114 MEN GATHER FOR CONFERENCE AT BROOKS HOUSE

The fifteenth annual conference of Eastern college men on the Christian Ministry began at 6.30 o'clock last night with a dinner in the hall adjoining the First Unitarian Church. One hundred and fourteen men were present, including members of the faculties from the three theological schools of the University. A last minute change in the list of speakers was made necessary by the sudden illness of Reverend Samuel McChord Crothers '99, Minister of the First Church.

Professor Evans of the Andover Theological Seminary, after announcing this change, introduced Dr. Elmer A. Leslie, Minister of the Epworth Methodist Episcopal Church, who then spoke in place of Dr. Crothers. Dr. Leslie is the secretary of the Committee of Twenty-one of the Seven Churches in Old Cambridge, under whose auspices the dinner was given.

After expressing the satisfaction he felt at the thought of the response the conference had brought from men in the various seminaries who came to the University yesterday. Dr. Leslie emphasized in particular the needs of the modern ministry and its opportunities; the need for men to mould the thought and the life of other men toward Christian ideals at this period of this world's history; and the opportunities for a life of service, which no other profession offers.

C. D. Keppner Speaks

The next speaker introduced was C. D. Keppner 2Dv., representing the student body of the three university theological schools. Mr. Keppner welcomed the men as men coming with open minds desirous of finding the niche of highest usefulness in life, and of filling it.

Mr. R. S. Lynd, representing the Union Theological Seminary, followed Mr. Keppner. Six years in the world of business, he said, had convinced him of the great need of ministers in the world. These men the speaker called "shock troops who were to fight the greatest battle in the world,--the battle for souls."

Professor MacKenzie of Hartford Seminary was the last speaker. The years of war, he said, which called men from their studies into a more active life, impressed, and at times horrified them. Contact with the world had inspired some men with the desire to get into the reality of life and not to sleep through it spiritually and mentally. The impression the speaker hoped would come to each man present was the unchangeable fact that there is one responsible life to be lived.

Conference Goes to P. B. H.

At 3.15--the Conference moved to Phillips Brooks House where the Reverend E. C. Moore Presided.

President Lowell formally opened the meeting with an address of welcome. He began by humorously warning his audience that it was to hear two lay sermons from men whose manners were not clerical.

He reminded his hearers that the University was founded for the express purpose of preparing men for the ministry at a time when the ministers were the leaders and powerful forces of the country. Since that time the leadership had passed to other occupations, but the opportunities of the ministry are now greater than most men think. He said that it was commonly believed, that there was more drudgery in the ministry, but he had been familiar with two professions, law and education, and had yet to learn of any profession where there was not drudgery.

He said that the business of the clergy was to deal with sin, righteousness, and judgment--questions of right and wrong instead of with controversial questions on which honest men might differ. The mission of the ministry should be to point the way to things of eternal and imperishable value.

Mr. John F. Moors '83 then spoke on "The Maintenance of Ideals in the Life of the Nation." When he was in college he very seriously considered becoming a minister, but he gave up this idea and became a stock-broker.

"The world is divided into two classes, people who do things and don't think, and people who think and don't do things. The man who counts is the man who thinks and thinks right." Since the war, America and the world have failed for lack of courage and thinking. In these times ministers must think and show others how to think. It is their duty to bring to the people a conception of the worship of God