moral influence theory. Nor have I ever taught it. Nor can I, in the face of palpable facts, accept, as containing all the truth, the exclusive governmental theory. THOMAS STALKER.

San Luis Obispo, Cal.

MUNICIPAL SUFFRAGE FOR WOMEN.

This seems to be the only means of averting one of the most imminent perils to our political system, arising from unrestricted suffrage as it now exists. In our cities the dangerous classes are in the very decided majority. They put aside party lines when their own interests are at stake, and vote as a unit to further their own cause. But those majorities, given by the unsafe classes, have a far-reaching influence over large districts of country adjacent to the cities. The vicious classes, as a matter of course, elect men to place from their own ranks. The persons elected are of the same low morals as the men who have chosen them. These men levy our taxes, frame our statutes, administer our laws. The integrity and safety of the entire republic are placed in jeopardy. The danger grows apace. Better discipline, greater boldness, new aggressions from year to year, mark the encroachments of this element of our political life. The danger has already reached alarming proportions. Some defense must be devised right soon, or it will swallow us up. Throw about our homes and our institutions the bulwark of municipal suffrage for women, and snatch the cities from the domination of the roughs, and all will be well. Offset the votes of the slums with the votes of good women. Good women are very much in the majority over bad women. Thank God that this is so! Let woman vote at our charter elections, as she votes in some States at the school elections, and we shall see this cloud, dark with danger, disappear. J. B. MAXFIELD. Omaha, Neb.

THE CALIFORNIA VINE.

The grape is the favorite export of California. It is becoming to the average Californian what gold was to the pioneer; and this, notwithstanding the fact that it is to-day, in point of valuation as an export, inferior to wheat, barley, gold, and timber. The grape has for its chief patrons wholesale and retail liquor-dealers; and next, the fashionable circles of society. By the enterprise of these parties the wine producing grape is pushed to the front as the coming product of California.

A commission on viticulture and viniculture has been created by the State. Among its duties are the "assisting producers in finding profitable markets for their products, by extending commercial and popular knowledge of the same throughout the United States and foreign countries by means of public addresses, circulars, printed documents, and personal efforts of duly authorized representatives and lecturers of the said board." Fifteen thousand dollars per year are spent annually by this commission for the carrying out of the above provisions. The State Commission has its head-quarters at the University of California. Professor

Hillgard performs the complex duties of the "Professor of Agriculture" and superintends the viticultural and vinicultural interests under the auspices of the above commission. Miss Kate Field is employed by this commission to proclaim the "gospel of the grape," in which she uses her splendid talents to show why wines should be used in polite circles as the beverage, and to show that California wines should be patronized by Americans to the exclusion of imported wines. The Vina Rancho has been donated by our United States Senator, Leland Stanford, to found a university in memory of his noble son. This rancho is part of the foundation of the new institution. It is the largest body of land exclusively devoted to the vine in the State, and consists of 3,575 acres, all in vines. There are 800 vines to the acre, and in all 2,860,000 vines, capable when matured of producing 2,000,000 gallons of wine annually.

These institutions, with their ample endowments, destined to have an immense influence upon the destiny of the State, intellectually, socially, and morally, lend their powerful aid to foster the wine interests of California. The vineyards of the entire State produced last year fifteen millions, and it is said are capable of producing thirty millions, of gallons of wine. It is claimed that the material interests of 150,000 people in this State are identified with this single product. Already there are causes operating here that may essentially modify the future of the wine interest. The profits from table and raisin grapes being larger than those from the wine grape may diminish the interest in the production of wines. M. E. Richardson's Lesson Manual on the wine question shows that while the net profits of wine grapes are only from $10 to $62 50 per acre, the raisin grapes net from $68 25 to $105, and the table grapes net from $110 to $250 per acre. Raisins, like wines, have the world for a market. The raisin industry - in California has had a wonderful growth. In 1872 six thousand boxes of raisins were packed for market, each box containing twenty pounds. In 1888 a million boxes were put upon the market.

The phylloxera is also a factor to be noted in considering the wine interest of the State. Its ravages in Napa and Sonoma Counties, and in Southern California, have been such that many acres have been uprooted; so that it is now with many a question whether the almond, fig, lemon, olive, orange, or prune trees may not be more profitable than the vine.

This beautiful vine, which is made the figure of the intimate relation that subsists between Christ and his disciples, and the fruit of which Christ made the symbol of his atoning blood, is now profaned by the fermentation and adulteration of the fruit, so that that which was ordained by Christ to be a symbol of life out of sacrifice is the vehicle of death. From the day when Noah planted the first vineyard and drank wine, and was drunken, history has most faithfully repeated itself. It is repeating itself in California, and will continue to do so. They who plant vineyards and drink wine will be drunken, and they will curse their offspring.

As vineyards and wineries come to the front in California the Church, the school, and wholesome law will recede to the background. Oakland, Cal.

R. BENTLEY.

EDITORIAL REVIEWS.

FOREIGN RÉSUMÉ.

THE GENERAL SITUATION.

BOULANGISM is the great question of the hour throughout Europe; this goes without saying, as says the French idiom. It would be a strange play of fortune, or perhaps more properly a strange dispensation of providence, that should give in the present great crisis in Europe such a political adventurer the key to the European situation. But all this goes to prove the uneasy and restless disposition of the French people, and the general distrust of all the peoples in their rulers and their systems. The disgrace brought on all the ruling houses of the Continent by the shameless life and discreditable death of the heir to the venerable and distinguished hous of Austria adds not a little fuel to the flame of the present general discontent. Francis Joseph, of the Austro-Hungarian throne, has truly drank the dregs of sorrow to the full. He inherited the throne largely be cause of the imbecility of an uncle; his mother, the archduchess Sophis, was the most heartily despised woman of the whole imperial family, and his wife, the present empress, is little else than a popular equestrienne. And now, as though to cap the climax, the heir to the throne proved to be a debauchee and suicide, and the crown princess of Austria an unfortunate refugee in her father's house, but fortunate, at least, to be spared the life of sorrow that awaited her in the home of her adoption: we say that all these things, discussed and exaggerated in all circles, tend to honeycomb the seats of those who wear the crown and wield the power.

In France there is but one saving remedy for the immediate future, sad that is the nearness and the importance of the great national French Exposition. All classes take a great pride and place much hope in this as a means of drawing to Paris the élite of the world to admire the creations of French skill and industry, and indorse the assertions of French en thusiasts that France is still the "Grande Nation" notwithstanding her misfortunes, and that her artisans can conquer the hated Germans though her soldiers may not be able to wave the palm of victory.

But sober Frenchmen know the perils of the future, and are inclined to study their needs and their duty for the present period, and they ass themselves the question, "What will be the outcome of the obscure drama in which we are engaged?" And they reply: That depends absolutely on the way in which the coming generation shall decide as to the general conception of things. If men yield to the present tend ency of materialism, there will spring from it nothing less than a re of brute force, and a cycle of fratricidal conflict will be inaugurated

among classes as among nations. Every thing, then, depends more or less on the influence to be exerted by the religion of love and of liberty. What a solemn hour, therefore, for the Church of Christ will be the closing years of the present century! The year that has just closed has proved its vitality by what it has preserved or what it has conquered in mission work at home and abroad; the grand international missionary jubilee of London has given convincing proofs of that. But now is not the time to slumber on the blessings of the past. The Church of Christ must every-where, and especially in France, see with the eyes of faith its divine King pass among its ranks as a triumphant chief on the eve of battle, and hear his words of command as those which the book of Revelation bore to the Churches of Asia Minor in a similar crisis: "Hold fast to that which thou hast, and let no one take thy crown. . . . To him who shall have conquered I will give the power over nations, and I will give him the star of the morning." Yes, to make the morning star of a new day to shine over the darkened heavens of France, and encourage humanity with a grand era of revival, the burning aspirations and the penitent tears are needed of all those who ardently believe in the possible regeneration of a lacerated and bleeding nation.

I. RELIGIOUS.

LAVELEYE, the noted Belgian savant and publicist, has just made through the columns of the Flandre Liberale a thrilling appeal to the Protestants of France to grasp the clerical situation in their country. He quotes the renowned Quinet as saying that political emancipation can only be securely gained by a religious reformation. The French Revolution was the result of the grand philosophical movement of the eighteenth century, which would found the edifice of modern liberty on the basis of reason, and consequently in conflict with the clergy. But has this experiment, which has been repeated in all Catholic countries, succeeded? See where France is to-day! fearing to see the triumph of a Cæsarism of the pot-house, which would be the acme of shame for the generous French nation.

The daring publicist declares that the strength of Boulanger to-day lies with the Clerical party. What is the rock on which the Republic threatens to make a wreck but the religious question within the domain of the public school, and public instruction generally? If the Catholic nations desire to found or maintain liberal institutions they are told that the Church proscribes them, and thus they are in a blind-alley without an issue. What, then, is to be done? Shall they surrender all instruction to the Church? Liberty granted by the Holy See will soon be limitedthen suppressed.

If the clergy are excluded from the school as teachers or advisers, the habits of the people are shocked, and especially the feeling of mothers; and in this way is created a formidable opposition, to which may be allied all the malcontents, as now, indeed, in France, to the peril of all

free institutions. In Belgium the principles of '89 seem conquered; for the Church has conquered. In Italy the danger is so great that the national government feels bound to make an ally of the empires of the North. If the liberalism of the day is to be conquered, it is because it has not comprehended the great role of religion, even in our day. And, nevertheless, see how the question presents itself to the house and hearth of each one of us, not less than to the State. You are perhaps indifferent to the Church, you may even be hostile to it, but your wife and children remain faithful to it; you are thus conquered in advance. If, on the contrary, you wish to withdraw your family from the school and all Christian worship, your defeat is still more certain, for you will collide with the fact that man is a "religious animal," that he needs a religion, and that he will return to his ancient altars if you offer him no others. What is the conclusion that forces itself on all good patriots, and which they are preaching without cessation? It is this: If you would establish liberty, abandon the Church and the worship that anathematize it, and embrace that one which consecrates it. These are views of Laveleye, born a Catholic, in a Catholic land, but whose wary eyes have been opened to the gravity of the situation, and who meets it not as a Christian, if you please, but as a common sense champion of the rights of God and of man. The defeat of Liberalism in Belgium, and the relegation of the secular schools to the hands and teachings of the priests, have been a sore and dangerous blow to true liberty, and the lesson may well be heeded in France and-nearer home.

IN ITALY the Churches of the Vaudois are sacred to their mission of spreading and nurturing the Protestant religion. They are now expressing a great deal of sympathy for their French brothers in distress, and have just sent to them a touching greeting and appeal, rising entirely above the present hostility and coolness between the nations. They say in this: "Brothers of France, count on our sympathy in these days of trial for your most sacred liberties. When we listen to the eternal quarrel between the countries, many of the Vaudois would gladly interfere and say to France, A truce to all recriminations! it is on us alone that ought to rest the debt we owe. Our sincere attachment to our king and country will never prevent us from acknowledging that the two heroic ages of our history were determined by the Frenchmen, Valdo and Colvin. We shall never forget that our Bible was translated by a Frenchman, Olivétan, and that the captain of our glorious liberty was a Frenchman, Henri Arnaud.”

"And then is not our confession of faith still Gallican?" say these grateful Vaudois. The use of the French tongue among them still recalls their origin, and their family names remind them of their duty to France, and thus they would still fraternize in spite of all the hard words and rash deeds that are now rampant between them. Another object of this "Epistle to French Protestants" was to announce the mournful news of the death at Florence of their beloved teacher and preacher, M. A. Revel, who died in his prime, being but fifty-eight years old. They had