they sincerely desirous of reaping the benefit of those means of instruction which as Christians they so abundantly enjoy? Do they embrace with gratitude the opportunities of spiritual improvement which are so universally extended to them? And are they fully impressed with a sense of the responsibility they incur if they neglect to profit by all the means of edification which they possess? Is their duty to their neighbours shewn in the practice of obedience to their superiors and employers, of honesty, fidelity, and diligence, in the discharge of their various duties? Are sobriety and humility the leading virtues which mark their station? Are all these duties so performed by the various classes of society amongst us, that they form distinguishing traits of the national character?

Lastly, Is the Sabbath religiously observed by all classes of the community? Is it set apart as a day for promoting in a more especial manner the honor and glory of God, the growth of piety and religion, and the practice of all the relative and social duties of life? Is it universally observed as a day of rest and religious retirement? Are all unnecessary employments prohibited or discouraged? and is it made by the Divine blessing the means of promoting the present and future welfare of all classes of the community?

These are serious and important questions, the consideration of which ought surely to become matter of deep and momentous concern to us, both as individuals and as a nation!

A grateful return on our part for the many mercies and blessings we have experienced at the hand of the Almighty, can alone entitle us to look forward to a continuance of his providential care and protection. The awful warning and threatening which the inspired legislator of the Israelites denounced against that infatuated people, ought surely to arouse us to a consideration of the danger we incur if we neglect to profit by their instructive example! If the ingratitude and disobedience of the Jewish nation, to whom was visible only the dim twilight of revelation, could draw down such signal punishment from the hand of God; if their disregard of the Divine warnings, echoed through the medium of a human legislator, exposed them to such dreadful consequences of the Divine displeasure, much more surely must the fate of a Christian land depend upon the use or abuse of the Divine mercies and blessings vouchsafed to it. "If they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more then shall not we escape if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven."

We may rest assured that the gifts of Providence are not bestowed upon his creatures in vain; both nations and individuals are deeply responsible for all the mercies and blessings they experience.

To ourselves as a nation the favour and protection of the Almighty have been extended to a great and unparalleled degree, and to a proper return on our part, rest assured, depend the future welfare and prosperity of the country. Though to a superficial

view the face of our affairs betrays no symptoms of an approaching storm, though our ears are neither assailed by wars, nor rumours of wars, but our political horizon appears clear and hopeful as the cloudless aspect of a summer's evening; yet such may not long be our view; the course of events may lead us to other prospects; a night of gloom may succeed the calm serenity of the evening; a nation's groans may follow the voice of joy and mirth and melody.

To whom, then, shall we turn, should ever night of adversity overspread the face of our country, if, in the day of our prosperity, we, like the Israelites, "of the rock that begat us are unmindful, and forget the God that formed us?" Will it not be more tolerable for " Tyre and Sidon," cities which knew not God, than for us as a nation, who have been raised up by Providence to our present exalted pitch of greatness, who have lived in the noonday light of the glorious Gospel of Christ, and who have within us all the means for accomplishing the great ends for which, as a nation, we have been exalted?

Should not then a review of the many mercies and blessings, the signal instances of Divine favour and protection extended to our country, induce us to pause and to reflect what return we have made for such tokens of providential regard, and to consider what future manifestations of the Divine favour we are likely to experience at the hands of a just and righteous God? Should it not lead us to the reflection

that if we fail now, while the day of grace lasts, to ponder these things, the time may come when the light may no longer beam upon us as a nation, but "darkness may cover the land, and gross darkness the people." Ought it not to fill us with apprehension lest the warning words of our Saviour should ever bear reference to the fate of this great and favoured land?-"O that thou hadst known even in this thy day, the things which belong unto thy peace, but now they are hid from thine eyes."

A consideration of such awful reflections ought surely to arouse every well-wisher of his country's welfare to a due sense of their supreme importance. On every class of the community rests a deep and solemn obligation of applying them to the great ends of repentance and humiliation.

Let the nobles and the rulers of the land consult the best and most lasting interests of their country, by preparing the way for the return of an ungrateful and disobedient people to the mercy of a just and righteous God!-Let them "blow the trumpet in Zion, sanctify a fast, call a solemn assembly gather the people, sanctify the congregation, assemble the elders, gather the children and those that suck the breast let the priests, the ministers of the Lord, weep between the porch and the altar, and let them say, Spare thy people, O Lord, and give not thine heritage to reproach that the heathen should rule over them wherefore should they say among the people, where is their God?"

Let all orders of men in the state bow with reverence before the throne of grace, and propitiate the mercy of God by repentance and humiliation; let them fall low on their knees before his footstool, and supplicate a continuance of the Divine favour and protection to themselves and their country; and let them testify by renewed vows of gratitude and obedience their deep sense of the blessings they have experienced, and their unworthiness of future tokens of his providential regard.

And let this period, which is externally one of national mourning and affliction, be not confined to the garb of sorrow and the heraldic pomp of woe, but let it become a season of national humiliation and penitential sorrow and contrition. Let our churches, which are now arrayed with the pious emblems of a nation's grief, be thronged with devout and prostrate worshippers! And let the recollection of the great and illustrious individual to whose memory we consecrate these tributes of our respect, become the means of rousing us to serious reflection on the past, and lively apprehension for the future.

To his family, to his country, and to the world he is no more!-The head which was once busied with vast projects of grandeur and glory, now rests pillowed in the tomb!-The heart which once swelled high with warm and fervent wishes for his country's welfare, now lies cold in the dust!—The eye which once beamed with delight on the gorgeous array of Britain's proudest and noblest sons, is closed in the