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Like the Jews, our Fathers were conducted by the hand of God, through a perilous ocean, and penetrated into a wilderness, to hew out for themselves settlements, and improve them into an American

with their father, and that one was not. Joseph still affected not to believe them, and to treat them as spies; swearing by the life of Pharaoh, that in order to prove them, they should not go forth hence, except their youngest brother should be brought to him, and that one of them should go immediately and fetch him, while the rest should be kept in prison, till his return with their youngest brother, to prove whether there be any truth in them; and he put them all together into ward for three days." But, on the third day, Joseph appearing to soften of his rigor, made a new proposal, telling them, that he was a just man, fearing God, and had no mind to destroy them; but instead of sending one of them to their father to bring their youngest brother, they should all go but one, who should remain bound in prison, till they should bring him, and prove their honesty; and he took from them Simeon and bound him before their eyes, to be kept as a pledge of their honesty in standing to their engagements. All this while, nature worked so strong in Joseph, that he could not stand the encounter, but turned himself about from them and wept; returning soon, however, to commune with them, and to comfort them with the assurance, that if they brought their younger brother back with them, Simeon should be safe, and they should receive every favour in the land. Having returned to their father Jacob, and the famine still continuing sore in the land of Canaan, he is at length with difficulty persuaded to let Benjamin go, after their telling him all that happened in their former journey, and that it would be in vain to return, or hope for any relief in buying more food, unless their younger brother should go down with them. Being then suffered by their father to depart, with his present of the best fruits of the land in their vessels, to be tendered to Joseph, and double money in their hand, besides the money that had been brought back in the mouth of their sacks in the former journey, they rose up and went down to Egypt and stood before Joseph; and when Joseph saw Benjamin with them, he ordered the ruler of his house to bring them in and prepare a feast for them; at which Joseph made himself known to his brethren, desiring them not to grieve, for having sold him; for that God did only send him before them into Egypt to preserve life, or to preserve them a posterity upon earth, and' for that purpose had raised him to great power, making him a father to Pharaoh, lord of all his house, and ruler throughout the land of Egypt: therefore, haste ye, says he, go up to my father, tell him of all my glory in Egypt, and request him to come down to me, that he may be near unt

Under Divine Providence, smiling upon the councils of our nation, supported by the union, valour and magnanimity of our citizens, our Liberty and Independence have been asserted against the great nation first mentioned, and by them explicitly acknowledged, as finally and fully established.

The depredations of the savages, our neighbours, we trust also, will speedily be restrained and terminated by the like valour of our citizens; and a permanent union, and interchange of all the good offices of humanity and civil life, be established on all our borders, between us and them, and our children and their children, to the latest times.

Whether the great nation last mentioned, hath in truth meditated any measures, inimical to our liberty and independence, it would be wrong to pronounce absolutely in this sacred place. But we are justified in declaring our apprehensions and fears on this head; encouraged and invited, as that nation hath been, to the attempt, by the wild principles and restless conduct of their partizans here, impatient of all rule and authority, always seeking innovations, and never content long with any frame of government.

The second and third of the sore evils, by which the Jews were sometimes punished, namely, the Famine and the noisome Beast, and Blast on the herbage and fruits of the earth, promotive of Famine; the Almighty, (by his blessing on the labours and industry of our husbandmen and yeomanry, throughout a land of various and fertile soil, happily given us to possess) has been graciously pleased, hitherto, to spare us from-except sometimes by a slight visita

getfulness of God; their inattention to his Providence, and neglect of amendment; continuing hardened in their iniquity amidst his various judgments and visitations, intended in mercy and long suffering, to lead them to reformation. The Prophecies of their Prophets are they not all to the like purpose? either filled with denunciations of judgments upon their apostacy from God; promises of forgiveness upon their repentance and amendment; or threatening of total ruin and destruction, unless they turned from the evil of their ways, to do that which is lawful and right!

Many and various were the judgments inflicted on this people by the hand of Providence, for the punishment of their transgressions; but the four sorest, in extreme cases, when they became wholly hardened in their iniquity, was "the Sword and the Famine, and the noisome Beast (to infest a desolate land) and the Pestilence, to cut off from it (by one dreadful visitation) both man and beast."*

The first mentioned of those four sore judgments, the Sword, hath been sent upon us, not only by the great nation, from which our fathers and many of ourselves originated, but many a time likewise by the savage of the wilderness round us. Nor is it foreign to our purpose, on this solemn day, to contemplate the possibility, and even probability, of a Sword against us, from another great nation; once gratefully caressed, and never ungratefully offended, by us as a people.

• Ezek. xiv, 21.

Under Divine Providence, smiling upon the councils of our nation, supported by the union, valour and magnanimity of our citizens, our Liberty and Independence have been asserted against the great nation first mentioned, and by them explicitly acknowledged, as finally and fully established.

The depredations of the savages, our neighbours, we trust also, will speedily be restrained and terminated by the like valour of our citizens; and a permanent union, and interchange of all the good offices of humanity and civil life, be established on all our borders, between us and them, and our children and their children, to the latest times.

Whether the great nation last mentioned, hath in truth meditated any measures, inimical to our liberty and independence, it would be wrong to pronounce absolutely in this sacred place. But we are justified in declaring our apprehensions and fears on this head; encouraged and invited, as that nation hath been, to the attempt, by the wild principles and restless conduct of their partizans here, impatient of all rule and authority, always seeking innovations, and never content long with any frame of government.

The second and third of the sore evils, by which the Jews were sometimes punished, namely, the Famine and the noisome Beast, and Blast on the herbage and fruits of the earth, promotive of Famine; the Almighty, (by his blessing on the labours and industry of our husbandmen and yeomanry, throughout a land of various and fertile soil, happily given us to possess) has been graciously pleased, hitherto, to spare us from-except sometimes by a slight visita

getfulness of God; their inattention to his Providence, and neglect of amendment; continuing hardened in their iniquity amidst his various judgments and visitations, intended in mercy and long suffering, to lead them to reformation. The Prophecies of their Prophets are they not all to the like purpose? either filled with denunciations of judgments upon their apostacy from God; promises of forgiveness upon their repentance and amendment; or threatening of total ruin and destruction, unless they turned from the evil of their ways, to do that which is lawful and right!

Many and various were the judgments inflicted on this people by the hand of Providence, for the punishment of their transgressions; but the four sorest, in extreme cases, when they became wholly hardened in their iniquity, was "the Sword and the Famine, and the noisome Beast (to infest a desolate land) and the Pestilence, to cut off from it (by one dreadful visitation) both man and beast."*

The first mentioned of those four sore judgments, the Sword, hath been sent upon us, not only by the great nation, from which our fathers and many of ourselves originated, but many a time likewise by the savage of the wilderness round us. Nor is it foreign to our purpose, on this solemn day, to contemplate the possibility, and even probability, of a Sword against us, from another great nation; once gratefully caressed, and never ungratefully offended, by us as a people.

⚫ Ezek. xiv. 21.

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