an altar, in all things an imitation of the true Regardless of this local inconvenience, unaltar of God, which is in Shiloh, except only cankered by jealousy, undepressed by fear, and that ours is an high "or great altar to see" cemented by mutual love and mutual benefits, from far. And this may convince you that it we trod the path of glory with our brethren for was not intended as an altar of sacrifice (for an hundred years and more-enjoying a length then it would have been but three cubits in of felicity scarce ever experienced by any other height, as our law directs) but as a monumen- people.-Mindful of the hands that protected us tal altar, to instruct our generations forever, in our youth, and submitting to every just regthat they are of the same pedigree with your-ulation for appropriating to them the benefit of selves, and entitled to the same civil and religious privileges. This noble defence brought an immediate reconciliation among the discordant tribes. "The words, (when reported) pleased the children of Israel-they blessed God together" for preventing the effusion of kindred blood," and did not go up to destroy the land where their brethren, the children of Reuben and Gad dwelt." The whole history of the bible cannot furnish a passage more instructive than this, to the members of a great empire, whose dreadful misfortune it is to have the evil demon of civil or religious discord gone forth among them. And would to God, that the application I am now to make of it could be delivered in accents louder than thunder, till they have pierced the ear of every Briton; and especially their ears who have meditated war and destruction against their brother-tribes of Reuben and Gad, in this our AMERICAN GILEAD. And let me add-would to God too that we, who this day consider ourselves in the place of those tribes, may, like them, be still able to lay our hands on our hearts in a solemn appeal to the God of Gods, for the rectitude of our intentions towards the whole commonwealth of our BRITISH ISRAEL. For, called to this sacred place, on this great occasion, I know it is your wish that I should stand superior to all partial motives, and be found alike unbiased by favor or by fear. And happy it is that the parallel, now to be drawn, requires not the least sacrifice either of truth or virtue? Like the tribes of Reuben and Gad, we have chosen our inheritance, in a land separated from that of our fathers and brethren, not indeed by a small river, but an immense ocean. This inheritance we likewise hold by a plain original contract, entitling us to all the natural and improvable advantages of our situation, and to a community of privileges with our brethren, in every civil and religious respect, except in this, that the throne or seat of empire, that great altar at which the men of this world bow, was to remain among them. Though for brevity, the sacred text, in this and other places, only mentions Reuben and Gad, yet the half tribe of Manasseh is also supposed to be included. our trade-our wealth was poured in upon them from ten thousand channels, widening as they flowed, and making their poor to sing, and industry to smile, through every corner of their land. And as often as dangers threatened, and the voice of the British Israel called our brethren to the field, we left them not alone, but shared their toils and fought by their side, "till there stood not a man of all their enemies before them,"-Nay, they themselves testified on our behalf, that in all things we not only did our part, but more than our part for the common good, and they dismissed us home loaded with silver and with gold,* in recompense for our extraordinary services. So far you see the parallel holds good. But what high altars have we built to alarm our British Israel; and why have the congregations of our British Israel, and why have the congregations of our brethren gathered themselves together against us? why do their embattled hosts already cover our plains? will they not examine our case, and listen to our plea? "The Lord God of Gods-he knows," and the whole surrounding world shall yet know, that whatever American altars we have built, far from intending to dishonor, have been raised with an expressed view to perpetuate the name and glory of that sacred altar, and seat of empire and liberty, which we left behind us, and wish to remain eternal among our brethren in the parent land. Esteeming our relation to them our greatest felicity; adoring the providence that gave us the same progenitors: glorying in this, that when the new world was to be portioned out among the kingdoms of the old, the most important part of this continent fell to the sons of a protestant and free nation; desirous of worshipping forever at the same altar with them; fond of their manners even to excess; enthusiasts to that sacred plan of civil and religious happiness, for the preservation of which they have sacrificed from age to age, maintaining, and always ready to maintain, at the risk of every thing that is dear to us, the most *The parliamentary reimbursements for our exertions in the late war, similar to what Joshua gave the two tribes and a half on the close of his wars. narchical, or whosoever distributed, may be represented under the figure of one common altar, at which the just devotion of all the subjects is to be paid. unshaken fidelity to our common sovereign, as | Power of an empire, whether theocratical, mothe great centre of our union, and guardian of our mutual rights-I say, with these principles and these views, we thought it our duty, to build up American altars, or constitutions, as nearly as we could, upon the great British model. But it is said that we have of late departed Having never sold our birth-right, we con- from our former line of duty, and refused our sidered ourselves entitled to the privileges of homage at the great altar of British empire. our father's house" to enjoy peace, liberty | And to this it has been replied, that the very and safety," to be governed, like our brethren, refusal is the strongest evidence of our veneraby our own laws, in all matters properly affect- tion for the altar itself. Nay, it is contended ing ourselves, and to offer up our own sacrifices by those charged with this breach of devotion, at the altar of British empire; contending that that when, in the shape of unconstitutional exa forced devotion is idolatry, and that no power actions, violated rights and mutilated charters, on earth has a right to come in between us and they were called to worship idols, instead of a gracious sovereign, to measure forth our the true divinity, it was in a transport of holy loyalty, or to grant our property, without our jealousy, that they dashed them to pieces, or whelmed them to the bottom of the ocean. consent. These are the principles we inherited from Britons themselves. Could we depart from | them, we should be deemed bastards and not sons, aliens, and not brethren. The altars therefore, which we have built, are not high or rival altars to create jealousy, but humble monuments of our union and love, intended to bring millions, yet unborn, from every corner of this vast continent, to bend at the great parent altar of British liberty; venerating the country from which they sprung, and pouring their gifts into their lap when their countless thousands shall far exceed hers. It was our wish that there should be an eternal "witness between our brethren and us," that if, at any future period, amid the | shifting scenes of human interests and human affections, their children should say to our children-"Ye have no portion" in the birthright of Britons, and to seek to push them from the common shrine of freedom, when they come to pay their homage there, they might always have an answer ready-"Behold the pattern of the altar which our fathers built." Behold your own religious and civil institutions, and then examine the frames of government and systems of laws raised by our fathers in every part of America? Could these have been such exact copies of your own, if they had not inherited the same spirit, and sprung from the same stock, with yourselves. Thus far you see the parallel yet holds good, and I think cannot be called a perversion of my text, if you will allow that the Supreme * In this respect, our plea is even stronger than that of the two tribes and a half. For, till an explanation was given, the height of their altar, like those of the heathen, who loved to sacrifice on lofty places, might create a suspicion of their "lapsing into idolatry; either intending to worship other Gods, or the God of Israel in an unlawful place and manner."-BP. PATRICK. This is, in brief, the state of the argument on each side. And hence, at this dreadful mo ment, ancient friends and brethren stand prepared for events of the most tragic nature. Here the weight of my subject almost overcomes me; but think not that I am going to damp that noble ardor which at this instant glows in every bosom present. Nevertheless, as from an early acquaintance with many of you, I know that your principles are pure, and your humanity only equalled by your transcendent love of your country, I am sure you will indulge the passing tear, which a preacher of the gospel of love must now shed over the scenes that lie before us-great and deep distress about to pervade every corner of our land ! millions to be called from the peaceful labors by "the sound of the trumpet, and the alarm of war! Garments rolled in blood," and even victory itself only yielding an occasion to weep over friends and relatives slain! These are melancholy prospects and therefore you will feel with me the difficulties I now labor underforsaken by my text, and left to lament alone that, in the parent land, no Phinehas has prevailed; no embassy* of great or good men has been raised, to stay the sword of destruction, to examine into the truth of our case, and save the effusion of kindred blood. I am left to lament that, in this sad instance, Jewish tenderness has put Christian benevolence to shame. 66 “ Our brethren, the house of our fathers, even * It is acknowledged with gratitude that many great and exalted characters have plead the cause of America ; and, previous to all coercive measures, advised an enquiry or hearing, similar to that for which Phinehas was appointed. What is here lamented, and will be long lamented is that this council could not take place. If brethren could come together in such a temper as this, the issue could not fail to be for their mutual glory and mutual happiness. A continued submission to violence is no tenet of our church. When her brightest luminaries, near a century past, were called to propagate the court doctrine of a dispensing power, above law-did they treacherously cry they have called a multitude against us. Had | fall together in America. We pray that both an enemy thus reproached us, then perhaps we may be perpetual. might have borne it. But it was you, men our equals, our guides, our acquaintance, with whom we took sweet council and walked together into the house of God." Or had it been for any essential benefit to the commonwealth at large, we would have laid our hands on our mouths, and bowed obedience with our usual | silence. But, for DIGNITY and SUPREMACY! What are they when set in opposition to common utility, common justice, and the whole faith and spirit of the constitution! True dignity is to govern freemen, not slaves, and true supremacy is to excel in doing good. It is time, and indeed more than time, for a great and enlightened people to make names bend to things, and ideal honor to practical safety?-Precedents and indefinite claims are surely things too nugatory to convulse a mighty empire. Is there no wisdom, no great and liberal plan of policy to re-unite its members, as the sole bulwark of liberty and protestanism, rather than by their deadly strife to increase the importance of those states that are foes to freedom, truth and humanity? To devise such a plan, and to behold British colonies spreading over this immense continent, rejoicing in the common rights of freemen, and imitating the parent state in every excellence-is more glory than to hold lawless dominion over all the nations on the face of the earth. 'Peace, peace," when there was no peace? Did they not magnanimously set their foot upon the line of the constitution, and tell majesty to its face that "they could not betray the public liberty," and that the monarch's only safety consisted "in governing according to the laws?" Did not their example, and consequent sufferings, kindle a flame that illuminated the land, and introduced that noble system of public and personal liberty, secured by the revolution? Since that period, have not the avowed principles of our greatest divines been against raising the church above the state; jealous of the national rights, resolute for the protestant succession, favorable to the reformed religion, and desirous to maintain the faith of toleration? If exceptions have happened, let no society of Christians stand answerable for the deviations, or corruptions, of individuals. The doctrine of absolute non-resistance has been fully exploded among every virtuous people. The free-born soul revolts against it, and must have been long debased, and have drank in the last dregs of corruption, before it can brook the idea "that a whole people injured may, in no case,' recognize their trampled majesty." But to draw the line, and say where submission ends and resistance begins, is not the province of the minister of Christ, who has given no* rule in this matter, but left it to the feelings and consciences of the injured. For, when pressures and sufferings come, when the weight of power grows intolerable, a peo But I will weary you no longer with fruitless lamentations concerning things that might be done. The question now is-since they are not done, must we tamely surrender any part of our birth-right, or of that great charter of privileges, which we not only claim by inheritance, but by the express terms of our colonization? I say, God forbid! For here, in par-ple will fly to the constitution for shelter; and, ticular, I wish to speak so plain that neither my own principles, nor those of the church to which I belong, be misunderstood. Although, in the beginning of this great contest, we thought it not our duty to be forward in widening the breach, or spreading discontent; although it be our fervent desire to heal the wounds of the public, and to shew by our temper that we seek not to distress, but to give the parent state an opportunity of saving themselves and saving us before it be too late, nevertheless, as we know that our civil and religious rights are linked together in one indissoluble bond, we neither have, nor seek to have, any interest separate from that of our country, nor can we advise a desertion of its cause. Religion and liberty must flourish or if able, will resume that power which they never surrendered, except so far as it might be exercised for the common safety. Pulpit-casu The author, in a sermon first published twenty years ago, on 1 Pet. ii. 17, delivered his sentiments fully on this point-in the following words, viz." It would be absurd to argue as some have done, that the Apostle here meant to enjoin a continued submission to violence-The love of mankind, and the fear of God, those very principles from which we trace the divine original of just government, will enslave the free-born soul, and oppose the righteous will lead us, by all probable means, to resist every attempt to of God by defeating the happiness of men. Resistance, however, is to be a last resource, and none but the majority of a whole people, can determine in what cases it is necessary. In the scriptures, therefore, obedience is rightly inculcated in general terms. For a people may sometimes imagine grievances they do not feel, but will never miss to feel and complain of them where they really are, unless their minds have been gradually prepared for slavery by absurd tenets." istry is too feeble to direct or control here. | crimes. But the good man, he who is at peace God, in his own government of the world, never violates freedom; and his scriptures themselves would be disregarded, or considered as perverted, if brought to belie his voice, speaking in the hearts of men. The application of these principles, my brethren, is now easy and must be left to your own consciences and feelings. You are now engaged in one of the grandest struggles, to which freemen can be called. You are contending for what you conceive to be your constitutional rights, and for a final settlement of the terms upon which this country may be perpetually united to the parent state. Look back, therefore, with reverence look back, to the times of ancient virtue and renown. Look back to the mighty purposes, which your fathers had in view, when they traversed a vast ocean, and planted this land. Recall to your minds their labors, their toils, their perseverance, and let a divine spirit animate you in all your actions. Look forward also to distant posterity. Figure to yourselves millions and millions to spring from your loins, who may be born freemen or slaves, as Heaven shall now approve or reject our councils. Think that on you it may depend, whether this great country, in ages hence, shall be filled and adorned with a virtuous and enlightened people, enjoying liberty and all its concomitant blessings, together with the religion of Jesus, as it flows uncorrupted from his holy oracles, or covered with a race of men more contemptible than the savages that roam the wilderness, because they once knew the things which belong to their happiness and peace, but suffered them to be hid from their eyes. And while you thus look back to the past, and forward to the future, fail not, I beseech you, to look up to "the God of Gods-the rock of your salvation." As the clay in the potter's hands, so are the nations of the earth in the hands of him, the everlasting JEHOVAH !-he lifteth up, and he casteth down-He resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble-He will keep the feet of his saints-the wicked shall be silent in darkness, and by strength shall no man prevail. The bright prospects of the gospel; a thorough veneration of the Saviour of the world; a conscientious obedience to his divinest laws; faith in his promises, and the stedfast hope of immortal life through him, these only can support a man in all times of adversity as well as prosperity. You might more easily " strike fire out of ice," than stability or magnanimity out of with the God of all peace, will know no fear but that of offending him, whose hand can cover the righteous "so that he needs not fear the arrow that fleeth by day, nor the destruction that wasteth at noon-day; for a thousand shall fall beside him, and ten thousand at his right hand, but it shall not come nigh to him; for he shall give his angels charge over him to keep him in all his ways." On the omnipotent God, therefore, through his blessed Son, let your strong confidence be placed; but do not vainly expect that every day will be to you a day of prosperity or triumph. The ways of Providence lie through mazes, too intricate for human penetration. Mercies may often be held forth to us in the shape of sufferings; and the vicissitudes of our fortune, in building up the American fabric of happiness and glory, may be various and chequered. But let not this discourage you. Yea, rather let it animate you with a holy fervor—a divine enthusiasm-ever persuading yourselves that the cause of virtue and freedom is the CAUSE of GOD upon earth; and that the whole theatre of human nature does not exhibit a more august spectacle than a number of freemen, in dependence upon Heaven, mutually binding themselves to encounter every difficulty and danger in support of their native and constitutional rights and for transmitting them holy and unviolated to their posterity. It was this principle that inspired the heroes of ancient times; that raised their names to the summit of renown, and filled all succeeding ages with their unspotted praise. It is this principle too that must animate your conduct, if you wish your names to reach future generations, conspicuous in the roll of glory; and so far as this principle leads you, be prepared to follow-whether to life or to death. While you profess yourselves contending for liberty, let it be with the temper and dignity of freemen, undaunted and firm, but without wrath or vengeance, so far as grace may be obtained to resist the weakness of nature. Consider it as a happy circumstance, if such a struggle must have happened, that God hath been pleased to postpone it to a period, when our country is adorned with men of enlightened zeal, when the arts and sciences are planted among us to secure a succession of such men, when our morals are not far tainted by luxury, profusion or dissipation; when the principles that withstood oppression, in the brightest era of the English history, are ours as it were by peculiar inheritance; and when we stand upon our own ground, with all that is dear around us, animat ing us to every patriotic exertion. Under such circumstances and upon such principles, what wonders, what achievements of true glory, have not been performed? For my part I have long been possessed with a strong and even enthusiastic persuasion that Heaven has great and gracious purposes towards this continent, which no human power or human device shall be able finally to frustrate. Illiberal or mistaken plans of policy may distress us for a while, and perhaps sorely check our growth; but if we maintain our own virtue; if we cultivate the spirit of liberty among our children; if we guard against the snares of luxury, venality and corruption, the GENIUS of AMERICA will still rise triumphant, and that with a power at last too mighty for opposition. This country will be free-nay, for ages to come a chosen seat of freedom, arts, and heavenly knowledge; which are now either drooping or dead in most countries of the old world. To conclude, since the strength of all public bodies, under God, consists in their UNION, bear with each other's infirmities, and even varieties of sentiments, in things not essential to the main point. The tempers of men are cast in various moulds. Some are quick and feelingly alive in all their mental operation, especially those which relate to their country's weal, and are therefore ready to burst forth into flame upon every alarm. Others again, with intentions alike pure, and a clear unquenchable love of their country, too steadfast to be damped by the mists of prejudice, or worked up into conflagration by the rude blasts of passion, think it their duty to weigh consequences, and to deliberate fully upon the probable means of obtaining public ends. Both those kinds of men should bear with each other; for both are friends to their country. | crime it would be, to suffer one freeman to be insulted, or wantonly injured in his liberty, so far as by your means it may be prevented. Thus animated and thus acting-We may then SING with the prophet— "Fear not, O land! be glad and rejoice, for the Lord will do great things. Be not afraid, ye beasts of the field, for the pastures of the wilderness do spring-The tree beareth her fruit-the fig-tree and the vine yield their fruit." Thus animated and thus acting-we may likewise PRAY with the prophet "O Lord be gracious unto us-we have waited for thee. Be thou our arm every morning, our salvation also in time of trouble. Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we will remember the name of the Lord our God-O thou hope of Israel, the Saviour thereof in time of need-thou art in the midst of us and we are called by thy name—LEAVE US NOT. Give us one heart and one way, that we may fear thee forever, for the good of ourselves and our children after us-We looked for peace but no good came; and for a time of health, but behold we are in trouble-Yet will we trust in the Lord forever; for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength-He will yet bind up the broken hearted, and comfort those that mourn."-Even so, oh! our God, do thou comfort and relieve them, that so the bones which thou hast broken may yet rejoice. Inspire us with a high and commanding sense of the value of our constitutional rights: may a spirit of wisdom and virtue be poured down upon us all; and may our representatives, those who are delegated to devise and appointed to execute public measures, be directed to such, as thou in thy sovereign goodness shall be pleased to render effectual for the salvation of a great empire, and re-uniting all its members in one sacred bond of harmony and public happiness! Grant this, oh father, for thy son Jesus Christ's sake; to whom, with thee and the holy Spirit, one God, be glory, honor and power now and forever! AMEN. One thing further let me add, that, without order and just subordination, there can be no union in public bodies. However much you may be equals on other occasions. yet all this must cease in an united and associated capacity; and every individual is bound to keep the place and duty assigned him, by ties far more powerful over a man of virtue and honor, than all the other ties which human policy can contrive. RESPECTING PERSONS SCRUPULOUS OF BEARIt had been better never to have lifted a voice in your country's cause, than to betray it by want of union; or to leave worthy men, who have embarked their all for the common good, to suffer, or stand unassisted. Lastly, by every method in your power, and in every possible case, support the laws of your country. In a contest for liberty, think what a ACT OF THE ASSEMBLY ING ARMS. In the assembly of Pennsylvania, June 29, 1775.-The house taking into consideration, that many of the good people of this province are conscientiously scrupulous of bearing arms, do hereby earnestly recommend to the associators for the defence of their country, and others, |