4. Remember that this great work is not accomplished.. The saddest, most solemn, most religious message ever delivered by an American President, was spoken at his inauguration by the great and good man, who, for the second term, has begun his arduous duties. Let me read to you some of those weighty words.

'Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet if God wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether." How they infold the past, the present, the future. How they point to our only success - God and duty. Our armies in the field, our legislation in Congress, our principles at home, our God in all of these, through them all, above them all these are our salvation. Only by adhering to the right shall we triumph -the whole right. We must uproot from our hearts that most unchristian and inhuman sentiment which makes us distinguish between man and man, between Christian brethren, on account of certain outward traits. These must be swept away, or the wrath of God will again rest upon us. The Scat of the Beast may be transferred from Charleston to Boston. We may feel this outpouring of divine displeasure. May this fate be averted by our earnest embracing of the whole truth as it is in Jesus. May our victories speedily be consummated, the greater victory of right be equally accomplished, and the Holy Spirit renew every heart, and all the land, in the purity, and peace, and brotherhood of heaven.

"AND THE LORD SAID UNTO MOSES, RISE UP EARLY IN THE MORNING, AND STAND BEFORE PHARAOH, AND SAY UNTO HIM, THUS SAITH THE LORD GOD OF THE HEBREWS, LET MY PEOPLE GO, THAT THEY MAY SERVE ME. FOR I WILL AT THIS TIME SEND ALL MY PLAGUES UPON THY HEART, AND UPON THY SERVANTS, AND UPON THY PEOPLE; THAT THOU MAYEST KNOW THAT THERE IS NONE LIKE ME IN ALL THE EARTH. FOR NOW I WILL STRETCH OUT MY HAND, THAT I MAY SMITE THEE AND THY PEOPLE WITH PESTILENCE; AND THOU SHALT BE CUT OFF FROM THE EARTH. AND IN VERY DEED FOR THIS CAUSE HAVE I RAISED THEE UP, FOR TO SHOW IN THEE MY POWER; AND THAT MY NAME MAY BE DECLARED THROUGHOUT ALL THE EARTH. - Ex. ix. 13-16.

99

ISTORY sometimes reproduces herself with phoPast and present then are tographic accuracy.

H

one.

The very man who molded that dusty past

after his image and likeness, seems to be stirring in the disturbed elements of the present, and fashioning them after the same form. Plutarch sought for such a parallel between the chief men of Greece and Rome. The present Napoleon has set up his great ancestor and the first Cæsar as of like lineaments, labors, and, he might have added, fate. Yet none so strikingly in their rise, rule, and fall resemble each other as Pharaoh and Jefferson Davis.

* A sermon preached in Boston on the occasion of the State Fast, Thursday, April 12, 1865.

Living thousands of years apart, under different skies, institutions, and religions, they have had a history and will have a fame well nigh identical. Their resemblances and contrasts will be the theme for our consideration.

We may properly engage in such contemplations, because the hosts of our Pharaoh are cast into the sea. On the triumphant shore stand victorious our Aaron and Moses, Lincoln and Grant; with their hardly less grand associates, Sherman and Sheridan, the Caleb and Joshua of the hour; while a rescued country, and the liberated millions for whose especial deliverance God hath raised up both Pharaoh and Moses, lift up glad hands in exultant hallelujahs to Him. whose right arm hath gotten Him the victory.

With overpowering emotions of thankfulness and praise we crowd His courts to-day. Our fasting is turned into feasting. The bridegroom is with us -how can we fast? The bands of wickedness are broken-why should we fast?

"Let the hills clap their hands, let the mountains rejoice,
Let all the glad earth raise a jubilant voice."

With our eyes fixed upon the ingulfing waves, that have drowned forever the great rebellion and its greater cause ; fixed yet more steadily and gratefully upon Him at whose command the waters disparted to let His people go over dry shod, and then closed eternally over their mighty oppressors, let us dwell upon the analogies our subject suggests. We shall find in them fresh cause to adore the wisdom, power, and goodness of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will; who, never interfering the least in the freedom of His creature, still holdeth the reins of sovereignty, and guideth the affairs of the universe.

The proper way to contemplate the great struggle, which seems so near its end, is to take our stand by the side of God, and look upon it from His point of observation. We have, as a nation, chiefly observed it from the side of Union.

To us it has been a struggle for sovereignty, for empire, for integrity of the national domain. The Flag has been the chief symbol of our sentiments and resolves. Nationality the inspiring energy of our souls. Not so with God. Our nationality is of small account with Him beside righteousness. He has inaugurated and conducted the war chiefly, we might almost say solely, in the interests of Liberty. He allowed, He encouraged our passion for the Union, because thus He could best work out His plan for emancipation.

Then, too, we have dwelt almost constantly upon the rebellious leaders and their hosts. Their policy, their progress, their prospects, have absorbed our minds. It is as if we studied the Mosaic deliverance from the movements of Pharaoh, his ministers and his people. That we never 'do. We look at it from its Mosaic, its divine, its slave side. We study the movements toward emancipation. We see Pharaoh not aggressive, but resisting the desires and decrees of God. The slave Moses, not his master, is the center around which those events are organized. So should it be here. Not the slaveholder but the slave, not the rebelling armies, but the organizing troops of Freedom; not the stately pronunciamentos of Jefferson Davis, but the prayers and prophecies of the captive, should be now, will be the future nucleus around which this Thirty Years' War will inevitably revolve. The movements of abolitionism, political, social, religious, military, from the rise of Garrison to the consummation of Lincoln's election and proclamation, of Sherman's marches and Grant's victories, as well as the hostile forces in the Senate, society, the pulpit, and the field, all gather around that Christian bondman. They are the chosen people of God who for three centuries have groaned in their prisonhouses, and whose liberation and exaltation, not our Union nor our liberties, are the great, almost the sole cause, of the outstretching of His arm, and the more than Mosaic miracles that pass before our half-observant eyes.

Taking our position, therefore, by His side, and looking on the war with His eyes, we see it to be, as all Europe sees it, a war of God for emancipation.

Three difficulties stood in His way: the words and construction of the Constitution; the aversion of the North to abolitionism, and the purpose of the South to prevent it. Each of these seemed strong. All must yield, or be crushed to powder beneath His omnipotent march. How can they be removed or reduced? Only by strengthening the last.

ease.

The dread of touching the Constitution had become a disThe people feared it, as our fathers did their idols— the work of their own hands. They said, The Constitution forbids us to touch slavery where it is. We cannot, we will not, violate that instrument. The slaveholders' will alone compelled them to forget their idol and fear God. They or it must die.

Behind and beneath this lay a horror of touching the slave. "Emancipation! haven't we opposed it from the beginning? The black man will become our equal, our master. He is a brute, an ape; does not want freedom, will not work, will not fight." Mr. Ten Eyck, senator of of New Jersey, declared in the Senate, after the war had begun, that if slavery was abolished in the District of Columbia, the slaves would be pouring down upon the North, and his State would not take care of them. He has just lost his rëelection because he would not give them their rights in his own State. This aversion was profound, was universal. How could it be overcome? Only by the firmness of the Southern purpose. The lesser evil can only be overcome by strengthening the greater, and God gives it that power. For this purpose He raised up their strong leader, and endowed him with extraordinary nature, in order that against His will these fears and prejudices of the nation might be dashed to pieces, and our glorious end be sublimely accomplished.