His message of 1851 says, "None can look back on the dangers which are passed, or forward to the bright prospect before us, without feeling a thrill of gratification. At the same time he must be inspired with a grateful sense of our profound obligation to a beneficent Providence, whose paternal care is so manifest in the happiness of this highly favored land." "We owe these blessings," he says, in his message of 1852, “under Heaven, to the happy Constitution and Government which were bequeathed to us by our fathers, and which it is our sacred duty to transmit in all their integrity to our children."

President Fillmore gives the following testimony to the value of the Sabbath:-"I owe my uninterrupted bodily vigor to an originally strong constitution, to an education on a farm, and to life-long habits of regularity and temperance. Throughout all my public life I maintained the same regular and systematic habits of living to which I had previously been accustomed. I never allowed my usual hours for sleep to be interrupted. The Sabbath I always kept as a day of rest. Besides being a religious duty, it was essential to health. On commencing my Presidential career, I found that the Sabbath had frequently been employed by visitors for private interviews with the President. I determined to put an end to this custom, and ordered my doorkeeper to meet all Sunday visitors with an indiscriminate refusal."

PRESIDENT PIERCE,

In his Inaugural, 1853, says, "But let not the foundation of our hopes rest on man's wisdom. It will not be sufficient that sectional prejudices find no place in the public deliberations. It will not be sufficient that the rash counsels of human passions be rejected. It must be felt that there is no national security but in the nation's humble, acknowledged dependence upon God and his overruling Providence.

"Standing, as I do, almost within view of the green slopes of Monticello, and, as it were, within reach of the tomb of Washington, with all the cherished memories of the past gathering round me, like so many eloquent voices from heaven, I can express no better hope for my country than that the kind. Providence which smiled upon our fathers may enable their children to preserve the blessings they have inherited."

His first annual message, 1853, declared that "We have still

the most abundant cause for thankfulness to God, for an accumulation of signal mercies showered upon us as a nation. It is well that a consciousness of rapid advancement and increasing strength be habitually associated with an abiding sense of dependence on Him who holds in his hands the destiny of men and of nations.

"Recognizing the wisdom of the broad principle of absolute religious toleration proclaimed in our fundamental law, and rejoicing in the benign influence which it has exerted upon our social and political condition, I should shrink from a clear duty did I fail to express my deepest conviction that we can place no secure reliance upon any apparent progress if it be not sustained by national integrity, resting upon the GREAT TRUTHS affirmed and illustrated by DIVINE REVELATION."

"Public affairs ought to be so conducted that a settled conviction shall pervade the entire Union that nothing short of the HIGHEST tone and standard of PUBLIC MORALITY marks EVERY PART of the administration and legislation of the Government.”

PRESIDENT BUCHANAN,

In his Inaugural, 1857, says, "In entering upon this great office, I must humbly invoke the God of our fathers for wisdom and firmness to execute its high and responsible duties in such a manner as to restore harmony and ancient friendship among the several States, and to preserve our free institutions throughout many generations."

In his first annual message, 1857, he says, "And, first of all, our thanks are due to Almighty God for the numerous benefits which he has bestowed upon this people; and our united prayers ought to ascend to him that he would continue to bless our great republic in time to come, as he blessed it in times past."

In his message on Central American affairs, of January, 1858, President Buchanan declared the Divine law to be the basis of the law of nations. He said, "The avowed principle which lies at the foundation of the law of nations is the Divine command that all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so unto them.' Tried by this unerring rule, we should be severely condemned if we shall not use our best exertions to arrest such expeditions against our feeble sister republic of Nicaragua.”

PRESIDENT LINCOLN,

In his Inaugural Address delivered on the 4th of March, 1861, amidst the opening scenes of the great rebellion, refers as follows to the justice of God as displayed in the government of nations:

'Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice of the people? Is there any better or equal hope in the world? In our present differences is either party without faith in being right? If the Almighty Ruler of nations, with his eternal truth and justice, be on your side of the North, or yours of the South, that truth and that justice will surely prevail, by the judgment of this great tribunal of the American people."

His message to Congress convened in extraordinary session, on the 4th of July, 1861, closes as follows:

"Having thus chosen our course, without guile, and with pure purpose, let us renew our trust in God, and go forward without fear and with manly hearts."

In his message to Congress at the opening of its session in December, 1861, President Lincoln used the following closing words:

"With a reliance on Providence all the more firm and earnest, let us proceed in the great task which events have devolved upon us."

This chapter will appropriately close with the following paragraphs from a work on the Institutes of International Law, by Daniel Gardner, an eminent jurist and lawyer of New York. He says,

"The permanent welfare and glory of every sovereign state. demand a faithful obedience to the laws of nations, founded on the precepts of the gospel. Self-preservation calls for it; interest and duty require it. International and municipal law are based upon the gospel, and obedience to them is necessary to the happiness and prosperity of every state. The violation of those celestial doctrines has swept away the Assyrian, the Egyptian, the Greek, and the Roman Empires; and the ruins of Baalbec, Palmyra, and Thebes, the shattered Parthenon, and the remains of Roman grandeur, all attest the suicidal effect on empires of disobedience to God's law of nations. Spain, once

great and powerful, has fallen by her atrocious national offences from her vast power in the reigns of Charles V. and Philip II. History teaches that national sins, by a fixed moral law, punish the states that commit them. Self-preservation, as well as the obligation of the Divine law, demands a voluntary obedience to the precepts of the gospel in all international transactions.

"The sanctions of that law cannot be disregarded, or its sure penalties avoided, as the King of kings enacted it. All nations before him are as the small dust of the balance; they are counted to him as less than nothing and vanity. He holdeth the seas in the hollow of his hand; he weigheth the mountains in scales; he sitteth on the circle of the earth; he ruleth the hosts of heaven and the inhabitants of the earth. His title is Jehovah in the highest.

"May our republic and all nations obey that law and enjoy its promised blessings.

"The precepts of the gospel are the basis of all law. It is a moral code of general principles, which, intelligently and honestly applied, will solve every question of international right and duty. In this age of civilization and improvement, a liberal code of public law, based upon the golden rule of the gospel, and assented to by the leading nations of Europe and America, is a great desideratum.

"Our American public and private international law is composed in part of a written code, enacted in the form of a national Constitution and State Constitutions and State laws, and in part of the law of national comity.

"This law seems to rest on the golden rule of the gospel, and, as the fruits of Christian civilization, to belong of necessity to American jurisprudence, as God's appointed regulator of the rights and duties of all national and State sovereignties. Treaties, constitutions, and laws merely recognize and regulate it in certain respects, but its true basis is in the command of Jehovah to nations and states, as well as to individuals, ‘Do unto others as you would they should do unto you.' The observance of the principles of the gospel will insure the prosperity of every State and nation."

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE CAPITAL-SELECTED BY WASHINGTON LAYS THE CORNER-STONE OF THE CAPITOL-CHRISTIAN SERVICE-BEAUTY OF THE SITE-CONGRESS MEETS IN THE CAPITOL, IN 1800-ADDRESS OF THE PRESIDENT-REPLIES OF THE SENATE AND HOUSE-THEIR CHRISTIAN TONE-EXTENSION OF THE CAPITOL, IN 1851-WEBSTER'S ADDRESS-DECORATIONS OF THE CAPITOL-HISTORIC MEMORIES OF THE CAPITOL-SENATE LEAVE THE OLD HALL-ADDRESS OF THE VICE-PRESIDENT-DR. BEECHER'S PARALLEL-GRIMKÉ'S-CHARACTER OF RULERS DESCRIBED BY THE BIBLE-INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIAN RULERS-PRAYERS IN THE CAPITOL-UNION MEETING IN THE CAPITOL-PRAYER AT ITS OPENINGSLAVERY ABOLISHED IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

THE Capital of the American republic, in its consecration to virtue, Christian civilization, and the purposes of Christian legislation, is in harmony with the genius and history of the nation. Its foundations were laid with Christian services, and the blessing of God invoked. Congress, on the 16th of July, 1790, set apart one hundred square miles, on the banks of the Potomac, as the future capital. On the 15th day of April, 1791, the Hon. Daniel Carroll and Dr. David Stewart superintended the fixing of the first corner-stone of the District of Columbia, at Jones's Point, near Alexandria, where it was laid with all the Masonic ceremonies usual at that time, and a quaint address, almost all in scriptural language, delivered by the Rev. James Muir. He said,

"Amiable it is for brethren to dwell together in unity: it is more fragrant than the perfumes on Aaron's garment; it is more refreshing than the dews on Hermon's hill! May this stone long commemorate the goodness of God in those uncommon events which have given America a name among nations. Under this stone may jealousy and selfishness be forever buried. From this stone may a superstructure arise whose glory, whose magnificence, stability, unequalled hitherto, shall astonish the world, and invite even the savage of the wilderness to take shelter under its wings."

On the 18th of September, 1793, the southeast corner-stone of the Capitol was laid by Washington, with Masonic and Christian services and military demonstrations. The commissioners