ge, some of you thirty or forty, some perhaps were older; what
kind of lives had you led before that time? How many of your former
companions did you injure by a godless example? perhaps by foolish words,
perhaps by ungodly actions. God has rescued you; where are they? What
has become of the seed you then planted in their minds? If God drew out
the roots of vice by his grace from your hearts, the influence of this
evil remains elsewhere. What mischief is often done by men prior to
their conversion in their families! When you see there is so much
wickedness in the land, then say, "What have I done to increase it?" And
I think we shall all find great need to repent; great need to set an
example of repentance to all about us.

The first thing, then, is this deep humiliation of heart that shall bring
us all to bow before God, and cause us to join in the prayer, "Enter not
into judgment with thy servants, O God, for in thy sight shall no man
living be justified." But, then, you Christian professors must bestir
yourselves. This repentance must not be a passing emotion, not a
temporary influence, however powerful; but there must be a correspondent
continued effort to promote it amongst your families and neighbours, and
to the utmost extent of your power in the world; engaging meanwhile in
earnest prayer; and then consecrating yourselves more fully to this work
under the influence of two things, a deep sense of personal
responsibility and of the constraint of divine love. Submit, then, to
this will of God. Know the rod, and Him that hath appointed it. If the
multitudes about you do not know it you know it. If God be not
recognised, let it be yours to recognise Him amid the surrounding
worldliness, and depend upon it your purity of heart shall increase, and
you will see God in all things, in all calamities, and in all joys. It
is a strange thing that nations and individuals see God more readily in
trouble than they do in their joys. Amid the immunities from ill which
Christian people often enjoy how little they think of God. Trouble
comes, calamity comes, and we owe the quickening of our religious
feelings, strangely enough, more to our fears than we to our gratitude.
And it will be well if we are so quickened by present calamity.

Thus let us prepare ourselves to promote that condition of feeling in the
nation which shall lead us to meet God not in conflict but in the way of
his judgments, to bow to his rule, to