youth has been renewed by an infusion of vitality and strength from their young and flourishing colonies. But for these, English enterprise had long ago exhausted itself, and an old age of weakness come on.

I shall regard the point as established then, without further argument, that in nations and communities of men, the period of enterprise is the period of early life.

2. I propose to show, secondly, that another element of importance and promise pertaining to this youthful period, is a strong, inherent, vital energy that operates to throw off the disease of malignant vices, and resist the tendency to internal decay. This is well illustrated by the early annals of Rome. If her own historians have done her justice, no nation ever took its rise from more unpromising material or a lower stage of character. Its foundation upon the banks of the Tiber was laid by a band of barbarians and criminals, and Romulus himself, their leader, was the murderer of his own brother.

And yet such was the pressure of the necessity that was laid upon them, and such was the vitality of that youthful period of their community, that in less than two generations, they acquire a character of more than ordinary rectitude and purity. And there is an emphasis in the phrase, Roman virtue, as retained in our own times. Much the same is now said to communities of transported criminals in the vicinity of Botany Bay.

But this department of the subject admits of an illustration from the history of religious communities. The seven churches of Asia were purest and most hopeful in their youth. The church of Ephesus had already fallen from their first love when the apocalyptic message was sent them. And they were assured that their only hopeful period of recovery was an early one. "Quickly, "-such was the language of the spirit. Quickly their candlestick was to be removed, unless they stirred up their youthful energies to the work of repentance and the performance of their first works. Very similar were the warnings that were addressed to the churches of Pergamos and Laodicea. Their only hope was in waking up the vital power that remained, and throwing off the disease that was upon them while they were young. This, all but one of the seven churches, failed to do, and the work of decay with them was rapid and sure. The church of Rome, in the days of its youth, was so exemplary and pure, that Paul told them their faith was spoken of throughout the whole world." A maturity of a few centuries, however, rendered it so corrupt that every effort to reform it has proved abortive, and its vices and heresies have become the scourge of the whole world.

The church of the Nestorians when young was pure and evangelic, and enterprising. Her missionaries spread the gospel and its triumphs from Damascus to Pekin, from Ceylon to Siberia.

Her cumbrous organization and machinery were like Saul's armor upon the stripling son of Jesse. But the energy, and zeal, and fire of youth rose superior to every obstacle, and spread the knowledge of the Savior over the continent of Asia. But in her crippled and weary old age, she has not been able to hold fast that which was her own. The emissaries of Rome have stolen away a large share of her strength, and but for the timely aid that has been rendered her by the American churches, there would be reason to fear that the papacy would soon engulf the whole. In her youth, with only the dim light that had come down through eight centuries, with the burden of an unscriptural hierarchy upon her, and without the printed bible to aid and confirm her conquests, she aspired to the conversion of the vast empires of Persia, Tartary, India and China. In the old age which she has now reached, with the printed bible in hand, and learned missionaries to aid her, she is scarcely able to reclaim and save her own wandering sons.

I trust that the point has now been rendered sufficiently clear, that with communities and bodies of men, as well as individuals, the season of promise-the time to lay a desirable foundation for the future is the period of youth. The providence of God clearly indicates this, and the obvious predominance of enterprise and healthful vital energy in the youthful period, discovers to us the most ample reason why it should be so.

III. The subject as now developed has a three-fold application to us. It addresses us, as citizens of this youthful republic,-as patrons of the youthful religious enterprises of our land,—and as members of this local community.

1. God has given us in this land a goodly heritage, and a youthful one. For thousands of years, he kept back the knowledge of this continent with its large resources, and its wide domain from the civilized nations of the old world, that when its colonization should begin, it might be under the best auspices, and with the largest promise of good for the race of man. And when the time had come for lifting the veil,-the mariner's compass having been discovered, and the art of printing having come into use, and the reformation just ready to flash its broad sheen of light over Europe, still this rocky cradle of liberty was not given to the Spaniards, nor to the French, but reserved another hundred years, until the Puritans could be disciplined amid the storms and fires of persecution, and prepared to begin an empire of freedom for the world. The work assigned them, was not to take an old decrepit nation, and hew away its rottenness, and infuse into it the spirit of life and youth anew-but to begin with the infant, and make it strong, and active, and pure, amid the invigorating influence of New England storms and snows, and under the simple Christianity of the New Testament.

And now that infant has become a strong and enterprising youth, and is stretching out her arms over the continent, and over all the seas, and amazing the world with feats of activity and vigor and strength. And there is hope in our country's youth. She has grievous vices, dark spots-sore and malignant disease upon her, it is true-but there is the healthful vitality of youth to combat and throw off disease, there are large fields for emigration still remaining to renew in years to come, the hardy virtues of the pioneer, and there are our nation's own warm aspirings and fond hopes, and buoyant attitude in the view of the world, with their inherent potency to resist decay. But other nations too have been young, and enjoyed many of these advantages in their youth, and yet have grown prematurely old, in spite of them, and perished. And there is an echo from their decaying monuments; there are a thousand voices from the wrecks of the past; there are the touching memories of our fathers, and our youthful country's call, and the speaking destinies of a legible future-all thundering forth the admonition. Now is the timefor the sons of this youthful republic to be jealous of her virtue and summon every guardian influence to make and keep her pure. Let them labor now, to promote a high intelligence, a pure morality, and above all, a quickening, diffusive religion, a prevalent, actuating fear of God among the masses; let them do all they can to enthrone the Lord Jesus Christ, and the religion of the New Testament in their own hearts, in our new settlements, over our emigrant population, and in the high places of trust and power; let them bring the mightiest influences of the unseen world to bear in the ordering of the concerns of this, and to shut out the low vices and dark crimes that blacken our horizon, and then our country's youth shall be pure, and her maturity strong, and glorious, and enduring. But let the season of her youth be lost or perverted, and the early inroads of incurable disease shall give premonition of her doom, and write in the face. of all her lofty pretensions, for the world to read," that she, too, was born to die.”

2. But we have, too, our youthful enterprises in behalf of religion. We have organizations for benevolent action that contemplate the spiritual improvement of our own population and of the world. And these are in their youth, and are acting with the energy and zeal that belong to youth. And it is of unspeakable importance that the supplies from which their life is fed, be rendered constant and full, and their youthful vigor, and activity, and purity, kept up, and on the advance for generations to come. Especially is this true of the churches of our land. The great majority of them are young, and every year is ushering a new multitude of them into being. These are the vital organs of the great national body, that renew the currents of health in its circulation, and put back the progress of disease and decay. How

important that these should ever be young in the ardor of their first love to the Redeemer-watching with sleepless vigilance, lest the warm pulsations of that early love should wax tardy, and its impulsive energy decline! How can the nation be young, and yet its heart and lungs-the vital air-cells and purifiers of its very blood become rigid and cold with premature old age, or even ossified and dead?

This church, reckoning from the time of its birth is young. And the ardor and fire of youth, I trust, are still kept alive. And there can be no good reason why it should ever be otherwise. The body passes on, by an unavoidable necessity, from youth to age. But not so the spiritual affections of those who have been "born again." Their youth may be perpetually "renewed like the eagle's." It is written for them, for you, my brethren, "they that wait on the Lord, shall renew their strength, they shall mount up on wings as eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint." We may advance in years, but the church shall still be young; time may lay its furrows in our countenances, but the daughter of Zion shall still be fair; disease may lay these bodies in the dust, but the church of Christ still lives on in her sons; aye, lives on in the departed; and is renewed in them with the vigor of an immortal youth. Their life is not extinguished. It is out of our sight-it has ceased to be discernible by sense, but that is because it is "hidden with Christ in God." It is purer, more remote from decay than it could ever be on earth.

Let this church, then, aim to keep up the life of faith, and the buoyant zeal of youth. Let her youthful members renew the life of holy affections from day to day. Let her strong pillars in middle life be as "lively stones, built up into the spiritual house."

Let those who are drawing nearest to the line where the visible fades out into the invisible-but oh! for whom shall such an admonition be framed? How little do we know of the proximity of mortals to that momentous change! We only know that some in the church are near; that the golden link of connection between the church below and the church above is to be kept bright, and the vision of faith quickened to behold it, by the frequent transition of the members of the one to the shining ranks of the others. But for whom it is appointed first to go-who are living nearest to the verge of that blessed world-whether it be the oldest, the youngest, the feeblest, or the strongest, we wait for time to tell. All are near enough, and oh! may all daily strive to catch the spirit of that world, and so be prepared when they reach its margin, to sing,

"By death I shall escape from death,

And youth immortal gain."

3. But I must pass to the application that our subject demands,

to this youthful community. Within the memory of some who are before me this place has had its beginning. You can tell of the time when the material of these dwellings, these stores, these factories, and these churches, was in the forest or in the quarry. The tall trees were waving their tops over your now graded streets-yonder lake was plowed by no keel but that of the Indian's light canoe-your river was wasting its strength in its time-worn channel, and nothing foretold the busy industry to which the long silence of Nature has now given place. But now the hillocks have been leveled down, and the vallies filled, and gardens smile where it seemed an irreclaimable wild; houses, sacred to neatness and order, the scene of cheerful firesides and happy homes, present their modest and graceful proportions along your streets; factories, whose productive industry reaches far abroad, lift their towering stories, and wake the echoes of the valley with their bells and clattering cams; your roads are already adapted to an active commerce; railroads are near you and soon to be of you-you live, even now, almost within hearing of the scream of the whistle; the telegraph reports to you its messages with the same dispatch as in our largest cities; the press throws off its weekly issues among you; the conveniences and the luxuries of an active mercantile traffic are brought to your very door; your river that for thousands of years had flowed idly by, has been taught to work, and like a mighty giant with a hundred hands, has sawed up your forests and is still turning the ponderous wheels that are doing the work of a thousand men. Under the very eye of its early settlers, and while that eye is still taking note, this village has passed from infancy to a vigorous youth, and is spreading its influence far abroad.

It is no longer a question whether this is to be a point of attraction for the enterprising and industrious; whether masses of men are to live and die here; whether their intimate contact shall be mutually improving or corrupting; or whether an influence shall be exerted upon the region around, that shall be potent to bless or to blight. All this is settled. There is to be a compact population here, and there will be the temptations and exposures, and corrupting influences which are always incident to a condensed state of society. There will be, also, peculiar advantages for combating these evils, and attaining a highly improved social state. But the thing which we are chiefly interested to notice now, is that this village is young. Its character is yet in the hands of its inhabitants. The influences that are to be most potent here remain to be determined. And very much will depend upon what is done, while the place is in its youth: upon what is done by the first generation of settlers.

You have made a noble beginning. You have already your temples of worship, and your temples of science. Here is proof that you have not lost sight of the importance of religious