[Footnote A:  The following facts regarding tract societies may be here stated:—­The Religious Tract Society of London was formed in 1799.  During the first year of its operations, ending in May 1800, it had issued 200,000 tracts.  What is its present working power?  Its annual income from sales and benevolent contributions (L12,500) is L95,000.  Its annual distribution of tracts, including handbills, from the London Depository is—­in English, 20,870,074, and in foreign languages, 537,729, making an annual total of 21,407,803.  It publishes tracts in 117 different languages.  Taking into account the number of affiliated societies, the total probable annual distribution of tracts, British and foreign, in connexion with the London Tract Society, amounts to 28,500,000.  Several religious bodies in the United States maintain Tract or “Publication” Societies.  But the “American Tract Society” (founded 1825) is the largest and most influential in the United States, and has a catholic constitution similar to our own Tract Society.  It is supported by more than 700 auxiliary societies—­those in Boston, Philadelphia, and New York being large and efficient.  We may add that its circulation is not confined to the United States, but extends to Mexico, Central and South America, and to those districts in the East and Asia Minor where the American missionaries are labouring.  It has issued upwards of 200,000,000 of publications since its commencement.]

And now let us ask, What shall be the history of the Church during the rest of this century?  Without attempting with a vain or profane hand to uncover what God has concealed, it is surely a comfort to be able to take our stand on the immovable rock of His promises to Christ, and to rejoice in the assurance, that, sooner or later, His name must be glorious in all the earth!

But when?  Is it too much to assert, that before the end of the present century, the gospel shall have been preached to all nations, the Bible translated into all tongues, and the last visible idol on earth cast down amidst the triumphant songs of the Church of Christ?  We might expect this blessing judging only from the past, and the constantly-increasing ratio with which society advances.  Yet, as revolutions in the physical world anticipate in a single night the slow progress of ordinary causes, so, for aught we know, may God, by some evolution of His providence, make one year do the work of many.

But while we do anticipate the most glorious results ever attained by the human race during this century, we anticipate, also, from the signs of the time, a desperate conflict of opposing systems, both of truth and error.  It is not a little remarkable, that never before was there such a life and strength in every system as at this moment.  Protestantism, Popery, Infidelity, and even Judaism,[A] were never so alive; and never were alive together before.  Does this not look like a coming struggle?[B] But what may appear suddenly and unexpectedly, may nevertheless be the necessary results of long preparation; like the water or the gas, which suddenly enter a thousand city houses to refresh and illuminate them, but which are the results of years of labour in digging trenches, laying pipes, and erecting reservoirs, during all which time no streams of water or of gas were ever present to the senses.