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 ASSEMBLING AND WELCOME. 79 the searcher after truth, and of Jeremy Taylor and John Milton and Roger Williams and Lessing, the great apostles of toleration. I Ijelieve that the spirit of Abraham Lincoln, who sought for a church founded on love for God and man, is not far from us, and the spirit of Tennyson and Whittier and Phillips Brooks, who all looked forward to this Parliament as the reali- zation of a noble idea. When, a few days ago, I met for the first time the delegates who have come to us from Japan, and shortly after the delegates who have come to us from India, I felt that the arms of human brotherhood had reached almost around the globe. But there is something stronger than human love and fellowship, and what gives us the most hope and happiness to-day is our confidence that the whole round world is every way Bound by gold chains about the feet of God. The manifestation of sympathy and approval which fol- lowed the address of the Chairman of the General Committee had not subsided when it was changed into a hearty greeting to the Most Reverend the Archbishop of Chicago, who was introduced to speak in the name of the Catholic communion. SPEECH OF ARCHBISHOP FEEHAN. On this most interesting occasion, ladies and gentlemen, a privilege has been granted to me — that of giving greeting in the name of the Catholic Church to the members of this Parliament of Religions. Surely we all regard it as a time and a day of the highest interest, for we have here the commencement of an assembly unique in the history of the world. One of the representatives from the ancient East has mentioned that his king in early days held a meeting something like this, but certainly the modern and historical world has had no such thing. Men have come from distant lands, from many shores. They represent many types of race. They represent many forms of faith ; some from the distant East represent- ing its remote antiquity, some from the islands and continents of the West. In all there is a great diversity of opinion, but in all there is a great, high motive. Of all the things our city has seen and heard during these passing months the highest and the greatest is now to be presented to it. For earnest men, learned and eloquent men of different faiths have come to speak and to tell us of those things that are of the highest and deepest interest to us all. We are interested in material things ; we are interested in beauti- ful things. We admire the wonders of that new city that has sprung up on the southern end of our great city of Chicago ; but when learned men, men representing the thought of the world on Religion, come to tell us of God and of his truth, and of life and of death, and of immortality and of justice,