PAGANISM. The dead are not always forgotten by the pagan negroes : they resort annually to their graves, and offer food and liquor to their departed relatives. A negro mo- ther in Jamaica was known, for thirteen years, to make this annual visit to the grave of her daughter, and, in an agony of feeling, to offer her oblation. Thus " they sorrow without hope." We re- spect the strength of the affection ; we lament its downward, earthly tendency : all the thoughts of that poor mother were in the grave with her child, and the only object of that unabated love was the mere dust of a dissolved frame. Such is hea- thenism ! Melting and mournful thoughts steal over the recollections of the be- reaved Christian mother too, and time has no power to dry up the fountain of her tears ; years may pass away, but the memory of the forms over which she has hung with maternal fondness suffers no decay ; it keeps its place to the last hour of the most extended life. But, when she thinks of her children, she thinks of them as in heaven, not as in the grave and, urged onward by this hope through her remaining pilgrimage, she hastens to embrace them again in the kingdom of God.i2. Watson.
Hosea 4:6. My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge
In a short time there will (we have reason to fear) remain but two kinds of persons among us, either those who think not at all, or those whose imaginations are active indeed, but continually evil. Of these latter it may be said, "Their foolish heart was darkened." Of the principles, I do not say of the detail, of political science, a sound theology is the only sure and steady basis. Now we trace the operations by which a destruction so extended in its consequences has been effected. The master-spring of every principle which can permanently secure the stability of a people is the fear and knowledge of Almighty God. The first operation of a principle of atheism, and perhaps one of the most formidable in its consequences, is that which leads political men to conceive of Christianity as a mere auxiliary to the State. Religion was not instituted (in the Divine council I mean) for the purpose of society and government, but society and government for the purposes of religion. As a...
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