tion, but it has comprehended all its blessings. It does not consist in a well-digested plan of ecclesiastical discipline, but in those great truths which, thank God, you read and acknowledge, not only a belief in the redemption of the world by Christ Jesus, who, in human nature taken upon him, made an atonement for the sins of the world; not only a belief in God the Father, as the Creator and Preserver of all mankind, but also a firm belief that there is no other religion but that which may be reduced to God's dwelling in the heart of man. All other systems called religion are beside our question, we acknowledge not those facts of which the history of the external church is full, to have anything to do with true Christianity; the proposition we are maintaining is this, that, according as the religion of the Bible, the religion of the Holy Spirit, prevails or prevails not, so is the amount of happiness or misery of a people; it is as it respects the nations by which we are surrounded, a question of facts; we may speak of the nations perishing or prospering before our eyes according to the degree of their Christianity. Look at the civilized portion of the world, from the extremity of the peninsula of the west of Europe to the wilds of Siberia in the north, and you will see our proposition strikingly verified; the dungeons of Portugal crowded with the victims of despotic jealousy, and the mountains covered with the bleached bones of contenders for dominion; the fertile soil and glowing clime of Spain, bereft of half its population; social order subverted; confidence in all institutions shaken; and what is the amount of true religion? scarce a Bible to be found, from the Pyrenees to the rock of Gibraltar. The God of love and mercy dishonoured by a hideous superstition; the true God forgotten, and other gods served and worshipped with all the grossness of ancient heathenism, the happiness is proportioned to the amount of true religion. Ever since the tongue of the dogs was made red by the blood of the saints, superstition has laid its loathsome hand upon that peninsula; the religion of the New Testament is well nigh lost; and are they not utterly perishing by civil wars, and discords in the midst of their vineyards and olive-groves, and in sight of their antiquated institutions. Turn your eyes to the States of that region, so favoured by soil and climate, that it is proverbially called the garden of Europe; and what is Italy? a tomb for genius to be buried in; a grave for patriotism; a sepulchre for every man who dares to aspire to seek to learn the truth; a garden indeed, but full of weeds, where "they sow much, and bring in little;"

where they eat, but have not enough; where they look for much, and lo! it cometh to little; where rags and poverty, and halffamished forms are the rule, and not the exception: because they have forgotten the true God, and followed other gods, and served them; therefore, that region, arched by a brighter sky than ours, and where food leaps almost spontaneously from the lap of earth, utterly perishes-perishes in spite of promised reforms without reformation, and of the business of religion without the spirit of Christianity. The doctrine we are contending for this day, my brethren, is equally exemplified in the nations of the North, where a colossal power has risen up, to transfer our fellow creatures from soil to soil, like herds of cattle, and to annihilate the last dying spark of liberty. It holds equally true in other countries more familiar to us, where the rationalism of the German sceptic, or the infidelity of the French philosopher prevails. The happiness is a little increased for the sake of the " fifty righteous in the city;" but the national prosperity is in jeopardy every hour: here and there we see a better state of things, as it regards temporal prosperity, but what is remarkable, in every instance where this is the case, we find a greater infusion of the spirit of true religion. What a lesson may we learn from a minute examination of this question; wherever we turn our attention, we find that what men consider as the best civil condition of mankind, is only to be found where there is the greatest prevalence of Christ's religion. Whether we look to bygone ages, or at the present state of the world, the proposition holds good,-that national blessings are given or withheld in proportion to national religion. That religion being no vague indefinite system, but Protestantism in all its essential principles; the Faith as reformed three centuries ago, after ages of corruption. It is not a matter of opinion, but a matter of fact; if the present and former state of the nations of Europe do not bear out the argument, we give it up. If any man can point to us, at this moment, a country under the dominion of Mahomedan, or Greek, or Roman superstition, or serving any other god, and yet in the enjoyment of that which constitutes a nation's happiness, and free from the tokens of God's displeasure, we give up the point; and if this be the general rule of God's providence, what, it may be asked, have we been doing, thus to fall under the Divine displeasure; has true religion been on the decline with us, and has a corrupt system of Christianity been put too prominently forward? Have those judgments, which have shaken the very foundation of empires, and crippled the

national resources, been sent upon us in conformity with the rule which Moses markes out in our text? Has our religion become less spiritual and pure? Our love of Divine truth, has it waxed cold, in some of these things? My brethren, we must see the offence for which God has visited, and then we shall look upon the solemn fast we are now professing to keep as a means of reviving our zeal, of quickening our resolution, and strengthening our confidence in the issue of the national affliction: it is, my brethren, the plain truth that, as a nation, we have forgotten the Lord our God; we have allowed the activity of the age to get ahead of our fervour of spirit in serving the Lord. The increase and accumulations of wealth has only increased and made selfishness more intense. Covetousness, which is idolatry, and serving other gods, has urged the man who was before content to live moderately upon a limited income, to launch out into speculative business, and gradually absorbed in the vortex of secular occupation; he has abandoned all thought of God, and loved the present world. Because we have not been obedient unto the voice of the Lord our God; He hath indicated by the tokens of His wrath, the way by which the nation may perish. It was boasted, that by the expansion of trade, the freedom of commerce, the rapid communication with distant countrieswhich the ingenuity of the age has created, England might defy the elements, and be fed in time of scarcity from the granaries of other realms; but the Lord of the whole earth has told us, by a single breath of his displeasure, that the fulness of the earth is His, and now, with all the resources of this great empire, the poor cannot be prevented from perishing by thousands. The sin here committed by the national voice, is the nonacknowledgment of God's sovereignty. Supposing that man, by his intelligence and activity, could supercede the care of Divine Providence, then have we disobeyed God in not giving Him the glory. He claims His Sabbaths, we have not honoured them; He bids us instruct the young, we have left them to grow up in ignorance and in vice, until they are past reclaiming; God bids us send His truth abroad, and proclaim His righteousness. The nation, as a nation, refuses to send the Christian Pastor to evangelize the colony, or reform the convict. The voice of the Lord invites us to serve no other god, and to discountenance the worship of other gods, and sacrifices to devils. The heathen feast is still held in our empire, and the Priests of Baal permitted to cut themselves with stones: these, my brethren, are the sins of which we have to repent, if peradventure the Lord

will turn again and heal us. I forbear, my brethren, to enumerate the sins which stain our guilty land. I have no mind today to embarrass your thoughts with the statistics of crime. I am loath to portion out the share of responsibility upon them on which the Tower of Siloam has actually fallen. I know that we all have reason to charge ourselves with neglect, and to share in the guilt which has brought the judgment as well as to share in the public calamity. And now, my brethren, this day is solemnly set a part for confessing our sins, and rending our hearts before God. The people are gathered from one end of the island to the other; and would to God that every heart were bowed as the heart of one man, then would the Lord be gracious, and turn away His anger from us; then would He be entreated for the land; and we need not say, as the King of Nineveh, peradventure, who can tell if God will turn away from His fierce anger, that we perish not; for we know He will save us for the sake of Him who loved us and died for us. We need not doubt His mercy, for it is secured in the everlasting covenant ordered in all things and sure-and what the Ninevites knew not of-is our greatest and most cherished blessing, a throne of grace to find help in time of need. Be it ours, brethren, from this day forward; and, as evidencing the fruits of a genuine repentance for all that is past, be it ours to be more diligent in promoting the interests of Christ's kingdom, to uphold the word of truth in our churches, in our schools, in our families, and in our own hearts, so that if the arm of vengeance be lifted up also upon us, it may be stayed by the great intercession, praying Him, Father not to destroy the righteous with the wicked, but to spare the whole people for the sake of the little flock, to whom it is His good pleasure to give the kingdom. Now to God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost, to whom be ascribed all might, majesty, and dominion, now and for ever more. Amen.

"Come, and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up. After two days will he revive us; in the third day he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight.”— Hos. vi. 1, 2.

How many persons are there so deluded as to flatter themselves that they are in the enjoyment of sound health while, in reality, experiencing the effects of an insidious and dangerous disease. Believing themselves to be whole, they cannot be persuaded that they need a physician; and, therefore, will not seek a cure for the malady which is undermining their health, and preying upon the life-blood of their constitution. But when a man is brought, however reluctantly, to the conviction that he is afflicted with an inveterate disorder, and is moreover able also to trace the malady to its source, he is in a condition to take the steps necessary for obtaining relief. Such was the state of the Israelites, as set before us, in language which we may regard as a national expression of the feelings of a whole people under circumstances of an afflicting character-language which be tokens an enlightened mind to perceive the evils resulting from forgetfulness of God-and a repentant heart to turn from the paths of the destroyer.

But this happy state of mind and heart had not been produced without the repeated strokes of God's afflicting rod. The testimony of the Prophet Hosea, as to the ignorance of the ways of God, and the consequent ungodliness which prevailed throughout the land, bringing with it sure destruction, is clear and explicit: "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge; because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee."