Rensselaer Union and Jasper Republican, Volume 8, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 April 1876 — RELIGIOUS AND EDUCATIONAL. [ARTICLE]

RELIGIOUS AND EDUCATIONAL.

—Archbishop Purcell, of Cincinnati, who is now seventy-six years old, will next May celebrate the jubilee of hit admission to tho priesthood. —Dr. Gumming, the distinguished Millenarian divine of London, has discovered that before September, 1876, the sure word of prophecy will be fulfilled—the Euphrates will dry up, the Jews will go back to Zion, and the heavens and earth will be removed. —The annual missionary report of the Methodist Episcopal Church for 1875' shows the following facts: Foreign mife® sionaries and preachers, 881; missionaries and assistants in the Territories Of the United States, 15; missionaries to foreign populations in the United States, 297; domestic missionaries, 2,878. The number of members in foreign countries is 18,775; probationers, 8,282. ; . ." . —The Jewish citizens of Williamsport, Pa., have united in a letter to the School Board, asking that singing of, .Protestant ’lymns as a part of the daily of the schools be discontinued, on the ground that it is “ entirely unwarranted/by law and openly in discord with the spirit of the Constitution of the XJnitqcj States, anil of this State of Pennsylvania; a. proceeding which makes out of onr tfeeaivd inde\ pendent Institutions of foaming sectarian mission and Sunday-schools.” —We see a good deal in the-papers against the endowment by the Stdtfe of institutions of a high grade, of which we do not lielieve a word: -High ■ schools, normal schools for the training < fopqhefs,professional schools for the education’of lawyers and physicians, institutions sos special instructions in the higfteg deptßrtL: ments of science, universities where alt' ,kinds of liberal culture may be acquired are eminently /sos pflijic kti>d//lf private munifitcnCe does not Provide tlieim the State should. The better Me.cbjn'ai 01 ! schools are the more demand there is fpr tlie university afid thdpfofessionai, school. What the State contributes in this way is more than repaid to it by the better s»ryice rendered itk cultured Christian Adbocate.

—lennesaee, Whioh hot lonc BgdstDdd second among fee States in-fee grade of, illiteracy, how holds the sixth place. The St. Louis Journal of ,palling attention to the fact, says: .ft shows that great work. hss.fieea .fi&e In tlie State; feat fee.peaplc arp: taecahiiag trtoid aildmore. concerned fin the progress ol education;,&nd .feat the sehooh"hnve< a large number of barney capdble aad-de-i voted instructors, and a corps of efficient and wide-awake County Superintendents, commanded by a liye Utatq,Su{)cidqfeMd' ent. 'Many of the popular’ heresies and prejudices about public schools have been eradicated; and as fee people see fee advantages and benefits of the new scholastic regime, the more willing do secy become to contribute' to its maintenance. The schools are no longer confined to towns and wealthy neighborhoods.’’’' * ' —As regards the growth of sects, It is stated that a centurv ago the more important religious bodies, (fitted dipt toe number of churches) were ranked iu fee following order: Congregatiqual, Bap r tist, Church of England, Presbyterian, Lutheran,’ fejfqiiu<*L Lfech He, foftped, aqd. By. ill*, Bkpust, Clnstlanq Lufecrwn, CmqjrigailonA fed Profestpnt EptappM* SPfeprflWfe OfO** ligious organizations has outstripped the growth of,pO*iflfiti§». | Atfihf MUtfeilg of the i| Mftln 1,050, with a population of §,500,000* showing a chinch ft»r‘everj* f.TW.Vouu. Tberemre now more than. 72,000, which, with & population 'of 38,000,000, iwtnfeif show a church for every, .623. In other words; while the population has multiplied' eleven.fqld, fee churches have multiplied nearly thirty-seven fold.—Peputer Science Monthly. « - 1 «' T Lieut. Cameron writes of the heart of Africa: ."The interior is mostly a magnificent And healthy country of unspeakable richness. .1 have a small specimen of good coalj other minerals, such aSigolcJ, copper, iron and silver, Are abundant, hndv. lam confident that by a wise arid liberal (not lavish) expenditure of Capital, one of the greatest systems of inland navigation in the world might be utilized.