per. May he infuse into your hearts a deep sense of your Christian duties, and give you grace to fulfil them. May "he convert your souls, and bring you forth in the paths of righteousness. May he be with you always. May

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his rod and staff so guide and direct you, that when your feet tread the valley of the shadow of death, you may fear no evil.

SERMON XX.

ISAIAH XXVI, PART OF 9TH VERSE.

When thy judgments are in the earth, the inhabitants of the world will learn righteousness.

AFTER an interval of nearly twenty years, we are again met together,* to confess our manifold provocations and offences as a people; to deprecate the just resentment of heaven, and to implore God to avert from us those calamities and evils, which our sins and iniquities have so righteously deserved. In the times to which I have just now alluded, when these appointed humiliations were of annual recurrence, the Scourge with which we were menaced was that of war. To some of my hearers, perhaps, the deeds of those days must be sought for, either in the narratives of others, or in the annals of their country; but there are many, I doubt not, present, who can

* This sermon was preached March 21st, 1832; being the day appointed for a general fast.

remember well the time, when these yearly periods of penitence were religiously observed. It is a grateful task to the Christian patriot to advert to those seasons of gloom and despondency, (which are now, alas! become like a forgotten tale,) when the judgments of heaven seemed about to fall upon our cities and our plains, and England, our country and our home, to be blotted out from the free nations of the earth. It was a dark prospect, my brethren, when the countless legions of our bitterest foes breathed their menaces of invasion upon our shores; when the gleam of the spears, destined to carry carnage and havock into our dwellings, was viewed from the towers of our native land. and of blood were wafted on

Tales of horror every gale. We of violation: we

heard of murder, of rapine, read that infancy had been no safeguard, age no protection that the palace and the cottage had been alike polluted, and the altar of domestic happiness turned into a waste of misery and shame. Say, then, ye who were husbands and looked fathers in those hours of peril, when round upon the families ye had reared, upon the children of your hopes and cares; when ye thought upon the home which had sheltered your infancy and fostered your later years; did not a shade of sadness settle upon your souls, when ye turned to contemplate the changes that were

ye

to come? When ye trembled lest the smiles which beamed around you, might be changed into tears of misery or shrieks of anguish, and the hearth of your fathers become an Aceldama in a wilderness of desolation?

But in this hour of your distress, God heard your prayer, and saved you from the judgments which had well nigh overwhelmed you. He went forth with your armies to conquest, with your fleets to victory; he dashed invasion from your shores, and guided the vessel of your country's fortunes safe through dangers and difficulties, into a haven of peace and rest. And then, L think, ye were grateful for these mercies. Never, never, will the remembrance of that solemn day, when we all met to thank the great God of battles and of armies for his protection and providence, be effaced from my heart. As a Christian, and as a Briton, I shall cherish it till memory fails, and the pulse of life has ceased to beat. It was, in truth, a glowing and a stirring sight, to behold a whole nation, prostrate before the throne of the King of kings, pouring forth their heart in praise and thanksgivings, because the destroying angel had been stayed in his career. There was cheerfulness on every brow, gladness in every eye, exultation on every tongue. But, alas! this happy temper did not long remain, these emotions of gratitude were soon

effaced. Years past on, and the mercies we had received, the preservation we had found, were forgotten or disregarded. But God is still above, to protect if we humbly ask his protection, to punish if we rebel against his providence. We have rebelled, my brethren, grievously and wickedly rebelled, and he hath sent his judgments upon us, that we may acknowledge our wanderings, and humble our souls before him.

At the present hour, indeed, the horizon of our country is shrouded in mist and gloom, and the sun of her fortunes is journeying amid clouds and tempests. It is not for us to tell, whether he will be permitted, as in other days, to dispel the darkness which surrounds his path; or whether the hour of his setting is nigh at hand. If this latter alternative be that which Providence has appointed, who can say that the infliction is greater than our iniquities have deserved? It is, my brethren, a fearful thing, to look around upon the cities of a Christian land, and see how far their inhabitants are removed from the spirit of him whose name they bear: to see rapine and desolation stalking through their streets; and infidelity and impiety cheering them on to their infernal orgies. God has blessed us, my brethren, with plenty; he has "dropped fatness upon the dwellings of the wilderness, and made the little hills rejoice on every side." And were