occasions, you will allow, call for extraordinary exertions; and, when charity is concerned, for exemplary acts of munificence.

But I pause. I pause from a conviction that the whole of this topic is superfluous. For to whom am I speaking? To men who constitute a part of a nation which may be called a nation of philanthropists. Charity, humanity, generosity, and all the nobler virtues of the heart are, at this hour, the acknowledged characteristics of our country, in the eyes of all Europe; and they are the genuine result of its religion, still preserved with exemplary faith and purity, and let me add without an apology, of its civil constitutional liberty. These, These, (inestimable jewels as they are) it has still retained, amid the conflicts and confusion of the world around; and these, more than any thing else, are perfective of human nature. These are yours; at once your happiness and your glory. It is enough that you are Britons. I leave the cause of which I am the advocate, entirely to your hearts, without solicitude for the issue. I anticipate the result. Distress never yet sued to you in vain. In times most unfavourable to liberality, you received your enemies into your bosoms; and when they were exiles and vagabonds, they found all the security and comfort of a home, in your comprehensive philanthropy. Yes; when I name the name of Englishmen, and remark the degenerate state of morals and religion, at this portentous period, over the whole terraqueous globe, more particularly in Europe and in Africa, I say-be proud of your country and your appellation; for in them is involved the character of men, who, amidst the unspeakable corruptions of surrounding nations, pre serve, more than all others that it has been my lot to hear or read of, the divine image undefaced.

Certainly, in no country under heaven is the life of man, the property of man, the liberty of man, the individual man, and all that concerns the comfort, the accommodation, and the safety of man, in private life, so valued, so respected, so protected, and so religiously preserved inviolate, as in this favoured island, this happy country, where religion and liberty, harassed as they are over the wide world, have found their last asylum; and I do firmly believe, that the virtue of this nation, religious and moral, like the salt of the earth, spoken of in Scripture, preserves the rest from utter corruption, and averts the thunderbolt of the Almighty.

What, though there occasionally arise among us some instances of singular degeneracy? An exception which, from its rarity, strikes the attention, confirms the rule. Not even the influx of riches from all regions of the earth, not even our consequent political corruptions, have yet been able to efface the deeply engraven marks of the national character, the manly features of our forefathers. The Christian religion, in all its purity, is still believed, revered, and (human infirmity excepted) still practised too, among the people at large. Freedom still flourishes; and, like the palm tree, preserves, under every weight suspended on its branches, its own native elasticity. All therefore, I trust, is safe, amid surrounding danger; and, so long as we preserve our religion and our laws, we may still confidently, yet humbly, rely on that favour of Heaven, which has to this hour, while all Europe is in a state of conflagration, preserved this island from becoming the seat of war; a mercy, for which we ought to pour daily hymns of gratitude to the King of Kings, the Lord of Lords, the only Ruler of Princes. Let us persevere, in holding fast that

religion, and that happy constitutional freedom, from which our national virtues have originated; and we shall still conciliate the favour of Heaven, and preserve, among the nations, our glorious preeminence -the preeminence of virtue-the distinction of faith, hope, and charity. Gracious God! may we never relinquish our religion, that sure anchor in the storms and tempests of a turbulent world. For ever may the British nation continue, as it is at present, one grand Philanthropic Society; of which I consider you as the delegated, or rather voluntary representatives. Go on and prosper; and be assured that the palaces of the poor, which stand so thick, like ramparts round our great city, will be stronger castles and fortresses, if they draw down the favour and tutelary protection of the God of Hosts, than the tower of the capital, with all its embattlements clothed with artificial thunder.

Proceed, therefore, in your work of benevolence, and be not weary of well-doing. But, why exhort you? Your activity and your bounty have anticipated exhortation from the pulpit (for till this day ye had not a pulpit), and your perseverance supersedes, at least on this occasion, its necessity. We trust the completion and the extension of the good work to the same virtuous and liberal dispositions, to which it owes its origin, its progressive advancement, and its present flourishing condition. Thanks be to God, it does flourish; and I venture to predict, it shall flourish more and more, like the cedars of Lebanus, and as the cypress trees upon upon the mountains of Hermon.

I will, therefore, add no more, but conclude, as I began, with a supplication to the Most High, who delights in mercy and in merciful men, that he would look down with peculiar favour on this house, and

grant that it may be perpetual; dedicated for ever, as it is opened, for the first time, this day, to Charity and to Prayer. May he pour down the sweet influence of his loving spirit on the appointed teachers, causing the instructions to be afforded from this place, to diffuse universal philanthropy among the sons of men, in every clime and of clime and of every colour; persuading them to love one another, as Christ has loved us, to conciliate, to pacify, to relent, to forgive; and to say to the sword, in the words of the prophet Jeremiah, O THOU SWORD, HOW LONG WILL IT BE ERE THOU ART QUIET; PUT UP THYSELF INTO THY SCARBARD, REST AND BE STILL. May the example of this Institution, and the doctrines taught from this pulpit, proceed auspiciously from age to age, to convince the world that all men, however divided by oceans, ought to be philanthropists; that man, born of woman, who hath but a short time to live, and is full of misery, was not formed to be the enemy of man; but the brother, the friend, the protector, the guardian, and the guide. May the prayers, together with the alms now offered, and to be for ever offered, from this sanctuary, ascend to heaven, as incense; and, while they bring down blessings on the institutors, blessings on the worshippers, and blessings on the poor objects of their charity, open the gates of that celestial mansion, where shall be no more misery to relieve, and where philanthropy shall be completely gratified, in finding all moral and all natural evil cease, under the eternal reign of the supreme lover of men, Jesus Christ, our Saviour and Redeemer.

SERMON XXVII.

THE SUPPORT OF THE MAGDALEN HOSPITAL RECOMMENDED.

[Preached at the Chapel of the Magdalen Hospital on the Anniversary, 1812.]

JOHN, Xi. 33.-When Jesus saw Mary weeping, he groaned in the spirit and was troubled.

THIS remarkable emotion in the mind of our Saviour terminated in a flood of tears; and some interpreters in ancient times, have been greatly perplexed by the passage; conceiving that tears, the natural effect of grief and pity, were unworthy the character of their Lord, and detracted much from his personal dignity. In their zeal for the honour of Christ some of them had been presumptous enough to erase from the New Testament, not without sentiments of indignation, the disgraceful verse, as they conceived it, in which it was related that "Jesus wept ;" thus, with the awkward hand of officious correction, defacing that beautiful picture of our Saviour which the spirit of God had delineated, with perfect simplicity, in the Gospel. They knew not that tears of compassion can never be symptoms of an unbecoming debility, and that the sacred fountain which flows from the heart, through the channel of the eyes, is among the most honourable distinctions of human nature. But the mistake of those who thus took offence at a weeping Saviour arose from considering him solely in the high character of his unblended Divinity. It may be proper therefore to premise a remark on the divinity and humanity of Christ, before we consider that propensity to pity and sym