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 God ! s Voice and the Lessons It 
 Tsr-chos: n ^erinorj Prerched on 
 the Occasion of the Dssth of 
 Gsnere 1 Taylor 
 
 ' By 
 
 i 3
 
 
 AT LOS ANGELES 
 
 ROBERT ERNEST COWAN
 
 " 
 
 '.'.i VMiirr. unit tlir Imim it farljrs. 
 
 A SERMON., 
 
 I 'UK ACHED ON THE OCCASION OK THE DEATH 
 
 (MINERAL TAYLOK, 
 
 
 uv Tin: 
 
 REV. D. MAGIE, D. D. 
 
 DEDICATED TO HIS PEOPLE. 
 
 AT THE REQUEST OF SOME OF WHOM TT IS NOW PfRLISHF.]!, SLIGHTLY Cll 
 
 AM) ENI,AKi;i.:i> --IMF. ITS \t\AA\ L II \' . 
 
 NEW-YORK : 
 'I IN F. TROW, PRINTER, 49, 51 & 53 ANN-STREET. 
 
 I CC.L.
 
 itt, mift tjp ICwns it farjjm 
 
 A SERMON, 
 
 PREACHED ON THE OCCASION OF THE DEATH 
 
 OF 
 
 GENERAL TAYLOR, 
 
 LATE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES. 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. D. MAGIE, D. D. 
 
 DEDICATED TO HIS PEOPLE. 
 
 AT THE REQUEST OF SOME OF WHOM IT IS NOW PUBLISHED, SLIGHTLY CHANGED 
 AND ENLARGED SINCE ITS DELIVERY. 
 
 NEW-YORK : 
 JOEIN F. TROW, PRINTER, 49, 51 & 53 ANN-STREET. 
 
 M.DCCC.L.
 
 SERMON. 
 
 MICAH vi., 9. The Lord's voice crieth unto the city, and the man of wis- 
 dom shall see thy name ; hear ye the rod, and who hath appointed it. 
 
 TRUE patriotism, scarcely less than sound piety, will lead 
 
 us to mark the footsteps of the Almighty in great public 
 
 events. We are not only servants of the Most High God, but 
 
 citizens of a free and favored land ; and as such are bound to 
 
 take a lively interest in whatever concerns the common wel- 
 
 , fare. Any thing that stirs the sensibilities of the country, and 
 
 ! plunges the nation into grief, may well be made the theme of 
 
 .pulpit inquiry and address. 
 
 We all feel that it would be criminal to suffer so instruc- 
 j tive a calamity as that which has recently befallen us, to pass 
 | without notice. Our beloved Chief Magistrate, honored and 
 : revered even more for his noble personal qualities than for the 
 | high military and civil stations he held, has been suddenly 
 cut off from the land of the living and laid low in the dust. 
 While office was still new to him, and the laurel unfaded on 
 his brow, the destroyer came to do his allotted work. The 
 country is in tears, and the speaker but falls in with the 
 sorrowful emotions of a whole bereaved people, when he seeks 
 to turn the general lamentation into a useful channel. A sub- 
 ject is assigned us, and all we have to do is to illustrate and 
 apply it as best we can. 
 
 God himself is speaking, and it becomes us all, high and 
 low, rich and poor, to stand in awe, and keep silence before him. 
 His voice cries to the metropolis of the land, and through that, 
 
 304825
 
 as a common centre, sends out its notes of warning and in- 
 struction to every city, town, and village, in our widely ex- 
 tended Union. And we shall be wanting to ourselves, as well 
 as wanting in respect for the memory of a great man, if our 
 ears are not open and our hearts attentive. 
 
 This is an event so serious in its nature, and so far-reaching 
 in its influence, as deeply to impress every thoughtful mind. 
 No one could be taken from a position so elevated the in- 
 cumbent of an office in comparison with which titles and 
 crowns are but gewgaws without making a breach ; and, 
 least of all, could such a man as Zachary Taylor. Well may 
 we exclaim : How are the mighty fallen ! and how is the glory 
 of the land perished in its high places ! It would argue a cri- 
 minal disregard to the operation of God's hands, not to pause 
 and reflect on so unlooked-for and portentous an event. "We 
 must not be so stunned and confounded by the blow, as to 
 fail to inquire into the reasons for its having been inflicted. 
 
 The mere political aspects of this affecting providence will 
 be left, as of right they should be, to other lips and other occa- 
 sions. But there are two points which may well claim atten- 
 tion here : Why is the late calamity to be regarded as the voice of 
 the Lord? and what are some of the lessons it seems intended to en- 
 force? These topics fall within the legitimate scope of the 
 preacher, and it will be his effort to treat them in a way befit- 
 ting the place and the day. 
 
 I. Why are we to regard the visitation, over which the land 
 mourns, as the voice of the Lord ? 
 
 That the Almighty has been speaking, and speaking with 
 unusual emphasis, no one has the hardihood to deny. 
 The event came like a clap of thunder in a cloudless sky ; 
 and as the tidings spread, with the speed of the lightning's 
 flash, from one end of the country to the other, it seemed like 
 the utterance of Deity himself. Senators rose in their place 
 acknowledging the hand of God, and expressing the hope that 
 we might still be borne onward and upward by the wings 
 of his kind providence. The representatives of the people 
 were for the moment awed into sobriety, and freely admitted
 
 that God had taken from us him on whom our hearts were 
 fixed in the hour of peril. Almost every press, secular as 
 well as religious, responded to the general sentiment : surely, 
 this is the finger of God. 
 
 Never before, since the organization of our government, 
 except on a single occasion, had such an event befallen us. 
 The brave and gentle Harrison, of whom the country enter- 
 tained the most sanguine expectations, and whose elevation 
 to the Presidency was hailed by a universal thrill of joy, 
 was called to surrender the staff of office while it was still fresh 
 in his hand. One short month was all that was allotted him 
 for the occupancy of his high seat before he was cast down 
 into the dust of death. Hardly had the sound of rejoicing 
 ceased at his unparalleled success, ere news reached us which 
 disappointed our fond hopes, and turned a nation's gladness 
 into grief. This was then a novel event in the country's an- 
 nals. But he who looketh upon the mountains and they melt, 
 and who toucheth the hills and they smoke, has come forth 
 again from his secret places to break the pride of our power. 
 For the second time, since Washington occupied the great 
 chair of state, has that chair been shrouded in the vesture of 
 the tomb. 
 
 Ordinary occurrences, though equally under the control of 
 Divine Providence, do not thus affect us. We can see the 
 foliage of our shrubbery scattered over the ground, and the 
 limbs of our fruit-trees twisted and broken, without any very 
 deep impression of the force of the wind. But not so when 
 the mighty oak, the giant of the forest, is uprooted from 
 its hidden fastnesses, and lies prostrate on the earth. Here is 
 something which tells us with what majestic power the tem- 
 pest moves. Thus it is in the present instance. Calamities 
 which are scarcely noticed, when confined to the humble and 
 obscure, are found to arouse attention, and awaken solicitude, 
 when they crush the hopes of a country. 
 
 It would seem as if God had resolved that men, willing or 
 unwilling, should see and should acknowledge his uplifted 
 hand. Death has of late been riding on his pale horse through 
 the capital of the land ; and I need not tell you how many
 
 shining victims he has selected among our great men before he 
 ventured to strike this last, this most fearful blow. No won- 
 der that levity puts on an aspect of seriousness, and that semi- 
 unbelievers are compelled to admit that this is the voice of the 
 Lord. How could it be otherwise, when the reasons for thus 
 thinking are so obvious and striking ? 
 
 To be convinced of this, look at the elevated position of the 
 man who has just been cut down as the grass, and withered as 
 the green herb. That such an event, connected with exalted 
 station and commanding influence, should affect us more 
 deeply than a similar calamity in private life, is agreeable to 
 the dictates both of reason and of Scripture. It is no symbol of 
 unmanly adulation, nor cringing before honor and office, for 
 the nation to bow its head and weep at a time like this. The 
 catastrophe, stripped of its appendages, is indeed just such an 
 one as is daily happening to multitudes of families in the land. 
 It is no new thing for a husband to lie on the bed of death, with 
 a fond wife kneeling in anguish at his side, or for a father to 
 call his children in and give them his parting benediction. 
 Scenes of this sort are familiar to the eye of afflicted humanity 
 the world over. 
 
 We have all visited sick chambers, and seen dying couches, 
 and walked in funeral processions. These are no strange 
 things in a world into which sin early entered, and where 
 death has been following in its train, from generation to gene- 
 ration. " The last of earth" is reached in cottages as well as 
 mansions. 
 
 But in the more retired walks of life, these distressing 
 incidents are confined to a small circle. If the grief be 
 equally sincere and deep, it cannot be so general. The hopes 
 of a family are crushed, and the happiness of a domestic 
 group is destroyed, but no sensation is awakened through the 
 land, no shock is given to the machinery of the social system. 
 Surrounding waters soon fill the cavity made by the plough- 
 ing keel, and all is level and smooth again. But the case is 
 different when death arrests one, on whom the eyes of 
 twenty millions of freemen are fixed, and who exerts an influ- 
 ence for weal or for woe over half a continent. When such
 
 a man falls, suddenly and unexpectedly, we can hardly help 
 feeling, that in his fall we hear the voice of the Lord, power- 
 ful and full of majesty. I trust in God it may not be a pre- 
 lude to thunderings and lightnings and tempests. 
 
 Again, reflect for a moment on the rare personal qualities 
 of the individual who has thus disappeared from among men. 
 It is not easy to give the character of General Taylor in a 
 single sentence, but all who have had the privilege of access 
 to him agree in the testimony, that he was emphatically one 
 of nature's noblemen. There was nothing showy, nothing 
 vapoury, nothing pretending about him. Plain in his man- 
 ners, honest and earnest in his principles, and simple in the 
 workings of his mind, his was very naturally the reputation 
 of an actor rather than a talker. Only give him something 
 to do; let difficult work be set before him; place him in 
 trying circumstances, and he was sure to equal the greatest 
 emergency. Never did he disappoint the hopes of his friends 
 never did he fail to overmatch the efforts of his enemies. 
 Washington was not eloquent Franklin never made a long 
 speech. 
 
 This man is called a successful hero, and so he was. But 
 what under God made him successful ? It was just that com- 
 bination of solid qualities, leading him to do more than he 
 said, to perform more than he promised, which would have 
 fitted him, and did actually fit him, for any position of diffi- 
 culty and responsibility. Half his worth is not seen when we 
 contemplate him as a star of hope on the battle-field. We 
 are not permitted to pry into futurity, but time may yet de- 
 cide that his counsels in the Cabinet embrace the great prin- 
 ciples on which the questions now agitating the land, must 
 be settled, if settled at all. I must say, the more I study his 
 character the more I admire it. Others may excel him in 
 individual traits, but take him as a whole, the tout ensemble 
 of the man, the entire grouping of the parts, he stands second 
 only to Washington himself. 
 
 How illy could such a man be spared in this frivolous, 
 wordy, speech-making age ? We needed, at the present crisis, 
 just such a pilot at the helm, one who could keep quiet while
 
 8 
 
 others made a noise, and whose silent, calm, and self-reliant 
 course, should be a perpetual rebuke to the everlasting talkers 
 of the day. Chosen to his high office for valuable, more than 
 for shining qualities, he went steadfastly on to the very last. 
 The crowning trait of his character was good common sense 
 not common because so many possess it, or because we see it 
 so commonly exercised but common because it applies to 
 ordinary trials and duties. This he had, and it fitted him to 
 run his noble race. This raised him above his compeers, 
 and fixed his seat as chief among the mighty. That a man 
 so gifted of God, and so qualified to be useful, should be thus 
 smitten down with all his blushing honors thick upon him, is 
 for a lamentation, and shall be for a lamentation. If there is 
 no voice of the Lord here, he never speaks to men. 
 
 Then consider, too, that Taylor has died at the very junc- 
 ture when his presence and the power of his fair name seem to 
 be most needed. It is no business of mine, be assured, to sound 
 an unnecessary alarm in the ears of the people, and the man 
 who does it for selfish and sectional purposes, ought to be re- 
 garded as traitorous to his country's welfare. Still it is im- 
 possible to shut our eyes upon the fact, that we have arrived 
 at a critical point in the history of the nation. Never have 
 the clouds gathered over our heads more portentously, and 
 never have the hearts of the people been more fearfully agi- 
 tated. In such a day who can say how much the prestige 
 of the well-earned laurels of the brave General might have 
 stood us in stead, as well as the cool sagacity and clear-sighted 
 perceptions of the beloved man ? We all felt that while one 
 so honest, so upright, and so fearless, was at the head of 
 affairs, threats of disunion were very likely to prove as idle 
 tales. His very name was a tower of strength. His strong 
 hand would have struck down any party flag. 
 
 The principle of rewarding military exploits with civil 
 and political honors, is perhaps never a sound, or a safe one. 
 Yet cases may occur in which courage and good generalship 
 on the battle-field, shall turn the attention of the nation to a 
 man who possesses every requisite for high station in the 
 Government, and whose strong qualities, matured and de-
 
 veloped in a former line of things, shall now be turned to a 
 still more exalted purpose. What the keen eye and firm 
 arm of such a one might be worth, none can tell. 
 
 Alas, that it should have pleased the Euler of the Uni- 
 verse to select such a moment for the striking of such a 
 stroke! We needed now more than ever before the tried 
 integrity, the immovable self-possession, and the unshaken 
 resolve of just this man to steady the ship of state, and guide 
 her into quiet waters. And to see the staff on which we 
 leaned thus suddenly broken, is surely adapted to open our 
 ears to the voice of the Lord. Happy, thrice happy, will it 
 be if, in the loss of human help and confidence, we are only 
 the more led to make the Most High our refuge and strength. 
 Thus improved, the recent dispensation though not joyous 
 for the present, but grievous will be sure to work out for us 
 the peaceable fruits of righteousness. This opens the way to 
 inquire, 
 
 II. What special lessons this voice of the Lord was intended to 
 give and enforce ? 
 
 That there is a deep meaning in the event, just happened, 
 there can be no doubt. I pretend not to predict its influence 
 on the adjustment of those questions, which have now for 
 months been shaking the nation, like the leaves of the 
 forest. On a point like this, it hardly belongs to the speaker 
 to hazard a conjecture. It will be allowed him, however, to 
 express the hope, which has never entirely deserted his 
 bosom, that by the blessing of God, all will come out right at 
 last. This land, I fondly trust, is destined to be a beacon-light 
 to a bestormed and bewildered world, for ages to come. 
 
 It is encouraging to turn to one delightful fact, which 
 serves' to show how deeply the love of our institutions is 
 imbedded in the hearts of the American people. In an 
 hour of intense political agitation, the President dies, and 
 the news sounds out into all the land, that the chair of 
 State is vacant; but there is no commotion, no rising to 
 obstruct the wheels of government, no note of treason to 
 the working of the Constitution. Business goes on as before. 
 Stocks maintain their price. If any thing can attach us to
 
 10 
 
 the land in which our lot is cast, and inspire us with a 
 feeling of security, under the aegis of liberty here spread 
 out, it is a sublime spectacle like this. Where besides could 
 power change hands so quietly, and with so little excitement ? 
 
 The language of my heart, I must say, is, My country, 
 with all thy faults, I love thee still. Not only as an American 
 citizen, but as a philanthropist and a Christian, I will seek 
 thy good. For my brethren and my companions' sakes, I 
 will yet say, peace be within thee. If I forget thee, O land 
 of my fathers' sepulchres, let my right hand forget her 
 cunning, and let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth, 
 if I prefer not thy welfare to my chief joy. Still the late 
 Providence is full of admonitory lessons. 
 
 We ought to regard it, it strikes me, as a timely and severe 
 rebuke on the party spirit of the country. It might have been 
 supposed, that such a man as Taylor, coming into office by 
 the unsolicited favor of the people, and carrying himself so 
 quietly and unoffendingly, would have been permitted to 
 pass along untouched of scandal. But knowing what we do 
 of poor human nature this was too much to expect. The 
 bloody Moloch must have victims, and the nobler the better. 
 No purity of private character, no splendor of public service, 
 no urbanity of social intercourse, and no wisdom of general 
 measures, could shield the head of the venerable man, and 
 save him from the pang of bitter opposition. It was not 
 enough that he had no enemies to punish, and no friends to 
 reward. He must drink his share of the same bitter cup, 
 which is put to the lips of all who prefer public usefulness to 
 private ease. 
 
 Mistake me not. I do not lose sight of the fact that, " the 
 price of liberty is eternal vigilance." Every man, even the 
 humblest in the land, has a perfect right to scan the measures 
 of the Administration, and to utter his objections, if he has 
 any, in clear and distinct tones ; but never is he to forget that 
 government is of God, and that those who conduct it are 
 God's ministers. To oppose the chief magistrate, simply 
 because he was not the man of our choice, and to wage 
 relentless war against him for no better reason than that
 
 11 
 
 we should have preferred another, is baseness itself. An 
 American citizen ought to blush at such a course. And yet, 
 who does not know that the efforts of multitudes, both in 
 Congress and out of it, to clog the wheels of Government, and 
 harass the Executive of the nation, have their origin in no 
 better motive than this ? 
 
 No wonder that crowns of earthly glory, so generally 
 prove to be crowns of thorns. 
 
 This, if I misjudge not, is the giant sin of the land, and 
 God is here rebuking it in tones of thunder. Oh, it were 
 easier, a thousand times easier, for a man of brave heart, and 
 firm resolve, to stand unmoved on the battle-plains of Mexico, 
 than be surrounded with the brightest civic honors, and at 
 the same time find his measures opposed, and his best efforts 
 to uphold the Constitution of the country, set at nought. One 
 is the severe pelting of an hour's storm the other, the driz- 
 zling of a tedious day. 
 
 How impressively, too, does this event exhibit the folly of 
 trusting in man, and making flesh our arm ? A voice issues 
 from that spacious East room, now hung in mourning, and 
 filled with weepers ; crying in the ears of the nation " Cease 
 ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils, for wherein is he 
 to be accounted of." There stands the hero of many a well 
 fought field, bending over his old companion in arms, and 
 thinking of an enemy who triumphs over all military prowess, 
 and laughs at the edge of the sword. Great men and honor- 
 able men are there ; sage counsellors, and eloquent orators, 
 officers of State, and ambassadors from other lands, all 
 gathered to witness the triumphs of the destroyer, and to 
 testify their respect by silence and sorrow. The coffin, the 
 shroud, and the funeral pall, affix the mark of vanity to 
 human distinctions every where, but they do it with a sort of 
 emphasis, in the dwelling of the chief magistrate of a mighty 
 nation. While we looked for good,. behold evil came down, 
 even unto the gates of Jerusalem. 
 
 Shall we ever again hang the glory and safety of our 
 beloved country, upon the frail arm of man ? We learn from 
 the black lines, which separate the columns of every news-
 
 12 
 
 paper the tolling bells of every town and village, and the 
 traces of thought and solicitude drawn on every individual 
 countenance, that a great man has fallen. How suddenly are 
 mansions of joy turned into abodes of sadness, and halls of 
 mirth filled with lamentation ! This was death's demonstra- 
 tion of human impotence, made by stalking in triumph over 
 the pride and confidence of an afflicted nation. ' Scenes like 
 these give force to the declarations of Holy Writ. Happy is 
 he that hath the God of Jacob for his help, and whose hope is 
 in the Lord his God, that made heaven and earth, and by his 
 strength setteth fast the mountains, being girded with power. 
 It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man, 
 yea, it is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in 
 princes. 
 
 The successful military chieftain and the high civil func- 
 tionary, are akin to ourselves in all the sensibilities of a 
 common nature, and all the frailty of a common inheritance. 
 Where is the waving plume now, and the prancing steed, and 
 the stern word of command ? Where now is the patronage 
 of power, and the petition of the office-seeker, and the recep- 
 tion of foreign embassies ? Death has passed along, and with 
 a single touch of his mighty hand has turned the brightness 
 of all this glory into the gloom of the grave. 
 
 We have then only to say farther how loudly does this 
 event proclaim the folly of human ambition. In five short days 
 we see a man who had attained the very summit of earthly 
 renown, with a fame as wide as the civilized world, and the 
 fair prospect of years to come, reduced to the weakness of an 
 infant and brought down to the shades of death. Ah where 
 is all that which we call grandeur, and power, and glory, 
 now ? We look about us, as the immense crowd moves slowly 
 on ; but instead of shouts of joy, we listen to the funeral 
 dirge ; and in place of merriment and gayety, we behold the 
 bier and the urn. Is this all that is left of the honor which 
 cometh from man only ? Must the brave Taylor sicken and 
 die ; and his wife be made a widow ; and his children father- 
 less, like the humblest and poorest of us all ? 
 
 I must say, that nothing has seemed to me to pour such
 
 13 
 
 contempt on the brightest visions of earthly glory, as to read 
 of these bitter tears, and this heartfelt sorrow, in the palace 
 of the nation. The soul, true to its native instincts, quails and 
 trembles in mansions as well as in cottages. Conventional forms 
 must now give place to life's stern realities ; and high official 
 men be beckoned from the bedside to make room for the weep- 
 ing wife, and let the children in to get their father's blessing. 
 This gives it the character of an ordinary domestic visitation. 
 We return from the contemplation of such a scene, more 
 deeply convinced than ever, that the brightest honors of this 
 world are as nothing, when compared with that glory which 
 a man can carry with him into eternity. 
 
 0, when shall we learn that there are better and more 
 enduring blessings, than can be won by valor, or purchased 
 by talent ? There are moments common to us all, when we 
 are forced to admit, that the Gospel and the Christian's hope 
 are the only possessions of permanent value. The wants of 
 the stricken bosom cannot be met, even in the high places of 
 the land, without bringing in the Bible and calling for the 
 ministers of religion, and listening to the words of eternal life. 
 Rich and poor come together here as possessors of a common 
 nature, and subject to a common destiny. The most power- 
 ful ruler that ever swayed a sceptre, needs to hear of Jesus 
 and the resurrection, on the bed of death, just as much as 
 does the humblest individual in his empire. All are involved 
 alike in the effects of the apostasy, and all must participate 
 alike in the benefits of redemption. 
 
 But I forbear. We have been listening to that voice 
 which breaketh the cedars of Lebanon and shaketh the wil- 
 derness of Kadish, and find that it inculcates upon us, as 
 individuals and as a nation, lessons of the deepest interest. 
 If any man have ears to hear, let him hear. 
 
 Every thing, as it respects the obsequies of the illustrious 
 dead, has been wisely and considerately done. Distinguished 
 men, both in Congress and out of it, have vied with each 
 other in depicting his high character ; and the nation at large 
 has been prompt to pay the proper homage to his memory. 
 So far all is well. But what we should desire, above every 
 
 304825
 
 14 
 
 thing besides, is that the death of our beloved President may 
 be followed with an increase of harmony in our national 
 councils, and an increase of dispatch in our public business. 
 If this shall be the happy result, the boon is not purchased at 
 too dear a rate. The life of no man in the land is for a mo- 
 ment to be compared with the prosperity and perpetuity of 
 our glorious Union, indivisible and for ever. Let it be our 
 earnest prayer, that this event may tend to close the opening 
 chasm, and smooth our way onward. 
 
 We could afford to part with the honest and venerated 
 Taylor, highly as we prized him, and dear as he was to the 
 hearts of thousands, were his death to be made the means of 
 hushing the elements of political discord, and bringing the 
 North and South as in the younger days of the republic to 
 feel that they are brethren. Alas, here is our chief danger. 
 I shall hardly be accused of any such speaking evil of digni- 
 ties, as the Bible condemns, if I say that what we want now, 
 is a certain largeness of heart, which would lead our public 
 men to forget neighborhood, and section, and party, and 
 legislate for the entire land. Our history hitherto has been 
 one of compromise and concession. So it must continue, if 
 we would not have its latter pages written in blood. That 
 man will live in the remembrance of a grateful nation, who 
 is willing, at the present crisis, to risk his reputation, and 
 grieve his friends, and go against his party, and lose his 
 place if he may but consolidate the union of these happy 
 States. 
 
 How will such a name stand on the historic page when 
 contrasted with that of the reckless disunionist? 0, if come 
 the sad hour ever must, when this glorious confederacy shall 
 be broken into atoms, and this lone star of the world's hope 
 shall be shrouded in darkness, we will hold to a fearful account- 
 ability one single man who dares to perpetrate the suicidal 
 deed. Posterity will call that man a second Arnold, and will 
 affix to him an ignominious memorial. 
 
 But I hope better things, though I thus speak. When I 
 think of the early providential settlement of this country 
 when I trace the numerous tokens of God's favor to us in an
 
 15 
 
 infant state when I consider the elevated position which it 
 has been given to this land to hold in the great benevolent 
 movements of the age and especially when I advert to the 
 fact that there are so many Noahs, Jobs, and Daniels, scattered 
 through these valleys and over these hills, I cannot but hope 
 that God has rich mercies in store for us yet. We may be 
 chastised for our sins, but we shall not be cut off for ever. 
 
 Christian citizens ! much depends on you. Give no coun- 
 tenance to the suspicion that your place in the house of God, 
 and your hopes for the world to come, are operating to render 
 you indifferent to your country's welfare. Show, by your 
 active efforts to elevate good men and true, and by your cheer- 
 ful submission to the powers that be, that you love the land 
 of your fathers' sepulchres. Above all, daily carry the pros- 
 perity of these United States with you to the mercy-seat, and 
 intercede for blessings on their behalf which shall reach to the 
 utmost bounds of the everlasting hills. 
 
 I suggest only one thing more. Taylor is gone, and his 
 place is filled by a man who comes into it by the providence 
 of God, rather than by the direct act of the people. On this ac- 
 count he all the more needs your sympathy and your aid. Eal- 
 ly round him from the very first, and give to every sound mea- 
 sure he proposes a cheerful and warm-hearted support. Eaised 
 up himself from the humbler walks of life, and rocked in his 
 early days in a rough cradle, he comes before us emphatically 
 as a man of the people. Let him have a fair trial. 
 
 We cannot better close than by adopting, with slight vari- 
 ations, the language of a great and good man, on a somewhat 
 similar occasion. Though under the mournful remembrance 
 of our departed President, we cannot but feel, at this season 
 of many tears, as if a volley of lightning had been shot at the 
 pillar of our Kepublic, yet if we strengthen its foundation in 
 the principles and character of the people, the pillar will stand 
 on the deep and steady basis of a country's virtue, and can 
 never be overthrown. Thus an enduring memorial of the la- 
 mented man will be embalmed in the hearts of the people, and 
 permanent good will emerge out of this dark and bitter dis- 
 pensation.
 
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