sagacity in counsil, have assigned the highest rank I political importance, and you point us to nations, whose 10 religious opinions are most closely allied to those we cherish. Besides, when was there a period, since the days of the Apostles, in which so many converts have been made to these principles as have been made, both from christian and pagan nations, within the last five 15 and twenty years. Never did the people of the saints of the Most High look so much like going forth in serious earnest, to take possession of the kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven as at this very day. 20 But suppose the cause did seem declining, we should see no reason to relax our exertions, for Jesus Christ has said, preach the gospel to every creature, and appearances, whether prosperous or adverse, alter not the obligation to obey a positive command of Almighty God. 25 Again, suppose all that is affirmed were true. If it must be, let it be. Let the dark cloud of infidelity overspread Europe, cross the ocean, and cover our beloved land--let nation after nation swerve from the faith--let iniquity abound, and the love of many wax cold, even 30 until there is on the face of this earth, but one pure church of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ-all we ask is, that we may be members of that one church. God grant that we may throw ourselves into this Thermopylæ of the moral universe. 35 But even then, we should have no fear that the church of God would be exterminated. We would call to remembrance the years of the right hand of the Most High. We would recollect there was once a time, when the whole church of Christ, not only could be, 40 but actually was gathered with one accord in one place. It was then that that place was shaken, as with a rushing mighty wind, and they were all filled with the Holy Ghost. That same day, three thousand were added to the Lord. Soon, we hear, they have filled Jerusalem 45 with their doctrine. The church has commenced her march--Samaria has with one accord believed the gospel--Antioch has become obedient to the faith--the name of Christ has been proclaimed throughout Asia Minor--the temples of the gods, as though smitten by 50 an invisible hand, are deserted-the citizens of Ephesus cry out in despair, Great is Diana of the Ephesians-licentious Corinth is purified by the preaching of Christ crucified. Persecution puts forth her arm to arrest the spreading superstition, but the progress of the faith can 55 not be stayed. The church of God advances unhurt amidst rocks and dungeons, persecutions and death she has entered Italy, and appears before the walls of the Eternal City-idolatry falls prostrate at her approach -her ensign floats in triumph over the capitol-she has 60 placed upon her brow the diadem of the Cæsars. Wayland. 90. The events of Providence promotive of the end Little did Julius Cæsar imagine, when the white cliffs of Britain, glittering in the sun, excited his ambition and drew him across the Channel, for what purpose he disembarked his legions on our coast; but we know that it 5 was to open a door through which the Gospel might enter our beloved country. Little did the spirit of commercial enterprise imagine, when urged only by its thirst for gold, it fixed its establishments at the mouth of the Hoogley or on the banks of the Ganges, that it 10 was sent thither as the forerunner of Christian Missionaries. Little does the genius of war imagine, when impelling its mad votaries to new contests, that Christianity is following at a distance, in the rear of victorious armies, to plant her stations on the fields of their en 15 campment, to bear away the best of the spoils, and assume the dominion which other potentates have lost. Little did Columbus imagine, when with a heart big with mighty projects, he walked in silence on the shores of Andalusia, and watched the star of evening down the 20 western sky, who it was that dictated the purpose to explore the region which she went nightly to visit on the other side of the Atlantic. We, however, live at a time when all these events are clearly seen to connect themselves with the grand purpose of Jehovah, "to bring 25 all men to Christ." And the people of future generations will as clearly discern the same relation in the circumstances of our day. I am about to urge a crusade to the heathen world; far different, however, from that dreadful superstition, 30 which in the midnight of the dark ages, disturbed the deep slumbers of the globe, and bursting forth like a volcano, precipitated all Europe in a state of fusion, upon the lovely valleys of Judea. Our object is not to recover the holy sepulchre from the possession of here 35 tics, but to make known the death of Him that descended to it, to wrest the keys of empire from the king of terrors:-the weapons of our warfare, are not carnal, as the sword, the spear, and the battle axe; but spiritual as the doctrines of the Gospel exhibited in the ser 40 mons of our Missionaries :-the line of our march will not be marked by ensanguined fields, and the reign of desolation, but by the comforts of civilization and the blessings of Christianity. We shall not be followed in our career by the groans of dying warriors, and the 45 shrieks of bereaved widows, but by the songs of redeem. ed sinners, and the shouts of enraptured angels; our laurels will be stained with no blood but that of the Lamb of God, and drip with no tears, but those of penitence and joy:-while our trophies will consist, not of 50 bits of the true cross, or shreds of the Virgin's robe, but in the rejected idols of Pomare, with the regenerated souls of those who once adored them. James. 91. The hatefulness of war. Apart altogether from the evil of war, let us just take a direct look of it, and see whether we can find its character engraven on the aspect it bears to the eye of an attentive observer. The stoutest heart of this assembly 5 would recoil, were he who owns it to behold the destruction of a single individual by some deed of violence. Were the man who at this moment stands before you in the full play and energy of health, to be in another moment laid by some deadly aim a lifeless corpse at your 10 feet, there is not one of you who would not prove how strong are the relentings of nature at a spectacle so hideous as death. There are some of you who would be haunted for whole days by the image of horror you had witnessed, who would feel the weight of a most oppres 15 sive sensation upon your heart, which nothing but time could wear away, who would be so pursued by it as to be unfit for business or for enjoyment, -who would think of it through the day, and it would spread a gloomy disquietude over your waking moments,-who would 20 dream of it at night, and it would turn that bed which you courted as a retreat from the torments of an evermeddling memory, into a scene of restlessness. But generally the death of violence is not instantaneous, and there is often a sad and dreary interval between 25 its final consummation, and the infliction of the blow which causes it. The winged messenger of destruction has not found its direct avenue to that spot, where the principle of life is situated; and the soul, finding obstacles to its immediate egress, has to struggle for hours 30 ere it can make its dreary way through the winding avenues of that tenement, which has been torn open by a brother's hand. O! if there be something appalling in the suddenness of death, think not that, when gradual in its advances, you will alleviate the horrors of this 35 sickening contemplation by viewing it in a milder form. O! tell me, if there be any relentings of pity in your bosom, how could you endure it, to behold the agonies of the dying man,--as goaded by pain he grasps the cold ground in convulsive energy, or faint with the loss of 40 blood, his pulse ebbs low, and the gathering paleness spreads itself over his countenance, or wrapping himself round in despair, he can only mark, by a few feeble quiverings, that life still lurks and lingers in his lacerated body,--or lifting up a faded eye, he casts on you a 45 look of imploring helplessness, for that succour which no sympathy can yield him ? It may be painful to dwell on such a representation, --but this is the way in which the cause of humanity is served. The eye of the sentimentalist turns away from 50 its sufferings, and he passes by on the other side, lest he hear that pleading voice, which is armed with a tone of remonstrance so vigorous as to disturb him. He cannot bear thus to pause, in imagination, on the distressing picture of one individual; but multiply it ten thousand 55 times,-say, how much of all this distress has been heaped together on a single field,--give us the arithmetic of this accumulated wretchedness, and lay it before us with all the accuracy of an official computation, and, strange to tell, not one sigh is lifted up among the crowd 60 of eager listeners, as they stand on tiptoe, and catch every syllable of utterance which is read to them out of the registers of death. O! say, what mystic spell is that which so blinds us to the suffering of our brethren, --which deafens to our ear the voice of bleeding hu 65 manity, when it is aggravated by the shriek of dying thousands,--which makes the very magnitude of the slaughter, throw a softening disguise over its cruelties, and its horrors, which causes us to eye with indifference the field that is crowded with the most revolting 70 abominations, and arrests that sigh, which each individual would singly have drawn from us, by the report of the many who have fallen, and breathed their last in agony, along with him? Chalmers. 92. The Preservation of the Church. The long existence of the Christian church would be pronounced, upon common principles of reasoning, impossible. She finds in every man a natural and inveterate enemy. To encounter and overcome the unani5 mous hostility of the world, she boasts no political stratagem, no disciplined legions, no outward coercion of any kind. Yet her expectation is that she live forever. To mock this hope, and to blot out her memorial from under heaven, the most furious efforts of fanaticism, the 10 most ingenious arts of statesmen, the concentrated strength of empires, have been frequently and perseveringly applied. The blood of her sons and her daughters has streamed like water; the smoke of the scaffold |