must have been concerned in this universal faith of the early disciples either by actually raising Jesus Christ from the dead, or by impressing upon their minds a lie—and so forcibly that the stupendous results could follow from it. Human causes are not adequate to explain this psychological miracle. The simplest, indeed the only adequate explanation of it is the reality of the event believed in.

(2.) The second indirect line of evidence, and the last which I shall present, is drawn from the existence of the Christian church. Here it is in the world before our eyes. It is a power simply stupendous, never greater than to-day, and constantly increasing. Whence came this mighty institution? What is the adequate cause which will furnish the true and rational explanation of this phenomenon? Trace the Christian church as we are acquainted with it back century by century to the Apostolic Age and you will find it having its origin in the labors of one man. That man is St. Paul. It was through him first that Christianity received the universal interpretation that its founder had in mind and was started on its world-wide career of conquest. The original apostles with one exception had comparatively little influence upon the development and spread of Christianity, and what they did have was a hindrance rather than a help. The one exception was John, and his influence came later, long after the death of Paul, and when he had grown wholly out of his early Jewish narrowness and crudeness into the full breadth and glory of Pauline Christianity, and even, in some respects, perhaps, beyond it. It is a statement which scarcely needs any qualification, that it is to the Apostle Paul that the Christian church owes its origin. But history testifies that this same Paul from whom the Christian church sprang was once the most bitter and virulent persecutor of the Christians. Between Saul the persecutor and Paul the Apostle there is a mighty gulf, a stupendous change. His own explanation of this change, as the records have it without conflict, is that the Lord appeared to him in person. It was from the Lord himself directly, and not from the other apostles, that he received

his assurance of the resurrection, and the gospel which he preached as well. His evidence is therefore entirely distinct from and independent of that of the original disciples.

Now the facts are these. Paul had an experience which changed him from a persecutor to a zealous advocate of Christ's cause. He believed that experience to have been a personal appearance to him of Jesus Christ some time after his death. This faith he retained steadfastly all his life. Was this appearance fact or delusion? Suppose the experience of Damascus to have been a delusion. How could such a man as Paul have been imposed upon in that way? His was one of the strongest minds the world has ever had. I challenge any one to read the Epistle to the Romans without being forced to that conclusion. The author of that Epistle is not a very promising subject to practice a delusion upon. If this experience was a delusion, even though the impression might have been strong at the time, it must have worn off after a while. On the contrary his faith in the resurrection of his Master grew stronger and stronger. It survived the fourteen years of comparatively limited activity and partial seclusion which followed the event at Damascus, and appeared in his preaching after that time as clear and unshaken as ever. Baur says the change whereby Paul was suddenly transformed from the most vehement opponent of Christianity into its boldest preacher cannot be called anything but a miracle, and a miracle which appears all the greater because he broke away from the bonds of Jewish particularism and rose into the universal idea of Christianity; yet, great as the miracle is, it can only be conceived as a spiritual process. Of course there was a spiritual process

there, and that spiritual process is the greatest miracle in the case. But just as was said in regard to the other disciples, this spiritual miracle must have had a cause. And there is no adequate explanation of it under the circumstances but the reality of the event which Paul was brought to believe in: namely, the personal appearance to himself, and consequently the resurrection, of Jesus Christ. In brief, this line of evidence may be stated as follows: The existence of the Chris

tian Church requires, for its adequate explanation, the psychological miracle of the conversion of St. Paul; and that requires the antecedent miracle of the resurrection as an objective fact.

To sum up, now, our whole discussion. We found two distinct classes of evidence: Direct historical evidence, and indirect or inferential evidence the first class tending to show that the resurrection was, and the second that it must have been.

We found the New Testament accounts varying greatly, in some unimportant particulars contradictory, but substantially agreeing that Jesus of Nazareth was seen and recognized after his death by a large number of persons who had known him well before the crucifixion. The testimony of these persons, although they were all friends and followers of Jesus, is not invalidated by predisposition to believe such a thing, for as a matter of fact they were predisposed against it; nor by credulity, for however credulous their age may have been, or they themselves in regard to other things, they were not credulous, but incredulous, of this. The historical evidence is such as would be conclusive respecting any ordinary historical event, and is so of this except to those who, upon philosophic grounds, regard the event itself as impossible, and therefore not susceptible of proof by historical evidence, if indeed by any evidence whatever. We then considered the indirect evidence afforded by two facts which are independent of the New Testament narratives of the resurrection :-the firm belief of the original disciples in their Master's resurrection and the existence of the Christian Church. The latter fact points back to and requires for its explanation the conversion of St. Paul. Both this change and that of the original disciples are characterized by the ablest rationalistic writers, like Baur, as psychological miracles, and both alike require, for that adequate cause and explanation which the principles of all sound science and philosophy demand, the antecedent miracle of the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead as an objective historical reality.

Edward L. Houghton.

ARTICLE XV.

Boston Association of Universalists.

THE important position which the Boston Association has occupied and the extensive influence it has exerted in making the Universalist Church what it now is, invest the events of its history with more than usual importance.

The record thereof, while it is accessible to all, is familiar to only a few, and the number of those who are knowing to more than its passing history is fast diminishing. To preserve the important facts of its rise and progress up to the present time, in a condensed form and to place them where they will be accessible to a wider circle who were important actors in making it what it is, is the object of the present writing.

The Trumpet and Universalist Magazine, bearing date May 30, 1829, contained the following notice:

"UNIVERSALIST ASSOCIATION.-The Universalist clergymen in the counties of Suffolk, Norfolk, Middlesex and Essex are requested to meet at Charlestown, on Thursday the fourth day of June next, at 10 o'clock A. M., to organize a new association, to include the pastors and delegates of societies within the territorial limits of the aforesaid counties. A general and punctual attendance is desired."

This is believed to be the first public indication of the intentional existence of that body, which will be fifty-nine years of age on the 4th day of June next.

In accordance with this notice, on the day designated several clergymen in the Fellowship of the General Convention of Universalists met in the vestry of the Universalist meetinghouse in Charlestown, at half-past 10 o'clock A. M. The first act of the meeting was to invoke the blessing of God, in prayer offered by Rev. Thomas Jones. Rev. Ezra Leonard was chosen moderator and Rev. Hosea Ballou 2d, clerk. A letter was received and read from the First Universalist Society in Charlestown, after which the following votes were passed, in the order in which they are presented :

Voted, that the brethren present from the four counties before named, now form themselves into a regular Association; That this Association assume the name of the "Boston Association of Universalists;"

That the ministering brethren in fellowship with the General Convention of Universalists, and residing in either of the four counties above named, together with two delegates from each of the societies in the same region and in fellowship, constitute this Association;

That the clerk be directed to lay before the General Convention of Universalists the request of this Association for its fellowship;

That a committee be chosen to draft a code of by-laws for this Association, and to report at our next session;

That this committee consist of three, to be chosen by nomination ;

Chose, Bros. Hosea Ballou 2nd, Eliphalet Case and L. S. Everett ;

Voted, that when this Association shall adjourn, it adjourn to meet on the first Wednesday in December. 1829;

Voted, to adjourn this Association to meet in Boston. The Boston Association of Universalists thus became an established organization on the 4th day of June, 1829. Its first constitution, containing substantially the provisions of the votes passed at this meeting, was adopted at the meeting in Woburn, Dec. 22, following. Agreeable to adjournment the Association met in Boston, at some place not specified, and chose Rev. Thomas Whittemore moderator and Rev. L. S Everett clerk, after which they adjourned, to meet at the house of Rev. Sebastian Streeter on Monday following-Dec, 7. At that meeting a request was received from the First Universalist Society in Woburn that the Association adjourn to that place. Accordingly it was resolved that this Association adjourn to meet at the house of Wyman Richardson, Esq., in Woburn, on Tuesday the 22nd inst., at 3 o'clock P. M.

At this meeting, Dec. 22, 1829, after uniting in prayer with Rev. Walter Balfour, Rev. Hosea Ballou was chosen moderator and Rev. Hosea Ballou 2d, clerk pro tem. The committee to