(_f_) The Home Mission Society.--This society has served us to greater results than any other agency. To this society the university owes above half the money which has given it support all these years. They have given us missionary aid which has served to produce higher life and better order in our churches and associations. And from their schools beyond our state we have received many of our most capable persons, among whom we may mention Drs. Dinkins, Purce, Stokes, Owens, our eloquent Fisher, and Jones, our scholarly Peterson, the urbane Jackson of Eufaula, the industrious Bradford, and others whose names I cannot at this moment recall. Mrs. C. S. Dinkins, as well as Mrs. C. O. Boothe, came to us from the Roger Williams University, a Home Mission Society School. But what has been said will suffice to show us how we have come to be a wiser and a better people than we were thirty years ago. And if we see what has blessed us in the years gone by, no doubt we shall be able to see that the same things may, if we will permit them to do so, bless us in the years to come. May our steps not be forgotten by our children. III. THE POINT WE NOW OCCUPY. Thirty years we have been beneath the opportunities and duties of free manhood, which is to say that for thirty years we have been associated with the family institution as husband, as wife, as parent, as sister, as brother, as son, and as daughter. Three decades with the family, developing affection and making patience. Thirty years of business life has passed upon us, which is to say that we have for this length of time been associated with those facts which grow out of our physical wants, such as labor, system, economy, competition, skill, etc. We have had thirty years over our own consciences, over our own wills, over our own church affairs. We have had thirty years with books and schools. We have had thirty years under the duties of citizenship. What have we attained to in this time? Have these years given us any fruits? Are we where we were in 1865? Let us see.