mbers, exclusive of the ministers, estimated at
43,368, are sufficiently gratifying; yet they do not represent the
real strength of the Church at large, and give only a faint idea of
its influence.

The Oecumenical Report gave the number of Methodist "adherents" as
24,899,421, intending, by the term _adherents_, those whose religious
home is the Methodist chapel, though their visits to it be irregular.
For the British Wesleyans the two millions of sittings were supposed
to represent the number of adherents (yet should all the occasional
worshippers wish to attend at once, it may be doubted if they could
be accommodated); for the other branches of Methodism in the United
Kingdom, four additional persons were reckoned to each member
reported. The statistics for Ireland and Canada were checked by the
census returns. Probably in the case of missions the adherents would
be more than four times the membership. Varying principles were
adopted for the United States, and the adherents reckoned at less
than four times the members reported. Should we to-day treat the
returns of membership on the same principle (Sunday scholars being
now as then included in the term "adherents "), we should find nearly
thirty millions of persons in immediate touch with Methodism and
strongly bound to it. Compare these figures with those of 1837, and
we must exclaim, "What hath God wrought!"

Estimating the increase of British Methodism, we have to remember
that the population has almost doubled in the sixty years, while
British Wesleyan Methodism has not doubled; but the great losses
occasioned by the agitations must be taken into account, and also the
curious fact that the ratio of increase for Methodism at large, in
the ten years between the two Oecumenical Conferences, was thirty per
cent--twice as great as the increase of population in the countries
represented; the Methodist Church in Ireland actually increasing
thirteen per cent, while the population of the country was
diminishing and the other Protestant Churches reported loss.

If the increase in Great Britain be proportionally smaller, this need
not cause surprise, in view of that vast development of energy in the
Established Church which is really due to the reflex action of
Methodism itself; that Church, with all the old advantages of wealth
and prestige and connexion with the universities and grammar schools
which she possessed in the days of her comparative supine-ness, with
her cl