clerk of the Yearly Meeting. When the case was called, through being presented on the minutes of the Quarterly Meeting, which had been directed to the Yearly Meeting, the clerk informed that the appeal had been mislaid! As it was not read in the Yearly Meeting, and Friends ought to be made acquainted with its contents, we have procured a copy, which we here subjoin, as also a letter of John J. Merritt to Daniel H. Sutton, informing the latter of the progress of his case, and the action of his agent on his behalf. It will be perceived that the case is adjourned until another year.

APPEAL OF DANIEL H. SUTTON.

To the Yearly Meeting of New York, to be held in Fifth month, 1868. DEAR FRIENDS,-In accordance with the notice heretofore given by me, to the Quarterly Meeting of Westbury, of my being dissatisfied with its judgment, in the case which was brought before it, upon my appeal to it, and of my intention to appeal from such judgment unto your body, I herewith offer you such an appeal, asking of you to review the action of your subordinate meetings, in the treatment of my case.

Being entirely inexperienced in such matters, and a thousand miles removed from my natural friends, who could, perhaps, advise me better, I have sought the aid of a clerical one, who has given to my appeal the intelligible form in which it is being presented to you.

I reside in Chicago, and the different members of my family are dependant upon my daily abor for their support; that I am now, as I have heretofore been, when my case was before the respective meetings which have given attention to it, unable to ravel so great a distance, and incur so large an expense as would be needful, to give my personal attendance to these meetings and committees. Under such circumstances, I appeared at the Quarterly Meeting, by requesting one of its members to represent me. He did this, and was recognized by the Meeting as such representative, but its Committee refused to hear me through bim, and through such refusal my case was resulted in the Committee on but little more than a one sided presentation of it.

Believing that the necessities of my family, and my duty to provide for them, should not Prevent me from prosecuting, in accordance with the provision of discipline, an appeal for the protection of my right of membership in the Society into which I was born, I have, as before, requested John J. Merritt to represent me, so far as he may be permitted to do it, efore you and the committees which may be appointed by you, for the investigation of this

matter.

If my proceeding in this manner is not satisfactory to you, and you prefer a correspondence directly with myself, I would ask of you to furnish me with the minutes of your subordinate meetings, and the allegations of their committees, that when required to do so, I may understandingly respond to them. I should at this time have been prepared to do this, but my application to the same effect, made to the Quarterly Meeting, to which the notice of my intention to appeal was given, has been unanswered.

I have thus done what I can, to relieve you of the necessity of a personal interview; and if it is not satisfactory, and you deem that the matter cannot be decided without a personal interview, you must come to Chicago, for I cannot possibly come to you.

I am, respectfully, your friend,

CHICAGO, Fifth Mo., 15th, 1868.

DANIEL H. SUTTON.

LETTER OF JOHN J. MERRITT.

NEW YORK, FIFTH MO. 31ST, 1868.

Dear Cousin, Daniel H. Sutton,-Yearly Meeting is over, and thou art still a member of the Society of Friends, thy life in it having been continued by the action of the Meeting for one

more year. Thy appeal was placed in the hands of the Clerk, for the purpose of being laid before the Meeting, but when called up by the reading of the minutes of the Quarterly Meeting, the Clerk stated that he had received such a paper, but he had mislaid it. He would therefore state its contents, from which it appears that an appeal had been made by thee, and that I had been appointed as thy representative. The Meeting made a minute of the fact; asserting thy right to appear by representative, but alleging that such representative must be a member of the Yearly Meeting, and being informed that I was not, it appointed a committee to notify thee of its conclusion, and then deferred the consideration of the subject to their meeting of another year.

All this I learned unofficially, and from out of doors report.

It seemed to me that in thus deferring thy appeal, on a mis-statement in reference to my being a member, they were doing thee an injustice, and I therefore went on fourth day to their meeting, and sitting near the centre of the house, until after the Clerk read the opening minutes, I walked up into the gallery, and said that there was a matter upon which I desired to address them, partaking somewhat of the nature of a personal explanation, and I would ask their indulgence while I briefly presented it. Before I had finished my introduction, or there had been any response to it, the front door opened, and some women Friends entered on a preaching expedition. I told them I perceived other business was approaching, and I would retire until that was disposed of. I returned to my seat, procured my hat, and went to the outside of the house.

A delay of about an hour occurred, when the women came out, and I went in. I returned my hat to George Merritt, who sat next to where I did, and again went up into the gallery. George T. Trimble promptly called out to the Clerk to proceed with the business. I as promptly commenced addressing the meeting, saying, they could see from my having withdrawn on the introduction of other business, that I had no intention of attending their meeting, or forcing myself upon them, when other business was properly before it than that upon which it was my wish to address them. I had said it involved something approaching a personal explanation. I would add, that it had no reference to any thing pertaining to my personal interest. It did not refer to my own personal case, but to a matter which interested the meeting at large, and which I believed should now engage its attention. I would, therefore, ask the meeting's permission to address it. This was promptly met by objections from the gallery and its neighborhood; and after listening to them until it became evident that there would be no sufficient counter expression, I told the meeting, that it seemed to me to be its judgment, that my request should not be granted. I accepted what we had heard, as being an expression of the refusal of the Yearly Meeting to give me the permission asked for, and I should act upon it as being such an expression. And now, as the indulgence had been denied to me as a favor, I should claim it as a right, and should proceed on that ground to address them. There was considerable of a breeze before, but this brought on a fearful tempest. Some of my Dear Friends were almost beside themselves with what seemed to be rage, and a determination that I should not be heard.

I knew that such violence would soon exhaust itself, and calmly awaited its subsidence; and after some considerable delay, and several unsuccessful attempts at making myself heard, I obtained a hearing, only because they could not prevent me from doing it, and on the ground of its being the easiest way of getting rid of me. I told them I wished to speak to them on the appeal of Daniel H. Sutton, which I understood had been temporarily disposed of by the meeting, though, I believed, it had not yet been properly presented to it. I would indicate the usual course of proceeding in cases of appeal, and the peculiarities in this particular case, which had brought me to such a conclusion.

In case of disownment, the discipline gave to the disowned party, if dissatisfied, the right of appeal to a superior meeting, requiring of, the appellant a notice to the subordinate meeting of his intention to appeal. When such notice is given to a Quarterly Meeting, a minute of

it is made, and a committee is appointed to attend the Yearly Meeting, with the minutes of the subordinate meetings, and also to give such explanations as may be desired. A copy of this minute is forwarded to the Yearly Meeting, and it is usual, after the reading of the several minutes from the Quarterly Meetings, if an appeal is indicated in any of them, for the Clerk of the Yearly Meeting to invite the presence of the appellant in the meeting; and on his appearing, to inquire of him if he intends to prosecute his appeal. If he responds in the affirmative, the appeal has been formally, though verbally, made by him, and further proceedings can be properly taken. But it is this appearance and answer which constitute the appeal; not the notice of intention merely to the Quarterly Meeting. Should the expected appellant fail in every way to appear, there would be no action required on behalf of the Yearly Meeting, not even a minute in the case, for the expressed intention to appeal would have failed without being perfected; more than its announcement being needful to its vitality.

In the case of Daniel H. Sutton, he had been unable to attend in person, but had sent a written appeal, which had been placed in the hands of the Clerk, and as he said, mislaid by him. The Clerk thereupon assumed to represent Daniel H. Sutton, by stating to the meeting his recollections of the contents of this appeal; and the meeting accepted of this representation, and proceeded as if the appeal had been actually made unto it.

But Daniel H. Sutton did not wish the Clerk to represent him. He had chosen somebody else; he had selected me; and in the absence of the paper and the representative, the appeal never properly came before the meeting. Such informality might be excusable and innocent, in a case where there was full unity of feeling and of sentiment, but this would not apply in the matter of an appeal, where the parties were differing, and this difference was the very question which was to be determined by the Yearly Meeting.

For one of the party appealed from, to assume, without authority, to represent the other in his absence, and to be permitted so to act, would be equivalent to a denial of justice. There could be no fair adjudication in this way.

If the paper, after being placed in the hands of the Clerk, was mislaid, the consideration of the matter should have been deferred until the paper could be found, or the representative chosen by Daniel H. Sutton have been produced.

The Yearly Meeting, on such a presentation of the case, as I have described, decided that an appellant might, under some circumstances, appear by a representative, who should be a member of this Yearly Meeting. They further decided that Daniel H Sutton might so appear, They were informed that he had selected as his representative, John J. Merritt, and they were then told that he was not a member of our society, and thereupon deferred the case until next year.

1, John J. Merritt, could say to them, that they had been misinformed as to my not being a member, as I was such now, and always had been one. True, I had been disowned by New York Monthly Meeting, so far as a Monthly Meeting could disown any one; but the action of Monthly Meetings was not final, unless it was acquiesced in by the individual, or he neglected the appointed means for preserving his right. The discipline gave to a disowned person the right of appeal, on certain conditions, and when they were complied with, the judgment of the Monthly Meeting was suspended and inoperative, until it should be confirmed by its superior meetings.

An appeal had been taken by myself, and was yet undetermined; thus I was now as much a member of society as any individual it it. I could, therefore, now, by the recorded decision of the Yearly Meeting, rightly represent Daniel H. Sutton, and the consideration of his case should now be resumed by the meeting.

I had claimed before the meeting the right thus to be there, and address them as I was doing. Let us examine this. Our discipline says, "after the case of an offender is brought to a meeting, he is not to attend any of our meetings of discipline."

It is not for me, to assume to point out what was the meaning of those who framed this

discipline, otherwise than by a reference to itself; but I have a perfect right to refer to its language, and give to it any fair construction, as being their meaning; and this language admits of no other construction than that it is intended to confine our business meetings to those who are clean-handed, who have never committed an offence against the discipline, to the extent of having a charge of one brought to the meeting. It matters not as to what disposition may be made of the charge, if it is carried to the meeting, the offender is not to attend any of our meetings of discipline.

By this clause of discipline, all you who have had your cases before a meeting, as offenders, would be excluded from this meeting, and you are not rightly here in attendance. And this is all that our discipline says upon this subject, with one single exception. It afterwards, in another clause, gives to an appellant the right to attend the meeting, while his committee is being appointed. Daniel H. Sutton then has the right to be here, and your having decided that he is so circumstanced, that he can rightly appear by a representative, gives to his representative the right to be here; and if Daniel H. Sutton has the right to be here, and also to select a representative, if he cannot attend in person; it cannot be otherwise than a right with him, to select as his representative, a person circumstanced with reference to the society precisely as he is himself. If his own position does not exclude him, a similar position cannot exclude his representative, circumstanced in this respect precisely as is Daniel H. Sutton. We have each been disowned, and being dissatisfied with the judgment of the meeting, in our re spective cases, have each appealed to a superior meeting.

It is therefore my right thus to appear and address you on his behalf. I regret that you should have felt it to be disturbing to you, and trust that you will find that I have not harmed you by what I have done. I have said what I have with the kindest of feeling, and with a desire to avert what, if persisted in, will, I fear, prove to be a dilemma of constantly increasing difficulty.

Believing that I had said enough to demonstrate the propriety of the meeting recalling thy case, I retired, that the deliberations might be unembarrassed by my company. In passing toward the door I paused to obtain my hat from my son, and the hand which I extended for it was grasped and sympathetically pressed by a minister from another Yearly Meeting, who had taken the seat which was at first occupied by myself. He was one who had heretofore himself suffered largely in feeling and reputation, through the action of some officials of the Society. Another Friend, near the door, in a suppressed voice told me, while passing him, he was glad that I had been able to relieve my mind. These were the only indicated results of my efforts on thy behalf, and I afterwards learned that soon after I withdrew, the meeting proceeded with its usual routine of business, and that thy case was not subsequently resumed by it. It will therefore be a case of suspended animation for the ensuing twelve months.

This action of the meeting is a denial of thy right to select some one of thy own choosing to represent THEE—THYSELF-not THEM, except that it may be done from among themselves, and, therefore, from among their own instruments-a caution which would seem certain to ensure their own safety, however much it may embarrass thee in thy pursuit of justice.

I would suggest thy selecting, as such representative, the Friend who has already acted in the before-unheard-of duplicate characters of overseer and also of committee-man in thy case, him from whose judgment thou art in fact appealing, as being likely to be most satisfactory to the meeting, and speedily effective in attaining the consummation at which it appears to be aiming; this being, not an unprejudiced examination of the case, aided by the representative of thy choice, but the confirmation of the judgment of their subordinate meetings.

In conclusion, I wish thee much joy as the attendant of what I should be glad to believe will prove to be a season of but patient waiting with thee, and remain thy Friend,

J. J. M.

THE CHINESE CLASSICS,

With a translation, critical and exegetical notes, Prolegomena, and copious indexes, By JAMES LEGGE, D. D., in 7 vols.

Vol. 1 containing Confucian Analects, the Great Learning and the Doctrine of the Mean. Hong Kong: at the Author's. London: Trubner & Co., 60 Paternoster Row, 1861. Dedicated to the Hon. JOSEPH JARDINE.

THE

HE Chinese Classics consist of "The Five King" and "The Four Shoo,"-sometimes described by Chinese writers as "the warp and the woof;" for the term King denotes primarily the warp threads of a web, and when applied to a book, gives it a regulative authority, in correspondence with this idea.

"The Five-King" are,

1. The Yih, or Book of Changes.
2. The Shoo, or Book of History.

3. The She, or Book of Poetry.
4. The Le Ke, or Record of Rites.

5. The Ch'un Ts'ew, or Spring and Autumn.-A chronicle extending from 721 to 480 B. C.

It is common to ascribe all these books to Confucius; even Loomis in his recent abridgement carelessly falls into this error. Only the fifth can, with any probability, be attributed to him. Much of the "Record of Rites" was written by a later pen; and of the other three, only the Yih, shows an addition from his hand. In one word, these were the books which Confucius found in existence, and according to which he regulated his own life. Indeed, he pored so steadfastly over the "Book of Changes," that the leathern thongs which bound his own copy together, are said to have been thrice worn out.

"The Four Shoo," is an abbreviation for “The Books of the Four Philosophers." We have,

1. The Lun Yu, or Confucian Analects.

2. The Ta Heo, or Great Learning.—The work of Tsăng Sin, a disciple of Confucius, or of K'ung Keih.

3. The Chung Yung, or Doctrine of the Mean.-Written by his grandson, K'ung Keih.

4. The works of Mencius.

It will be evident that this is an imperfect classification, for the "Great Learning," and the "Doctrine of the Mean," are both included in the "Record of Rites," or the 4th of the "Five King," and prove conclusively that Confucius had nothing to do with its authorship. At different times, between his day and the present, the Chinese Canon has varied. In the earliest time, we had the Six, and then the Nine King, and a little before the birth of Confucius (that is, in 650 B.C.) we find Thirteen!