rovidence on their behalf; often baffled the designs of their adversa-ies; and inclined the hearts of their haughty conquerors to acts of indness, and condescension. By degrees they became weaned from heir idolatrous attachments, and began to trust, anew, in the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. As the reformation of your fathers dvanced, the Almighty proceeded in the exhibition of his mercy; for he object of the captivity was not to destroy, but to reclaim, his eople. After the restoration of your fathers from their captivity to their Former possessions, whatever may have been their occasional sufferngs, they did not, for a long course of years, realize the full accomolishment of the wrath which God, by the mouth of Moses, denounc The entire accomplishment of that wrath was reserved to the timewhen your temple, and city, and country, were ruined by Vespasian and Titus. For many years before, the way had been preparing for this signal catastrophe. Your fathers first experienced what it was to be a dependent ally of Rome; and then to be made a Roman Province. In the course of these events it was,that the Lord brought against them a nation from far, as swift as the eagle flieth; a nation whose tongue they did not understand; a nation of fierce countenance, which, in the prosecution of its purpose, was notorious, for neither regarding the person of the old, nor shewing favor to the young; a nation which, beyond any other, did eat the fruit of their cattle, and the fruit of their land until they were destroyed; and which left them neither corn, wine, nor oil, nor the increase of their kine, nor flocks of their sheep, until their destruction was accomplished. Then it was, that they knew, by bitter experience, the full purport of being besieged in all their gates throughout all their land, which the Lord their God had given them, until their high and fenced walls, wherein they trusted, came down. Then it was, that the Lord' did, indeed, make their plagues wonderful, and the plagues of their seed, even great plagues, and of long continuance; and sent upon them sore sicknesses, and of long continuance. Then it was, that He seemed to rejoice over them to destroy them, and to bring them to nought. Then it was, that He plucked them off the land, which they and their ancestors had so long possessed, and scattered them among all people, from one end of the earth even unto the other. Then it was, that they were made to do service to other gods, to the gods of the Romans, which neither they, nor their fathers, had known.-Whether among the nations through which they have been dispersed, they and their descendants have found any ease, or whether the soles of their feet have had rest;-whether they have there had a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and sorrow of mind; whether their lives have hung in doubt before thems—and whether they have feared day and night, and had no assurance of their lives, I appeal to the history of your nation, and to your own bosoms. That all these visitations upon your fathers and their offspring, for the space of eighteen hundred years, have been for a SIGN AND A WONDER, who can refuse to acknowledge? - From a mere cursory reference to the history of your people, such as has now been made, it is evident that God had never inflicted upon his people all the curses written in the Book of the Law, until the period of their dispersion by the Romans. But since that time, how strikingly, and circumstantially, exact is the agreement betwee the language employed by Moses, and the events which have followed Who can doubt, that the Romans were the instruments, designed of old, to accomplish that strange work of the Almighty-the execution of the fulness of his wrath upon your nation? If any doubt concerning this subject could, at the present day, exist in your minds, it were easy to bring further proof in support of what I advance. This, however, cannot be necessary: for the whole subject is but too familiar with you; and fancying that I hear you say, in the manner of Job, have pity upon us, have pity upon us, O ye our friends; for the hand of God hath touched us; I forbear to pain you with needless retrospection. It was necessary, that I should thus far appeal to the language of Moses, and to so many facts in your history connected with it, in order that the subject, of which I treat, might be the better understood in all its bearings. The way is now prepared to show the cause why the calamities, which you have experienced, and particularly some of a very peculiar character, have been brought upon your nation. The first verse in the chapter of Deuteronomy, from which several d quotations have already been made, is in these words: "And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt diligently hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the Lord thy God will set thee on high above all the nations of the earth." Then follows an enumeration of the blessings, which should attend the obedience of his people.-In the fifteenth verse, which has been already quoted, the language is: "But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes, which I command thee this day, that all these curses shall come upon thee." After a specification of many grievous curses, it is repeated, in the fifty eighth verse, "If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law, that are written in this book, that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, THE LORD THY GOD; then the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful, and the plagues of thy seed," &c. Obedience, therefore, to the commandments of God procures his blessing, and disobedience to them provokes his displeasure: in other words, disobedience to the commands of God is the cause of the calamities, which he brings upon his people. The history of his providence, however, as given us in your Sacred Scriptures, teaches us, that he visits with his rod in proportion to the extent of the transgressions, which he reproves. Few and small transgressions are visited with few stripes; but many and great transgressions meet with heavier tokens of his displeasure. When the measure of offences is full, then comes his wrath to the uttermost. Let me not be understood to say, that any offence, in itself considered, is of small moment. Every transgression of the law of God is fearfully odious in his sight; and it is only when one sin is compared with another, that we can pronounce it either great or small. there certainly is a gradation in guilt; and the perfection of justice consists as much in proportioning the punishment to the offence, as in the certainty with which it detects, and chastises it.-As the Lord is a God of truth, whatever he says, he will certainly perform; none of the purposes, either of his mercy, or his wrath, will ever fail. Whenever, therefore, he threatens any act with punishment, and the punishment follows, we may know, for a certainty, both that the act has been committed, and that it was the cause of the punishment which followed. If he denounces sundry judgments, upon sundry acts of disobedience, and a part, only, of those judgments are afterwards executed, the inference is, that a part, only, of those acts have been committed; since a contrary supposition would be inconsistent with gradation in guilt, and with that proportioning of the punishment to the offence, which, as we have seen, perfect justice requires. For like reasons, when the whole vengeance denounced is actually executed, we cannot fail to believe, that the disobedience was as universal as the vengeance. The Sovereign Law-giver and Judge has, undoubtedly, a right to enjoin on his subjects a general and summary obedience to his commands, on pain of some general and undefined punishment, in case they transgress. This, in many instances, he has accordingly done. But when he commands or prohibits certain conduct, with certain specified penalties annexed, his truth and justice are pledged that the punishment shall comport with his declaration, and that the penalty shall not be inflicted if the offence do not exist. If these things arc so, the general cause of the judgments brought upon your forefathers, cannot be doubtful;-they did not hearken to the voice of the Lord their God. Now it has already been made to appear, I apprehend, that your fathers had never been visited with all the penalties specified by Moses, until the final destruction of Jerusalem in the reign of Vespasian. That all those penalties were at, and near that time, exhausted upon them, I deem to be certain. If they were not, will you point out the one, which yet remains to be inflicted? Until this be done, I must consider the melancholy catalogue as then complete. But if every specified penalty was then executed, there must have been a breach of every specified requirement. The fulfilling of wrath to the utmost that was threatened, must have been preceded by a disobedience of the law to the utmost that was enjoined or forbidden. The words employed by Moses, in relation to this point, are very remarkable. "If thou shalt diligently hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments, which I command thee this day."* "If thou wilt not hearken to the voice of the Lord thy God, to observe to do all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day, that all these curses shall come upon thee." "If thou wilt not observe to do all the words of this law that are written in this book, that thou mayest I fear this glorious and fearful name, the LORD THY GOD, then the Lord will make thy plagues wonderful." Set your hearts unto all the words, which I testify among you this day; which ye shall command your children to observe, to do all the words of this law. For it is not a vain thing for you; because it is your life: and through this thing ye shall prolong your days in the land whither ye go over Jordan to possess it." Moses here repeatedly demands obedience to all the words of the Law; at the same time declaring, that a breach of all its requirements should be followed by the infliction of all its penalties: and assuring your fathers, that their obedience to all the * Deut. xxviii, 1. † Ibid 15 verse. bid 58 verse. Deut. xxxii, 46, 47. 1 commands of God should be their life, and the prolongation of the days in the land of Canaan. This obedience, moreover, was to be u obedience of the heart, in opposition to any external, or seeming ca formity with what the Law requires. "Set your hearts unto all in the words, which I testify among you this day."-After so direct, positive, so clear, assurances from God himself, by the mouth of hi servant Moses, who can doubt that your fathers received all the plaguõj written in the book of the Law, in consequence of their disobedien to all its commands? Who can doubt that their disobedience was tha of the heart, as well as of the hands and the lips; a disobedience against the spirit, as well as the letter of the Law? So sure as God is true, if your fathers had obeyed his voice to the end, He would have blessed them to the end; and have continued them in the posses sion of Canaan, and of the peculiar privileges of his people. But eighteen hundred years bave witnessed the execution of all the peralties, which were denounced against transgression, upon your Cathers and their children. Hitherto there has been no reprieve; and HE who has maintained his word with perfect exactness for eighteen hun dred years, gives assurance unto all men, that he will maintain forever. Whatever were the offences of your fathers, the same have bee committed by their children; and are by them, still repeated. This fact, too, is supported by the unerring authority of God's word. "And it shall come to pass, when all these things are come upon thee. the blessing and the curse, which I have set before thee, and thos shalt call them to mind among all the nations whither the Lord thy God hath driven thee, and shalt return unto the Lord thy God, and shalt obey his voice, according to all that I command thee this day, thou and thy children, with all thine heart, and with all thy soul; that then the Lord thy God will turn thy captivity, and have compassion upon thee, and will return and gather thee from all nations whither the Lord thy God hath scattered thee. If any of thine be driven out unto the utmost parts of heaven, from thence will the Lord thy God gather thee, and from thence will he fetch thee. And the Lord thy God will circumcise thine heart, and the heart of thy seed, to love the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, that thon mayest live. And the Lord thy God will put all these curses upon thine enemies, and on them that hate thee, which persecute tlice. And thou shalt return and obey the voice of the Lord thy God, and do all his commandments, which I command thee this day. And the Lord thy God will make thee plenteous in every work of thine hand, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and in the fruit of thy laud, for good; for the Lord will again rejoice over thee for good, as he rejoiced over thy fathers; if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the Lord thy God, to keep his commandments, and his statutes, which are written in this book of the law, and if thou turn unto the Lord thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul."* No promise can be more complete than the one which God has here made to you, that if you will return unto him, and obey his voice with all your heart * Deut. xxx, 1-10. and with all your soul, He will turn your captivity and have compassion upon you and gather you from all the nations among which you are scattered, though it be from the end of the earth, and make you plenteous in every good thing. If this promise has not been fulfilled, it is because you have not returned unto the Lord your God, in the manner which he has required. “God is not a man that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he said, and shafl he not do it; or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?"* The same disobedience, which first occasioned so many calamities to your fathers, continues to occasion them to their children. Had you avoided the sins of your ancestors, and returned to the Lord, he would have returned unto you in boundless love and compassion; he would have "circumcised your hearts," according to his promise, and "the hearts of your seed," and have caused you to know, by happy experience, the full and important import of such a declaration. Instead of being at this time scattered among the nations of the earth, subject to the innumerable miseries and disquietudes incident to such a condition, you would now have been in the country, which God gave to your fathers, there enjoying his smiles, receiving his protection, and rejoicing in all the bounties of his providence. Think not that I thus speak, in order to reproach you, or to wound your feelings. I am not aware that I could touch the subject at all, with any degree of faithfulness, and say less. Flattery is never indicative of good will;-we are taught from high authority, that "faithful are the wounds of a friend; but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful."† If the fact be so, that disobedience to the law of God has brought such a multiplicity of evils on your land and nation, and has caused them to continue to the present time, it would seem, that you could not fail to inquire, with anxiety, into the nature of that disobedience. Should you fully ascertain that point, it would also seem, that you could not fail of being solicitous to regain the long lost favor of Heaven, and to avail yourselves of the promises set before you. To ascertain this important point, therefore, shall be my next endeavor. If we examine all the offences mentioned, and forbidden, in Scripture, I know of but one, which your fathers had not committed at one time, or another, long before the destruction of Jerusalem,and the events which followed; and until that time, as we have already seen, the wrath of God had not been consummated. The offence to which I refer, was a final rejection of the authority of God. I imagine that I see you start at this suggestion; and that you ask, with amazement, when, and how, did such a rejection take place? Have not our fathers and ourselves been his peculiar people, the depositaries of his revealed truth, and the defenders of the worship of the LIVING, AND TRUE GOD? Have we not asserted his worship, even during the long and gloomy period of our dispersion; and, by so doing, have we not exposed ourselves to persecution, and distress? I readily answer, yes;-still you may have finally rejected his authority in the most absolute sense. No small offence, surely, can have brought upon you the evils, which you have experienced. Your fathers, and, I fear their children have done the same, confided in a dangerous error. They thought that so long VOL. XVI. Num. xv, 22. + Prov. xxvii, 0. 50 |