(> the sacrifice of continual praise. of every perfect gift? As Christian patriots we are bound to recognize the hand of God in all events. We do not believe the affairs of nations are outside of His government. On the other hand we know, by even the most superficial study of our Bibles, that in no department of the vast scheme of His providence, is God represented as more directly working than in the rise and fall of nations. “Times of wide-spread and sanguinary disaster are upon our beloved land, but they do not come unsent; the hand of God is in all this conflict. Convulsion, revolution, and war, are but the footsteps of His universal providence in its march through the world.” There is therefore no duty more frequently urged in the Bible, than that of continued thanksgiving. This is the whole idea of the text; at the same time it is just this disposition that we, as believers in this universal providence, should ever cultivate. The gospel always uses the loving kindness of God, His multiplied mercies, new every morning, repeated every evening, as its crowning argument for repentance. Our own experience has surely often taught us that, in the very heaviest trials we are called upon to endure, we gain our richest consolation from a contemplation of Divine love. We are to meet the events of life, not as heathens, but as Christians. The old philosophers, groping in the dark, could only see, in the course of events, either a blind chance or inexorable fate. But not thus do we, as chrfetians, come to the discharge of our duty at this hour; but rather by Christ Jesus, the Savior of sinners. “ By Him,” Jesus, “ who sanctifies His people with His own blood,” let us offer sacrifice of praise continually. Now, more than ever, since we bow beneath the rod in our
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