use of Christian Indians, who were formerly settled there, or the remains of that society, as may, in the judgment of the Geographer, be sufficient for them to cultivate.

"Saving and reserving always, to all officers and soldiers entitled to lands on the north-west side of the Ohio, by donation or bounty from the Commonwealth of Virginia, and to all persons claiming under them, all rights to which they are so entitled under the deed of cession executed by the Delegates for the State of Virginia, on the first day of March, 1784, and the Act of Congress accepting the same; and to the end that the said rights may be fully and effectually secured, according to the true intent and meaning of the said deed of cession and Act aforesaid, Be it ordained, That no part of the land included between the rivers called Little Miami and Scioto, on the north-west side of the river Ohio, be sold, or in any manner alienated, until there shall have been laid off and appropriated for the said officers and soldiers, and persons claiming under them, the lands they are entitled to agreeably to the said deed of cession, and Act of Congress accepting the same.

"Done by the United States in Congress assembled, the twentieth day of May, in the year of our Lord One thousand seven hundred and eighty-five, and of our Sovereignty and Independence the ninth.

CHARLES THOMSON,

Secretary.

RICHARD H. LEE,

President.

APPENDIX E.

SERMON PREACHED AT CAMPUS MARTIUS, MARIETTA, NORTH-WEST TERRITORY, AUGUST 24, 1788-CENTURY DISCOURSE, DELIVERED IN HAMILTON, MASS., OCTOBER 27, 1814.

Malachi, Chap. 1, Verse 11: "From the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering, for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts."

The divine attributes of wisdom and goodness are nowhere more gloriously displayed than in the Gospel dispensation. The singular revolutions and operations of Providence, which the Almighty has already performed, and will yet perform, for the salvation and happiness of man, and the final extension of true religion to every part of the earth, are subjects of delightful contemplation and useful improvement. "To make the soul of man great and good," says a sublime writer,*"it is necessary to give it large and extensive views of the immensity of the works of God, of his providence and grace, and of his inexhausted wisdom and goodness." The oracles of God inform us of the rise and progress of religion unto the time of their completion, and lend a clue to our meditations on the future extent and glory of the Redeemer's kingdom.

The prophetic writers carry us far beyond the apostolic age, or the period in which we now live, to a time when the true God shall be universally worshiped, and sincere and pure incense shall be offered to his name, in every part of the Earth. Malachi, who was the last of the prophetic writers before the advent of the Messiah, gives us a striking prediction of this event. Speaking in the prophetic style and in the name of

* Dr. Burnet, in his Theory.

the great Jehovah, he says: "From the rising of the sun even unto the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place incense shall be offered unto my name, and a pure offering, for my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord of hosts."

The venerable patriarch Jacob, in blessing his son Judah, gives an early intimation of what was afterward more fully predicted. He tells him the scepter shall not depart from his family, till the immortal Shiloh shall come, who was to erect an everlasting kingdom, and unto whom the gathering of the people was to be. But the prophet Isaiah seems to have had the fullest view of the Gospel state from the birth of the Messiah to the period of which we now speak. For this reason he has been styled the evangelical prophet. He delivered many interesting and sublime predictions concerning the extension of the Gospel, and the final conversion of the nations." The earth," says he, in language peculiarly emphatical," shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." "I will also give thee" (speaking of the Messiah), "for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the ends of the earth." Speaking, in another place, of the spreading of religious knowledge in the remote parts of the world, he expresses himself in the truly eastern style: "The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing; they shall see the glory of the Lord and the excellency of our God." To the universal spread of the Gospel must be referred those promises, made to our blessed Lord: "I will give thee the heathen for thine inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession;" all kings shall fall down before him; all people, nations, and languages shall serve him; and when the fullness of the Gentiles is come in, all Israel shall be saved. Many and triumphant are the predictions of this kind, for there is no subject upon which the prophetic writers seem to dwell with more pleasure. All which is confirmed with the utmost solemnity, by the voice of the Angel in the Revelations, declaring "that the kingdoms

of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ, and he shall reign forever and ever."

Although these prophecies may, in part, have had their completion, by the vast rapidity with which the Gospel spread itself into almost every corner of the old world soon after our Savior's ascension, yet it is impossible that they should have their full accomplishment until it shall have spread through this extensive Continent. We have many of the strongest arguments to induce this belief. For none of the prophetic passages put a shorter limit to the extent of the Gospel than the ends of the earth. The prophecy in the verse of our text is extended" from the rising of the sun unto the going down of the same." And our Savior, the greatest of the Prophets, tells us that "Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled;" for the Jews should be led captive, and dispersed among all nations, until the conversion of the Gentiles should be accomplished. Accordingly, the Jews, for many ages, have had no particular place of abode as a nation, but are dispersed over all the habitable world, hated and despised wherever they are permitted to dwell; and yet, by a singular providence, they are not mixed and blended with other nations so as to be lost among them, but are preserved a distinct people. There is no instance like this in any history. They seem intended for a standing memorial and example of the power of God, and the punishment he inflicts. To me it seems a most rational and convincing argument, indeed, one of the plainest arguments to prove the divine authority of the Scriptures and the fulfillment of the events predicted.

It has been made a question, if such be the intention and purposes of God, why has the accomplishment of them been so long delayed? Why is the Christian religion professed in so small a part of the world, while paganism and Mohammedism overspread at least three-quarters of the globe? Why has God permitted imposture so long to triumph over truth?

With regard to such inquiries, it must be confessed that the imperfect reception of Christianity in the world is one of the darkest mysteries of divine Providence. But, because we can

not comprehend the designs of Providence, shall we object against the providence itself? Or conclude that the wise Ruler of the Universe conducts without reason? How can a finite mind fully understand the polity of that Government which is directed by infinite wisdom, justice, and goodness? "Thy judgments are a great deep," says the Psalmist; not to be fathomed by the short line of human reason. Known unto God, and to him alone, are all his counsels from the foundations of the world. Some conjectures, however, we may venture to offer, without the imputation of presumption.

The Supreme Being seems to conduct his operations, except in extraordinary cases, by general laws; both in the natural and moral world, the advances to perfection are gradual and progressive. The Law and the Prophets, which were of old, were but a faint and mysterious revelation of the will of God to the full blaze of the Gospel, whereby his whole counsels shone forth at last to mankind. The Lord once spoke in thunders and lightnings from Mount Sinai, but now leaves the conversion of nations to the ordinary methods of his Providence and Grace. God did not give the Christian Revelation until Roman ambition had brought almost the whole world to a kind of similarity of language and manners, and had opened such an intercourse between distant nations, as made that period one of the most favorable for spreading a new religion. Countries were now accessible that had been before unknown; and universal peace added to universal subjection to one common Empire, gave the disciples of Christ, the first preachers of the Gospel, a great advantage in traveling from clime to clime. Add to this, that this great event was ushered in at a period when the minds of men were in a degree prepared to receive a religion founded on the highest reason and benevolence, and which was calculated to improve the understanding, penetrate the heart, regulate the passions, and engage the affections of rational creatures. A religion that was to be propagated, not by the aid of the sword, nor by the civil arm, not by the arts of superstitious intrigue, or the forces of blind enthusiasm, but by reason and argument, by a conviction of the truth in the hearts and consciences of men. The world for a long time before had been enveloped in dark