CopV 
 
 A DISCOURSE, 
 
 BY 
 
 REV. DR. BYRO^ SUNDERLAND, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 SHOOTING OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD 
 
 AT THE DEPOT IN WASHINGTON, SATURDAY MORNING, 
 JULY 2d, 1881, BY CHARLES J. GUITEAU : 
 
 DELIVERED AT 
 
 THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C, 
 
 SABBATH MORNING, JULY 3d, 1881. 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C. : 
 U. 0. POLKISHORX, PRIST!: It. 
 
 1881. 
 
A D1SCOU RSE, 
 
 HV 
 
 REV, DR. BYRO^ SUNDERLAND, 
 
 ON THE 
 
 SHOOTING OF PRESIDENT GARFIELD 
 
 AT THE DEPOT IN WASHINGTON, SATURDAY MORNING, 
 JULY 2D, 1881, BY CHARLES J. GUITEAU : 
 
 DELIVERED AT 
 
 THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C, 
 
 SABBATH MOKNING, JULY 3d, 1881. 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. O.: 
 
 R. 0. POLKIS110RS, PRINTER. 
 
 1881. 
 
 CO 
 
 n 
 
.Sis 
 
 Washington, D. C, 4th July, 1881. 
 Rev. Byron Sunderland, D. D. : 
 
 Dear Sir: We earnestly unite in asking of you the manuscript ot 
 your able sermon of yesterday morning having for its subject the les- 
 sons to be learned of the atrocious attempt on Saturday last upon the 
 life of our noble President, whose continued extreme danger has made 
 this a day of deep solicitude and sorrow instead of celebration and joy. 
 
 It is our desire to print and give it circulation beyond the walls of 
 the church of which you have been so long its loved pastor, for we 
 believe it contains truth worthy of earnest heed on the part of every 
 lover of our dear country. 
 
 Very sincerely and truly, 
 
 John Bailey, J. P. Low, 
 
 S. W. Ctjrriden, Gov. R. P. Lowe, 
 
 J. E. Carpenter, James Patterson, 
 
 H. Crittenden, T. F. Sargent, 
 
 F. B. Dalrymple, Chauncey Smith, 
 Charles DuBois, E. B. Taylor, 
 
 G. M. Fisher, T. C. Thaker, 
 M. S. Gibson, Alfred Thomas, 
 C. H. Graves, E. D. Tracy, 
 
 Dr. G. F. Johnston, S. M. Williamson, 
 
 Octavius Knight, Irving Williamson, 
 
 And others. 
 
 Washington, July 4th, 1880. 
 Messrs. Bailey, Curriden, and others: 
 
 Gentlemen: In reply to your request, I submit the manuscript of 
 my discourse for publication. 
 
 Thanking you for the favorable opinion and just sentiments you ex- 
 press; Bharing with you, as well as the people of the whole country, 
 in the astonishment and sorrow of this day; and fervently praying 
 that this evil may be overruled for good — I remain, gentlemen, 
 Very truly, your friend, 
 
 B. SUNDERLAND. 
 
WMOtf- 
 
 Ezekiel VII.: 17. All hands shall "be feeble and all knees shall 
 
 be weak as water. 
 
 The event of yesterday has filled the land with a 
 new dismay. "All hands are feeble and all knees are 
 weak as water." 
 
 Assassination is the grimmest ghost that stalks 
 among the nations. Of all the spectres that haunt our 
 planet — to fill mankind with horror — none is more 
 demoniac. Well it is for human kind that the fell 
 spirit is hut rarely permitted to execute its fiendish 
 deeds. No sadder page does the muse of history 
 record. 
 
 When Caesar was slain the Roman people wor- 
 shipped him as a god ; when Henry IY. of France 
 was stabbed to the heart in the streets of Paris, his 
 death was mourned as a national calamity. When 
 Lincoln was laid low by the shot of a dastard stage- 
 player, his demise was an event which raised the 
 sympathetic indignation of the civilized world. 
 When Alexander II. of Russia was torn in pieces by 
 Nihilist torpedoes, a shudder ran through the nations 
 of Europe, the tremors of which still linger in the 
 hearts of men. 
 
 But who could dream that here in our peaceful, 
 
4 
 
 favored country, under the freest government on earth, 
 with so many severe struggles over-past, so many 
 deliverances wrought out, so many prosperities smil- 
 ing on every hand, so much happiness filling the 
 hearts and hopes of the people, the dreadful shadow 
 would break in upon us, the demon would spring- 
 again, as from the mouth of hell, and in a moment 
 cover the land with the darkness of terror, making 
 all hands feeble and all knees weak as water ? 
 
 On the very eve of the Nation's anniversary, when 
 the land should be filled with grateful jubilation, and 
 men should have occasion to speak proudly of the 
 position of the great Republic among this world's pow- 
 ers, ascribing to the God of our fathers the glory of 
 our establishment and the splendor of our progress — 
 here in his own Capitol, on a bright summer Satur- 
 day morning, before the eyes of men, women and 
 children, at a public station, through which he was 
 passing, bearing in his person the chief dignity of 
 the Magistracy- -that the President should be shot 
 down as if he were a dog; that the murderous hand 
 should bear an aim so cruel and then that the lips of 
 the demoniac should pronounce the deed " a political 
 necessity," is all so sudden, so startling, so appalling, 
 as to paralyze our very thoughts. In such a time 
 Rumor, hundred tongued, gives voice to imagination, 
 and public inquiry must await with patience the reso- 
 lution of the dreadful confusion. 
 
 Through day and night suspense has held her breath. 
 while the bulletins from the White House, where he 
 
lies, have announced the progress of his simple for 
 life; and while the Faculty arc using their utmost 
 skill to turn the trembling scale in his favor, the 
 heart of every christian in the land has been pouring 
 forth its prayer into the ears ofG-od that He will raise 
 up again the prostrate ruler of this people. One 
 touch of the Almighty linger can turn His servant 
 at this time from the issues of death ! 
 
 But what a spectacle! Around the couch of Gar- 
 field a procession files to-day with muffled tread and 
 tearful countenance. In that procession is the Fealty 
 of fifty millions of people to our form of government. 
 There is the woful lace of our National Constitution, 
 looking on the pallid and bleeding form of kirn in 
 whom it has been so brutally and basely desecrated ; 
 there I see the sad genius of our American Institu- 
 tions, bending in grief and shame at the outrage com- 
 mitted in the name of political necessity. There, too, 
 is the venerable and august presence of Civil Liberty, 
 weeping for the dishonor of her much-favored people ; 
 and there, in deepest sympathy of affliction, stand 
 Public Order, and Honest Labor, and Sober Industry, 
 and Eager Commerce, and Gold-Browed Finance, 
 each smitten with the shock ; each grieving with ap- 
 prehension ; yea, and all the Trades of Human Dis- 
 covery and Invention, the Sons of Literature and 
 Science, come bowing in anguish. 
 
 He was on his way to the Alma Mater, where ex- 
 pectation had long prepared for his coming, and where 
 in the classic halls of learning his laurel wreath 
 
6 
 
 awaited him. But more than this. May we not say 
 that over that bloody couch bend down at this mo- 
 ment the immortal shades of our fathers with looks 
 of lamentation ? Alas ! when they laid the founda- 
 tion of this free nation — when in the old historic Hall 
 they affixed their names to the Declaration, and when 
 they proclaimed it would be celebrated in all gene- 
 rations by "festivities, bon-fires, and illuminations," 
 how little did they imagine that the demon spirit 
 which had stained the roll of history with the crime 
 of regicide would ever assault the sovereignty of the 
 people in the person of their Chief Magistrate. 
 
 So, in this period dedicated to memories which 
 stir our minds with gratitude and pride, the paeans 
 turn to songs of mourning, the gladness is changed 
 to grief, mirth ceases from the land, and every pat- 
 riot's head hangs low with dread and shame. 
 
 How changed will be the tone of the pulpit and 
 the press through all the land to-day. This year of 
 marvels has now added to its portrait one foul blot 
 which cannot be effaced. The bullet of a bloody 
 man has laid low in the dust this great nation's pride 
 — and the Calends of July, 1881, will stand in the 
 records of time signalled with fiendish crime. 
 
 With such events staring us in the face, what heart 
 can we have, as a people, to celebrate our liberties ; 
 with such possibilities before us, in peaceful and quiet 
 limes, what civic honors can ever be safe; what 
 pleasing anticipations may be suddenly cut off. It 
 is thus, we find, alike with men and nations — the good 
 
and evil commingled, the mystery of darkness shad- 
 owing the brightest lines of human life. When on 
 this day we would have opened our mouth in glad- 
 ness, and made remembrance of our national historic 
 fame, and sounded the trumpet of the future, calling- 
 all hearts to omens of hope and deeds of heroic vir- 
 tue, we have suddenly to suppress our growing ardor 
 and give way to the anguish of deep humiliation. 
 
 But in the stillness of the dread hush which lies 
 upon the Nation, what lessons spring from the con- 
 templation of such a tragedy? What views should 
 be taken of an event like this ? The secular press 
 will no doubt fully express and diffuse the atheistic 
 notions prevailing in our times, and will discuss, with- 
 out reference to God or His providence, the nature 
 and influence of this flagitious crime. But it is the 
 duty of the Christian pulpit to direct the public mind 
 in those channels of sober thought which are opened 
 in the Christian theory of a Supreme Ruler guiding 
 the affairs of men, and working out from age to age 
 the sublime purposes of a Divine administration. 
 
 1. First, then, it may be said that the shooting of 
 the President was the work of a wretched adventurer, 
 who, broken in fortune and claiming some place 
 under the Government, was driven to desperation, 
 and who sought relief by an assault on the life of the 
 Chief Magistrate. That a man of right principles 
 and a sound mind could ever be induced to the per- 
 formance of such a deed is wholly inadmissible. The 
 
8 
 expressions which the homicide is reported to have 
 made on his arrest — the views announced by him in 
 a letter taken from his person, must be regarded as 
 the vaporings of an unbalanced intellect attempting 
 to justify his most heinous crime. He styles himself 
 a lawyer, a theologian and a politician. Under which 
 of these professions he would rank his infamous deed 
 he has not attempted to disclose. But any ascription 
 of the crime to either would be a libel on the truth, 
 and a horrid travesty on all the honorable pursuits of 
 men. Can, then, the irreligious science or philoso- 
 phy of our day explain the state of mind or trace the 
 effectual causes which led him to the act ? It is evi- 
 dent that his own explanation must be taken as simply 
 the baseless raving of a fanatic too vicious for sober 
 logic, and yet too studied to escape responsibility. 
 
 Yet I discover in an infidel book the follow- 
 ing exposition of a theme which bears directly upon 
 this point: "In the phenomena of mind we find 
 the same endless chain of efficient causes — the 
 same mechanical necessity. Every thought must 
 have had an efficient cause : every motive, every de- 
 sire, every fear, every hope and dream, must have 
 been necessarily produced. There is no room in the 
 mind of man for providence or chance. The facts 
 and forces governing thought are as absolute as 
 those governing the motions of the planets. 
 A poem is produced by the forces of nature, 
 and is as necessarily and naturally produced as mount- 
 ains and seas. You will seek in vain for a thought 
 
9 
 in Hum's brain without its efficient cause.— Every 
 mental operation is the necessary result of certain 
 facts and conditions. — Mental phenomena are consid- 
 ered more complicated than those of matter, and con- 
 sequently more mysterious. Being more mysterious 
 they are considered better evidence of the existence 
 of a God. No one infers a god from the simple - from 
 the known — from what is understood, but from the 
 complex, from the unknown and incomprehensible — 
 our ignorance is God. What we know is science. 
 When we abandon the doctrine that some infinite 
 Being created matter and force, and enacted a code 
 of laws for their government, the idea of interference 
 will be lost. The real priest will then be not the 
 mouth-piece of some pretended deity, but the inter- 
 preter of nature. From that moment the church 
 ceases to exist; the tapers will die ©ut upon the 
 dusty altar ; the moths will eat the fading velvet of 
 pew and pulpit; the Bible will take its place with 
 the Shastras, Puranas, Vedas, Eddas, Sagas, and 
 Korans, and the fetters of a degrading faith will fall 
 from the minds of men." 
 
 This is the blind and superficial doctrine of the 
 current evolution. It is the survival of the fittest in 
 the struggle for existence. It is the doctrine of pos- 
 itive fate and mechanical necessity- and, as applied 
 to the case before us, it is an imposition on the moral 
 and religious convictions of the whole country. What 
 place has an infidel philosophy in meeting a great 
 national calamity like this? How vain and vapid 
 
[0 
 are its reasonings ! How frigid and fruitless its con- 
 solations I 
 
 If the teaching above cited be true, then why has 
 the homicide been incarcerated ? Why is he held in 
 custody for a moment? He is as much a victim of 
 fate as the victim of his assault ; and courts of justice 
 are a mockery and criminal punishment an oppres- 
 sion. With what repugnance does the soul of the af- 
 flicted nation turn away from the maudlin vaporings 
 of atheism in such a day as this ! 
 
 2. But what is the Christian philosophy of this 
 event ? It is simply that which the Bible reveals — 
 an almighty and perfect moral Governor of the world T 
 who has created the human race and placed them 
 under His law as free moral agents ; who has given 
 them, within certain limitations, the power of choice, 
 and who holds them responsible for the exercise of 
 that choice. And so this same Supreme Ruler of the 
 world has divided the nations, both in time and space. 
 He raises up one and puts down another. He so 
 controls all things in His providence as to hold men 
 in themselves and in society amenable to His law for 
 the deeds they do ; and it is upon this righteous 
 principle of God's moral government that all enlight- 
 ened and civilized modern human government is 
 founded; and when society forgetst his principle; 
 when, through the influence of human depravity and 
 practical atheism, the laws and ordinances of heaven 
 are trampled underfoot ; when public discipline be- 
 comes lax, and the whole mass of the people — espec- 
 
11 
 
 ially the dregs of society — are delivered up to the free 
 license of vanity and conceit in the sacred name of God 
 and liberty ; when all social order is broken down. 
 and there is no more any veneration for authority in 
 the land — then a state of things has been prepared 
 in which such events as this may easily transpire ! 
 
 It is plain that the stroke which has now fallen on 
 the head of the nation has not made him the victim 
 on any merely personal grounds ; but as the repre- 
 sentative of the nation's authority, he lias been 
 smitten down by the hand of murder — and this hor- 
 rible deed has been permitted to take place, under 
 the providence of God, in order that the people of 
 this country and the world may learn the perils of 
 unbounded license as they have already learned those 
 of despotic tyranny in ages past; and the lesson 
 which springs from the day's disaster is one which 
 no system of atheistic philosophy would suggest — 
 namely, that it is unsafe to permit the domicile of the 
 magistrate, 01 the movements of his person, to be 
 haunted by fanatical tramps, hungry with greed of 
 office and maddened by disappointment to deeds of 
 desperation. 
 
 I hold that the powers which be are ordained of 
 God ; and that in this country those powers derived 
 from the people themselves, and expressed by their 
 representatives in the laws established, and in their 
 just and faithful administration, must be respected 
 and obeyed, in order to preserve society from utter 
 dissolution. But what are the actual facts of the 
 
12 
 case? Vice and irreligion abound on every hand ; 
 the Sabbath of God is with multitudes becoming a 
 thing of the past; intemperance and profanation of 
 all sacred things are wide-spread ; and a universal 
 greed of gain without labor has eaten at the core of 
 the public morals of the nation. In too many cases, 
 gambling speculation controls politics and legisla- 
 tion ; men high in popular favor have lent their in- 
 fluence to this demoralization ; the example of prom- 
 inent station has contributed to the growing laxity ; 
 the public press has only too often and too constantly 
 sneered at moral sentiments, indulged in the wildest 
 spirit of defamation, and prostituted its mighty pow- 
 ers in pandering to the basest passions ; the sanctions 
 of religion have been undermined, and the reverence 
 denied to God and his laws has been followed in too 
 many cases by the repudiation of all respect for the 
 obligations between man and man. 
 
 A gross instance of this laxity occurred in our 
 own city but a short time since, and to which I shall 
 take the liberty here to refer. A well-meaning citi- 
 zen propounded a question of Sabbath desecration to the 
 District authorities and they referred it to the law 
 officer for an opinion. His answer was a disgrace to 
 his profession, and an affront to the religious senti- 
 ment of the age. He cited, for the purpose of hold- 
 ing up to contempt, the statute on blasphemy — and 
 even ventured to impugn the Sabbath labors of the 
 Christian clergy. Be stated that the almost univer- 
 sal belief was that the Supreme Ruler of the universe 
 
L3 
 could not have His own way upon our globe, even 
 with such aid as man had been disposed to volunteer. 
 He quoted the penalties of the law which were, in 
 the judgment of the trainers of it, the measure of 
 such deserts — and in which we should only differ 
 from them in relegating them to the hancl of God him- 
 self; and he concluded by virtually admitting that no 
 competent Sabbath laws were in force among us — and 
 the whole Christian church sat by and made no pro- 
 test or sign of dissent whatsoever. 
 
 The fact is, we are all more or less responsible in 
 this community for such a state of things, when the 
 very officers of the law and custodians of the public 
 morals, with the tacit consent of the whole Christian 
 church, thus formally and officially cast down all the 
 sanctions of authority both human and divine. 
 What may we expect shall not transpire to pollute 
 the very soil on which we stand ! 
 
 3. But there is another lesson which this calamity 
 most deeply impresses — namely, the different values 
 in the lives of men and the perils which yet belong 
 the same to all. In this case it is bad enough at the 
 best. The career of the Chief Magistrate for a score 
 of years in public life, has been distinguished, and is 
 familiar to us all ; and whatever maybe men's views 
 of his policy and procedure since his inauguration, 
 no true American, of any class, will, for a moment, 
 seek to disparage the fact that he has risen to the 
 highest office of human fame, and stands clothed with 
 the majesty of the Executive power of a great people. 
 
14 
 To strike him down from his high office is to wound 
 the nation's very head. And when, on the other hand, 
 we turn to scrutinize the personal value of the life of 
 the assassin, what compensation might his death be 
 for the loss of the President of the United States ? 
 Life for life it may be ; but how unequal the ex- 
 change ! Amid what dangers do the most favored 
 walk when, as the great poet of nature writes — "An 
 eagle soaring in his pride of power is hawked at by 
 a mousing owl and killed." Whoever has strength 
 enough to pull a trigger and malice enough to assault 
 the fairest, proudest citadel of human life, can put in 
 jeopardy the very Chosen of the people — and there 
 is absolutely no adequate atonement. If the Presi- 
 dent should die then the miserable carcass of the as- 
 sassin may adorn the gallows. But if the President 
 should by any means survive, then his would-be mur- 
 derer would simply be domiciled in some house of 
 correction at government expense. And what satis- 
 far lion can this furnish for the commission of so great 
 a crime ! 
 
 Out of the bright hours and happy throngs of re- 
 joicing people — full of the plans and pleasures of the 
 coming days — this new anguish grows upon the Na- 
 tion, and the whole land shudders with a deep dread 
 of apprehension as to the hope of the morning suc- 
 ceeds the night's uncertainty and the gloom of mor- 
 tal suspense. And all this fearful change is wrought 
 as in a moment by a vagabond's bloody caprice. 
 They will doubtless attempt to shield him by prov- 
 
15 
 ing him a maniac. But maniac or not the gallows 
 should claim him for its own. The error of this 
 country, perhaps more than of any other, is lenity 
 toward criminals. And when a few more Presidents 
 are slaughtered perhaps the dilettanti dream of an illu- 
 sive humanitarianism may finally be dispelled and some 
 more competent punishment devised. Till then the 
 only price for an offence like this must be the con- 
 finement of the offender at public cost. 
 
 Yes, men may scoff at the idea of atonement under 
 the government of God, that sin may be destroyed 
 and the sinner live ; but look at the great characters 
 in human history, and the effect of th«ir death by 
 the hand of violence. They have been the foremost 
 men of all the world. It is a sad, strange thing that 
 only thus has the evil of the world been counter- 
 vailed. There must be sacrifice. It is the doctrine 
 of the New Testament, and the Supreme sacrifice 
 was Christ Himself. Never was there a truer say- 
 ing than this : the blood of the martyrs is the seed of 
 the church ; and I will add what has also been 
 proved in history, the blood of patriots is the seed of 
 the State. There are many who complain of the 
 despotism of the Church — the cruelty of the priest- 
 hood. They have yet to learn of the despotism of 
 the mob and the more fearful cruelty of the autocrat 
 of the pavement ! The liberalism of our day needs a 
 lesson in the volume of European communism and 
 nihilism, and there are men among us who are the 
 forerunners and abettors of this carnival of crime ; 
 
16 
 
 men who, by their public teachings, are corrupters 
 of society at its very foundations, and who, applauded 
 by listening thousands, are preparing this people for 
 the renewal of those old dreadful Roman days, so 
 vividly drawn in the mouth of the great conspirator, 
 Catiline : 
 
 ■Traitor, I go. but I return! Look to your hearths, my lords, for 
 there henceiorth shall sit for household gods shapes hot from Tar- 
 tarus — all shames and crimes — wan Treachery with his thirsty dagger 
 drawn— Suspicion poisoning his brother's cup — naked Rebellion, with 
 his torch and axe, making his wild sport of your blazing thrones till 
 Anarchy comes down on you like night, and Massacre seals Rome's 
 eternal grave! " 
 
 4. But the question ever returns : Why do of- 
 fences come ? Why this demon deed, like a bolt 
 from a clear sky ? In what mystery of evil must it 
 transpire ? In the reported query of the President 
 himself, "why did that man shoot me?" — who, in 
 answer to this question, can trace the working of a 
 disordered mind ? Will the infidel philospher tell us 
 it was a mechanical necessity ? Will the wretched 
 homicide himself tell us it was a political necessity ? 
 And one answer is equally satisfactory as the other 
 to the great, surging, palpitating heart of this nation 
 on this fair summer Sabbath day ! 
 
 But why, if God rules (and rules most surely He 
 docs), was such a deed permitted to fall like a leaden 
 wciidii upon our national name — staining the fair 
 escutcheon of America, and lowering the mighty flag 
 of the Republic to halt-mast on the country's proudest 
 day in all the year? 
 
 Why should the innocent be made to suffer by the 
 
17 
 hand of the guilty ? Why should the honored and 
 distinguished be laid low by the murderous acl of an 
 insignificant and crawling miscreant, prowling in the 
 very sanctuary of women, and watching his chance 
 for an immortality of infamy? Why docs the Al- 
 mighty Ruler of the Universe permit such things to 
 be, unless upon the principle that human agency is 
 free ? Men are moral beings, and are acting them- 
 selves out, and acting on one another to resolve the 
 stupendous problem of human life — so that good may 
 be evolved from evil ; so that nations may learn 
 more thoroughly the value of authority and subordi- 
 nation — the very marrow of tranquillity and peace ; 
 so that men may know that the. laws of God are the 
 only foundation on which the stability of States can 
 safely repose ; to stain the vanity of human pride ; 
 to show how greatness may be suddenly crippled by 
 littleness ; to show what small credit lies in all the 
 boasted glory of human progress ; to show that the 
 vaunted civilization of our times can be equally 
 shamed by deeds that once stained the barbarism, so 
 called, of former ages ; that human nature is the same 
 in all climes and centuries ; and that the Bible of the 
 Christian is God's faithful transcript of the history of 
 man on Earth, and that the muttering, peeping wiz- 
 ards of a shallow philosophy are the most arrogant 
 deceivers and most virulent enemies of mankind. 
 
 In this year of wonders — when the physical ele- 
 mentsseemto be astir with unwonted energy: when 
 the political elements in all nations are filling the 
 
18 
 hearts of men with perplexity and fear; when com- 
 ets blaze in the midnight sky, and tempests make 
 havoc of the homes of men ; when murder stalks 
 abroad in open day, and the honored head of a great 
 people lies in the anguish of his mighty struggle for 
 life itself — what ought to be the attitude of such a 
 people before the Supreme King of the world ? 
 There is, and there can be, but one rational reply. 
 . Let the feuds of party and the bickerings of 
 ambition have a pause. Let vice be arrested — 
 let corruption perish. Let blasphemy seal her lips. 
 Let the tongue of slander be paralyzed, and the 
 hand of detraction be palsied. Let the lying 
 spirit abroad in the land be made silent as the 
 grave. Let the church be purified and re-indoctrin- 
 ated in the saving truth and energy of the cross. 
 Let Sabbath profanation cease. Let the scourge 
 of intemperance no longer waste the country's gen- 
 ius and flower. Let humility take the place of 
 pride. Let infidelity hide its hideous head. Let 
 superstition and fanaticism be suppressed. Let the 
 wandering and infatuated people return to the sanc- 
 tuaries of God, and there, by the altars of prayer and 
 praise and worship, learn once more in penitence 
 and tears that the favor of the Omnipotent Jehovah 
 is the only buckler of a nation's prowess — the only 
 fortress of a nation's peace ! 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 The Washington Post, a prominent journal of the clay, had an edi- 
 torial commenting on a paragraph of this discourse, in its issue of 
 Tuesday, July 5, 1881. 
 
 As that article is personally dignified and respectful, and contains 
 some points in which I heartily concur, I take the liberty of adding 
 below'a communication which was prepared so soon as my attention was 
 called to it, but which, through some unavoidable delay, was 
 not sent to the conductors of that paper. 
 
 To the Editor of the Post. 
 
 My Dear Sir: In the rush of events, and the anxiety of these days, 
 I had not seen your comments of the 5th instant on a paragraph of 
 my last Sabbath discourse. In fact, my attention was c died to it by 
 a letter from a gentleman in Virginia received yesterday, and inspired 
 by his reading your article. He also sent me a pamphlet which he pub- 
 lished in New York not yet a month ago. 
 
 As to the tone and manner of your criticism I note no exception — un- 
 less it be that you have taken a single paragraph for the whole dis- 
 course. I perceive you hold the optimist view of the occurrence— and 
 surely it is more grateful to our nature to make the best of everything 
 — but you will agree with me that there is a time to mourn as well as 
 a time to dance. And does it not pertain to the christian pulpit to point 
 out the danger of society, and raise a voice of warning againt the evils 
 which threaten it? If the christian clergy may not, or ought not, to 
 do this, to what class of men shall we look? Many, I know, affect to 
 despise them as inferior in intellect, and incapable oi tracing causes 
 and effects; yet if this could be shown to demonstration, the clergy 
 might, possibly, be of some public utility — since we are told that on 
 one occasion it was the cackling of geese that saved Rome. 
 
 Every thoughtful man will seek to find, as far as possible, a final 
 cause for such^vents as that which the civilized world is now deplor- 
 ing. In this pursuit I ventured to give an interpretation to the dis- 
 pensation of Providence. But to this you take exception — as you 
 surely have the full liberty to do. You and I both believe in I lie su- 
 perintending Providence of God, and that by His purposes, either posi- 
 tive or permissive, He designs to deal with men and nations as moral 
 agents, capable of free choice, and responsible to law. We are not of 
 those who seek to sit in judgment on the Supreme Being, and with 
 vain hardihood speak of Him in terms of contempt and blasphemy. 
 
 But you think I have failed to draw the rightful lesson from the 
 premises; not because there is no lesson, but because the evil specified 
 does not in fact exist. 
 
 As to the perils of "unbounded license," were it agreed that such 
 an evil does exist I presume we should not differ. Nor do I imagine 
 you to dissent from the liability that this evil may come to exist, even 
 if it does not now, and in either case to be forwarned is to be fore- 
 armed. You will take notice that I have only discussed the tendency 
 
20 
 
 of the current state of things, without attempting to define the point to 
 which we have already reached. 
 
 Of course you are looking at the aspect from one stand-point and I 
 am looking at .t from another; and viewing it as I do, I must confess 
 that while my hope as a christian predominates, my fears as a citizen 
 arc many and great. 
 
 I fully agree witli you in the doctrine of toleration; but at the same 
 time I deplore many sentiments which seem to me to be most perni- 
 cious, and which, if they could prevail, would, in my opinion, inflict 
 the deepest injury upon society. 
 
 There are many points in your editorial which deserve candid con- 
 sideration, but I will only ask for space at this time to elucidate my 
 statement toward the close of the paragraph you cited trom the dis- 
 course — 
 
 "There are men among us who are the forerunners and abettors of 
 this carnival of crime, " &c. 
 
 This you emphatically deny, and declare that no class of men 
 among us teach assassination. While I perfectly agree with you that, 
 so far as now appears, the crime of this assassin should not be laid to 
 another man's door; and while it would be cruel to intimate or sug- 
 gest, at this time, that another human being had any knowledge or 
 thought of the murderer's intention; still records have been made in 
 this country, within the last few years, which I think would justify a 
 rational fear of the evil I pointed out. 
 
 From the pamphlet above referred to, I extract the following: 
 
 P. 91. " In the New York Weekly Herald of March 19lh, 1881, we 
 have the programme of Nihilism authenticated to us and taken from 
 the columns of the Journal of the Congress of Internationals not long 
 since convened at Berne, Switzerland." 
 
 After citing the creed of the Nihilist — which is "to destroy every- 
 thing, the good with the bad "—the writer follows with a reference to 
 New York Nihilism, and the proceedings of a large meeting convened 
 at the Steuben House, March 15th, 1881; and states that a preamble 
 and resolutions were adopted, the conclusion of which is in these 
 winds — "kill, destroy, assassinate, annihilate, even to the very germ, 
 your aristocracy. Have for them no feeling of love, for they are in- 
 capable of that noble emotion." 
 
 And prior to this, the writer states that a public lecturer (whose 
 name 1 now withhold for a similar reason to that given by the author- 
 ities for withholding the name of the person who furnished Guiteau 
 with money) said in a certain lecture, contained in a volume the page 
 of which is given, what will, no doubt, shock the public mind and 
 create surprise in unaccustomed quarters. The language is as fol- 
 lows: 
 
 " I suppose Alexander of Russia was put there by the order of God, 
 was he? I am sorry he was not removed by the Nihilist that shot at 
 him the other day. We telegraphed to that country congratulating 
 that wretch that he was not killed. * * * My sympathies cluster 
 around the point of the dagger! " 
 
 Mr. Editor, contemplate these utterances, and then say whether 
 my language was too strong tor the facts. "The voice of the raven" 
 ina\ he hoarse, hut I respeet fully submit if he is not a more seemly 
 bird at a funeral than the fowl of the Argus tail ? 
 Very truly, 
 
 B. SUNDERLAND. 
 July 8th, 1881. 
 
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 
 
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