religion; and of the duties, responsibilities, rights, and privileges of citizens. These two branches of this deadly upas always unite in the same trunk, and are always, so far as they exert an influence, destructive of the best interests of society. But we not only have an abundance of this evil among us that is of native growth, but vast masses of it are constantly drifting upon our shores from the Old World; and, the whole combining, lies like an incubus upon the very vitals of the body politic. Our institutions are not to be preserved in safety and prosperity by ignorance. They are, indeed, eminently perilled by the prevalence of this curse of the human soul; and especially so when it is united, as is very common, with a superstitious veneration for corrupt forms of religion, and an implicit obedience to a designing priesthood. And who does not see that there is enough of this deadly leaven in our country to work our ruin, unless by some efficient remedy it shall speedily be neutralized?

2. Is not infidelity sadly prevalent in our country? This evil takes various hues, according to its various associations. We sometimes see it assume the garb of philosophy; at other times, that of politics; and still, at others, that of the most degrading vices. Philosophical infidelity is reason run mad; political infidelity is liberty without restraint; and vulgar infidelity is a full license of the grosser passions. In every form, it is the same enemy to the improvement and happiness of man. A nation of infidels could not long exist. It would very soon burst like a bubble, and be numbered among the things that were. And this obstinate demon is lurking about in all directions; and though he may cover himself with the garb of religion, he is no less a devil at heart, nor any less dangerous to the public weal.

3. Does not pride exist to an alarming extent among us? We need not attempt to trace out and identify this evil in all its various forms. It will be sufficient to notice it as it influences individuals, as it

affects the national character, and as it shows itself in our religion. We may name individual pride, decency, and self-respect; national pride, a patriotic concern for the nation's honour; and religious pride, a pious regard to the decencies of divine institutions: but it is still the same accursed thing, which the Lord abhors,—the wicked rebellion that expelled Lucifer from heaven. And where are the footsteps of this rebellious demon not seen? I need not point you to his infallible tokens; they are everywhere displayed before the gaze of earth and heaven.

4. Is not selfishness a ruling principle among us? By selfishness I do not mean a due regard to our own best interests: this is so far from being wrong, that it is enforced by the obligations of religion. But I refer to private ends arrayed against the general good. And how has this principle shown itself, not only in the various departments of business, and in political manœuvres, but even in our benevolent and most Christian enterprises!

I have noticed but a small portion of this species of evil. We cannot go extensively into a detail of particulars, without becoming lost in the maze. Who can look away from dear self, and seek the good of the whole lose his own interest in the general welfare? Such individuals, thank God, there are; but, certainly, they are quite too rare for the honour and prosperity of our beloved country.

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5. Is not avarice a prevailing vice in this land? This is a species under the genus selfishness; but it figures so largely, as to require separate notice. Wherever you look, you see every one pursuing gain from his quarter." In all departments of business, little is to be seen but one general scramble for wealth. If men labour, it is to make money; if they study, it is to find out a short road to riches; if they bestow a charity, it is to enhance the value of their real estate, or to give them increased power over their fellow-men, that they may ultimately make it turn to their own account. What an excitement!

what a stir! what a rage does this miserable demon constantly keep up! Is it any wonder that intelligent travellers suppose mammon to be the god of the Americans? M. De Tocqueville, an intelligent Frenchman, says, "A native of the United States clings to this world's goods as if he were certain never to die; and he is so hasty at grasping at all within his reach, that one would suppose he was constantly afraid of not living long enough to enjoy them." All we can say to this is,

*As a specimen, we give the following extract from Mr. Buckingham's lately-published work, "The Slave-States of America." We do not quote it as though only an American could act thus; but to show the evil of the principle when once it is admitted. "They that will be rich, fall into temptation and a snare."

"The contractor declined to carry us farther than twenty miles, because, as he said, we were setting out in the middle of the day, and his horses could never reach Newburn by sunset, and it would knock them up to travel after. We appealed to his contract, and argued, that whether horses set out at six and halted at six, or began their journey at ten and ended at ten, it was but twelve hours in either case, and twelve hours was abundantly sufficient to go twenty-eight miles. But we were in his power; there was no other person who had a coach but himself, and the public stage had gone by. He said, therefore, he could only do this,-take us twenty miles with this team of four horses, then engage a new team to take us the other eight miles; and so charge us another half-day, or six dollars, for the extra team. We had no alternative; though when we stated this to be an extortion, wholly unwarranted, and practised on us because we had no remedy, he frankly replied, 'I go for making money, and nothing else; and every time I find a good opportunity of doing so, I sha'n't let it slip.' At which all the bystanders laughed approbation, and some few said, 'That's right; and so would I:' but no one uttered a word of disapprobation.

"The truth is, this passion for the acquisition of money is much stronger and more universal in this country, than in any other under the sun, at least that I have visited; and, in proportion to the strength of the passion, so is the weakness of conscientiousness, or the strength of justice, among all ranks. If money can be made honestly, it is well; but if it cannot be made without breaking down some of the barriers which conscience opposes to its acquisition in the minds of honourable men, these must be demolished, and the money acquired; till, at length, perpetual indulgence of the passion, at all hazards, causes it to increase,-like the propensity of gambling, of dram-drinking, or any other vice,-till it becomes ungovernable, and sweeps all before it.

"The crowning piece of duplicity in this transaction was reserved for disclosure at the end of our journey. We had agreed to pay twenty-four

that it is but too true a picture of what is every day passing before our eyes.

6. How does wickedness abound in the land! Under this head I would embrace impiety, injustice, and licentiousness.

The most heaven-daring instances of impiety are so common, as scarcely to excite the least surprise. Witness the profanation of the Sabbath. In our city, we are compel led to see the most dreadful desecration of this holy day. Shops are open; business goes on; strollers and pleasure-takers fill the walks, the stages, and the rail-cars; and newspapers, (Sunday newspapers!) to the scandal of our city be it said, are publicly cried and sold every where. Even when in church, your ears are often saluted with the clamour of boys employed by the publishers and proprietors of newspapers to circulate them on the Lord's day. Would that our gene ral Government were clear of this heaven-daring offence ! Has our national Congress never protracted its sessions into the time which God has reserved to himself? Are not the post-offices open, and the mails transmitted, on the Sabbath? What can justify these instances in a land where the institution of the Sabbath is recognised, and its obligations

dollars to be driven twenty miles; and an extra six dollars was demanded, because, at the end of these twenty miles, it would be necessary, according to the statement of the stage contractor, to get a new team, from the impossibility of the first team going further. It was for this alone that the extra six dollars were demanded and paid. Yet, when we reached the end of our twenty miles, we found there was no new team there; that the stage contractor himself knew this; and that he had secretly, and unknown to us, told the driver, when he arrived at the end of the twenty miles, to give his team a feed of corn and an hour's rest, and drive them the remaining eight miles of the way, as it must be no difference to the passengers whether they were taken on by the old team or a new one. Wherever this was known along the road, or told by us afterward, it was regarded only as a clever stroke of business; and Mr. Robertson, the perpetrator of this fraud and extortion, (for so every just mind would consider it,) was called a smart man, who knew what he was about, and was very well fitted for his business. Such is the low state of morality, and the low standard of honour and fair-dealing, when money is to be made." (Vol. ii., p. 296.)--EDIT.

enforced by law? Is it because public bodies are supposed to be released from the obligations of religion? Alas! for such instances of practical infidelity in our representatives in Congress assembled, and under their official sanction !

Look at the monstrous profanity which is everywhere practised. Can you pass a group of boys in the streets, without hearing the name of God blasphemed? Nor is this vice confined to boys, nor to those who are confessedly of the baser sort: it finds its way into the higher circles.

Injustice is another species of wickedness which we have to lament. This shows itself in the various forms of over-reaching, swindling, theft, robbery, oppression, and murder and, in one or other of these ways, this species of wrong-wrong done by man to his fellow-man-is constantly before us. We need not go to the records of our courts for specimens of this kind; they are but too common in the ordinary and every-day transactions of life. There are also other prominent instances of injustice which should not be forgotten. We have been guilty of most cruelly oppressing the African race while we have driven out the natives, the original owners of the soil, from their homes, and from the graves of their fathers.

But men who will offend God, and wrong their fellow-men, will also injure themselves. Licentiousness is a sin against our own body and soul. And who doubts but that, in its various forms, it is alarmingly prevalent ?

Great and successful efforts have been made in this country against intemperance; but still it is sweeping a tide of woe and ruin over every part of the land.

7. And, finally, what shall we say of our political animosities and dissensions? Though we are all brethren, we have been sadly at war with each other. What assaults upon character, what vile abuse, what falsehood, have characterized our political press! We are left to doubt, whether our politicians have not thought themselves released from the common obligations of truth

and justice. Though some degree of self-respect and decency of demeanour is necessary in the discussion of other subjects; yet, in political discussions, the way of success, it would seem, is, to trample these principles under foot, and give the most unbridled latitude to the malignant passions. And are these the appropriate means for the defence and permanent preservation of our institutions? Can they only live by the total shipwreck of every principle of moral justice and integrity? If this be indeed the expense at which our free institutions are to be sustained, I, for one, must abandon them, and say, "Let justice be done, though the heavens fall!" Just now, thank God, our political fever has somewhat cooled down. The national mind is calm and thoughtful. We seem to have returned to our sober senses, and to be looking with some solicitude after the national character, and the safety and prosperity of our institutions.

But the ground of fear still is, lest the tide has only ebbed out for a season, to return with the greater violence. It is seriously to be apprehended, that some new occasion of excitement may bring back the spasmodic agitations of the past with redoubled fury. "The unclean spirit" of political frenzy "has gone out of" the people, "and is walking through dry places; but not long hence he will say, "I will return to my house whence I came out. And taking with him seven other spirits more wicked than himself, he will enter in and abide there, and our last state will be worse than the first." This I suggest as a possible case: would that I could say, it is not a probable one! I will, indeed, hope for the best. And let all pray, that our present quiet and peaceful state may not prove to be a dead calm, indicating that peculiar state of the atmosphere which precedes a tempest.

We have now noticed "seven abominations," (as many as there were devils in Mary Magdalene,) which more or less involve the national character. Each of these has a numerous progeny, which we

cannot particularly notice in this discourse. The whole together may be "called legion, for they are many;" and they are most obstinate and inveterate in their character. They are strongly rooted, and will never yield to mild measures. He who would eradicate any one of them, must gird himself for a strong effort; and, certainly, if we would engage them all, we need most solemn preparations.

II. We come to inquire into the means by which these evils may be successfully encountered.

But, before we enter upon the discussion of the true remedy, let us glance at sundry unauthorized means, which are often resorted to, for the cure of national evils.

1. Political changes are often relied upon. Were we to believe our pseudo-patriots, we might expect that some small change in the administration of the government would sweep all the disorders of the land, moral, political, and physical, into eternal annihilation. If we only mind them, they would fain have us expect, for ourselves and our children, health, peace, wealth, and happiness for ever. But, though such changes might be really important, they by no means reach the foundations and sources of the mischief. The evils are of a moral character, and will yield only to moral remedies.

2. Another measure proposed for the reformation of morals is, satire or ridicule. There are absurdities in manners and taste, for which satire is a very effective and an authorized remedy. But we must not look to it as a cure for the evils of the heart; especially to such forms of it as are most frequently turned against virtue itself. For instance: What can we look for from romance and the stage, the two principal forms of this pretended corrective of the manners and morals of the age? Who expects the regeneration of our country through these means? Who does not know that this is casting oil into the fire? It is as obvious as the sun at noon-day, that these very pretended remedies have contributed

largely to the lamentable decline of the national morality, especially within the last twenty years.

3. The last species of unauthorized remedies for the errors and vices of men which I shall mention, is, ill-natured censure. Men are not to be scolded out of their sins and errors, but may very easily by this means be confirmed in them. I must not be understood to interpose a bar to that species of just rebuke necessary for the conviction and humiliation of the subject. This is so far from being contrary to true Christianity, that it constitutes one of its leading duties. It is necessary to expose error and vice, in all their native deformity; to make no compromise with them; to give them no quarter; to stamp them with infamy; and to load them with all the curses of the last day. But in all this we must treat our erring brethren with compassion, with kindness. We must show them that we exercise for them the tenderest sympathies, and long after their salvation"in the bowels of Jesus Christ."

How much of empiricism is there in religion and politics! For reigning evils, there are many nostrums prescribed. The press teems with infallible cures for all the disorders of the times. But how many patients die under the treatment of empirics, perhaps will only be known in the great day of final reckoning. They promise us long life and good days; but let us beware ; there may "death in the pot." All these experiments are as unnecessary as they are dangerous; for a remedy, a sovereign remedy, is at hand. This we find in the text and its connexions, and shall now proceed to its consideration.

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The only remedy for the disorders of the human heart is, the abounding grace of God through Jesus Christ. The means, then, by which this grace is obtained, and made to bear directly upon the disease, is the matter of inquiry. For it seems that the remedy, though ample, is not universally and unconditionally applied.

1. The leading condition suggest