Systematic Beneficence in the Presbyterian Church [pp. 351-370]

1872.] PRESBYTERL4N CHURCH. 357
Finance was the idea that every member and every congregation would adopt the scheme of regular systematic proportionate giving at its recommendation. They wonid speedily
find that the Church is not to be brought up at once to this
duty, by mere resolves or by the best system ever devised. It
will from the very nature of the case be a slow, laborious
process. We ask, did the Church respond in this way to the
request and resolutions of the Memorial Committee, and
would more attention be paid to a new Board than to some
of the older ones? What power woMd it have that they have
not, when its great underlying principle is just what the General Assembly has again and again recommended? But let us
look a little more closely at these.
The first is what we may call a "GENERAL COMMIssION," as
set forth in the Report of the Committee of Twenty-one.
That report assures us, that the principles of our Presbyterian
system cannot be brought into full operation through existing
agencies. "To obviate this, we propose, in order to simplify, 4
consolidate and unify the various benevAent operations of
the Church, there shall be a General Commission which shall
have supervision of the benevolent woH~ of the Church," etc.
In other words, what the present schemes have failed to do,
a Commission peculiarly constructed and endowed can do.
This, until tried, rests upon a mere assumption. If it could
not command the approval of the Church's representatives,
how could it commend itself to the Church at large? It failed
at the very outset. Among the many objections to such a
commission were the following:
It awakened fears of its involving an undue concentration
of power; of its amounting to a body co6rdinate with the
General Assembly, so far as the control of Christian beneficence was concerned. It seemed likely instead of relieving to
increase the cost of our benevolent operations. Thus to call
men from all parts of the country, from Oregon or California
to Massachusetts, and from South Carolina or Florida to
Minnesota, and bring them together from thirty-four Synods,
to say nothing o~ China and India, twice a year, in May and
November, to consult about matters pertaining to the Boards,