In just a decade after its refusal to admit a woman, the Meadville Theological School (Unitarian) opened its doors to women students, since which time it has received sixteen. About one third of these have graduated, while others have taken but a partial course as wives or prospective wives of ministers, in order to be more truly “help-meets” in the pulpit work of their husbands. “Among these graduates,” writes a member of the faculty, “every woman has been above the average. Our experience indicates that for success in our ministry, care should be taken to encourage only such women as, together with personal fitness for the work, can easily maintain this high rank.” An amusing incident in the domestic life of one of these women pastors may indicate a possibility of growth in the woman ministry likely to startle conservative minds. A little boy and girl, the children of a mother whose work as a minister evidently contained no surprises for them, were discussing plans for their own future. “I shall help mamma preach,” said the little girl. “I shall preach, too,” stoutly said the small brother. His sister, looking thoughtfully and doubtfully at him, said slowly, “Yes, mens do preach sometimes.” The woman ministry in America has had no warmer friend than Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, herself a preacher of well-known ability, occasionally preaching in the pulpits of this country, and having preached in Rome, Jerusalem, and Santo Domingo while sojourning in those places. In 1873 Mrs. Howe succeeded in securing a convention of such ministers as were within convenient distance of Boston during Anniversary week, at which addresses were made and the communion observed, Rev. Lorenza Haynes and Rev. Mary H. Graves officiating. Since that time eight annual conventions have been held in Boston; and in the Hollis Street Church, on June 2, 1882, the “Woman’s Ministerial Conference” was formed, Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, president. This is not a working body, but a fellowship of women preachers, whether ordained or not, representing all denominations. Its present officers are: Mrs. Julia Ward Howe, president; Rev. Mary H. Graves, corresponding secretary; Rev. Ada C. Bowles, recording secretary. These, with the additional names of Rev. Louise S. Baker and Rev. Mary T. Whitney, form its executive committee. The title of Rev. is never applied save to those who have been regularly ordained in their respective denominations. That women bore an important part in the planting and early growth of the Christian church needs no argument. That the plain teaching of Paul should have been so perverted as to mean their exclusion from the office of public teaching is to be explained only by the fact of a departure from the methods of the primitive church, through a purely masculine interpretation and application of regulations which, entirely adapted to the age and country in which uttered, were never intended to be prohibitive of women’s preaching in that, or at any later, period.