Par beaten, cut, and almost murdered. But to thee, O most compassionate Father, we need not cnumerate our grievances and sufferings. Thou knowest all that has befallen us from the time we were forced from our native country to this day. Often, with sorrowful hearts and weeping eyes, do we recollect our once happy, though homely, abodes; our near and dear relatives; our water brooks, our rosy bowers, our vernal groves, our shady woods, and scented meadows. don, O most merciful God, our importunity; and look down with piteous eyes upon us the most wretched of thy creatures. Under our bleeding wounds and excrutiating tortures we languish, we groan, we die. Judge, we pray thee, between us and our capricious, cruel tormentors. Hast thou not declared thyself a God of great compassion and tender mercy; who will by no means clear the guilty? Art thou not the friend of the helpless, the fatherless, and the avenger of the oppressed? We, no less than our merciless tyrants, are the workmanship of thy Almighty hand. In us, as well as in them, thou hast placed that precious jewel, the immortal soul; and hast said, that thou wilt not respect persons in judgment; but wilt render to every man according to his works. Rescue us, O God, we beseech thee, from our op :: pressors, as a lamb from the jaws of the roaring, rapacious lion. Shall Thus they incessantly cry from the rising to the setting, from the setting to the rising sun. their cries remain forever unheard, their prayers forever unanswered? No. For the sighing of the poor and needy will I arise, saith God. And, when he ariseth to judgment, who can stand before him? With a prophet, I ask, who can abide the day of his coming? When the cup of the indignation of the Almighty is full, must it not be poured forth? Are not the judgments of God already in the earth? Are not the times, in which we live, in a peculiar manner, portentous and eventful? What mighty revolutions, and wars, and massacres are taking place among the nations? Are not less judgments, in the usual course of providence, the fore-runners of great, er? Is this country exempted from judgments? No. Judgments are of two kinds, temporal and spiritual. The former affect especially the body; the latter the soul. Is the soul of far greater value than the body? Then the plagues which are fatal to it are more to be deprecated than those which hurt the mortal body. In what age, and in what country, had infidelity ever a more ex tensive spread or a more powerful sway, than it the inhabitants of the American now has among states? How enslaved to the basest appetites; and how callous to every religious and moral obligation are multitudes among us! What paved the way for the introduction and spread of moral and penal evil in our world? The answer is obvious; the infidelity and scepticism of our original parents, and their subsequent indulgence of an unbridled appetite and criminal propensity. Review the history of the Jews; revolve the annals of the world; and they will furnish you with innumerable instances of the happy consequences of the cultivation of religion and morality, on the one hand; and, on the other, the bant ful effects of the prevalence of impiety and vice. What a contrast do we see between the state of the Romans during the long and happy reign of Numa Pompilius, and the situation of that great people under the reigns of m reigns of many of his predecessors and' successors? Read the history of the decline and downfall of the four great empires, the Abyssi nian, the Babylonian, the Grecian, and the Ro man. Investigate the causes of those direful re volutions; and the coincidence between the g which preceded them, and those which predomi nate among ourselves, will strike you more for. cibly than I have language to express. How successful in the invention of crimes and modes of sinning, has the depravity of human nature been? What diversified and complicated scenes of guilt have been discovered? In what various forms and shapes has every moral precept been violated? Can any new mode of offending Heaven and ruining souls be found out? Is it possible to make the smallest addition to the long black catalogue? How many practicably declare to all around them, that they neither fear God nor regard man? The religious duties they owe to their Maker, and the relative duties they owe to their neighbour, they treat with equal contempt. Is my account of the vices of the age exaggerated? Is it the effect of fanaticism? No. He must be a great stranger in our Israel, that does not know the truth, and perceive the justness, of the description; dismal, horrid as it is. In many, prejudice and interest blind the judg ment; sordid avarice shuts up the avenues of sensibility; and seems to extinguish every sympathetic and tender feeling. To my serious strains the ear is shut; and the heart impenetrable; while the idle fopperies and the foolish dreams of the romance or the novel, find the readiest access and the kindest entertainment. The reader is all attention. He is amused, he is delighted, he is in raptures. Delusory prospects, fanciful scenes open to him, with which he is, at once, astonished and delighted. Every thing he sees is marvellous. Every house is a palace or a cottage; every man an angel or a fiend; every woman a goddess or a fury. Here the scene momentarily varies; and assumes new appearances. Now it is a dreary castle full of spectres and ghosts, robbers and murderers. Next moment it is a beautiful villa or a splendid palace, resounding with the notes of festivity and joy. Now it exhibits the appearance of a loathsome dungeon, with rattling chains and chilly damps. Suddenly it is changed into a beautiful garden with fragrant flowers, blushing parterres, inviting fruits, and melodious songs; by which the juvenile mind is entangled and infatuated. Then succeed adventures, intrigues, rapes, duels, elopements, darts, sighs, groans, armies, murders. Debauchery, in this way, assumes the form and name of gallantry.-Revenge is termed honour. Thus the destruction of the human soul is accomplished; the arts of seduction are practised, and female innocence is ruined. Thus libertines endea |