safely be ventured. This Committee are clearly of opinion that no more stereotype plates should be made or purchased by the Society, and they are likewise as clearly of opinion that none now on hand should be used in manufacturing unless in the special cases above named. All other plates it would be wise to dispose of as soon as they can be sold to advantage. Happily there is no necessity for a hurried settlement of the final question. The stock of sheets on hand remains so large that no immediate replenishment of the stock from the plates, about which doubts are entertained, is required, and the question can therefore be waived for a more intelligent decision. By a resolution of the Society, the Board of Managers are required to report in detail their doings upon this whole subject, at the next annual meeting, and in presenting such a report, they will have an opportunity to give the facts upon which the Society itself can judge in the case. It may be found that the best of the plates can be disposed of during the year at favorable prices, and, if so, it may be wise at once to cut off the manufacturing of Bibles and Testaments entirely, as proposed in the resolution under notice. Without doubt the progress of the mechanic arts, and the growing competition of business, point to this method as the ultimate policy of the Society, and it is equally clear that this policy will greatly simplify the business of the Society, without at all obstructing its efficiency or usefulness. It should be mentioned in this connection that in the case of the 61 cent Testament, there cannot be an immediate abandonment of manufacturing without essential loss to the Society. The Society has on hand a considerable quantity of paper purchased for an edition of 10,000 copies of the 12mo 25 cent Bible, under a contract for manufacturing, which was made before the annual meeting of 1850. The Board, in the belief that the getting out of so large an edition was premature, and that purchases of 25 cent Bibles could be made to better advantage, (as the result has proved,) induced the contractor for the printing, some time last summer, to abandon the contract. This he did in a most liberal and courteous manner, for which he merits the thanks of the Board. The paper, however, remained on hand, and being of peculiar and unsaleable size, it could be used to advantage only in the manufacture of the 6 cent Testament. There has been already manufactured from it an edition of that Testament, of 10,000 copies, and another edition of 15,000 copies will be immediately required. The Board cannot expect to do better than to use the whole of this stock of paper in the same manner. On the whole. the present Committee, under the considerations here named, are prepared to recommend the supplying of the Depository with Bibles and Testaments by purchase, as the ultimate policy of the Society, and that the present exceptional cases be left as above named, for maturer consideration. They recommend the manufacture of the 64 cent Testament until the paper now used for it is exhausted, but that no other plates of English Scriptures be used until after the final report on the whole subject shall have been presented to the Society. They recommend further, that measures be taken to dispose of all manufacturing stock, excepting that above named, for the benefit of the Depository. In regard to the remaining suggestions found in the report of the Society's Committee, the present Committee are not required to offer extended remarks. In respect to the division of the business of the Society into Departments, their spheres and designations, and the methods of keeping accounts, this Committee would refer to the previous action of the Board covering the same ground, and reaching substantially the same results. This Committee, however, greatly prefer the designations adopted by the Board to those named in the report under consideration. "Foreign Department" and "Book Department" are not, as it seems to this Committee, expressive of the real distinctions in the case. This Society has a part of its work in supplying the destitute at our own doors, and these destitute increase with every ship-load of immigrants landed on our wharves. The Society makes its grants to the destitute at home, from the same resources from which it makes grants to the destitute abroad. A more general title, therefore, for the department into which funds are received, and from which funds are dispensed, for supplying the needy with the bread of life, seems preferable; and this Committee would recommend therefore an adherence to the titles which have been already adopted by the Board, viz., “Department of Donations," and "Department of Publication and Sales.” They submit herewith an extract from a paper on the business arrangements of the Society, prepared by the Corresponding Secretary, at the request of the special Committee to whom that subject was referred, which paper was approved by the Board.* The subject of quotas to Life Members and Directors demands the early and deliberate attention of the Board and the Society. The rapid increase of Life Members and Directors creates a claim upon the Depository of serious prospective magnitude, and indicates the imperative necessity of timely modification and relief. If quotas were called for only in the spirit of the grant,—to supply the destitute with the Word of God,-there would be less objection to the system, But it is difficult, not to say impossible, to restrain applications within those limits, as the experience of the officers of the Rooms too plainly testifies. This Committee recommend the thorough examination of this whole question during the year, and that it be reported upon to the Society at length for definitive action. The Committee, in compliance with suggestions made at the last meeting of the Board, would here allude briefly to one or two points of practical importance in estimating the value and feasibleness of a department for supplying English Bibles and Testaments, which are not fully developed and explained in the report presented to the Society. It may be inferred from the report in question that the sum of $9,832 42, or, in * In compliance with the request of the joint Committee on the Rooms, the undersigned presents the following suggestions: "The Donation Department, and the Department of Publication and Sales, in the operations of this Society, are essentially distinct, and should be so administered. The one is a facility through which the benevolent in the churches may reach the destitute, to supply them with the Word of God. The other is a commercial facility through which the churches may procure supplies of Bibles for individuals, families and Sunday-schools in good editions, and at prices only sufficient to pay the costs of production and incidental expenses. "The two Departments may be for many reasons conjoined in one institution, but essentially they are distinct, and will best work together when that distinctionis observed in the administration of affairs. To a certain extent this distinction has always been observed. There have been "Donation Ledgers" and "Book Ledgers," and the receipts into the treasury of the Society have been recorded as for the one Department or the other, according to the facts; but these receipts, when in the treasury, have constituted a common fund, and in appropriating money, that common fund has been drawn upon without any attempts, so far as I know, to discriminate be tween portions properly belonging to the one or the other, except in cases of specific designation by donors. "I would suggest that the moneys belonging to the different departments remain distinguished in the treasury; and that each department be confined in its drafts upon the treasury to its own income. Thus the proceeds of sales would go to the replenishment and maintenance of the stock, and the moneys which pious benevolence has consecrated to the sacred purpose of supplying the destitute with Bibles, would go for that purpose only. The expenses of the departznents should be judiciously defined, and each department, for its own expenses, be a debtor to its own treasury. In this way it could readily be ascertained at any time whether the Publication and Sales Department was self-supporting or not, and the churches could understand that the means of the Society to reach the destitute were at all times exactly according to the liberality of their contributions. By this system, moreover, the indefiniteness and doubt which hang over the Publication and Sales Department, and the prejudices thence arising, would be at once and for ever removed. I think the above suggestions easy of application, and would suggest that the Books be kept accordingly." cluding the grants to Life Members and Directors $13,464 28, covers the full amount of gratuitous distribution of the English Scriptures accomplished by this Society during the term of its existence. In fact, however, this is but the smaller part of the work effected in that direction. This Society avoids direct grants for gratuitous distribution wherever this work can be effected by its Auxiliaries. The Society has Auxiliaries scattered over the whole country, some of which are large and efficient, and a very large amount of the sales to such Auxiliaries (which sales are the chief ones of the Society) has taken the direction of gratuitous distribution among the destitute. These Auxiliaries would not have existed, nor would their work have been done, but for the home work of this Society. In estimating, therefore, the amount of gratuitous distribution accomplished by the Society, the relations and labors of its Auxiliaries should not be overlooked. The only practical question would seem to be, so far as this particular point is concerned, whether the full amount of gratuitous distribution accomplished directly and indirectly by the Society and its Auxiliaries, has been an adequate and reasonable result from the funds and labor expended in producing it? And this leads to another and more comprehensive inquiry, namely,-how is the term "losses," as applied to the home department of this Society, to be understood? -and by what rule is the profitableness of the department to be determined? The terms loss and losses are frequently used in the report of the Society's Committee in a broad sense, as they would be in reference to a commercial house existing for the sake of gains. There are, however, qualifications in the reasonings of the report, which indicate that the terms in question were not intended to be received without some abatement of their ordinary force. The point is so essential as to require further elucidation. The department does not exist for pecuniary gains. It is not its purpose to manufacture Bibles at the lowest possible rates, and sell them at rates the highest possible, that it may grow rich in traffic. Its design is to reduce the price of Bibles and so to facilitate the widest possible circulation of the Word of Life. The practical question is, whether it does its work with prudent management and at reasonable cost? The aim should be to procure and sell good copies of the Scriptures at such rates as will meet the expenses involved, and no more. Whether this can be accomplished is the problem to be solved. It may fail of accomplishment from two causes, one of which is errors of management, the other the inevitable liabilities of trade. If Bibles and Testaments are manufactured or purchased at ill-judged rates, or in immoderate quantities and suffered to depreciate on hand; if depository expenses are unnecessarily large, and bad debts accumulate by indiscreet sales or inefficient collection, the failure of the experiment may be altogether the fault of erroneous administration. On the other hand, where all these mistakes are avoided with wise and scrupulous care, it may still be the case that the vicissitudes of trade in various ways may so affect the receipts as to show a deficiency in the end. Auxiliaries fluctuate in character, and there can be no insurance against bad debts. Sales will sometimes fall below anticipations, and stock will inevitably depreciate to some extent. These are liabilities which are necessarily involved in a department of publication and sale, and where no margin for profits is calcu lated, a deficiency is no improbable thing. But is the deficiency necessarily a loss, furnishing an argument against the department? Other questions arise before this can be answered. Has the deficiency been occasioned by errors of management? If so, let these errors be corrected. To reform is better than to destroy. Lessons of experience are oftentimes necessary to indicate ways of improvement. But, supposing that even under the best conceivable management, a deficiency still occurs in the end. Then the ques tion is, does the department work any advantage to the cause of Christ compen sating for the expense of sustaining it! In answering this question, a wider range than the present Committee can now traverse opens itself. Why are Bibles and Testaments so cheap to-day in Great Britain and the United States, and wherever the English language is spoken? Why is it that they are found in bountiful abundance in common schools and Sunday-schools, and every where in the habitations of the poorest of the people? It is because Bible Societies, reducing the cost of Bibles, and calling into existence every where auxiliary societies for dis tributing them like autumn leaves, have carried forward their benevolent designs at an annual outlay beyond the receipts from annual sales. It is a glory of the age that Christian benevolence has sustained the expense. This outlay, however, should always be as economical as possible in relation to the work done. It may be believed that the improvements in the book-making arts which have occurred during the last few years, have rendered this outlay no longer necessary in the process of manufacturing Bibles and Testaments. In depository expenses, however, and sometimes to meet a deficiency occasioned by the feebleness or the breaking up of an Auxiliary, which has bought Bibles and Testaments and distributed them among the needy, but is now unable to pay for them, outlays may still be demanded, which create a just and reasonable call upon the benevolence of the churches and friends of the Bible. In relation to our own Society, suppose that after every wise step has been taken to procure Bibles and Testatments at the lowest costs,-steps which it is the settled purpose of the Board to take,-it should still be found that an outlay of a few hundred dollars per year is required to meet the expenses of the Depository; is there not a sufficient compensation for it in the fact that the existence of the book department keeps in life and operation a large sisterhood of Auxiliaries which, from Maine to Oregon, are distributing the Word of God? These Auxiliaries, by the very force of their relations to the Society, maintain a wide-spread sympathy with the great foreign work for which the Society was chiefly established, and which this very sympathy has enabled it so honorably to perform. To drop the book department, at the cost of dropping these Auxiliaries, should be an ultimate measure, adopted only after every improvement of practical administration has proved that the department is too expensive for the good which it accomplishes. Held in high esteem by the larger portion of the patrons of the Society, and constituting to them an essential link in the chain of their connection with its great objects, its abandonment would be an experiment too serious to be hazarded, except for the most imperative and manifest reasons. In concluding this report, the Committee would re-express their profound sense of the importance of the matters involved in the present deliberations and doings of this Board. The Committee are glad to see, in the document submitted to them, a looking to remedies for existing evils rather than a breaking up of the depository. The patrons of the Society, however, have a right to look for and demand the most scrupulous economy in the administration of its affairs. Such economy should be, and will be, the studious care of the Board. By the system of business adopted the real condition and cost of the Department will, as stated in the Annual Report, be at all times apparent. If the Department can be made a vigorous and useful agency in spreading the Word of Life, at a cost which is rea sonable, all will rejoice to sustain it; and to make it so will never cease to be the aim and care of the Board of Managers. S. S. CUTTING, E. L. MAGOON, Committee. List of Contributions MADE TO THE AMERICAN AND FOREIGN BIBLE SOCIETY, MAINE. man, 50c.; T. J. Bearce, 55c.; W. M. Bray & Co., books, 3 87. Paris, Mrs. M. Cummings, 5; Mrs. M. Prentice, 1 25; Mrs. B. Hopper, 75c. Harrison, Dr. H. A. Barrows, 3; S. Burnham, 3; P. Tolman, 36 55 10; Sewing Circle, stockings and dresses June-Belfast Bap. ch. 13 92; Waldo) Oct. Coll. by Rev. F. Merriam.-Bloom- sold and realized, 297; Rev. C. B. Davis, Nov.-Saco, ch., per Rev. N. M.Williams, Plumer, 5. Damariscotta, B. D. Metcalf, 245 66 |