old abode, as if but newly born. Venerable institutions, such as time had made hoary and honourable, are disdained, as the baubles of childhood, the appendages of the nursery. Kings are cast down, as the mighty from their seats. Crowns perish as garlands in the grasp of popular fury; or, if spared, only survive as fiefs from the sovreignty of the people. Order ceases in uproar, Law cannot be overheard, amidst the din and bray of civil discord, while Justice seems about to drop both her balances and her sword together. The gradations of society fast disappear, and the foundations of the social structure are in no small danger of being overturned, and ploughed up. The vast social mass, is with comparative exceptions, in a state of fusion, everywhere prepared to take new moulds, and to be recast, and consolidated, by the hand of time, and the will of man. We do indeed now behold, "what desolations he hath made in the earth." The work of ages has been done in a day-the chaotic state marvellously induced, as the conclusion of unnumbered social epochs-and the rudiments of a new political creation are prepared, in the confluence of the mightiest elements of mind contained in the whole wide world. It is Europe that gives law and destiny to the world. Asia is decrepit, America is in her childhood, Africa in savagism. Europe is in full age, her civilization is normal to the entire planet, her tribes are the masters of entire humanity. All of worth contained in the residue, is a derivation of her greatness, a redundancy of her plenitude, a reflection of her glory. Her arts, and arms, her literature, philosophy, commerce, enterprize, are the treasury of the globe. Her sons bear sway in all lands. Her ships whiten every sea, and swell in every gale. It is Europe, that colonizes the waste, peoples solitude, multiplies cities, and pours the tide of social energy to the ends of the earth. The regeneration

of the whole world of man, seems to have been confided to her alone, who in addition to all her natural endowments, and fruit of culture, possesses the Bible, and the Church,the truth, and its herald, the germs of all civil perfection, and the "incorruptible seed;" "the kingdom which cannot be moved," when all things are shaken, and in which all nations as "of one blood," have the same fraternal rights of inheritance.

The words of the text, are the only ones in the Psalm, put forth as immediately the Voice of God, and they stand out from the body of the Psalm, as the great oracle of instruction addressed to the church. They express the will of God as to the mood and direction of its mind, in seasons of public agitation and of fearful portent. "Be still!" whatever dispositions may prevail around-however the mind of the world may be tossed to and fro-incapable of, or disinclined, to dispassionate reflection—the sport alternately of hope and fear-awed by the sounds of tumultuous collision -distracted with the number of public occurrences so rapidly announced-inflamed by debates, governed by party interests, or blinded by party exasperations-one duty is prescribed to the disciples of revelation-"Be still!"

The command is issued by the great Author of all these complicated and astounding movements, while the boon promised, is inclusive of every wish of piety, and is summed up in the simple conviction, all perfect, and satisfying, that he alone is God, who thus speaks to us-that in the full assurance of this great truth, we possess a guarantee for a wise ordination, and glorious issue of all events-that they all tend to, and terminate in, the sole consummation which wisdom can desire, or God himself intend, viz: that He should be "exalted in the earth."

(1.) The condition of mind enjoined upon the church by this solemn oracle is to be explained. Stillness is con

trasted with the fluctuation, and excitement of worldly passion, the whirl and eddyings of minds not calmed and balanced by religion. It implies a tranquility favourable to reflection, and is akin to that patience of which our Lord speaks, by which christians are made to possess their souls, to enjoy a perfect self mastery, the command of every faculty, with the use of every principle acquired in earlier times, and under quiet and ordinary influences. Religious principle is then to be awakened into full and governing action. As a plant, it is then to bear its fruit, as heavenly wisdom, it is then to whisper counsel, and to direct pursuit. It is as discipline and courage in the soldier, prompting him in the day of battle-as talents and virtue in a citizen brought forth into the arena of public action, and consecrated to the service of one's country, in a crisis of its affairs. The stillness here commanded, reigns within the heart, while thunders roar without, "men's hearts failing them for fear," "looking after those things which are coming on the earth." Such is the privilege of piety. It is rest, amidst catastrophe-peace, amidst dissolving worlds. 'Tis to the soul, what the ark was to the favoured family, when the waters rose above the mountains; or, the blood of the passover on the thresholds and lintels of Israel, in the night so fatal to Egypt's first-born. It is a foundation which no agitations can shake, a palladium inviolable to all aggression. The religious temper, so serene and heavenly, is the true result of wisdom's rule, all harmonious, poising souls on eternal truth, breathing into them her fulness of life, and thus making them strong, either to suffer, or to act-calm, yet piercing to survey-to keep watch over events, while garrisoned by peace, as with a general's eye, which roams o'er the field of conflicting hosts, dealing out upon each other carnage and destruction. It gives more than the loftiness of the philosopher; it is as the light of

an angel's soul, whose intellect and moral, are but one power of deep, flowing, tranquil life-the reflection of the immutability of God. Never the slave of fear, or blind to the impulsions of passion, its liberty is more precious as terror multiplies its phantoms, and destruction hurls its darts around. The voice that cries, "Be still!" is sovereign over the heart that hears it. Aloft, o'er every other sound from above, or beneath. God stands as the shepherd who guards his flock, or as the eagle brooding over its young. He who put Moses into the cleft rock, is descried as the ever present guardian of His church. "The Lord of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge."

(2.) "Be still." This is declarative of intense interest. It implies the arrested attention of the mind upon the career of providence. We are to be deeply interested-to be all eye, and all ear. As the tents of Israel were to be struck, when the cloud was taken up, and the trumpet blast was to be waited for, as the signal for an immediate march, so are the minds of christians to be turned toward the more visible and wonderful footsteps of providence in the affairs of nations, and the changes of human society. The more regular and quiet order of his government generally passes on, and men sleep to the impressions of the presence and agency of the one Governor of the earth. His tread is so gentle and measured that it fails to be heard. His voice is so ordinate and soft, that the ear becomes dull and listless to its holy sounds; but His preparations advance incessantly toward some grand and startling crisis, some mighty series of events, which take the world, and the church too, by surprise. The lovely and the tranquil give place to the turbulent and the dreadful. Hidden powers in society burst at once into almost supernatural action. The deluge and the earthquake warn us how mighty are the magazines laid up for the world's destruction, and social

convulsions, in like manner, how near at hand, even in the bosoms of our fellow men, are provided all the resources necessary for the accomplishment of God's most terrible works. Even under common aspects, and the usual progress of human development, the nations of our race offer a vast spectacle to contemplation. The identity and unity It is the spring of our

of universal man is a grand fact. sympathy with the whole history and prospects of the world. The characters of bygone generations are reflected in ourselves, while ours will survive in the characters and fortunes of posterity. The linkage of the law remains unbroken which binds the first and the last of men together, rendering the living man, wherever found, the representative of the entire past, and in some sense, the guardian of the future's weal. Transmission is the only prerogative of a transient being, not possession. Introduction and departure, conjunction and separation, affinities and repulsions, are the constituents of our lot; but the brevity of our stay in the world presents a contrast with the width of our sympathies, and the intensity of our interest in its affairs. Patriotism stirs its fires-our country is our home-the fortunes of posterity are meditated as blended in the political and religious position of the world, when we have left it. Humanity is the vast circle which philanthropy and religion fill with their benignant eye. Το what is the course of the world tending? Is it progressive or otherwise? What are the existing aspects of providence most prominent? Where are the footsteps of Deity most visible in the deepening shades, or marked as on the faithless sands, or the oblivious waves? What nations are now advanced to the front of the world's theatre? What are their separate peculiarities, or for what designs are they raised up to this rank of eminence? For judgment or for mercy? Whether to plough the waste, or to sow the seed?