Source: Britannica online
A sermon delivered by Bishop James
Madison on February 19, 1795 on
the influence of divine
providence on the growth of America. Effects
of love and peace on the equality of the human race. Desire to
preserve the blessings that arose from governments founded in wisdom,
justice
and equality. Call for virtue as a ruling principle. Plea for patriotism
resulting from social virtue, rather than disorganizing anarchy.
Excerpt:
Brethren, there are few situations more interesting to the human race
than that which the people of America this day presents. The temples of the
living God are everywhere, throughout this rising
empire, this day, crowded,
I trust, with worshipers, whose hearts, impressed with a just and lively
sense of the great things, which he hath done for them, pour forth, in
unison, the grateful tribute of praise and thanksgiving. Yes, this day,
brethren, "the voice of rejoicing and salvation is in the tabernacles
of the righteous"; and with reason, for the history of nations doth
not exhibit a people who ever had more cause to offer up to the great author
of every good the most fervent expressions of gratitude and thanksgiving.
Let, my brethren, the sons of irreligion, wrapped in their dark and
gloomy system of fatality, refuse to open their eyes to the great luminous
proofs of providential government, which America displays; let them turn
from a light, which their weak vision cannot bear; but let the righteous,
let those who trust in God, who can trace in that good and glorious being
the relations of father, friend, and governor, let them with eagle
eyes look up to that full blaze of salvation, which he hath vouchsafed to
this new world.
Permit me, then, upon this occasion, to turn your
attention to those
great things which the Lord hath
done for us, to those manifold displays of divine Providence,
which the history of America exhibits; and let the subject afford
an opportunity to revive within us sentiments of lively
gratitude, and excite sincere resolutions to fear the Lord, and to
serve him—in a word, to increase daily in piety, and in all those
noble affections
of the soul which dignify the Christian and the patriot.
I. Who can tell how many ages had been swallowed up in the all-absorbing
gulf of time, before the bold navigator first essayed to visit these
distant regions of the earth? Who can tell how long this western world
had been the habitation of the listless savage, or the wild beasts of
the forest? At these questions chronology drops her epochs, as incapable
of conducting her to periods so remote, and which have escaped her grasp.
The ways of heaven must off appear to us weak mortals dark and intricate.
But the first suggestion, which here presents itself,
is that Providence seems to have thrown
a veil over this portion of the globe, in order
to conceal it from the eyes of
the nations of the East, until the
destined period had arrived for the regeneration of
mankind, in this New
World,
after those various other means, which the wisdom of the Almighty
had permitted to operate in the Old, had proved ineffectual. In vain
had
reason ,the handmaid of pure religion, long attempted to convince
men of the reciprocal duties which equality and fraternity impose.
....
In vain had even thy dispensation of love and peace, blessed
Jesus,
long essayed to disarm ambition of the ensanguined sword, and to diffuse
benevolence, equality, and fraternity among the human race. Millions
still groaned under the heavy pressure which tyranny imposed. Yes, even
thy gospel of love, of universal fraternity, had been, too often, perverted into the most formidable system of oppression; and mankind, instead of
seeing it diffuse the heavenly rays of philanthropy, too frequently beheld
it as imposing a yoke to degrade and enslave them.
The princes of the
earth sought not for the sacred duties which it
enjoined; but they sought to render it the sanction of their exterminating
vengeance,
or their
deep-laid systems of usurpation. Is not the history of
almost all
Europe pregnant with proofs of this calamitous truth? If you
can point to some
small portion where the religion of the blessed Jesus, untrammeled with
political usurpations, was left to operate its happy effects upon
the
passions and the conduct of men; or where toleration extended wide
her arms of mercy to embrace the whole family of Christ, the spot
appears
like a solitary star, which in the midst
of night, beams
forth alone, whilst clouds and thick darkness obscure
the rest of the innumerable host of heaven. Alas, what avails the
voice of reason or religion,
when
the lust of domination has usurped the soul. At the shrine of this
fell demon, the human race was sacrificed by thousands. Nay, too
many of the
sons of Europe are still bound with cords to the altars of ambition,
and there immolated, not only by thousands, but by tens of thousands
.
But, brethren, important considerations still demand
our attention. Has heaven been thus propitious; are we possessed of
all those blessings
which flow from governments founded in wisdom, justice, and equality;
doth the morning of America break forth refulgent with unclouded glory?
Then it behooves us, above all things, to inquire how are these blessings
to be preserved? How shall we ensure to her a meridian splendor worthy
of such a morning? This inquiry immediately resolves itself into another.
What is there in this sublunary state that can attract the smiles of
heaven, or ensure political happiness, but virtue? Never was there a
mortal so depraved, never was there a conscience so deaf to that internal
voice, which always whispers truth, but must acknowledge that virtue
only gives a title to hope for the favor of that high and lofty one,
who inhabiteth eternity.…
Although the language is plodding according to contemporary standards,
Bishop Madison is stating that America is the New World and Europe
the Old World. Nowhere in history has Jesus'
gospel of love had such
an impact as in America—the "solitary
star, which...beams forth alone."
To preserve these divine blessings, he calls
all to practice "virtue." He clearly means Christian virtues.
