prayer for their national fafety and profperity.

This request, like the former, comprehends a great variety of particulars.

It will be readily admitted, that a form of government, by which the natural rights of men are most effectually fecured, and in which the impartial adminiftration of establifhed laws guards the life, the liberty, and the property of the meaneft individual, may, without ftraining the metaphor, be included in the idea of walls and bulwarks, which contribute at once to the defence and ornament of a city. With regard to the walls or bulwarks" of our civil conftitution, it gives me pleafure to acknowledge, that they are not only entire, but in feveral refpects more fair and durable than thofe of any other nation upon earth. In other lands, the walls of government are built on the furrender of fome of the most precious rights of human nature: But in this happy country, we have not bought the protection of government at fo dear a rate; nor is the hard hand of the oppreffor either felt or feared by the meanest member

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of

of the community.

And muft not the

heart of that man then be hard and unfeeling, who doth not with and pray that fuch an invaluable conftitution may be built up, and preferved entire to latest generations?

* But the expreffion ufed in the text, calls upon us to look with weeping eyes and forrowful hearts, upon that awful rent in the British empire, which is the immediate occafion of our meeting together at this time. We have feen a cloud rife out of the west, at first no bigger than a man's hand, but, like that which the Prophet's fervant faw, it hath overfpread the face of heaven, and carried tempeft and defolation in its progress. When I mention this great calamity, I do not mean to fix your attention on it as an object which presents nothing to our view but complicated distress and danger. Much as I difapprove of that fevity which" despiseth the chastening of “the Lord,” I am yet no friend to that defpondency which would make us "faint "when we are rebuked of him." The same expreffion in my text, which reminds

us

us of the alarming breach which we deplore, doth at the fame time lead us to look beyond and above it, to him who is able to repair it; to that God who "hath the "hearts of all men in his hands, and turneth them as the rivers of water. With him it is a small matter, not only to fill up the gap which hath feparated Great Britain from her American colonies ; but if it seem good in his fight, he can, with infinite eafe, make this temporary feparation the occafion and the means of establishing a firm and permanent union: an union which neither political artifice, nor selfish ambition, nor the pride of independence, will be able to diffolve. This is the defirable iffue to which our wifhes may lawfully direct us, when we pray in the language of the Royal Pfalmift, "Build thou

"the walls of Jerufalem."

Having made thefe remarks on the import of David's requests, let us attend, in the

Second place, To the order in which they are placed. He begins with praying for

the

the good of Zion, and then offers his fupplication in behalf of Jerufalem. Nor is this an accidental or arbitrary arrangement. The fame fubordination of temporal to fpiritual bleffings, is uniformly observed through the whole of the facred record, both in the promises of God, and in the accepted prayers of his people: and it deferves our notice, that, in this order, we are called upon by his Majefty's proclamation, to conduct the devotional exercifes of this day. For, previous to any particular request refpecting the political state of the British empire, we are admonished by our gracious Sovereign, "To humble ourselves "before Almighty God, on account of our "fins; to implore his pardon, and to fend up, in the most devout and folemn man

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ner, our prayers and fupplications to the "divine Majefty, for averting thofe heavy judgements which our manifold fins and provocations have most justly deferved." It may be remembered by fome now present, that in the year 1759, when Great Britain fat as Queen among the nations, we were called together by a proclamation

from

from the Throne, to return public thanks to Almighty God, for the great and public bleffings which enriched and distinguished that memorable year.

It was then my object, to warn my fellowcitizens against the criminal abufe of our national felicity, by perverting, into weapons of rebellion against God, the fruits of that fuccefs with which he had been pleased to favour us.

Since that time, we have enjoyed a period of very uncommon profperity as a kingdom. While riches have been flowing to us from all quarters, luxury and diffipation advancing with an equal pace, have proved at once the propriety and the neglect of that warning. Enormous fortunes, fuddenly acquired in our foreign fettlements, have accelerated that corruption of manners, which is the ufual concomitant of profperity. Successful adventurers, coming home with fums almost beyond the calculation of a moderate mind, produce a difdain of the flow and fober paths of industry: and men haftening to be rich fall into "temptation, and a fnare, and into many

"foolish