loved him, and obeyed his word. We would not have him rise in any other way. We could not find it in our hearts to tear him from the rapt embraces of the everlasting peace.

"His voice is silent in your council hall

For ever; and, whatever tempests lower,
For ever silent; even if they broke

In thunder, silent: yet, remember all

He spoke among you, and the man who spoke;

Who never sold the truth, to serve the hour,
Nor paltered with Eternal God for power;
Who let the turbid streams of rumor flow

Through either babbling world of high and low;
Whose life was work, whose language rife

With rugged maxims hewn from life;

Who never spoke against a foe.

And he is gone, who seemed so great!
Gone but nothing can bereave him
Of the force he made his own
Being here; and we believe him
Something far advanced in state,
And that he wears a truer crown
Than any wreath that man can weave him."

Christian Inquirer, May 4.

DEATH OF PRESIDENT LINCOLN:

A DISCOURSE DELIVERED AT MILLSTONE, N.J., ON SUNDAY MORNING,
APRIL 16, 1865;

BY REV. E. T. CORWIN.

PROV. xxi. 30: "There is no wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the Lord."

TH

HE astounding intelligence reached us yesterday, that the President of the United States had been shot; and this awful fact, with some hasty reflections upon it, is the only theme upon which we can fix our minds to-day.

The first thought is, that it cannot be that our nation has been so disgraced. In the times of the old Roman emperors, it was a rare thing indeed for one of them to die a natural death. And the reason of this was to be found, not only in the ambition of others, but in the judgment of God, and the just hatred of the people whom they had enslaved and oppressed. They were monsters of iniquity and despotism, and aptly described in prophecy as beasts, because they were the destroyers and enemies of mankind, the despisers of the rights of men. In striking contrast, our Chief Magistrate was not the enslaver, but the freedom-giver to men. He was a man whose name will be linked, to the end of time, with the great and glorious. Not theories, but facts, of accomplished emancipation; looked upon, and truly, as

the man raised up by Providence to conduct the nation to a higher, a nobler, a truer position before the world. For we stood as a Christian nation, the great representative of Freedom, though portions of our land had long been disgraced with the sin of slavery. But it was at length almost utterly, yea, virtually, abolished. But just at this time, the one whom we thought raised up to carry on this glorious renovation, to consummate the great truth contained in the first sentence of our Declaration of Independence, "that all men are born free and equal," - such a one, not the tyrant, but the friend of the oppressed, and the freedomgiver to the slave, has fallen by the hand of the base assassin. The land may well go in mourning for the loss of such a one, and for grief at such a disgraceful deed. Peace was just dawning upon our desolated country. Only the day before, the orders had gone forth, that no more men were needed for the war. The bright bow of promise was seen spanning the skies. Thanksgivings from innumerable hearts were ascending to God. The nation was saved from the blood-stained hand of the slaveholders' rebellion. It was purged of its great crime. In the words of the departed, "Perhaps for every drop of blood drawn by the lash, another had been drawn by the sword." And he whose heart was foremost in the great work which God was accomplishing for man; he whose mind had been racked with many a sleepless night because of a nation's burdens laid upon it, who had a task of difficulty and responsibility and world-wide interest, such as perhaps no other man ever had, and who was at length thanking God for a nation's triumph, yea, the triumph of human liberty, and of slow justice through the land, in the very midst of his joy is stricken down by the hand of the foul assassin. Oh, how mysterious are the ways of Providence!

"God moves in a mysterious way

His wonders to perform."

His ways are not as our ways, nor his thoughts as our thoughts. The good and noble and intelligent of the earth are ever working with God, for the triumph of liberty and righteousness, according to the best of their ability. But suddenly, to their utter amazement, instruments which seemed to be so necessary for the accomplishment of these ends are removed, and others substituted to finish the work. Such sudden turns of Providence bewilder our minds for a moment. At first, the thought of irretrievable disaster flashes upon us. But a little reflection upon the ways of God, and the promises of his word, and that the throne of the universe is occupied by the Lord Jesus Christ, whose whole business is to raise the poor and the downtrodden, and to break the rod of the oppressor, as it exists, and is wielded in the first place by the Devil himself, and then by his countless agents of high and low degree on earth; as we reflect upon the fact, that our Almighty and infinitely benevolent Saviour is the Lord of all, and that no event, whether accomplished by good or evil instruments, is independent of his wise and holy will, - we begin to understand that He who doeth all things well, and who sees the end from the beginning, is only accomplishing the same grand and holy purpose, for which his people have been laboring and praying so long, in a more thorough manner than they had designed. For while every Christian and loyal heart abhors the foul deed which has been committed, and while their eyes help swell the river of tears which this day flows through the land, yet, to the man of faith, the glorious cause of Christ and humanity is not injured,—no, is not injured, nor is delayed for a single day, by the destruction of even such a life as that of Abraham Lincoln. For all things must work together for good to the cause of God, to the cause of right, to the cause of justice; and all these, as far as they were contained in national and political events in our land, and indeed throughout the world, were

chiefly centred in him. For these holy causes are greatly involved, not only in the revolutions, but even in the politics, of the present day. It has no doubt often been true, that politics, when concerned simply with questions of tariff and commerce and such like things, were fairly open questions for honest Christian differences; and often indeed it was no easy thing to decide strictly as to duty. But every intelligent and unprejudiced man, (but, alas! how much mischief has mere prejudice and partisanship wrought in the world!) if he make himself sufficiently acquainted with current events to understand them in their great moral significancy, could not fail to see, that, for several years past, a disunion (not yet by any means perfect, but progressing), that a division, like that of the future sheep and goats, has been going on. Righteousness or iniquity, which should prevail? has been the real question, though not in just so bald a form. Truth or error, liberty or oppression, Christ or Satan,-these are the real and simple issues in the great political, moral questions of the present day. The lines are becoming each year more clearly marked. The friends of Christ and of mankind are each year coming more closely together. There are, indeed, many of the true friends of Christ, by some sad mistake, by want of reflection or understanding, by family connections sometimes, or by want of prayer for divine direction, who are yet, alas! mingled with the friends of Satan. It seems impossible to understand, how, sometimes, men of intelligence and unquestioned piety can take such a false or even neutral position. And it is just as true, alas! that many, who, by unregeneracy of heart, are the friends of Satan, are found in these great political divisions with the friends of Christ. But these political divisions will each year become more clearly defined. Babylon, in prophetic language, is a name which describes the whole policy and organization of the cause of iniquity; and to those who should find themselves inhabitants of that