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 THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF ENGLISHMEN IN 
 THE COLONIES OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 
 
 A SEFIMOK 
 
 PRF-ACHF.O IN THE 
 
 > 
 
 CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF QUEBEC, 
 
 BEFORE THE 
 
 ST. GEORGE'S SOCIETY 
 
 OF THAT CITY, 
 
 Ofv tU 23^ Qk^\\l, lUl, 
 
 BY 
 
 (^^ 'U^ s;^i2CE>'v;^S3r^cp,i^^s2Sjra se)o l©o 
 
 LORD BISHOP OF MONTREAL. 
 
 PRINTED AT THE DESIRE OF THE SOCIETY, 
 
 J, C. FISIIER, NO. fi, MOUNTAIN STREET; QUEBEC, 
 
Dctxi. iv. 5. 6.-BeLold I have taught you statutes and judgments even 
 as the Lord commanded me ; that ye should do so in the land 
 whither ye go to possess it. Keep therefore and do them ; 
 for this b your wisdofti ^d your understanding in the sight of 
 the nations, which shall hear all these statutes and say, Surely 
 this great nation is a wise and understanding people. 
 
 *""'*** " " [ " l - M - h ' t nr w -LJULJCJ _ 
 
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^/^^ 
 
 rp 
 
 ± HERE are many instances in the Old Testament of 
 a soleiijn charge given to the Israelites, relating to th« 
 observance of specific injunctions and peculiar insti- 
 tutions imposed upon that people, but obviously sus- 
 ceptible of a much more comprehensive application. 
 The great features, indeed, of the moral law, and cer- 
 tain fundamental points in the Mosaic system, of faith 
 and homage towards God, are things of perpetual and 
 unchangeable obligation among mankind ; and there 
 are many important principles derived from that system 
 which are found transfused into the poljty and incor- 
 porated with the institutions of christian lands. But in- 
 dependently of such considerations as these^ the charge 
 ivhich is given to the people of Israel, respecting their 
 own particular affairs, is often so framed in the wisdom 
 of God,-^and we may take the passage which I have 
 now brought before you, as an example in point— that 
 we can readily adapt it to a case nearer home and draw 
 instruction from it, which is immediatly profitable for 
 ourselves. 
 
 My brethren, let w pray the God of all grace that, in 
 the contemplation of this passage from his holy word, we 
 may lay to heart the lessons which it carries— for we 
 are solemnly met together in his house, as Englishraen 
 and as Christians, marking ourselves ay both to the eye 
 of the world, with the duties which lie upon us in both 
 capacities, by the observances of this day :— As English- 
 
 ^"^ 
 
I] 
 
 men by the oekbration, in ani/ sliapi^, ot tlie anniver- 
 sary— -as Christians by the very fact of our behig here 
 withhi these walls, where, if we do not come as Chris- 
 tians, as men desiring to ivorship the father in spirit 
 and in truth, seeking mercy from hiai, relying for the 
 pardon of their sins and the salvation of their souls upon 
 the Lord Jesus Christ, and him alone, and recognizing 
 the principle that the life which they live in thejlcsh, they 
 must live by the faith of the Son of God, •—if we do not 
 come thus, we have manifestly no business to come ai 
 all, and can expect no greeting from the master of tae 
 house but the question. Who hath required this at your 
 hand, to tread my courts f\ or the similar repudiation 
 of our persons, and rejection of our approaches which 
 is found in another place. Are ye come to enquire of me f 
 As Ilive,saith the Lord God, I will not be enquired of 
 by you. X 
 
 God, therefore, must be present tp our souls in the 
 celebration of this day,— God and our responsibilities to 
 God,— our collective and our individual responsibilities, 
 —for let us remember that v^hatever effect is to be pro- 
 duced, in whatever way, by an Association, that Asso- 
 cialitsn is madtup of parts ; and the responsibility which 
 lies upon t\\e zvhole in carrying out the objects for which 
 the Association is constituted, lies diffused to their very 
 extremitie* over tLs parts. For the body, as the Apostle 
 says of the christian brotherhood, is not one member but 
 many ;§ and, as he there shews, each member must 
 sustain the share assigned to it, in the functions of that 
 body, in order to the soundness and efficiejit operation 
 of the whole. 
 
 • Gal. ii. 20. 
 t Is. i. 12. 
 % Ezek. xx= ?>, 
 % 1. Cor. xii. U. 
 
 1 
 
r 
 t 
 
 % 
 
 if 
 
 The Association, llieiij with which we hiive here todeui 
 is, together with tlie corresi^onding Associations in our 
 oilier cities, designed to he a representation, before the 
 world, of the English interest in the Colony, — not as in- 
 vidiously separating that interest from the interests of our 
 fellow subjecis of other races within the land, — not with 
 the object of perpetuating any national feeling of jealousy 
 relatively to any other quarter whatever, or retarding 
 the social amalgamation of the community in all the pri- 
 vileges of British subjects, the offices of charity and 
 good-will, and the enterprises of public improvement, 
 — thi' oiijerwi:je than this, it is, I am sure, the heart-felt 
 .'^;^s»c£; of the liismbers, may I not say one and ail ?— 
 to obliterate all auc!i use of national distinctions as can 
 obsti -^t't the hurinony er the prosperity of the country, 
 iiml (wiiiiovt comprcmis^ingan iota of principle) to mix 
 with the; -irci.lation of ev^ry enlarged and generous sen- 
 timent, the current of English blood which flows in their 
 veins, — but they desire to cherish those recollections of 
 the land of their fathers which, in themselves naturally 
 dear to their bosoms, are also bound up with thoughts 
 of blessing > mankind : there are English feelings, Eng- 
 lish principles, English institutions, English energies, 
 which Englishmen, impelled by the very action within 
 them of a general philanthropy, desire to carry over the 
 world ; and it is the part assigned to them by Providence 
 to plant these happy productions of their uative soil in all 
 those vast and widely severed regions of the globe, 
 which own the sway of their empire and bow to the 
 sceptre of their Queen. And upon all this we are im- 
 pressing its proper religious character by interweaving 
 with the observances of the day, this our dutiful attend- 
 ance in the house of prayer. V\ie unfurl, as it were, the 
 standard of England, and in all humility and thankfulness 
 of heart, we stamj) upon It the sacred eaiblern of the 
 cross. 
 
6 
 
 In this serious and exalted view, tlierefore, of the 
 subject, let each individual member of the society, learn 
 to regard himself as one who is called upon to exhibit 
 a consistency throughout , in his course of action. He is 
 called upon to recommend his own country and her in- 
 stitutions, which make his boast, by his own example; 
 by the good effects, visible in his own character, deport 
 went, habits and social eiliciency in his station, of the 
 origin by which he is marked (so far as that can have influ- 
 enced his opportunities of doing good in his generation,) 
 and of the system of things to which he owns an heredit 
 ary attachment. And in all this, he is to approve himself 
 to the eye of God, before whom he is answerable pre- 
 cisely in proportion to his advantages. If be has emi- 
 nently possessed means of enjoying the light of civili- 
 zation, the light of political freedom, the light of moral^ 
 intellectual and scientific advancement, and above all, 
 the light oi" the Gospel of Jesus Christ, he must take 
 heed to let his light so shine before men, that they may 
 see his good works, and glorify his father which is in ' 
 heaven.m Unto whomsoever much is given of him, 
 shall be much required.\ England pours ber sons over 
 the world : they seat themselves among the luxuries of 
 the tropics— they lay under tribute the snowy forests of 
 Canada— they rifle the gorgeous treasures of the distant 
 east— they ransack inhospitable regions, piercing far 
 within the polar circle, to bring off the shaggy spoils of 
 the wilderness — they master the obstacles, as they turn 
 to account the resources of nature, and seem in a man- 
 ner as if they would make an England of half the world, 
 and, by the modern discoveries and improvements 
 whether in the facilities of intercourse and communica- 
 tion or the rapid conveyance of intelligence, would lead 
 
 • Math. V. 16. 
 
 f Luke xii. 48* 
 
the way in bringing all the world together j—an'.l 
 wherever they go, wherever tliey establish themselves, 
 they cover the land with the monuments of their indus- 
 try, enterprise and skill. And while England thut 
 pours her sons over the world. Christian England re- 
 minds them of the commission, in its full extent, which 
 they bear. Their privileges are received from the hand 
 of God : it is by his free favor, not by any claim which 
 they can make good upon Him, that they have been dis. 
 tinguished among the people of the earth, and to His 
 glory and the good of their fellow -creatures, all thege 
 privileges are made capable of ministering,— -Christian 
 England, therefore, says to them in all their migrations 
 and with reference to all the blessings of every kind 
 which they have inherited. Behold I have taught you 
 statutes and judgments even as the Lord my God com* 
 manded me, that ye should do so in the land tvhithet ye 
 go to possess it : Keep, there/ore, and do them : cherish 
 your principles; act up to your advantages-^/or this 
 is yonr wisdom and your understanding in the sight of 
 the nations, which shall hear all these statutes and say. 
 Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding 
 people. 
 
 Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding 
 people. My breth: m, you do see, I persuade myself, 
 that it is this character of our country, that every indivl* 
 dualwho enrols himself a Member of the National 
 Society of Englishmen in the Colony, becomes engaged 
 to sustain in his own person, before God and the world. 
 He puts himself forward, he undertakes, to represent 
 within his particular sphere, a great and enlightened 
 Christian country — a country eminently conspicuous as 
 a city set on a hill which cannot be hidy% and called to a 
 
 Mdtli 
 
 V. li. 
 
8 
 
 task of uncquulied importance and magnitude ii|)on 
 earth. I do not mean that auy aiiventitions duties )f the 
 nature here under consideration, can possibly be regard- 
 ed as higher than his original duty as a Christian :— it 
 can hardly be necessary lo disclaim suoh a supposidon as 
 that— but 1 mean that, supcraiided to such original duty, 
 he assumes, (as men do ?n a multitude of other coses,) 
 duties springing from a new position and that he con- 
 tracts new obligations, accordingly :— 1 mean that he is 
 to regard himself, if so familiar an expression may be 
 allowed to pass, as a sample tj tlie world of whai ati 
 Bnglishman ought to he, or if that simple description do 
 not please, an impersonation of all that is moulded in 
 the human character by means of the peculiar influences 
 of Christian England, when acting in a favorable way, 
 upon their subject 3 and it -.^rould be a very low and inade- 
 quate, we might call it a degenerate view of his affilia- 
 tion to such a jociety, :o treat it as a mere matter of 
 hearty and honest good-fellowship among the sons of 
 old England, with a free hand to help a countryman in 
 distress. — It must not stop tnere. 
 
 Let us go back a little to a mort» general view of the 
 subject, that we may return with the greater adva.itage 
 to our poini. 
 
 We profess to be followers of the Christian Reliffion. 
 We carry that name, formed from the name of the 
 anointed* Son of God, which was first given to his 
 disciples at AntiGch,t and has spread thence over that 
 portion of the world which from the same etymology, is 
 called Christendom, We revolve in that system, d'ini 
 and minute specs though wc may individually be, in the 
 
 * Most readers pprhaps are aware tbat this is tlie signirtcation of the 
 word Christ, which is of Greek formation, as it is also the sigiwficafion of 
 the Hebrew word Messiah. 
 
 t Acts xi. 20. 
 
9 
 
 vastnessofoiir fiimanKMit, which gives U5 a denomina- 
 tiouanda character distinct from rhatof the Pagan the 
 MusHihnan and the Jew. Let us look then at Christ- 
 ianity in a naiionai poiat of view, i. e. as it affec's 
 masses and communities of men,-and consider, very 
 briefly, the clianges which it has wrought and is destined 
 - yet to work among mankind. And here will it be neces- 
 rary to guard against the error which has nianifested 
 Itself with f-ufficient frequency in such enquirits,-thp 
 error of charging upon Christianity, the delinquencies of 
 men who happen to be called Chk . uis without know- 
 i"g any thing of the spirit of ♦Ii2u- faith, or the acts 
 which, perhaps in the very name and professedly for the 
 cause of that holy religion, have been perpetrated in 
 direct and flagrant violation of its whole object in the 
 world ? We need not, 1 hope, say much upon this 
 point. The Founder of the system, who knew the depths 
 of human corruption and the prevalent disposition of 
 fallen naUire to love darkness rather than light,— fore- 
 saw the consequent perversions of Hie Gospel by false 
 disciples, and forewarned his adherents that oj^ences 
 W2W5/, of necessity, tome— denouncing woe at the same 
 time,— a woe impending over the head of every incon- 
 sistent professor of Chrisiianity-a^amr/ that man hy 
 whom the offence should come « ; and the same sacred 
 vcioe which thus addresses itself to genuine disciples. 
 Peace Heave with you, my peac: 1 give unto you, f asks 
 the question, with reference to the actual working of 
 his religion in an evil world. Suppose ye that I am come 
 to send peace upon earth ? and supplies also the ijnswer, 
 I tell you nay but rather division, % 
 
 * Luke xvii. \, 
 t John xiv. S7. 
 X Luke xii. 51. 
 
r(f 
 
 And yet, my brethren, taking all this into oin' 
 account, what a cliang'e, what a Wessetl change has 
 Christianity operated in the world ! Compare together 
 ttie state of the world aefi)re ami since the introduction' 
 of Chrisiinn!ty,-**compare the countries,— I will not 
 point to the barbarous or semi-barbarous countries 
 where Satan reigns supreme a»well in the ruder debase- 
 ment, generally, of ttiespecits, as in tae grossness of 
 a disgusting and revolting idolatry ,— but compare with 
 Christian countries, the mighty, the powerful, the 
 liixurfous, the magnificent, th»» polished^ and as far as 
 the wisdom of man is concerned, the wise and enlight- 
 ened nations of the world, — take especiaily the two 
 great exampfes of ancient Greece and Rome, — with their 
 gods many and lord» ma7ii/,m what did they learn from 
 them ?-~What lessons were carried to their hearts, what 
 effect was produced upon their lives, from the contem- 
 plation of these imaginary deities and the practice of 
 those rites with which they honored them? — What lessons 
 could be carried, what effects could follow from a mytho- 
 logy and a worship which presented gods and goddesses 
 invested, in the popular belief, with attributes of crime 
 disgraceful to human nature, in fact, in some instances, 
 too filthy to be named, — and supposed to be propitiated 
 by religious salemnities replete with cruelty, witb 
 obscenity and frantic excess f ?— The fruits in the state 
 
 • 1 Cor. viii. 6* 
 
 t Particdhr examples of each of these characteristics may be fcnnd in 
 the practices embodied respectively in the worship of Diana, Venus and 
 Bacchus. A great Roman Satirist has ^treated as something wonderful^ 
 the infatuated creed and worship of the Egyptians, (another ancient 
 nation Wkto at one time led the way in learning, and exhibited a highly 
 advanced state of the arts of life,) and, after asking the question 
 
 Quis nescit, Vohisr Bilhyniee, qualla demena 
 ^gyptus porteuta colatT (Juv. Sat. xv.v. 1.) 
 and proceeding to .mnmerate several of evamiiles of degrading objects of 
 
 
 f' 
 
n 
 
 f 
 
 of pul)lic SLMitiment aud manner?, were precisely what 
 were to be loo^ked for from such a religion :~.ihese 
 fruits are pictured by the haiwi of St. Paul, specially in 
 the hrst chapter of his Epistle to the Romans :— it is an 
 •appalling [wcture— but monuments and records in abun- 
 dance have been left to us by the people themselves 
 whom he describes, to testify to its exact ftdelHy and 
 truth. If we examine the details of their social and 
 <lomestic life-~if we look into their literature, as a whole, 
 beautiful and exquisite as it is when considet-ed apart 
 ^rom its moral character and tendency,— if we observe 
 the principles upon which they waged, and the manner 
 in which they conducted their w^irs with other nations — 
 if, again, we notice the negative operation of their 
 religion, if we ask for <heir public clwrities, for their 
 bcKeficent foundations, for their plans to mitigate the 
 ills and to meUorate the meral condition ©f poor outcast 
 beings, of degraded classes, or oppressed races among 
 «iankind,— for the effoits and saciifices of tl)eir self- 
 
 worahip.nnd proofs of a monstrous superstition, lie comments upon tlie 
 Btrangeness of adoring dogs, the animals of ohace, and paying no 
 veneration to fhe huntress Deity herself. 
 
 Oppida tota eanew reneranturnewo Diatmm. 
 
 It must, however, be a great question with those wlm are ncqaiiinted 
 with all the complex and distorted fables of which Diana, under her 
 several aspects, was tlie subject, and who remember that among the rites 
 by which this Deity was propitiated, was the practice of whipping boys 
 to death, what the Egyptians, (if, in point of fact, tliey had been wholly 
 ignorpnt of the worship of Diana,) would have gained by exchanging their 
 own stiperstitions for those of heathen Rome. Juvenal, however, in 
 suspected of not having had a very sincere respect for the latter. 
 
 A remarkable and instructive lesson was conveyed, in the plagues of 
 Egypt, with refcrenre to the received superstitions of that country. It 
 will be found that they served to fulfil, rn a signal and pointed 
 manner, the denunciation of the Almighty. Ex. xii. 12. Also upon the 
 Gods of Egypt will I execute jwlgtMnt, See Bry«n('« Egyptian Plague$,-^ 
 a work m which this feature of the divltic proeccditigs in the memorabio 
 liisstory here noticed, is treated at large, and with much learning. 
 
12 
 
 denying zeal, to bind up the broken hearted and to 
 carry such comfort and light as was in their power, to 
 these who were involved in misery and gloom, — and if 
 we find nothing whatever of all this — not a trace of it to 
 be seen — and nothing in the place of it but a cold and 
 supeicilious philosophy or a vain-glorious and boastfn.l 
 patriotism, resting for its real basis upon individual and 
 selfish pride— and then if we turn and look at the fruits 
 of the religion of Jesus, — mixed as the wheat is and will 
 be, with the tares, and imperfect in many seasons and 
 in many places as is the development of the wheat 
 itself, — then, my brethren, we shall come to our con- 
 clusion that this counsel or this luork is not of men, and 
 we shall feel, if we rightly apply our conclusion, the 
 accountability of our position, kst haply , in the very 
 possession of these advantages, we be found after all to 
 fight against God% — for we shall remember the words 
 of the Redeemer himself, which are here strictly in 
 point, He that is not ivith me is against mefand he thai 
 gathereth not with me, scattereth.f 
 
 Look again, for one moment, at the disciples of Ma- 
 homet, with all their stern rejection, of idolatry, and 
 their punctilious observances in public devotion — take 
 only one example of the fruits of the system, as con- 
 trasted with those of Christianity — consider the condi- 
 tions of their women — kept as mere property, by scores 
 or by hundreds, for the base pleasure of the man, exactly 
 as he would keep a stud of j hunters or a pack of hounds, 
 and mercilessly put, in the mass, to some shocking 
 death by their owner, — (of which there have been recent 
 instances within the verge of Christendom, and where 
 the Turks might be supposed to have been humanized 
 in some points by their contact with Christians,)— for 
 
 t. 
 
 • Acts V. 39. 
 t Matli. xii. 30. 
 

 13 
 
 no other reason than that, without their having been 
 jjarties to it themselves, they have been placed in circuin^ 
 stances which have involved the fact or simply brought 
 the suspicion of a taint upon their persons.* And all 
 this, be it observed, without any shock given to the re- 
 ceived sentiments of the community o. any violence done 
 to the received principles of religion. 
 
 This is the way in which the world goes, without the 
 checks, without the softening as well as purifying in- 
 fluences of Christianity. By the mercy of God, this 
 Christianity, this great changing power both in th^ case 
 pf the community and of the individual, has come down to 
 us. It was planted in the British Isle;*, long before their 
 spiritual subjugation to the See of Rome, in the same 
 fprmin which it subsists in England at this day, as the 
 National Church : (in fact that Church is still one and 
 
 • A remarkable and horrible example of this kind is recorded by La- 
 martine in his Souvenirs, &c., pendant un voyage en Orient, in the case 
 pf an Emir whose palace and fortress were taken possession of by his re- 
 bellious guards, while he was fighting in another part of the country, 
 with liis brother. In another instance, for which I have not the means 
 at present, of indicating my authority, a bevy of ihese females who had 
 been captured and speedily ransomed from their captors by a British Ship 
 of war, were restored to their owner, with the pledge of British honor 
 that their persons had been scrupulously guarded from all approach to 
 familiarity antl screened even from observation. The great man 
 ccarteoHsly thanked tlie officers, paid the ransom in full, and then 
 caused all the unfortunate women to be tied up in sacks, and thrown 
 into the sea. I give these particulars from memory. The treatment 
 of the women in the first mentioned instance, was far worse. 
 
 Perhaps if the accomplished author of i !m leaves had given a little 
 consideration to occurrences of this nature, as connected with the system 
 of the hareem, it might have served to qualify his commendation of 
 eastern manners in this bthalf. See Quarterly Review. No. cxllx. Art. 
 V. The Author of the Crescent md (he Cross will be seen t" have 
 •formed ;i very different estimate of the practicp in question, 
 
II 
 
 14 
 
 tht same tliitig that it was then,)* It has passed ihroii^fi 
 many struggles ; it has been exposed to the action of 
 many couSicting elements in the land of our fathers, and 
 has experienced alternations or other changes of domi- 
 nant parties, political and religions, — in all which there 
 has been, as a ne'^essary accompaniment of human 
 agency, much that has scandalized the faith and much 
 mixtureof motives and doings on either side, which it 
 is painful to contemplate, — but all, by the over-ruiing 
 hand of God, has resulted, upon the whole, in what is 
 good, and fervently may we bless his holy name that we 
 have been brought up to ttie point where we now stand. 
 I will not say securely — for we have many sins and much 
 that we ouglrt to amend — we may yet provoke God to 
 remove our eandlestick out of its placcyf and to lay In the 
 dust our cherished and vaunted institutions : but in the 
 meantime. Englishmen, in the manner which I have 
 already endeavoured to indicate, have the task cc added 
 to them from above, of carrying the elevated principles of 
 their country over the world, and in the entire range of 
 the Colonial territories of the empire, east and west, 
 ana north and south, to keep and do them — for this is 
 their wisdom and their understanding in the sight of the 
 nations, lohich shall hear all these statutes, and say. 
 Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding 
 people. Alas ! how little have we Englishmen, in too 
 many instances, appeared sensible of what we ow**^ in 
 
 * It is well known that Uie Bi-itish Church was represented bya dele- 
 gation of Bishops at the Council of Aries, A. D. 314, and that the 
 British Clergy strenuously resisted the claims made en behalf of Rome 
 by the Missionary monk Augustine, A. D. 597. A great mass ofanthcntic 
 and carious information upon this whole question, will be found in a 
 work upon the Origin and independence of thc^ Primitive Church 
 of the British Isles, by the late learned Dr. W. Holes, of Kille* 
 Sandra. 
 
 t Rev. ii, 5 
 
■. 
 
 
 1 
 
 i) 
 
 thh LeFialf, to God and to mankind ! How litire bare 
 \te considered the solemn duty which lies upon us, cre- 
 ditably to uphold our Leligion and all our institutions 
 in the eyes of the population, A whatever faith or 
 features or blood, where we have cast in our lot ? 
 How little have we remembered the necessity of our 
 having a good report of them which are withoui^pro- 
 viding things honesi in (he sight of all men^giving none 
 offence neither to the Jews nor to the Gentiles, nor to the 
 Church of God^having our conversation honest among 
 the GentileSf or any other parties discriminated by 
 marks of external separation from ourselves,— and in 
 a manner compelling them, if their prejudices would 
 prompt them to speak against us as evil-doers, yet by 
 our good tuorks which Ihey shall behold, to glorify God 
 in the day of visitation !# How little has it been felt or 
 understood that besides our stricly pei-sonal obligations to 
 holiness of life, we have here a separate and thus a 
 double responsibility to exhibit a pattern before the 
 world of all the fruits of ri!;hteousness tuhich are by 
 Jesus Christ to the glory and praise of God,* and giving 
 all diligence, to add to our faith virtue (the original 
 word imports a manly firmness of religious character,) 
 and to virtue knowledge; (knowledge of spiritual 
 things,^ and tc knowledge temperance ; and to temper^ 
 ance patience ; and to patience Godliness ; and to God" 
 line&s, brotherly kindness ; and to brotherly kindness, 
 charily. f 
 
 We in this particular colony, oceitpy the soil, the 
 whole of which, some three centuries ago, was a waste 
 hoivling wilderness,X inhabited only by heatli^ savages 
 and the wild beasts, whom they slew for their subsistence 
 
 • 1 Plus. iii. 7. Rom. xii. 17. I. Cor. x. 32, 1 Pit, ii. 12. 
 
 t 2 Pet. 1. 5, 6, 7. 
 t Dent, xxxii. 10, 
 
\e> 
 
 and their clothing, with not much other evidence id 
 mark by any very wide interval, the superiority of n)an. 
 They, however, with iiiany a cry sent to heaven against 
 Europeans, wiiich will be remembered at the last ac- 
 count, have dwindled into insignificance, and the remaius 
 of them, at this day, have in a great measure, ceased 
 to be heathens : — pa^'tly under Romish, and partly under 
 Protestant auspices, they have been brought to make, in 
 some shape, a profession of the Christian Religion. We 
 have come in to mix ourselves with those who w^re the 
 intermidiate lords of the territory, and we have partially 
 modified their institutions and engrafted our British 
 principles upon them. We have had further accessions 
 of population from different parts of Europe and Ame- 
 rica, and we form our part of a people who may correctly 
 be described as made up of heterogeneous materials. 
 God Almighty grant that we and others too with us, may 
 work as a good leaven in the mass, and that our whole 
 example and infinence and the characteristic proceed- 
 ings, in particular, of this our distinctive National 
 Associatk>n, may be found in harmony and keeping 
 with the views of duty which I have here endeavoured 
 to exhibit ! And God Almighty be praised that the 
 people of England and the Church of England at home 
 and abroad, are in truth becoming daily more alive to 
 the weight of their responsibilities in this behalf. 
 
 There is one leading object of the Christian religion, 
 which our Society has not forgotten, which forms, indeed, 
 a primary feature of its designs, and for aiding in the con- 
 tinued prosecution of which, the bounty of this congre* 
 gation is now solicited, — the object of affording relief 
 to hunaan misery. By the general principies of Christ- 
 ianity, the Members of the St. George's Society are well 
 aware that they are called upon, according to their 
 ability, and opportunity, to sooth the sufferings and to 
 
to 
 
 17 
 
 alleviate the wants of all who belong to the family of 
 man. ^, Members of that particular Society, constitu- 
 ted for certain special objects, and comprehending Oie 
 purposes of beneficence to distressed Englishmen — 
 wuh no violation, no dereliction, of the broad Jnd 
 diffusive principles of Charity, to which they respond in 
 other ways,-~they have opened the door to claimants 
 who have the plea of countrymen, and who in many 
 instances perhaps, as forlorn and downcast strangers in 
 unexpected difficulty and unwonted distress, look for 
 some peculiar plea to encourage their hearts, before they 
 can give utterance to an application for relief. The 
 funds have always been very carefully and very judicious- 
 ly managed-(in fact the Society has been quite an ex- 
 ample in this point^-and, within the past year, the sum 
 of about £130 has been expended in Charity,—the num- 
 ber of cases relieved having been fifty-six.— The decent 
 widow left helpless, with her children, in a land of 
 strangers j the poor settler in the woods wanting seed 
 to repair the failure of his crop j the languid and ill- 
 recovered sufferer from sickness, crawling from hospital 
 to seek a shelter where he may ; the disabled mariner 
 who has been shipwrecked upon the desolate shore of 
 the Gulph and left with limbs to be sacrificed, in that 
 exposure, to the rigours of Canadian frost,~these form 
 part of the description of cases for which the appeal is 
 made to you to day. The calls upon us are many-there 
 are constant and uniform, and there are extraordinary 
 calls-signal, awful, widespread visitations from the 
 hand of God, within the colony and out of it, prompt a 
 cry to us for help-but far from pleading exemption or 
 seeking excuse from the frequent repitition of these 
 calls,— let us rather think that God schools us to the 
 haolt of giving and the habit of abridging our own indul- 
 gences that we may not abridge ourselve.? in the privilege 
 of giving. 7 he more we see and know of human wants 
 
ll'i 
 
 18 
 
 and sufferings, the more we should cultivate the 
 familiar exercise and manifest the ready fruits of our 
 sympathy. We ought, according to an Apostolic charge 
 read to us in the second lesson of this morning,—/© sup- 
 port the weak and ta remember the words of the Lord 
 Jesus, how he said. It is more blessed to give than to re- 
 ceived The luords of the Lord Jesus have some title to our 
 remembrance and some claim upon our hearts :— they 
 are the words of one who, besides having divine autho- 
 rity to command his creatures, sei us an example of love 
 and beneficence exercised towards ourselves, which never 
 can be equalled, but which always must be imitated: 
 One ivho though he was rich, yet for our sakes became 
 poor, that zve through his poverty might be rich.f One 
 who loved us and gave Himself /or its.X And shall we 
 refuse to give our hearts to him ?— Or shall we grudge 
 what we give to sufferers for his sake ?— No—never — 
 never. Only let us remember his gracious and blessed 
 words, Liasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the 
 least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto Me, j— 
 and his encouraging assurance to those who can give 
 but little beyond their prayers, that a cup of cold tvater 
 given in his name and for his sake, shall in tw ivise loss 
 its reward, Ij 
 
 • Acts XX. 35. 
 t 2 Cor. viii. 9. 
 
 I Gal. ii. 20. 
 
 § Math. XXV. 40. 
 
 II Math. X. 42. 
 
 ERRATA. 
 
 Pqge 14, liftli lin •, for religions, read religious. 
 
 Pag-e 15, foot-note, /or 1 Plm. read \ Tim. and /or 1 Pit. read I Pet. 
 
 Page h;, eUveuih liae,/or intermidiate, read intermediate.