ject can suppose that fallible rulers have a right thus to require friends to become mortal enemies, and to seek for glory in attempting to shed each other's blood! What maniac ever entertained an opinion more repugnant to the dictates of moral justice and the christian religion? With equal propriety we might suppose, that rulers have a right to authorize highway robbery, piracy, assassination, and every other crime which afflicts or disgraces mankind. It is impossible to name greater atrocities than those which have been practised in war; and if rulers have a right to authorize these for national revenge or national glory, so they may every crime that they may suppose will be subservient to such purposes.

DISTINGUISHING FEATURE OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION.

B- Dec. 31, 1826.

DEAR SIR,-The following is an extract from a sermon lately preached here, on the distinguishing characteristics of Christianity. If you think it worthy of a place in your next number of the "Friend of Peace," it is at your service; if not, please to destroy this, and there will no harm be done to any body. Very respectfully,

"There is one more feature of our religion by which it is too remarkably distinguished from all others, to be passed over. It is its character as a peaceful religion. The pacific, forbearing, and forgiving dispositions hold a conspicuous place in the christian system, and place it in strong contrast to every other that has ever been known upon the earth. In no religion, but that of Jesus, was it ever dreamed of to inculcate such sentiments. On the contrary, they all sanction a resentful spirit under injuries; they go forth to battle with the armies of their country; they pray to God to bless the exertions made to produce the greatest amount of misery, pain, and death among the people whom some miserable pretext of state policy has chosen to call enemies; they sing praises and Te Deums when the work of destruction has been successfully accomplished, and when at the same moment are rising to heaven from the abodes of suffering innocence and wretchedness the cries of injured humanity. But, blessed be God, not such a religion is ours. Let its professors be as bad as they may, and understand as little of its spirit as they may.

Let this be charged, not upon their religion, but upon their ignorance of it. It is a divine distinction of Christianity that it breathes such a spirit of mildness, forbearance, and candor, as, if carried by rulers into the management of the public concerns, would probably put a speedy end to the disgraceful scenes of contention and bloodshed which have made the world seem more like a haunt of ravenous wild beasts, than the residence of reasonable creatures that have a common Father in heaven.

"Prophecy presents us with a beautiful picture of our religion, taming the savage passions of men, and causing peace and harmony to spread themselves through the world. Is this delightful prospect ever to be realized? If it is, is it to be by a miraculous influence? Is it not rather by the diffusion in the breasts of men of the gentle, unresentful spirit of our religion?

"But this will be called visionary; and, reasoning only from the past, there seems to be but too much justice in saying so. Instead of the peaceful reign of the gospel, the earth has never witnessed more tragical and bloody scenes than have deluged it in christian countries. The true delineation of the christian system forms a perfect satire on the history of christian nations. It seems as if men had determined that if the blissful scenes of peace foretold of the gospel should ever be realized, it should be in spite of them, rather than by their aid; as if they were determined to have nothing to do with it, but to keep on fighting until the miracle should come, which should convert them from tigers into lambs.

"But, visionary as we may be, we can have no belief in such a miracle as this. God has given mankind a religion, which is calculated to produce all the happy effects that are prophetically ascribed to it. But if men will not yield to its divine influences, we know no help for it. Religion certainly means to act on us by persuasion, not by compulsion; moral agents are not literally to be forced to be good.

"But is the case really so desperate as only a view of the past would make it? We think not. Every body believes that a Christian may, by persevering attempts to imitate his Saviour and practise self-control, be enabled, by God's favor, to acquire the mastery of their unruly tempers and passions. Why may we not hope to see a community, a world of such Christians?

"Why should we be discouraged for the future by looking so much at the past. There are more powerful means in operation for spreading our religion through the mass of society, than the past has ever known. There is the mighty agency of education spreading every where its still growing energies. There is the equally mighty agency of the press to co-operate with education. Preaching has assumed a deeper and more practical character, aims to get a stronger hold of the heart and the affections. May we not hope that by these means, the unwarlike principles of the gospel, spreading gradually through society and operating on public opinion, may come at last to control the measures of the state; and to teach men in public stations to regard the communities for which they act, as only bodies of reasonable beings like themselves, whose differences of opinion are as amenable to a sense of justice and as capable of being decided on christian principles, as those of individuals? Does it require any thing more indeed in those who manage nations than a spirit of justice, a disposition to bear as much and to act as deliberately as would be requisite in private life, in order to realize the blissful scenes of peace and harmony, by which prophecy delights to describe the golden age of Christianity?"

ABOLITION OF WAR BY POLITICAL ECONOMY.

"I shall only, therefore, further observe, that the war of 1756, the American war, and the greater part of the wars of the last century, with the exception of those that grew out of the French Revolution, were waged for the purpose of preserving or acquiring some exclusive commercial advantage. But does any one suppose that these contests would have been carried on, at such an infinite expense of blood and treasure, had the mass of the people known that their object was utterly unattainable? Had they known that it is impossible for any one country to monopolize wealth and riches; and that every such attempt must ultimately prove ruinous to itself, as well as injurious to others? It is to Political Economy that we owe an incontrovertible demonstration of these truths;-truths that are destined to exercise the most salutary influence on humanity-to convince mankind that it is for their interest to live in peace, to deal with each other on fair and liberal principles, and not to become the dupes of their own shortsighted avarice, or the willing instruments of the blind ambition or petty animosities of their rulers." John R. McCulloch on Political Economy. See Edin. Rev. No. 84.

The advocates for peace have many strings to their bow. Those who will not abandon war from regard to the principles of justice, humanity, and religion, may perhaps listen to arguments which show it to be repugnant to their interest, and to the principles of political economy. The following remarks are from the "Crisis," by one, who, as a political writer, was once in high repute in this country.

"War never can be the interest of a trading nation, any more than quarrelling can be profitable to a man of business. But to make war with those who trade with us, is like setting a bull-dog upon a customer at the shop door."

"There is such an idea existing in the world as national honor, and this falsely understood is oftentimes the cause of war. In a christian and philosophical sense, mankind seem to have stood still at individual civilization, and to retain as nations all the original rudeness of nature. As individuals, we profess ourselves Christians, but as nations we are Heathens, Romans, and what not. It is, I think, exceedingly easy to define what ought to be understood by national honor. For that which is the best character for an individual is the best character for a nation; and whenever the latter exceeds or falls beneath the former, there is a departure from the line of true greatness." Crisis, No. 7.

THE GRASSHOPPER WAR.

"IT is a well authenticated portion of native history, that a few years after the pilgrims were firmly seated in their new settlement, two powerful tribes of Indians who were in the habit of roasting fish and taking repose upon the opposite banks of the same stream entered upon a most bloody war on the following occasion: The pappooses of the two tribes were in the habit of intermingling daily in their wild diversions, and for the want of higher game, were improving the bow exercise upon grasshoppers. To preserve harmony, small circles were described with the point of the arrow, and the gunners of each circle entitled to all the game falling within their respective circles. A chief was always in attendance to preserve order and serve as umpire in case of dispute. A grasshopper had fallen within or upon one of the lines, and was claimed by the pappooses of each circle; a contest commenced; the old chief happened to be in an ill humour and talked about bloody war, and did not attend to making peace; the squaws from Vol. IV. No. 12. 46

the opposite side feeling some solicitude for their own, paddled over to take them away; arriving on the spot and seeing some unfair play, incautiously made use of blows; this brought on a contest between the squaws; the Indians rushed over, took sides, and fought the field until night. Many thous ands were slain, and the war never closed until one of the tribes was entirely destroyed and the other nearly so."-Western Tiller.

In the greater part of the wars of nations a small spark, like the contention about a grasshopper, has been blown to a terrific and devastating flame which filled countries with havoc, mourning, and wo. Even the most terrible of all modern wars, the war of Napoleon on Russia, may in respect to its origin be termed a grasshopper war. Napoleon himself thus stated the cause of the war, "At Tilsit, Russia vowed eternal alliance with France, and war with England. She now breaks her vows." Labaume, one of Napoleon's officers, states the affair as follows. Napoleon, "forgetful that since the treaty of Tilsit, he had not only invaded Holland and the Hansetowns, but likewise the duchy of Oldenburgh, which belonged to the sister of Alexander, he imputed to the latter as a crime, that he had renewed a commercial intercourse with England." Yes, Alexander at Tilsit agreed to discontinue his "commercial intercourse with England," but finding that Napoleon violated the treaty on his part, Alexander renewed his intercourse with Britain; and this was the grasshopper for which Napoleon waged war, caused the destruction of nearly a million of his fellow men, and filled all Europe with calamity. In such grasshopper contests probably more than a hundred millions of people have been sacrificed in Christendom, within the last thousand years. Yet such has been the delusion of Christians, that they have praised the deeds of such mammoth murderers as Alexander the Great, Tamerlane, and Napoleon Bonaparte!

Supposing it to be true, that Alexander, at Tilsit, had vowed "eternal alliance with France, and war with England," and that he afterwards broke that vow. The crime would have consisted in making such a vow, and not in violating it. But admitting he had broken a vow, which he ought to have kept, did this give Napoleon a right to wage war, to sacrifice thousands of his own people in attempting to murder a greater number of Russians, that he might thus punish Alexander? If any one