CHILD EDUCATION AND THE KINDERGARTEN.

YOUNG children suffer either from neglect or from premature forcing. The importance of discovering the golden mean between these two extremes, and of applying sound and safe principles to the management of their early years, leads many of us to look with great interest and hope to the Kindergarten method of training young children, which originated with Fröbel, a wise German, and is slowly making its way in our own country. We commend it to public consideration

1. From a sorrowful feeling that we are all constant sufferers from the early mis-direction or non-direction of our faculties, and the consequent loss of time, capacity and happiness.

2. Because society is missing the service of many of its members, through the stupid or vicious maturity which generally follows an untrained infancy and childhood.

3. Because the common method of putting children too early and too much to books, which can only give secondhand knowledge, operates to disqualify them for the habit of observing nature and