The editor of the "Official Year Book of the Church
of England" has published some interesting statistics of the sums contributed by English Churchmen to English Church work in 1899. They have subscribed for the clergy, £197.000; for philanthropic work, £2,065,000; for curates and church assistance generally, £798,000; for elementary education and Sunday-schools, £1,177,000; and for general parochial purposes, £3,422,000; making a total of £5,398,000. To this must be added £1,439,000 spent on home and foreign missions, the grand total reaching £7,640,000, contributed in one year. That is the revenue of an important State, and equal to a gift of 5s. from every household in the kingdom. The voluntary contributions exceed, in fact, the sums raised by tithes, plus the revenues of Church property. When one examines details the most remarkable fact, perhaps, is the exceeding smallness of the sum collected for the clergy themselves. It is under 2200,000 a year. English Church- men will give pounds for church services, church schools, church repairs, in fact anything churchy, when they will only give shillings towards securing for their clergy a decent maintenance. They think that vague entity "The Establishment' should provide for that, and grow censorious if the rector does not act as an unpaid school superintendent besides.
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