ORIGIN OF THE OLD BOARD AND PERMANENT COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION, Its Great Ends-Works through the Presbyteries-Direct Duties of the Board-Office of the Presbytery-Office of the Synod-Duties of Students II.-Hearty Interest of the Membership of the Church. III.-Cooperation of Ecclesiastical Courts. IV.-Abundant Circulation of Information. V.-General Working of the Scripture Plan of Giving. CANDIDATES UNDER THE CARE OF THE BOARD, Number Aided-Number who have Finished their Course-Table of Presbyteries Represented-Welsh Calvinistic Students-Care of the Amount fixed for past Year-Important Question of Increase-The Proper Amount of Increase-Decision of the Assembly to Increase not ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH IN THE United States of America. PRESENTED TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY PHILADELPHIA: PUBLISHED BY THE BOARD. BOARD OF EDUCATION. THE BOARD OF EDUCATION, which now sends its first Report to the reunited Presbyterian Church, was conceived near a quarter of a century before the parts separated, and belongs, in its beginning, its design, and its present form, to each of them. It was the offspring, fifty-two years ago, of the great revivals of 1816 to 1820, which begat also the American Bible Society, the American Tract Society, and various home and foreign missionary boards and societies. Its object was vital and fundamental to the success of them all, for the Scripture places, next after the necessity of the Spirit in producing faith, and before the office of sending forth the preacher, that of the due preparation of "a preacher;" "for how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher? and how shall they preach except they be sent? As it is written, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things!" The Board of Education was the product of the piety, the wisdom, and the holy zeal of James Wilson, James Patterson, and Ezra Styles Ely, as well as of Ashbel Green, and Samuel Miller, and William Neal. For a time the stream of Presbyterian history separated about obstructions in its course; now they have met again. Cortland Van Rensselaer and Thornton Mills took counsel together. The same precedents were incorporated in the Rules of the organs of both portions of the Church, as they began to grow more kindly, and draw together in heart. And now, as it is the object of the Church, in correspondence with the great events of the period, with the urgency of a groaning and travailing world, with the mercies shown and the gifts with which we have been enriched, and with our hopes of still more abundant and heavenly gifts, to be a great missionary Church; so also is it the most anxious desire, and prayer and effort of this Board to be, in its sphere, a worthy representative of the Church in its aims and labors, and be the instrument of multiplying greatly the numbers, and making more and more thorough the intellectual and spiritual preparations, of those heralds who shall over this land, and in all the earth, prepare the way of the Lord and make his path straight, so that soon "all flesh shall see the salvation of God." At the outset of the work of Ministerial Education in a new career; and in a form more complete, it is believed, than any which has preceded, by the adoption of the best results of the experience of both branches of the Church, it is most important to present summarily, for the consideration of the ministry and membership of the Presbyterian Church, the outlines of that form, and the leading principles which animate it; and to state what is needed still to give the cause the highest degree of efficiency. Constitution and Rules of the New Board. ITS GREAT ENDS. The Joint Committee on Education, appointed by the General Assembly at Pittsburgh in November, 1869, aimed to present the great ends in the plan for the work of the reunited Church. It gave the true, and we trust abiding, key-note to it in Article II. of the Constitution, which says: "The Board of Education shall be the organ of the General Assembly of the Church for the general superintendence of the Church's work in furnishing a pious, educated, and efficient ministry, in sufficient numbers to meet the calls of its congregations, to supply the wants of the destitute classes and regions in our own country, and to go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. It shall provide for the collection and judicious distribution of the funds which may be requisite in the proper education of candidates for the ministry under its care; and it shall, in coöperation with the ecclesiastical courts, do whatever may be proper and necessary to develope an active interest in education throughout the Church." WORKS THROUGH THE PRESBYTERIES. Being the organ of the Assembly the work of the Board is performed through the Presbyteries. Candidates are received only on their recommendation, and are subject to their direction and care as to study and occupation. So the Constitution states: "The Board shall act through the Presbyteries of the Church. Candidates for the ministry, when properly examined and received by the Presbyteries, and recommended for aid to the Board, shall receive the amount specified, within the limits prescribed by the Assembly, provided in all cases that a discretionary power, necessary to the general trust committed, shall be exercised by the Board." * * * It shall take suitable means to inform the Church as to the duties and interests relating to the consecration of her young men to the office of the ministry, and their sound and thorough education, and to urge the effective care of her judicatories over them. |