The first of the William Belden Noble lectures for this year will be given this evening at 8 o'clock in Sanders Theatre, by the Rt. Rev. Charles Henry Brent, D.D., Bishop of the Philippines. The general title of the six lectures which are included in this series is "Leadership," and the lecture this evening will be on "The Metaphysic of Leadership." The dates and titles of the remaining lectures, all of which are to be given in Sanders Theatre at 8 o'clock, will be: December 4, "The Power of the Single Motive"; December 6, "The Power of the Human Will"; December 9, "The Power of the Blameless Life"; December 11, "The Power of Fellowship with the Divine"; December 13, "The Representative Leader of Men."

Bishop Brent, who has been chosen to deliver this important series of lectures, was born in 1862, and was graduated from Trinity College of the University of Toronto. He was ordained a deacon in the Protestant Episcopal Church in 1886, and a priest in 1887. During 1887 he was assistant minister of St. Paul's Cathedral, Buffalo, and in the following year he came to Boston and entered the clergy-house of St. John the Evangelist, which was in charge of the Cowley Fathers. In 1891, on the dissolution of this order, he was taken into the mission church of St. Stephen's, Boston, where he remained for the next ten years. The distinguishing feature of his life in Boston was his enthusiastic work among the colored people, for whom he built St. Augustine's Chapel. In 1901 at the General Episcopal Convention he was elected first, bishop of the Philippine Islands, and was consecrated in January, 1902. His work in the Philippines has been marked by the same simple, devout earnestness that had been shown in his stay in Boston, and he has been instrumental in building up the church among the natives and foreigners of the islands to a high point of efficiency.

He is the author of several works on religious questions, the most important of which are "With God in the World," "The Consolations of the Cross," and "With God in the Nation."

The fund which provides for these lectures was presented to the University in 1898 by Mrs. William Belden Noble, in memory of her husband, an Episcopal clergyman of the class of 1885, and of Phillips Brooks, with whom Mr. Noble was in close sympathy.

The lectures will be open to the public