there is clearly an established religion, whatever may be the form by which it is distinguished.

And who can doubt for a single moment, either the propriety, the lawfulness, the wisdom, or the necessity of such a provision, by which the people may be taught and instructed in the Christian doctrine, and might attend without fear or danger on the worship of Almighty God? And also in thus guarding against the danger arising from the corrupt nature of man, of losing the knowledge, the religion, the worship, and the very name of God, from the land? For these to exist for any considerable length of time in any land, among any people, and under any circumstances, without the appointed rest, instruction, worship, and sanctification of the Sabbath, as required in the Scriptures; is, from the corrupt nature of man, without a continued miracle, utterly impossible. If, under the most favourable circumstances, and guarded as the sacred day is in this country from all profanation by legislative enactments, by fines and punishments of various kinds, a great portion of the nation neglect the worship of God, and are scarcely restrained from violating it in the most profane and shameful way, and from exercising violence, injury, insult, and persecution against the seriously devout,-what, I ask, would have been the case, had there been no enactments for the sanctification of the one, or the protection of the

other? And what would be the consequences, if these restraints and sanctions of the state were entirely withdrawn? For ourselves, we can appeal to facts in all these respects; but especially in the last, as witnessed within our own recollection, and our own times. The French, in their late revolution, made the experiment; but such a brood of monsters in all kinds of wickedness did they instantly bring to light, that the leaders in this horrible work of banishing Christianity, the Sabbath, and the worship of God from the land, were very soon obliged, for their own safety, and the national existence, to retrace their steps; to return to that from whence they had departed, and to re-establish, corrupt as it was, that religious system, which they found by sad experience to be infinitely better than none.

In those times of rebuke and of blasphemy, our own country was not without its evil men, working in every way to effect the same horrible designs among ourselves. But our religious

establishment was formed of different materials from that of our neighbours; and though shaken, with the state, to its very centre, yet with the Scripture for its guide, and Jehovah for its guard, it came out of the furnace somewhat purified, and has ever since, in various respects, been rising in beauty and glory.

But so blind and inconsistent is error, that the stoutest objectors to the religious establishments

of the land, are the most tenacious of the privileges, which in fact these establishments bestow: so little, indeed, are most of them inclined to be interfered with, or to suffer any inconvenience either in their persons or in the invasion of their rights, that they are the very first to complain of any, even the least encroachment; and to seek redress from those protecting laws which the state has provided for all the professors of Christianity throughout the land. But if the state had not been professedly Christian, and if Christianity had not been declared by it to be the established religion of the land, there would have been no protection of this description to which they could look. Christianity, and its real professors, would have been always exposed to the scorn, contempt, and persecution, of the wicked; and there would have been no safety for those who, influenced by its doctrines, and obedient to its laws, separated themselves from the society of their thoughtless and wicked neighbours; and by this declared, that they alone were the children of God. In fact, real Christianity cannot exist but in a state of constant persecution, where it is not professed and protected as the established religion of the land. To entertain the opposite opinion is to do so against the evidence of the most clear and undeniable facts. Left, therefore, to itself, it would only exist in small and detached societies. The great bulk of the nation would have no

means, as they would have no inclination, to be instructed in their duty to God. Either then the Christian religion must be the established religion of the land, and means must be provided for the universal instruction of the people, or the great bulk of the nation must be always in a heathen state, and remain the implacable enemies and constant persecutors of them that are good. But this surely was never the intention of Him whose mercy is over all his works; and whose religion, while it brings glory to himself, breathes nothing but peace on earth, and good will towards men. It was therefore clearly designed to be the universal religion. All nations were to be taught, and none were to be left, if possible, without the constant means to be informed. Nothing but a religious establishment, embracing an universal and successive ministry, can meet these demands. God works his will ordinarily by means, and not by constant miracles. This is the usual course of the Divine proceeding. So our great and wise ancestors thought. They were men of enlarged, enlightened, and liberal minds. At the hazard of their lives, therefore, they projected and accomplished that which merits not the censure, but the respect and admiration of mankind. Raised up by God in troublesome times, and qualified by wisdom, holiness and zeal, to effect the poses of his mercy and grace towards the nation; they not only delivered us from under the power

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and tyranny of the most hateful and dangerous apostacy that ever disgraced and cursed either the church or the world; but they laid a platform, on which they built the ecclesiastical edifice of the realm, so wise and scriptural in its constitution, and so beneficent, expansive, and holy in its designs, that ages yet to come will commemorate with joy and gladness, the wisdom and beneficence of its objects, and of the methods proposed for their accomplishment.