vantage to the State.

Every nation has its God or its gods. "Blessed is the nation whose God
is the Lord." Blessed is America so long as a pure, scriptural
Christianity stimulates and governs its public life.

It may be mentioned, but need not be discussed as a distinct topic,
although its full consideration would greatly enforce the views just
presented, that, as a matter of fact, God does regard nations as
responsible persons, and does hold them in strict account to himself.
The highest truth of universal history being the universal and
comprehending providence of God, and the great factors of history
being the nations of mankind, and the personal and responsible
character of nations continuing only in this life and obtaining God's
full judgment of mercy or wrath during the time of their present
continuance, the historic page, recording the majestic movements of
empires in their rise and fall, becomes unspeakably sublime as the
record of the Almighty's manifested character, smiling and blessing in
their righteous prosperity, and frowning and overthrowing in their
guilty doom.

* * * * *

II. But let us pass to another view of nations. The race of men we
behold in a family of nations. We may consider the relations of these
nations one to another.

I use the word _family_ in reference to nations, to indicate at once,
at the outset, and as fully as possible, their true relations. Nations
are most closely and most tenderly related. Their relation is one of
blood, and their one parent is God. "He hath made of one blood all
nations of men, for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath
determined the times before appointed and the bounds of their
habitation." Each nation has a certain completeness in itself, yet it
is but a partial completeness. Nations are still connected. They are
dependent on one another. They are under obligations to one another.
They are alike and together bound to the same God. They are a
brotherhood before God their common Father. Patriotism has its limits,
and philanthropy, its appropriate and transcendent sphere.

See the physical dependence of nations. Does not every nation on the
face of the earth contribute to the conveniences and comforts and
luxuries, not to say the necessities of our every-day life? And do we
not, as a nation, contribute something for the physical well-being of
every nation in turn? What mean these thousand ships, at all times and