The Wesleyan Conference, after a most excited discussion, has decided
that a plan for the admission of laymen into Confer- ence shall be prepared in time to be formally accepted by the Con- ference of 1877, and prepared by a mixed committee of ministers and laymen. This may be taken to be the final step previous to the legal admission of the laity into the governing body of the Connexion, and it is only fair to the Wesleyan clergy to notice that it was carried by a majority of more than seven to one,-369 to 49. The submission to modern opinion is the more creditable, because the clergy had unbroken precedent on their side, and are undoubtedly acting against the order of hn Wesley, though the change may be in accordance with the views on which that great' organiser, had he been alive, might now have proceeded.
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