Earl Russell on Monday delivered an address to the Historical
Society, of which he has been elected President, on the progress of oivil and religious liberty since 1815. He believes that both have advanced materially, the landmarks being the abolition of .slavery,---now nearly complete, the enfranchisement of Italy, and
the toleration now accorded to Protestantism throughout Catholic Europe. He thought the next great step should be the abrogation of war, but had little confidence in treaties of peace or "com- plicated and artificial schemes of arbitration." His hope was in the introduction of a Christian temper into international affairs, a hope we should more fully share, if we did not observe that Courts of civil law—and a Court of International arbitration is a Court of civil law—are just as necessary to Christians as to anybody else. A man may be of true Christian temper, and a pighearted assertor of his rights, nevertheless, sure if he is refused legal remedy to right himself by the strong hand. We admit fully the difficulties in the way of international arbitration, but if it is only practicable, it will be as great an improvement on war as a trial is on the practice of private combat.
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