3 12a PAST AND PRESENT OF the union, which then took place, of all the sections of the Presbyterian church in Can¬ ada, and into which all the Presbyterians on the Island entered with the exception of those who were under the ministry of the late Rev. John Goodwill , the able, success¬ ful and hard-working successor of the Rev. Donald McDonald . Doubtless they too at no distant date will unite their forces, inasmuch as this would only be the natural result of their well known loyalty to the doctrine and polity of the united church, the Presbyterian church in Canada . From the year of the union until the present the church, whose constituency embraces thirty- four per cent, of the population, has not les¬ sened her activity. On the contrary she has added thirteen new charges, has increased her givings by practically one hundred per cent., and has enlarged and modernized her equipment and organization so that today she is better fitted to do the work of Christ at home and abroad than at any time in her past history. In this last period a new generation of men has arisen to guide the destinies of the church, men of culture and piety who are true to the great ideas of the generations that have passed away, God , duty, immor¬ tality, Christ. They recognize, however, while truth is eternal the nomenclature changes with the age, and rising to the de¬ mands of modern life, they are keeping the church in the van of every movement that is likely to be for the welfare of the people. They obey in a pre-eminent degree the in¬ junction of the poet: Hold fast your Puritan heritage, But let the free thought of the age, Its light and hope and sweetness add To the stern faith the fathers had. In the premature death of the Rev. David Sutherland , for some years pastor of Zion church, Charlottetown , a great loss was sus¬ tained by the present leaders of the church in this province. He was a man of literary attainment, very much above the average, a cultured, simple and earnest preacher whose memory will long be cherished and revered by his brethren in the ministry and by the many to whom his life and work proved a source of inspiration and strength. He saw beyond the clouds The eternal sun, and felt within his soul The secret pulse of everlasting life. One thing that must strike the reader of the annals of the church is the patriarchal age, a wise and fair old age, serene and bright and calm as is a Lapland night, which was attained by many of the pioneer minis¬ ters, notwithstanding the rigor of the win¬ ters, the extent of country over which they had to travel, and the amount of hard work they had to undergo. Marvellous it is beyond expression that so many of these hard-worked, ill-paid men lived far beyond the three score years and ten. It is not too much to repeat at the close of this brief and imperfect resume that the history of Presbyterianism on the Island is the record of the lives of devoted men, known and unknown in the ranks of the clergy and laity alike. They were faithful as stewards of the mysteries of God . They were deeply conscious of their office and work; their responsibilities never lay lightly upon them nor the work by which they sought to discharge them. All of them, min¬ isters and laymen, were men of pure and elevated character who drew to themselves the respect and admiration, if not the affec-