expended on so divine an enterprise? Shame on thy coward spirit and thine avaricious heart! Do the holy scriptures, does the experience of ages, does the nature of things, justify the expectation, that we shall carry war into the central regions of delusion and crime, without opposition, without trial? Show me a plan which encounters not fierce resistance from the prince of darkness and his allies in the human heart, and I will show you a plan which never came from the inspiration of God. If missionary effort suffer occasional embarrassment: if impressions on the heathen be less speedy, and powerful, and extensive, than fond wishes have anticipated: if particular parts of the great system of operation be, at times, disconcerted: if any of the ministers of grace fall a sacrifice to the violence of those whom they go to bless in the name of the Lord; these are events which ought to exercise our faith and patience; to wean us from self-sufficiency; to teach us where our strength lies, and where our dependence must be fixed; but not to enfeeble hope, nor relax diligence. Let us not despise the day of small things. Let us not overlook, as an unimportant matter, the very existence of that missionary spirit which has already awakened Christians in different coun

tries from their long and dishonorable slumbers, and bids fair to produce, in due season, a general movement of the church upon earth. Let us not, for one instant, harbor the ungracious thought, that the prayers, and tears, and wrestlings of those who make mention of the Lord, form no link in that vast chain of events by which he will establish, and will make Jerusalem a praise in the earth. That dispensation which of all others is most repulsive to flesh and blood, the violent death of faithful missionaries, should animate Christians with new resolution. Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints. The cry of martyred blood ascends the heavens; it enters into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. It will give him no rest till he reign down righteousness upon the land where it has been shed, and which it has sealed as a future conquest for him who in his majesty rides prosperously because of truth, and meekness, and righteousness.

For the world, indeed, and perhaps for the church, many calamities and trials are in store, before the glory of the Lord shall be so revealed, that all flesh shall see it together. I will shake all nations, is the divine declaration, I will shake all nations; and the desire of all nations shall come. The vials of wrath which are now running, and others which remain to be poured out, must be

exhausted. The supper of the great God must be prepared, and his strange work have its course. Yet the missionary cause must ultimately succeed. It is the cause of God, and shall prevail. The days, O brethren, roll rapidly on, when the shout of the isles shall swell the thunder of the Continent: when the Thames and the Danube, when the Tiber and the Rhine, shall call upon Euphrates, the Ganges, and the Nile; and the loud concert shall be joined by the Hudson, the Mississippi, and the Amazon, singing with one heart and one voice, Alleluia! Salvation! The Lord God omnipotent reigneth!

Comfort one another with this faith, and with these words:

Now, Blessed be the Lord God, the God of Israel, who only doeth wondrous things. And blessed be his glorious name forever: LET THE

WHOLE EARTH BE FILLED WITH HIS GLORY! Amen and Amen!

CHRISTIAN MOURNING.

A SERMON,

OCCASIONED BY THE

DEATH OF MRS. ISABELLA GRAHAM;

AND PREACHED ON THE

EVENING OF SABBATH, AUG. 14, 1814.

A gracious woman retaineth honor."- Prov xi. 16.

VOL. III.

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