QassJ: 
 
 Book_-JlifL 
 
Tia::E ^oxcm oif Tmn -rotd. 
 
 A SERMON 
 
 PREACHED ON THURSDAY, JUNE 1, 18G5, 
 
 ^t B* iorli %kmu lixMnm (Cljurtb, 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C, 
 
 The Rev. P. D. Gurlev, D. D., 
 
 PASTOR OP THE CHMROH. 
 
 WASHINGTON, D. C. : 
 
 WILLIAM BALLANTYNE, BOOKSELLER. 
 
 1865. 
 

 898 
 
CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 Washington City, June 1, 1865. 
 Rev. P. D. Gurley, D.D.. 
 
 Kev. and Dear Sir : At a meeting of the congregation to which you 
 minister, it was, on the motion of Brig. Gen. Eaton, seconded by Maj. 
 Gen. Casey, unanimously 
 
 Ecsolrcd, That the officers of the New York Avenue Presbyterian 
 Church be directed to request for publication a copy of the able and 
 singularly appropriate sermon delivered by our pastor, the Rev. P. D. 
 Cxurley, D. D., on this the day appointed by the President of the United 
 States as one of "humiliation and prayer." 
 
 The undersigned, officers of the New York Avenue Church, of Wash- 
 ington, saddened by the event — the assassination of our honored Chief 
 Magistrate, the late President Lincoln — which has made ours a nation 
 of mourners, and cordially endorsing the suggestive teachings which you, 
 as our under shepherd, called us in that connection this day to consider, 
 hasten to execute the expressed wish of your people, whose representa- 
 tives we are. 
 
 Hoping that you will, at an early day, place a copy of your discourse 
 at our disposal, that the important truths it contains may be more widely 
 disseminated, we are, very sincerely, your brethren, 
 
 JAMES P. TUSTIN, 
 J. McKENNEY, 
 JNO. M. McCALLA, 
 F. A. TSCHIFFELEY, 
 J. V. A. SHIELDS, 
 • JOS. A. DEEBLE, 
 WM. L. WALLER, 
 CHARLES STOTT, 
 
 Elders. 
 
 JAS. B. MUNRO, 
 GEO. J. MUSSER, 
 CAREY GWYNNE, 
 
 Deacons. 
 WILLIAM McLEAN, 
 JOSEPH W. NAIRN, 
 
 D. McClelland, 
 
 Trustees. 
 
REPLY. 
 
 Washington, June 3, 1865. 
 To the Elders, iJeacons, and Trustees of the Neio York Avenue Presby- 
 terian Church . 
 
 Dear Brethken : Your kind note, requesting for publication a copy 
 of the sermon preached by me on Thursday last, is before me. I yield 
 to your judgment, and to the judgment of the congregation you repre- 
 sent, touching the propriety of giving the discourse to the public in a 
 printed form, and send j^ou a copy herewith, according to your request. 
 May the blessing of God attend it, is my sincere and earnest prayer. 
 What thrilling and momentous events we have recently been called to 
 contemplate! What a sore and sudden bereavement we have recently 
 been called to bear! God speaks to us as He never spoke before. Let 
 us study the lessons He is teaching us, study them prayerfully, and lay 
 them to our hearts. 
 
 Truly your friend and pastor, P. D. GURLEY. 
 
SEPaiON. 
 
 " Hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it." — Micah, vi, 9 
 
 God is a father. He stands iu that relationship to us. When we 
 approach Him as suppliants, He permits us to say " Our Father 
 who art in heaven." He performs towards us and for us the j^a^t 
 of a father — and oh, how wisely and well does He perform it ! 
 He gives us food and raiment, shelter and protection, counsel and 
 guidance, education and discipline, comfort and blessing. Nay, 
 more: He gives us the rod of correction when we go astray; 
 gives it for our good, that He may remind us of our sins, re- 
 claim us from our wanderings, and incline us to walk more care- 
 fully and steadily in the way of his commandments, which is the 
 way of life and peace. The rod of correction and chastening — 
 our heavenly Father holds it in his hand, and He uses it betimes 
 for our profit, that we may be partakers of His holiness. His 
 ancient people, in the midst of their waywardness and wander- 
 ings, felt that rod fi*om time to time — felt it often and severely — 
 and as they suffered beneath its heavy inflictions, this mandate 
 came to them from heaven : " Hear ye the rod, and who hath 
 appointed it." We, the people of this land, have felt that same 
 rod ; we, too, have felt it often and severely ; we have felt it re- 
 cently — how keenly we have felt it! — we feel it to-day; and as 
 ice bow, and weep, and suffer beneath its heavy inflictions — per- 
 haps, I should say, beneath that latest and heaviest infliction of 
 all, the death of our lamented Chief Magistrate — the mandate 
 which comes to us from heaven is this : " Hear ye the rod, and 
 who hath appointed it." The rod, then, is not a thing of chance. 
 It is an appointment — an appointment of God. It is applied in 
 his own time, which is the best time, and in his own way, which 
 is the best way. The great national afiiictiou which brings us 
 here to-day did not come forth of the dust ; the trouble that so 
 
suddenly turned our gladness into mourning did not spring out 
 of the ground. It was the ordering of Him whose throne is in 
 the heavens, and whose kingdom ruleth over all. He appointed 
 the rod that smote us so unexpectedly. He struck the blow that 
 has clothed the nation in sackcloth. And we may depend upon 
 it that our views arc not right to-day, and our feelings are not 
 right, unless we are prepared to look through and beyond all the 
 second causes that operated in the case to the great First Cause, 
 and to say from our very hearts, " It is the Lord. The Lord 
 gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the 
 Lord." The text, moreovei", suggests that the rod of correction 
 is also a rod of instruction. It has a voice. It speaks. It teaches. 
 It proclaims timely lessons of wisdom and of warning, which we 
 are to consider and lay to our hearts. " Hear ye the rod," says 
 the Spirit of inspiration. Hear what it says. It is the voice, as 
 well as the hand, of God. While it smites it instructs. While 
 it bereaves it enriches. While it terrifies it also testifies. And 
 they that are wise will study its testimony, and understand it, and 
 derive such a blessing from it as will induce them to say in the 
 end, ''It is good for us that we have been afflicted." 
 
 It is ray simple purpose to-day to set before you, and urge you 
 to remember and improve, some of the lessons of wisdom and 
 warning which the chastening hand of God is now teaching us. 
 " Thar ye the. rod." And what is its language, its teaching, its 
 clear and impi-essive testimony ? I answer — 
 
 1. The rod of chastening which we feel to-day teaches us to 
 nck-noiclcdge and adore the sovereignty of God, He has smitten 
 us in a way and in such an hour as we thought not. Our late 
 President, by his administrative career of blended wisdom and 
 enei'gy, promptitude and patience, justice and mercy, had greatly 
 endeared himself to all the loyal people in the land. We had 
 learned to admire, and love, and ti'ust him. During four stormy 
 and perilous 3'ears ho had guided the ship of state so cautiously 
 and well that we desired to continue him at the helm for four 
 additional years ; and we felt that, having such a pilot, we should, 
 with the blessing of God, outlive the tempest and anchor at last 
 in tranquil waters, where the winds and waves of rebellion should 
 disturb and imperil us no more. Our eyes and hearts were 
 
turned to liim. His integrity commanded our confidence, and 
 his wise and timely utterances stimulated our patriotism and in- 
 spired our souls witli hope. " May he live to the end of his 
 term — live till the wounds of the nation are healed," was the 
 silent prayer of our hearts. But Grod's ways are not as our ways, 
 and His thoughts are not as our thoughts. In His wise and 
 mysterious providence He permitted a conspiracy to be formed 
 against the life of the nation's head, and He permitted the pur- 
 pose of the conspirators to be executed. The plan was carefully 
 laid, the time appointed, the place chosen, the means of escape 
 prepared, and,, when all things were ready, the fatal shot was 
 fired, and he whom the nation delighted to trust and to honor, 
 bowed his head, languished in utter unconsciousness for a few 
 brief h6urs, and then he was a corpse. Never did the wires of 
 the magnetic telegraph convey so sad a message to the people of 
 the land as was conveyed on that memorable morning. They 
 heard it, and were filled with horror; they considered it, and 
 wept in silence. They were so troubled that they could not 
 speak. They met one another upon the street, clasped hands, 
 burst into tears, separated, and returned to their homes to weep 
 there. " The victory that day was turned into mourning unto 
 all the people ;" and as they looked through their tears, with 
 trembling hearts, to heaven, they could only say, " How un- 
 searchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out." 
 And surely this must be our feeling and our language to-day. 
 As we review the events of that terrible Friday night, that night 
 of horrors, and then look around us and see the nation clothed 
 in mourning, and then remember that long funeral procession 
 that bore the remains of our murdered Chief to Springfield, and 
 then feel that our bereavement is a reality and not a dream, that 
 he is verily gone, and we shall see his face no more, it must 
 needs be that we acknowledge and adore the sovereignty of Grod, 
 and that we understand as we never understood before the force 
 of such Scriptural records as these : " Our God is in the heavens j 
 He hath done whatsoever He pleased." " He doeth according to 
 His will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the 
 earth ; and none can stay His hand, or say unto Him, What doest 
 Thou '/" '' How great are His signs ! and how mighty are His 
 
wonders !" '' Clouds and darkness are round about Him; righteous- 
 ness and judgment are the habitation of his throne." It is said 
 that when the multitudes were looking upon the remains of our 
 departed President in Philadelphia, a venerable and intelligent 
 colored won an came up, and having gazed for a moment upon the 
 faded form as it lay silent and lifeless in its coffin, she clasped her 
 hands in agony, while her tears were flowing fast, and exclaimed 
 with a loud voice, " 0, Abraham Lincoln I Are you dead ? Are 
 you dead ?" You may imagine, if you can, but I cannot under- 
 take to describe the effect of this exclamation upon all who heard 
 it. Many a time within the last few weeks have we all felt as she 
 felt, and our hearts, if not our lips, have said, " 0, Abraham Lin- 
 coln! Are you dead? Are you dead?" Yes, he is dead; and 
 his death has plunged us into the lowest depths of sorrow. But 
 our affliction is from God. '' Shall there be evil in a city, and the 
 Lord hath not done it ?" "What saith the High and Lofty One in 
 these Lively Oracles? "I form the light and create darkness; I 
 make peace and create evil ; I, the Lord, do all these things." And 
 again He says : " Hear the rod, and who liatli appointed it." In 
 several different places, as we pursued that sad and never-to-be- 
 forgotten journey to Springfield, did I see this touching and appro- 
 priate inscription : " Be still, and know that I am God " — showing 
 that under the pressure of sorrow the people were recognizing 
 and adoring the Divine sovereignty. Let us do the same to-day. 
 While we weep, let us bow and worship, and say to Him who has 
 smitten us, " We know, God, that Thy judgments are right, 
 and that in faithfulness Thou hast afflicted us." Has the rod a 
 voice ? Does it speak ? Does it teach while it smites ? Sure 
 am I that a part, and an important part, of what it teaches us is 
 this : " Be still, and know that I am God." 
 
 2. The rod of chastening which we feel to-day teaches us the 
 duty of depending upon God icith an exclusive and an ahiding 
 confidence. Perhaps we were leaning too much upon our wise 
 and patriotic President. Perhaps our devotion to him and our 
 confidence in him were rendering us too unmindful of that High 
 and Holy and Mighty One in whom are all our springs, and with- 
 out whom we can do nothing. In the flush and joy of victory, 
 perhaps we forgot to acknowledge Him as we ought, to praise Him 
 
as we ought, and to ask Him to be with us and help us to the end. 
 We rejoiced, but not with that trembling which became us in 
 view of our weakness, our wanderings, and our sins. We needed 
 something to arrest, and solemnize, and humble us — something to 
 lead us to feel as we had never felt before, and to acknowledge as 
 we had never acknowledged before, that the favor of God, even 
 after the battle had been fought and the victory won, was our only 
 security. And what we needed we received. The rod of chasten- 
 ing fell upon us suddenly, fearfully — and behold, the man to 
 whom we had extended so much of our confidence, and upon 
 whom we had centered such large and lively hopes, was no more. 
 It was a gloomy, an unlooked-for. a momentous, a perilous crisis. 
 And to whom could we go but unto Grod ? How helpless 'We felt I 
 how utterly in the hands and at the disposal of an overruling 
 Providence ! What a realizing sense we had in that hour of our 
 perils and our dependence I With humility, as well as grief, we 
 bowed before the Majesty of heaven, and every one of us said, 
 with deeper, stronger emotions than we had felt before, even in 
 the darkest days of our civil strife, 
 
 " Bly spirit looks to God .alone ; 
 My rock aud refuge is Ids throne ; 
 lu all niy fears, in all my straits, 
 5Iy soul on liis salvation waits." 
 
 So we felt when cmr trial first came, and, I trust, the solemn ser- 
 vices and remembrances of this day will but deepen and intensify 
 the feeling of utter dependence upon God in every one of our 
 hearts. Let us revert a moment to the history of the past. When 
 the war was opening, and our chosen leader was entering upon 
 hi§ grave and responsible duties, he recognized his dependence 
 upon God and solicited an interest in our praj-ers. And what did 
 we do ? AVe bore him earnestly and often before the throne of 
 mercy upon the arms of faith and love. All the .loyal and pray- 
 ing people in the land sent up their petitions for him day and 
 night with earnestness and tears Never before was any Presi- 
 dent so remembered and prayed for in the closet, the sanctuary, 
 and around the family altar; and never before was any President 
 so sustained, and guided, and made a blessing to his country, to 
 liberty, to the world. He lived till the war was over and the 
 
 2 
 
victory gained, and then his work was done. And now another 
 stands in his place, to gather and preserve the legitimate fruits of 
 victor}'-, to repair abounding desolations, and re-establish our 
 lately imperilled nationality upon a sure and enduring foundation 
 — a foundation of liberty and righteousness, of unity and peace. 
 And what can we, what should we do for him ? Just what we 
 did for his distinguished predecessor. Acknowledge his depend- 
 ence and the nation's dependence upon God, and bear him up to 
 God day and night by faith and prayer, that an arm more than 
 human may sustain him, and a wisdom more than human may be 
 his guide. Yes, we must begin again now, just as we began four 
 years ago, by looking earnestly and prayerfully to God, and we 
 must continue now, just as we continued through the long and 
 bloody strife, looking earnestly and prayerfully to God, and we 
 must plead now for the new Pi-esidcnt just as we pleaded for the 
 late President, that God will furnish him for his mission, and 
 spare him till it be accomplished. And, if I mistake not, this is 
 a part of the teaching, the message, which comes to us to-day as 
 we weep in the furnace of trial. '^ Hear ye the rod," my breth- 
 ren. It speaks — speaks to the nation — speaks to us. And what 
 is its testimony ? It says, " Cease ye from man, whose breath is 
 in his nostrils ; for wherein is he to be accounted of ?" Ttsays, 
 " Trust ye in the Lord forever : for in the Lord Jehovah is ever- 
 lasting strength." It says, " Cast thy burden upon the Lord, 
 and he shall sustain thee." It says, " Continue in prayer." It 
 says, " Still acknowledge your dependence upon God, and still 
 commit the nation, with its rulers, and people, and all its precious 
 interests, unto Him, and He will fikish the work of deliverance, 
 and ordain peace, and continue to do great things for you whereof 
 you shall be glad." It is even so. Unless we have studied the 
 matter to no purpose, the rod of chastening which we feel to-day 
 is teaching us renewedly the duty of depending upon God and 
 waiting before Him as suppliants with an exclusive and an abid- 
 ing confidence. 
 
 8. Again, the rod of chastening which we feel to-da}' suggests 
 to us that ivhcn a great mission is to be accomplished /or God and 
 humanity, it is sometimes necessary that he who accomplishes it 
 shoidd also seal it icith his hlood. History is full of illustrations 
 
11 
 
 of this thought. We refer you to two or three : Abel had a ' 
 mission to acoamplish-r-a momentous mission. It was to exhibit, 
 in the infancy of the world and to all the subsequent ages, the 
 great doctrine of justification by faith in the blood of atone- 
 ment — the great truth that there is no acceptance for sinners' 
 with God unless they come to Him in the name and through the 
 merits of Him who is the divinely appointed sacrifice for sin, 
 wounded for their transgressions and bruised for their iniquities. 
 He understood this principle; he embraced it; he adhered to it 
 in the face of peril and persecution. But this was not enough. 
 It was necessary that he should seal it with his blood. 
 He did so seal it; and that sealing gave it an impress of power 
 beyond the ability of man to estimate. John the Baptist had a 
 mission — ^a momentous mission. It was fo prepare the way of 
 the Lord, to tell the Jewish people their sins, exhort them to 
 repentance, baptize them with water as a symbol of needed 
 spiritual purification, and proclaim in their hearing, " He that 
 cometh after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not 
 worthy to bear. He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and 
 with fire." He performed his duty, performed it boldly, earn- 
 estly, and well. But that was not enough. It was necessary 
 that he should seal his mission with his blood. He did so seal it; 
 and that .sealing gave it an influence over the minds and hearts 
 of men which it could have derived from no other source. 
 Stephen hatl a mission— a moiiifintous mission. It was to testify 
 for Christ iiiJerusalem, and before the Jewish Sanhedrim. It 
 was to defend the inauguration of the new, the Christian dispen- 
 sation, and show that the teachings of the Apostles respecting it 
 were in exact and beautiful harmony with all the teachings of 
 God, and all his dealings with the Church from the beginning. 
 He bore his testimony boldly, faithfully. But that was not enough. 
 It was necessary that he should seal it with his blood. He did so 
 seal it. And who shall tell us how much that sealing had to 
 do with the subsequent spread and triumph of the gospel? All 
 the Apostles had a mission — a glorious mission of power, and 
 love, and blessing to the world. They told the story of the cross; 
 they proclaimed the character and urged the claims of the 
 Crucified in the hearing of Jews and Gentiles; they besought 
 
12 
 
 men in Christ's stead to be reconciled to God; they were fearless 
 and faithful in all their ministry, and they shunned not to 
 declare unto sinners " all the counsel of God." But that was 
 not enough. They, too, must seal their mission with their blood. 
 ^yith perhaps a single exception they did so seal it. And 
 who shall tell us how much that sealing had to do with the 
 renowned and subsequent victories of Christianity in every part 
 of the Roman Empire ? All the martyrs of the early Church had a 
 mission — a blessed mission. They also were witnesses for Christ. 
 They loved Ilini, they honored Ilim, they clung to Him, and they 
 could not deny Ilim. But that was not enough. They must seal 
 their testimony with their blood. Thoy did so seal it. And the 
 effects of that sealing were so beneficent and abounding that it 
 soon became a proverb in Zion, " The blood of the martyrs is 
 the seed of the Church." It was precious seed; God blessed 
 the springing thereof, and it yielded a long succession of harvests 
 to the praise of the glory of His grace. In all these ipstances 
 the sealing of blood completed the antecedent mission of truth 
 and love, sanctified it, crowned it with glory, and made it precious, 
 memorable, and powerful forever. Is not the same thing true, 
 manifestly true, in the case of our murdered President? He, 
 too, had a mission — a momentous mission; a mission for liberty, 
 for humanity, for his country, and his God. God raised him up 
 for it, prepared him for it, gave him wisdom and energy, and 
 firmness and patience to accomplish it — permitted him to see the 
 end of the war, the end of slavery, and the dawning glories of a 
 brighter and a better day. But that was not enough. He, too, 
 must seal his mission with his blood. He did so seal it. And 
 that sealing has sanctified it, crowned it with glory, and made it 
 precious, memorable, and powerful forever. That sealing attaches 
 sanctity now to all that he ever said and did for the cause of 
 truth and justice, of law and order, of liberty and good govern- 
 ment. It imparts a new power to his example and life, uev/ 
 interest to his speeches and proclamations, a new value to every 
 principle he announced and defended ; and it inspires every 
 patriotic heart in the land with a new and a firmer resolve that 
 the Republic shall live, and that its bondsmen shall be free. 
 Nay, more : that sealing has attracted the gaze and moved the 
 
13 
 
 heart of the world. Surrounding nations have seen it, and while 
 their sympathies are aroused for a weeping people so suddenly 
 Ijereft of their wise and honored head, they will not forget the 
 cause for which he died. They will now consider the claims of 
 that cause as they never considered tliem before, and judge be- 
 tween it and its enemies as they never judged before, and rejoice 
 with us, that though our President is dead, liberty survives, and 
 our national life is secure. Many eyes in distant lands are turned 
 in tearful sympathy to-day towards that new-made grave iu 
 Springfield. They will be turned there for years and years to 
 come 5 and we may well say, as we gather in imagination arouud 
 that loved and lonely tomb, 
 
 "This consecrated spot shall be 
 To Freedom ever dear; 
 And Freedom's sous of every race 
 Shall weep and worehip here." 
 
 Many hearts in distant lands are with us to-day as we mourn our 
 martyred Chief, and they unite with us in the petition, 
 
 " Grant that the cause for which ho died 
 May live forevermore." 
 
 And if it be true, my hearers, that the blood of our assassinated 
 President is the seed of liberty and truth, and that our loss is 
 gain to the cause he loved and served so well — then, while we 
 mourn to-day, we should not murmur, and, while we weep, we 
 should not complain. " Hear ye the rod ;" and remember one of 
 its lessons is, that icJien a great viission is to be accomplished for 
 God and Immanify, it is sometimes necessary, in order to secure 
 the largest and lest resxdts therefrom, that he u-ho accomplishes it 
 should also seal it tcith his blood. 
 
 4. Again, the chastening rod which we feel to-day suggests to 
 us tchat is the real, tendency/, and ichat are the diabolical cajpa- 
 bilities and achievements of that combined spirit of treasoti and 
 slavery icith ichich ice have been contending for the last four years. 
 We have seen it strike at the life of the nation with a malicious 
 and a persistent vigor that filled us with wonder. We have seen 
 it madly bent upon the overthrow, at any and every cost, of the 
 mildest and best government the world ever saw. We have seen 
 it, for this very purpose, inaugurating and cruelly protracting a 
 
14 
 
 war tliat has filled the land with mourning. We have seen it 
 chanting the praises of slavery and declaring it to be the great 
 mission of the South to keep four millions of human beings, with 
 their descendants, in bondage. We have seen it cursing and de- 
 nouncing and laboring to desti'oy a Union of States, which, under 
 God, has placed us in the foremost rank of free and prosperous 
 nations. We have seen it commissioning incendiaries to burn 
 our largest cities in the night. We have seen it leaving our iin- 
 fortunate and sufieriug prisoners without food and shelter till 
 they died, or sending them back to us in such a condition, physi- 
 cal and mental, that it were a relief to see them die. And now 
 at the last we have seen it cap the climax of all its crimes and 
 atrocities by assassinating the man whose lips and life were vocal 
 with the utterance, " With malice towards none, with charity for 
 all." It is enough. The blindest can see now, and all the world 
 can see, that the spirit with which we have been contending is 
 the very spirit of darkness and of the pit of darkness. It began 
 with perjury and theft; it culminated in murder; and now, a 
 spectacle and a horror to the world, its true character revealed, 
 and its infernal origin and destination demonstrated, nothing re- 
 mains for it but a few expiring struggles and a death that will fill 
 both earth and heaven with joy. Thanks be to God who has 
 given us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ ! Thanks be 
 to God that the blow which prostrated the President was the last 
 desperate effort of a defeated fiend, who, having failed to kill the 
 nation, could only kill the nation's head, and thereby render his 
 own destruction the more sure and speedy. " Hear ye the rod." 
 It unmasks the enemy with which we have been contending, re- 
 veals the fearfulness of the perils we have escaped, the value of 
 the victory we have won, and bids us look up to-day and say to 
 the God of our salvation with hearts deeply and tenderly thank- 
 ful, " Not unto us, Lord, not unto us, but unto thy name give 
 glory, for thy mercy and for thy truth's sake." 
 
 5. Finally, the rod of chastening which we feel to-day suggests 
 a lesson touching the character and influence of the theatre, which 
 we should note and remember. It will always be a matter of deep 
 regret to thousands that our lamented President fell in the theatre ; 
 that the dastardly assassin found him, shot him there. Multitudes 
 
15 
 
 of his best friends — I mean his Christian friends — would have 
 preferred that he should have fallen in almost any othet place. 
 Had he been murdered, in his bed, or in his oflSce, or on the 
 street, or on the steps of the Capitol, the tidings of his death 
 would not have struck the Christian heart of the country quite so 
 painfully ; for the feeling of that heart is that the theatre is one of 
 the last places to which a good man should go, and among the very 
 last in which his friends would wish him to die. Little or nothing 
 has been said upon this subject in the pulpit or by the religious 
 press; but it is one of the eases in which silence is more expressive 
 than words, and, therefore, I shall say no more. T ask you, how- 
 ever, to consider this : when a murderous conspiracy has been 
 formed, and the assassination of the President has been resolved 
 upon, and the conspirators are looking for a suitable person to 
 perform the dreadful deed, to strike the fatal blow, or fire the 
 fatal shot, where do they find him ? Who is the man they select ? 
 To whom is the dark and hellish work committed ? To a man 
 schooled and' trained in the fhea/re. He is just the agent suited 
 to the occasion, just the bold, and daring, and practiced actor, 
 who can steal behind his victim, skilfully lodge the fatal bullet 
 in his brain, bound quickly and adroitly away, stalk defiantly 
 across the stage, brandish a dagger, shout ^'Sic semper ttjraU' 
 nis,''' and mysteriously disappear. Just what we might ex- 
 pect from such a character, trained in such a place, maddened 
 with disloyalty, heated with liquor, and M.secZ to the exciting and 
 tragic scenes of the theatre. Surely a place where such men are 
 trained and fitted for such atrocious deeds of death is not a proper 
 resort for you, my hearers, or for those you love. For my own 
 part, I have always regarded the theatre as in the main a school 
 of vice and corruption — the illumined and decorated gateway 
 through which thousands are constantly passing into the embrace 
 of gaiety and folly, intemperance and lewdness, infamy and ruin. 
 I have always hated and avoided it, and taught my children to 
 avoid it, on account of its character and influence, its associations 
 and accompaniments, its misleading, corrupting, and demoral- 
 izing tendencies; but henceforth it will be more odious to me 
 than ever before. Jlay it be odious to you. I deem this a suita- 
 ble occasion to lift my voice against it, and to exhort you to num- 
 ber it from this day forth among the polluting, perilous, and pro- 
 
hibited places where you and your children must never be found. 
 And as for yonder building stained with the blood of him for 
 whom the nation mourns to-day, let Aceldama be written upon 
 its walls, and let it stand for years to come as it now stands, 
 silent, gloomy, forlorn, more like a sepulchre than a place of 
 amusement, saying to all the passers-by, " Here the greatest crime 
 of the age was committed, and 'committed by one who was ad- 
 dicted to tragedy and had made the stage his home." 
 
 And now, having considered some of the lessons which God is 
 teaching us hy the voice of the rod, let us unite in the prayer that 
 these lessons may be sanctified and made a blessing to us all. 
 May they be sanctified to rulers and people, to all the people, to 
 all our rulers from the highest to the lowest, so that we shall be 
 the better and not the worse for our sudden and sore bereavement. 
 What wo need now, and what the whole country needs, is an in- 
 fluence from above — a season of refreshing from the presence of 
 the Lord. This, more than anything else, will heal alienations, 
 soften down asperities, lead the guilty to repentance, bege£ in the 
 hearts of all a spirit of kindness and conciliation, of forgiveness 
 and love, and hasten that blessed day when revolted States shall 
 return to their allegiance, and we shall be once more a united and 
 happy people. We have received a baptism of blood, copious, 
 protracted, tei'rible ; that it may be followed, and that right 
 eai-ly, by the precious and purifying baptism of the Holy Spirit. 
 " Come, Holy Spirit, come " — come to every heart and habitation 
 in the land, and do us the good we need. Brethren, join me to- 
 dayWn the prayer of the Pi'ophet and of Inspiration : " Lord, 
 revive Thy work in the midst of the years, in the midst of the 
 years make known ; in wrath remember mercy." " Wilt Thou 
 not revive us again, that Thy people may rejoice in Thee V 
 " Return, Lord, how long ? and let it repent Thee concerning 
 Thy servants. satisfy us early with Thy mercy, that we may 
 rejoice and be glad all our days. Make us glad according to the 
 days wherein Thou hast afflicted us, and the years wherein we 
 have seen evil. Let Thy work appear unto Thy servants and Thy 
 glory unto their children. And let the beauty of the Lord our 
 God be upon us; and establish Thou the work of our hands upon us ; 
 yea, the work of our hands establish Thou it." Amen and Amen.