in mind, body or soul.  They were all Christian ladies who recognized the duty of ministering in Christ’s name to those who were in need and so fulfilling His injunction of kindly service.  The plan finally adopted was to organize circles of ten members each, who should be pledged to use their opportunities, as far as they were able, for Christian ministration.  Each member agreed to wear, as a badge of the Order, a small silver Maltese Cross, bearing the initials, I.H.N., representing the motto, “In His Name.”  Every circle was to be left free to apply the principle of service as it saw fit, or as special circumstances might suggest, and all the circles to be under the direction and limited control of a central council.  The plan, subsequently modified as experience suggested, was widely adopted.  The circles have worked in a variety of ways, visiting hospitals and prisons, making garments for the poor, raising funds for the needy, aiding the churches and rendering service in various ways in which kindly Christian women are so effective.

Still another form of combination in Christian work has distinguished this century.  In 1844 George Williams, a London dry goods merchant employing a large number of young men, made an effort to provide them with a species of Christian club.  His own experience as a young man fresh from a country home, suddenly inducted into the temptations of city life, suggested to him the kind of help such young men needed.  A Christian friend in a great city to help a new-comer, to find him wholesome amusement in the evenings, and to put him on his guard against the pitfalls that were set for his unwary feet, might, Mr. Williams was convinced, save many a young man from ruin.  To provide them with such friends and to furnish a place of meeting for reading, converse and amusement, was the problem the kindly Christian man attempted to solve.  Out of his effort grew the institution we know as the Young Men’s Christian Association, which has its mission in nearly every large town in this country and in England.  The young man of this century can go into no considerable town without finding a commodious hall, with well-equipped library and reading-room, generally with a gymnasium attached, and with a host of young men ready to make his acquaintance and surround him with Christian influences.  In many towns, the institution has developed from the purely religious enterprise into a many-sided effort to give practical educational training and to attract young men to it by the help it renders them in secular pursuits.  The institution as it now exists, must be counted as one of the most beneficent in its far-reaching influence that the century has produced.

HUMANITARIAN WORK.