“In going about we learn something, and it would be a shame to us if we did not; and we look back to our own country and view it as a whole, and many of the little feelings we had when immersed in our own denominations we lose, and we look to the whole body of Christians with affection.  We rejoice to see them advancing.  I believe that every Scotch Christian abroad rejoiced in his heart when he saw the Free Church come boldly out on principle, and I may say we shall rejoice very much when we see the Free Church and the United Presbyterian Church one, as they ought to be....  I am sure I look on all the different denominations in Hamilton and in Britain with feelings of affection.  I cannot say which I love most.  I am quite certain I ought not to dislike any of them.  Really, perhaps I may be considered a little heterodox, if I were living in this part of the country, I could not pass one Evangelical Church in order to go to my own denomination beyond it[53].  I still think that the different denominational peculiarities have, to a certain degree, a good effect in this country, but I think we ought to be much more careful lest we should appear to our fellow-Christians unchristian, than to appear inconsistent with the denominational principles we profess....  Let this meeting be the ratification of the bond of union between my brother[54] and me, and all the denominations of Hamilton.  Remember us in your prayers.  Bear us on your spirits when we are far away, for when abroad we often feel as if we were forgot by every one.  My entreaty to all the Christians of Hamilton is to pray that grace may be given to us to be faithful to our Saviour even unto death.”

[Footnote 53:  Dr. Livingstone gave practical evidence of his sincerity in these remarks in the case of his elder daughter, saying, in reply to one of her guardians with whom she was residing, that he had no objections to her joining the Church of Scotland.  This, however, she did not do; but afterward, when at Newstead Abbey, she was confirmed by the Bishop of Lincoln, and received the Communion along with her father, who helped to prepare her.]

[Footnote 54:  Dr. Livingstone had been joined by his brother Charles, who was present on this occasion.]

At Blantyre, his native village, the Literary and Scientific Institute gave him a reception, Mr. Hannan, one of the proprietors of the works, a magistrate of Glasgow, and an old acquaintance of Livingstone’s, being in the chair.  The Doctor was laboring under a cold, the first he had had for sixteen years.  He talked to them of his travels, and by particular request gave an account of his encounter with the Mabotsa lion.  He ridiculed Mrs. Beecher Stowe’s notion that factory-workers were slaves.  He counseled them strongly to put more confidence than workmen generally did in the honest good intentions of their employers, reminding them that some time ago, when the Blantyre proprietors had wished to let every workman have a