by our self-spun philosophy. The capacity for such a revision would render the revelation needless. Nor does any more or less strict theory of inspiration modify our office and duty as interpreters. If God has vouchsafed to become our instructor, there is no room for doubt that he has given us his instruction in an authentic form, in a form that demands our implicit credence. The plenary authority of the Gospels- their right to be believedrests on no technical definition of the mode or measure in which their authors were inspired, but on the necessity of the case, on the only conditions under which alone a divine revelation could have been needed and given. For loyalty to the sacred record, freedom from party bias, the thoroughness with which the lights of philology, archæology, and parallel Scripture are concentrated on the first Gospel, and the conscientious exclusion of other than legitimate sources of illustration, we can safely commend the Disquisitions and Notes on Matthew to Christians of every name.

Of Dr. Hackett's work we expressed our high appreciation on its first appearance. Many of the illustrations are new, and those that are not so are virtually original, as they come to us confirmed by the actual observation of one second to no living Biblical critic in sound judgment, acute discernment, and ripe scholarship. This volume, by the weight and worth of its contents, merits a place on the table of every clergyman and student in theology; while its simplicity of style, its attractive form, and its moderate dimensions adapt it to the use of common readers, and render it invaluable as a manual for families and Sunday schools.

ART. IX.-1. Annual Report of the Board of Trustees of the Massachusetts General Hospital, for the Year 1859.

2. Annual Report of the Boston City Missionary Society, for the Year 1859.

3. Twenty-Sixth Annual Report of the Executive Committee of the Benevolent Fraternity of Churches. 1860.

FIFTEEN years ago we published a list of the religious, benevolent, and educational societies and institutions that had received large sums of money from citizens of Boston, and mentioned the monuments of various kinds which had been erected in memory of distinguished individuals among us within that period. We now recur to the subject, and propose to lay before our readers a similar catalogue of contributions for the public good, and for objects of interest beyond the limits of our own community, by inhabitants of our city; embracing the larger gifts of the rich, and the gathered contributions of the poor, for a curious and interesting variety of purposes. This, as we think, is a species of statistics which it is important to collect for various reasons. If institutions exist for the relief of the misfortunes and troubles to which all are liable, it is important that they should be known, in order that they may be useful. If experiments are tried, and every new benevolent association is an experiment, their results should be made known, that the institution may be imitated, or improved, wherever a similar spirit and a similar want can be found. And it is not likely that any harm will be done by excessive liberality in founding or endowing charitable institutions, either at home or abroad, which can be traced to the influence of our example. We trust, on the contrary, that the influence of such example would be to produce imitators rather than barren approvers, and thus to cherish institutions of beneficence and utility. Neither can it be said that we are fostering a narrow spirit, while we thus justify our love for our own city. We know what is done here, and we do not know what is accomplished elsewhere. It may be that as much or more is effected, in a similar manner, in other places. We know that the liberality and the

attachment to home, which lead to precisely such a result, are felt elsewhere, as well as in Boston; and we should like very much to see a similar statement of the channels of benevolence, their direction, width, and depth, from other cities and towns. There is no doubt that we could learn many lessons of wisdom and of kindness from such a record of the foundations of past generations in the great European cities, where enlightened experience has been longer observed than here; and, from the early ages of Christianity, when benevolence had its birth, to the present time, there have been eminent examples, both public and private, of the same spirit which animated our fathers, and which, we rejoice to believe, has not deserted their descendants.

It would not be difficult to show that a wise and refined beneficence produces fruits of direct utility which the most cunning selfishness could not reach; and therefore that charity, in all its forms, is an agent and a producer of good in a much larger proportion than selfishness. Does not a hospital restore the health and strength of many a poor man, who saves his family from becoming a burden on society? Is not many a child rendered a producer, instead of a mere consumer, by the asylums, the Sunday schools, and the day and evening schools, that are supported by public contribution and private charity? If the industrial and productive effect of many of the institutions called charities were capable of being seen and known, would they not be proved to be a remunerative expenditure? remunerative, we mean, not to the individual founder or benefactor, for in that case there could be no charity, but to the community in which they exist. This view makes every founder and supporter of a useful scheme of benevolence a public as well as a private benefactor; and adds dignity as well as utility to his labors or his gifts. In a country like this, growing every day in wants as well as in means, -all classes of society, the rich, the poor, and every variety of the one and the other, increasing each day, - institutions of charity must increase with equal growth, and must multiply with the multiplying employments and wants of the population, or else great numbers will be left without resource in the worst calamities

and most distressing circumstances of life. Large portions of the community are found in a new condition in every succeeding generation; foundations which were well adapted to their times are, at later periods, either inadequate or comparatively useless; and the charitable as well as other institutions must be modified, or new ones must be created, to meet the wants of each successive age. It is with great satisfaction, therefore, that we observe in our present list so many associations, whose names and objects are new; which have, indeed, begun to exist since 1845, and which show, or tend at least to show, that the resources upon which public spirit may draw are neither hoarded nor exhausted. The old institutions are kept up, and new ones are formed, very generally by voluntary contribution; in a few instances only, by permanent funds; and thus successive generations meet new occasions, without forgetting the perpetual wants of society.

There is one contribution for the general benefit, which, as it comes in the shape of a tax, may not be considered as charity; but the spirit, the essence of charity is in it, and it is in fact principally a contribution by the richer classes for the benefit of all; namely, the school tax, which is larger or smaller in every town, according to the liberality with which the inhabitants provide for the public schools which by law they are obliged to maintain. In Boston it would be thought little to comply with the bare letter of the law. The schools are sustained with a liberality, and a judicious abundance, both in number and in apparatus, which show a spirit quite beyond that of the mere law, for providing adequate instruction for all, and compelling all to avail themselves of it. There are, unhappily, some parents, who are so little aware of the advantage of having their children attend school, and acquire the elements of knowledge, as to render compulsion necessary to bring the young within reach of instruction; and there are officers employed by the city to gather vagrant children to the schools to which they properly belong, and to put them in the way, at least, of learning something better than the instructions of the street. For the fifteen years last past, the average expense of the public schools has amounted to $324,263.15 per annum, of which the sum of

$164,620.97 has been the annual cost of the grammar schools, $83,437.35 of the primary schools, and $76,204.83 of the various school-houses, making a total amount of $4,863,947.23 within the period named. This appears a large amount. Whether it is larger than the necessities of the population demand, can be known by the school committee only; while the figures are certainly large enough to arrest the attention of the inhabitants who are called upon to pay these expenses. In their hands they may safely be left, as it is no part of our purpose to invite inquiry as to the economical expenditure of the sums contributed by the city government. There are whole departments of that government whose especial business it is to attend to this subject, and we have no doubt it will be investigated with sufficient care.

There is another kind of city expenditure which approaches more nearly to the character of charity, - a provision for those who are absolutely destitute of ability and of means for selfsupport. This includes the inmates of the House of Industry, and the Lunatic Hospital maintained by the city, the former of which has, within fifteen years, required for its support $781,150, and the latter $ 84,841.32. Besides these sums the Overseers of the Poor have distributed to those who need a partial support in their own houses, the amount of $441,568.77; and the city has also been charged with the sum of $ 13,043.03 for the support of paupers in the State Lunatic Hospital, making a total amount of $1,320,603.12 spent in what may be called the corporate charity of the city. The sums distributed in this manner have increased of late years with great and unexampled rapidity, from causes which we cannot search out, but are content to leave in the competent hands of the government. Thus the expense of the House of Industry was $13,514.02 in the year 1845; in 1850 it had risen to $61,898.67; in 1855 it was $58,786.93; and in 1859 it was $77,817.95. The Overseers of the Poor also in 1845 expended $7,655.19; in 1850, $ 21,761; in 1855, $ 37,314.39; and in 1859, $55,277.74. After making appropriate allowance for the increase of population, and the depreciation of gold, we cannot but think these figures adapted to startle even the extravagant, and to make prudent men inquire with more than