The Gospel will never gain its conquests in such way as to relieve the Church of the duty and labor and self-denial and discipline of carrying it and proclaiming it to the heathen, who will find it, as all people have, opposed to all their habits and pleasures and traditions, and will, therefore, when they understand it, resist it before accepting it. The cheering news which so often comes to us from Central Africa and other lands will doubtless be followed by most discouraging news of disappointment and seeming disaster. On the other hand, it must be remembered that in all really substantial buildings, especially if erected on doubtful ground, a large proportion of the cost and of the most valuable material, and also of the time, must be expended out of sight before it becomes a feature of the landscape. In all religious movements it is especially true that much of the best material, and much of the cost, is utterly lost to sight before the world sees any result. In the South, for the past fifteen years, the foundations have been laid for a superstructure which is to arise in grand and glorious proportions, the joy of our land and the praise of all people. We are just reaching the surface, and others than the workmen themselves are now able to see that something has been going on during all these years. If structures, however beautiful, which have no foundations, must topple, and we should feel no disappointment when they do, we would yet understand that much has been done when a foundation broad enough and strong enough has been laid. The work will go on now with apparently tenfold rapidity, for, since it attracts attention it will also attract helpers, and those who doubted and sneered will co-operate in carrying it forward. * * * * * BENEFACTIONS. It is reported that John I. Blair has recently given $40,000 to Lafayette College. Hon. Levi Parsons has given $50,000 to Union College for the benefit of worthy students. Mrs. Orra Bolles, of Hartford, Conn., has given $15,000 to different benevolent enterprises, mostly under the auspices of the Baptist denomination. Ex-Secretary Delano has given $10,000 to Kenyon College. The Botanical Department of the Cornell University has recently received a donation of $10,000 from the Hon. H. W. Sage, of Ithaca, N. Y. Mr. Spurgeon is reported to have recently received $200,000 for his Pastors’ College, and $125,000 for his Orphanage. Mr. Amasa Stone, of Cleveland, Ohio, has offered $500,000 to the Western Reserve College, conditioned on its removal to Cleveland. James Mackey, of California, has signified his intention of giving $50,000 to Bowdoin College. It is said his example is likely to be followed by a gentleman in Philadelphia. The will of Mrs. Maggie Embry, of Eleton, Ky., which has been admitted to probate, gives $200,000 in Louisville and Nashville Railroad Stock to the Vanderbilt University at Nashville.