PRESENTATION TO DR SIDEY.

Evening Star, Issue 12964, 8 November 1906, Page 5

PRESENTATION TO DR SIDEY.

At the General Assembly of the Ries/.vteriin Church to-day a presentation was made to the Rev. Ur Sidcy, who has .-orved fur about, twenty-two yeats as clerk of Assembly and treasurer. .Mr' James M'Kerrow called on by the Moderator in the absence of Ur Irwin) s.iid that for the last twenty years he had hud a great deal to do with Ur thdey. Amongst other things, they co-operated in the hives tn out of Church funds, and lie was happy to -ay that they were very safely invested. Ue remembered well me sag.itauiLS views of fly Sidey in ih.ese matters. Ur Sidev was a splendid business man, and ho 'the" speaker) could not find words to express the worth of Ur tsidey s cervices to 7 he Church- Members of Assembly nud no idea of what llie work of tiro Ucautirer was. Ur Sidev had always commanded the speaker s re. peer and love, lie was a noble 2;: an. The Rev. Mr Asher, of Napier, added his tr.bute. lie knew that the interests of t’nc* Church, from North to South, had been Very near and dear to Ur Sidcy s heart. Ur Sidev’s own people in Napier, ms own province, wcie deeply gratified at. the action of tiie Aissemb.y towards him. Ur Side-y laid had great inlluence in training students, and in this r.-speci also he had done a great wotk. His (the speakers) feelings towards Ur Side}' Were akin to those of Mr M'Ketrow. He honored Ur iSidey os the Grand Old Man of the Church. The Moderator (the Rev. Mr Munro) said that he had known Ur Sidey for thirty vears, and feit honored hi being called upon to make iiim this presentation. All that Ur Sidev had done tiad always been a credit to the Church. Tney laid decided that the presentation should take the form of the recipient’s portrait in oils and a purse of sovereigns. Ur Sidey expressed his thanks for the presentation, and asked the Moderator to iiand the portrait to the convener of the Theological Commit tea, to he placed among the records ol the men that had left them. In his wildest dreams, he said, he had never thought that there was any reason why he should stand forward as one of the memorial men of the Cuureh. He gave in terse and .character-stic terms a sketch of bis official life in the Church. He told of bow ha had settled initial murmurs about the unwisdom of-appoint.ng a minister to the treasurership, and bore testimony to the able assistance given him in that sphere bv the Rev. Mr Comrte. With grave humor be made reference to his connection xv.th the training of students. It was his way, he explained, to sound the intellectual capac.ty oi a man, and then set h.m a text that was sure to touch his weak place. And when that student had written a seriuuii on the appointed text, the doctor

would criticise it, pointing out the writer’s ! strong points and shortcomings, and direct- ' ing him in the way ho should go. His ] system, he admitted, might not always have ; been pleasant to the students, but he had never made a bad friend among them. Now ho had finished his work, and he was going out thankful that he trad been enabled to work so long. He hoped that his two sue- . ces.-ors would find the same sati faction and pleasure that lie had found in the work dur- i ing the past twenty-two years, and that the i blessing of God would rest on the Church. I He thanked the Assembly for the kind con- I sidcratiou shown him as clerk and treasurer. 1